Response to the Parable of the Unforgiving Servant
The core theme of the Parable of the Unforgiving Servant is forgiveness. It seems to be the case that Jesus is arguing for us to have a forgiving heart, as the mercy that was shown to us via the cross is the ultimate paradigm for what forgiveness is (forgive them for they know not what they are doing). The main question that I see with the parable is the motivation for forgiveness. There seems to be three options for WHY we need to forgive: Either we: (1) forgive out of consistency (2) forgive because God is the sage — the embodiment of virtues, which we ought to emulate. (3) forgive because forgiveness itself is a virtue. The first case is clearly wrong, and says nothing about the ethics of forgiveness (just divine command theory). So do we demonstrate forgiveness just because God commands us to? The second case is what virtue ethics is. In this case, what we do is an emulation of the desired virtues. But this is a roundabout way to say that we only have indirect duties tow...