Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Sunflower: On the Possibilities and Limits of Forgiveness, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Forgiveness and Compassion
Religion and Moral Truth
Remembrance
Anti-Semitism and Dehumanization
Silence, Guilt, and Resistance
Summary
Analysis
Marcuse thinks that he would have acted in the way that Simon did. He believes that one should not be able to murder and then simply ask and receive forgiveness. He concludes simply that easy forgiveness simply perpetuates the very crime it aims to alleviate.
Marcuse, who is Jewish, also agrees with Simon’s decision not to forgive, but for a less common reason: what Martin E. Marty refers to in the next response as “cheap grace.” Marcuse’s worry that easy forgiveness diminishes the seriousness of crimes, particularly those as severe as mass murder, and devalues the lives they destroy.
Themes
