112 Quotes About Forgiveness (That Might Help You Let Go And Free Yourself)
Forgiveness is generally defined as a conscious, deliberate decision to release feelings of resentment or vengeance toward a person or group who has harmed you, regardless of whether they actually deserve your forgiveness. It should be emphasized that forgiveness is different from condoning (failing to see the action as wrong and in need of forgiveness), excusing (not holding the offender as responsible for the action), forgetting (removing awareness of the offense from consciousness), pardoning (granted for an acknowledged offense by a representative of society, such as a judge), and reconciling (restoration of a relationship).
Forgiveness is the act of compassionately releasing the desire to punish someone or yourself for an offense. Revenge is the desire to get even when someone does you wrong. However, revenge reduces you to your worst self, puts you on the same level with those who hurt you. Studies have shown that revenge increases stress and impairs health and immunity. In order to thrive personally and as a species, we must resist this predictable lust for revenge, and seek to right wrongs more positively. These quotes about forgiveness uttered and written by famous people will remind us of that.
Table of Contents
- Short quotes about forgiveness
- Funny quotes about forgiveness
- Motivational quotes about forgiveness
- Insightful quotes about forgiveness
- Poetic quotes about forgiveness
- Long quotes about forgiveness
Short quotes about forgiveness
- To forgive is wisdom, to forget is genius. Joyce Cary
- Life’s too short not to forgive. Miranda Kenneally
- To err is human, to forgive, divine. Alexander Pope, An Essay on Criticism
- Forgive your enemies, but never forget their names. John F. Kennedy
- Tiny men hold tall grudges. J. Macken
- It is easier to forgive an enemy than to forgive a friend. William Blake
- Forgiveness is the sweetest revenge. Isaac Friedmann
- There is no love without forgiveness, and there is no forgiveness without love. Bryant H. McGill
- Forgiving men is so much easier than forgiving women. Margaret Atwood
- Forgiveness is the final form of love. Reinhold Niebuhr
- Strong give forgiveness but weak give permission. Santosh Kalwar
- He who cannot forgive breaks the bridge over which he himself must pass. George Herbert
- A life lived without forgiveness is a life lived in the past. Asa Don Brown
- Mistakes are always forgivable, if one has the courage to admit them. Bruce Lee
- The man who forgives is far stronger than the man who fights. Nathan Croall
- Sometimes what a person needs most is to be forgiven. Jennifer McMahon
- To be wronged is nothing, unless you continue to remember it. Confucius
- Sweet mercy is nobility’s true badge. William Shakespeare
- Forgiveness spares the expense of anger, the cost of hatred, the waste of spirits. Hannah More
- There is no revenge so complete as forgiveness. Josh Billings
- One forgives to the degree that one loves. Francois de La Rochefoucauld
- Forgiveness is really just another word for freedom. Julie Lessman
- Love is an endless act of forgiveness. Jan Karon
- Forgiveness is the process of dropping off your emotional baggage. Tim Fargo
- Without forgiveness, there’s no future. Desmond Tutu
- You cannot forgive just once, forgiveness is a daily practice. Sonia Rumzi
- Forgiveness is God’s greatest gift. Dan Brown, The Da Vinci Code
- It is surely better to pardon too much, than to condemn too much. George Eliot
- An eye for an eye, and the whole world would be blind. Kahlil Gibran
Funny quotes about forgiveness
- Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much. Oscar Wilde
- One of the keys to happiness is a bad memory. Rita Mae Brown
- I’m a good enough person to forgive you, but not stupid enough to trust you again.
- Sometimes the first step to forgiveness is understanding the other person is a complete idiot.
- I asked God for a bike, but I know God doesn’t work that way. So I stole a bike and asked for forgiveness. Emo Philips
- Yes, forgiving others feels good. But I’ve always found that kicking them in the groin twice and then forgiving them feels even better. Buster Guru
- Forgive, O Lord, my little jokes on Thee, and I’ll forgive Thy great big joke on me. Robert Frost
- When tempted to fight fire with fire, remember that the fire department generally uses water.
- Forgive and forget? I’m neither Jesus nor do I have Alzheimer’s.
- In the Bible it says they asked Jesus how many times you should forgive, and he said 70 times 7. Well, I want you all to know that I’m keeping a chart. Hillary Clinton
- People in general would rather die than forgive. It’s that hard. If God said in plain language. I’m giving you a choice, forgive or die, a lot of people would go ahead and order their coffin. Sue Monk Kidd
- Forgiveness is not about forgetting. It is about letting go of another person’s throat. William Paul Young, The Shack
Motivational quotes about forgiveness
- Forgive, not because they deserve forgiveness, but because you deserve peace. Unknown
- Before we can forgive one another, we have to understand one another. Emma Goldman
- Forgiveness: It’s not because they deserve it; it’s because you do. Sometimes forgiveness is about loving yourself enough to move on. Steve Maraboli
- It’s one of the greatest gifts you can give yourself, to forgive. Forgive everybody. Maya Angelou
- Forgiveness is the key to action and freedom. Hannah Arendt
- One should never do wrong in return, nor mistreat any man, no matter how one has been mistreated by him. Socrates
- I will look at the past, but I will not stare at it. M. Spio
- The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong. Mahatma Gandhi, All Men are Brothers
- We think that forgiveness is weakness, but it’s absolutely not; it takes a very strong person to forgive. T. D. Jakes
- Forgiveness does not change the past, but it does enlarge the future. Paul Boese
- When you forgive, you in no way change the past but you sure do change the future. Bernard Meltzer
- Anger makes you smaller, while forgiveness forces you to grow beyond what you were. Cherie Carter-Scott
- Forgiveness is not to give the other person peace. Forgiveness is for you. Take that opportunity. Mackenzie Phillips
- One of the secrets of a long and fruitful life is to forgive everybody everything every night before you go to bed. Bernard Baruch
- Forgiveness is a virtue of the brave. Indira Gandhi
- Only the brave know how to forgive. A coward never forgave; it is not in his nature. Laurence Sterne
- Forgiveness says you are given another chance to make a new beginning. Desmond Tutu
- In this life, when you deny someone an apology, you will remember it at time you beg forgiveness. Toba Beta, My Ancestor Was an Ancient Astronaut
- Grudges are for those who insist that they are owed something; forgiveness, however, is for those who are substantial enough to move on. Criss Jami
- It’s not an easy journey, to get to a place where you forgive people. But it is such a powerful place, because it frees you. Tyler Perry
- Forgiveness is the one gift you don’t give to others. Rather, it is the gift you give yourself, so you can finally be free. Shannon L. Alder
- The more you forgive, the stronger you become. Kevin Keenoo
- I think we learn the most from imperfect relationships things like forgiveness and compassion. Andrea Thompson
- The first thing that happens when you’re happy is you start forgiving everyone. Marty Rubin
- When you forgive, you free your soul. But when you say I’m sorry, you free two souls. Donald L. Hicks
- Be happy by forgiving or forgetting or doing both, but we can gain no happiness by holding grudges. Dinesh Kumar Radhakrishnan
- Nothing erases the past. There is repentance, there is atonement, and there is forgiveness. That is all, but that is enough. Ted Chiang, The Merchant and the Alchemist’s Gate
- Forgiveness means it finally becomes unimportant that you hit back. Anne Lamott
- Hatred does not cease by hatred, but only by love; this is the eternal rule. Gautama Buddha, The Dhammapada
Insightful quotes about forgiveness
- The stupid neither forgive nor forget; the naive forgive and forget; the wise forgive but do not forget. Thomas Szasz
- I guess forgiveness, like happiness, isn’t a final destination. You don’t one day get there and get to stay. Deb Caletti
- To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you. Louis B. Smedes
- We learn our lessons; we get hurt; we want revenge. Then we realize that actually, happiness and forgiving people is the best revenge. Madonna
- To forgive is the highest, most beautiful form of love. In return, you will receive untold peace and happiness. Robert Muller
- We are all on a life long journey and the core of its meaning, the terrible demand of its centrality, is forgiving and being forgiven. Martha Kilpatrick
- Forgiveness is giving up the hope that the past could have been any different. Oprah Winfrey
- The truth is, unless you let go, unless you forgive yourself, unless you forgive the situation, unless you realize that the situation is over, you cannot move forward. Steve Maraboli, Unapologetically You
- Forgiveness is a funny thing. It warms the heart and cools the sting. William Arthur Ward
- Without forgiveness life is governed by an endless cycle of resentment and retaliation. Roberto Assagioli
- Forgiveness is me giving up my right to hurt you for hurting me. Unknown
- We must make our homes centers of compassion and forgive endlessly. Mother Theresa
- In this life, when you deny someone an apology, you will remember it at time you beg forgiveness. Toba Beta
- Forgiving is easier when we understand that forgiving someone else means that we are freeing ourselves of an unnecessary burden. Donna Goddard
- There is a hard law. When an injury is done to us, we never recover until we forgive. Alan Paton
- Inner peace can be reached only when we practice forgiveness. Forgiveness is letting go of the past, and is therefore the means for correcting our misperceptions. Gerald Jampolsky
- When you hold resentment toward another, you are bound to that person or condition by an emotional link that is stronger than steel. Forgiveness is the only way to dissolve that link and get free. Catherine Ponder
- The only vice that cannot be forgiven is hypocrisy. The repentance of a hypocrite is itself hypocrisy.
William Hazlitt, Selected Essays - It’s toughest to forgive ourselves. So it’s probably best to start with other people. It’s almost like peeling an onion. Layer by layer, forgiving others, you really do get to the point where you can forgive yourself. Patty Duke
- Forgiveness doesn’t excuse their behavior. It prevents their behavior from destroying your heart. Hemant Smarty
- Peace is such hard work. Harder than war. It takes way more effort to forgive than to kill. Rae Carson, The Bitter Kingdom
- Forgiveness is not a one off decision; it is a journey and a process that takes time, determination, and persistence. Forgiveness is not forgetting; it is simply denying your pain the right to control your life. Corallie Buchanan, Watch Out! Godly Women on the Loose
- When you begin to see that your enemy is suffering, that is the beginning of insight. Thich Nhat Hanh, Peace Is Every Step
- Marriages, even the best ones—perhaps especially the best ones—are an ongoing process of spoken and unspoken forgiveness.
- Forgiving is not forgetting; its actually remembering–remembering and not using your right to hit back. Its a second chance for a new beginning. And the remembering part is particularly important. Especially if you dont want to repeat what happened. Desmond Tutu
Poetic quotes about forgiveness
- A life lived without forgiveness is a prison. William Arthur Ward
- Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it. Mark Twain
- A happy marriage is the union of two good forgivers. Robert Quillen
- Resentment is like drinking poison and then hoping it will kill your enemies. Nelson Mandela
- Forgiveness liberates the soul. It removes fear. That is why it is such a powerful weapon. Nelson Mandela
- Being forgiven is like having all the worst bits of yourself stuffed into a balloon and then having that balloon set free. Shannon Wiersbitzky
- As long as you don’t forgive, who and whatever it is will occupy a rent-free space in your mind. Isabelle Holland
- The ineffable joy of forgiving and being forgiven forms an ecstasy that might well arouse the envy of the gods. Elbert Hubbard
- Forgiveness is the answer to the child’s dream of a miracle by which what is broken is made whole again, what is soiled is made clean again. Dag Hammarskjöld
- The forgiving state of mind is a magnetic power for attracting good. Catherine Ponder
- In love, everyone does things that hurt the other person, so there really is no Right and Wrong. You just have to decide what you’re willing to forgive. Yvonne Wood, Dead Beautiful
- Never does the human soul appear so strong as when it foregoes revenge and dares to forgive an injury. Edwin Hubbel Chapin
- Humanity is never so beautiful as when praying for forgiveness, or else forgiving another. Jean Paul
- The heart stays heavy if it remains in a state of unforgiveness. Aisha Mirza
- A grudge is like a cesspool; forgiveness like a flowing river. Chris Northrup
- Buried beneath disappointment and fear, anger and pride, I just might find it in my heart to forgive. Emily Giffin, Heart of the Matter
Long quotes about forgiveness
- Forgiving other people does not mean that they will get away with what they did to you, it means that You are set free from the pain they have caused you. Forgiveness is the hardest lesson we are here to learn to master, but it is possible with time and patience. Jeanette Coron
- Sincere forgiveness isn’t colored with expectations that the other person apologize or change. Don’t worry whether or not they finally understand you. Love them and release them. Life feeds back truth to people in its own way and time-just like it does for you and me. Sara Paddison
- Forgiving does not erase the bitter past. A healed memory is not a deleted memory. Instead, forgiving what we cannot forget creates a new way to remember. We change the memory of our past into a hope for our future. Louis B. Smedes
- Not to forgive is to be imprisoned by the past, by old grievances that do not permit life to proceed with new business. Not to forgive is to yield oneself to another’s control, to be locked into a sequence of act and response, of outrage and revenge, tit for tat, escalating always. The present is endlessly overwhelmed and devoured by the past. Forgiveness frees the forgiver. It extracts the forgiver from someone else’s nightmare. Lance Morrow, The Chief: A Memoir of Fathers and Sons
- We must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive. He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love. There is some good in the worst of us and some evil in the best of us. When we discover this, we are less prone to hate our enemies. Martin Luther King, Jr.
- Anger is like flowing water; there’s nothing wrong with it as long as you let it flow. Hate is like stagnant water; anger that you denied yourself the freedom to feel, the freedom to flow; water that you gathered in one place and left to forget. Stagnant water becomes dirty, stinky, disease-ridden, poisonous, deadly; that is your hate. On flowing water travels little paper boats; paper boats of forgiveness. Allow yourself to feel anger, allow your waters to flow, along with all the paper boats of forgiveness. Be human. C. JoyBell C.
- A definition for forgiveness could be: giving up my right to hurt you, for hurting me. The word “forgive” means to wipe the slate clean, to pardon, to cancel a debt. When we wrong someone, we seek his or her forgiveness in order for the relationship to be restored. It is important to remember that forgiveness is not granted because a person deserves to be forgiven. Instead, it is an act of love, mercy, and grace. source: www.allaboutgod.com
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