The mysterious grand banquet of pardon according to Vladimir Jankelevitch

Abstract

This article analyses the possibility of pardon and its inner dynamics from the perspective of Vladimir Jankelevitch, which is Judeo-Christian. The study is done in five interrelated parts. The first introduces the enigmatic place of pardon in Jankelevitch's thought, and the reasons for the apparent incoherence in his discourses on pardon. The second analyses the three organ-obstacles that make this act nearly impossible. The next two sections examine the three imprints of impure and pure pardon, respectively. The concluding section presents the infinite dialectic between pardon and evil, neither one stronger than the other. Pardon is an inexplicable, mysterious grand banquet, manifesting itself in all its gratuitousness as a sudden and spontaneous event, in a face-to-face encounter between the transgressor and the transgressed.