Forgiveness Quotes



I hope you enjoy this lovely collection of forgiveness quotes broken down by category.

Forgiveness is probably the most powerful healing agent to help you recover from the hurts in your past.

I've included an inspirational video on the Gift of Forgiveness.

Forgiveness Quotes Index

About Forgiveness
Beautiful
Benefits of Forgiveness
Bible Verses
Cost of Lack of Forgiveness
Forgiveness is NOT…
Forgiving Enemies
Forgiving Others
Forgiving Self
God and Forgiveness
Good Advice
How to Forgive
Humorous
Importance of Forgiveness
Insightful
Inspirational
Reconciliation
Unconditional Forgiveness
You Have Forgiven WHEN…

Video - The Gift of Forgiveness

Teaching video outlines the cost of un-forgiveness and the benefits of forgiveness.

This lovely video has the soothing music of “Pax Deorum” by Enya and inspirational messages on forgiveness with powerful quotes on forgiveness.

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If you enjoyed this video, we have a whole collection of forgiveness videos ranging from true stories of forgiveness to inspirational videos with encouraging messages and quotes on forgiveness for your enjoyment.

About Forgiveness

"Forgiving is love's toughest work, and love's biggest risk. If you twist it into something it was never meant to be, it can make you a doormat or an insufferable manipulator. Forgiving seems almost unnatural. Our sense of fairness tells us people should pay for the wrong they do. But forgiving is love's power to break nature's rule."
~ Lewis B. Smedes

"A mistake is always forgivable, rarely excusable and always unacceptable."
~ Robert Fripp

"Forgiveness is a virtue of the brave."
~ Indira Gandhi

"Forgiveness is the final form of love."
~ Reinhold Niebuhr

"Forgiveness is the giving, and so the receiving, of life."
~ George MacDonald

"Forgiveness is the remission of sins. For it is by this that what has been lost, and was found, is saved from being lost again."
~ Saint Augustine

"Forgiveness means letting go of the past."
~ Gerald Jampolsky

"Forgotten is forgiven."
~ F. Scott Fitzgerald

"I can forgive, but I cannot forget, is only another way of saying, I will not forgive. Forgiveness ought to be like a cancelled note - torn in two, and burned up, so that it never can be shown against one."
~ Henry Ward Beecher

"Life is an adventure in forgiveness."
~ Norman Cousins

"Mistakes are always forgivable, if one has the courage to admit them."
~ Bruce Lee

"Forgiveness is not an occasional act: it is an attitude."
~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

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Beautiful

"Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it."
~ Mark Twain

"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 Hammarskjold

"Humanity is never so beautiful as when praying for forgiveness, or else forgiving another."
~ Jean Paul

"To err is human; to forgive, divine."
~ Alexander Pope

"Lord, make me an instrument of your peace,
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon; ...
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned."
~ attributed to St. Francis of Assisi

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Benefits of Forgiveness

"To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you."
~ Lewis B. Smedes

"Forgiveness is a funny thing. It warms the heart and cools the sting."
~ William Arthur Ward

"Forgiveness is the economy of the heart... forgiveness saves the expense of anger, the cost of hatred, the waste of spirits."
~ Hannah More

"Forgiveness is the key to action and freedom."
~ Hannah Arendt

"The ineffable joy of forgiving and being forgiven forms an ecstasy that might well arouse the envy of the gods."
~ Elbert Hubbard

"When you forgive, you in no way change the past - but you sure do change the future."
~ Bernard Meltzer

"You have to forgive to forget, and forget, to feel again."
~ Unknown

"Forgive all who have offended you, not for them, but for yourself."
~ Harriet Nelson

"Forgiveness does not change the past, but it does enlarge the future."
~ Paul Boese

"Never does the human soul appear so strong as when it forgoes revenge, and dares forgive an injury."
~ E.H. Chapin

"Forgiveness is the cleansing fire that burns away old regrets and resentments."
~ Jonathan Lockwood Huie

"Forgiving is not a gift to someone else -
Forgiving is your gift to yourself -
a great gift - the gift of happiness.
~ Jonathan Lockwood Huie

"Anger makes you smaller, while forgiveness forces you to grow beyond what you were."
~ Cherie Carter Scott

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Bible Verses

"As far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us."
~ Bible - Psalm 103:12 (NIV)

"'Come now, let us reason together,' says the LORD.
'Though your sins are like scarlet,
they shall be as white as snow;
though they are red as crimson,
they shall be like wool.'"
~ Bible - Isaiah 1:18 (NIV)

"I, even I, am he who blots out your transgressions, for my own sake, and remembers your sins no more. Review the past for me, let us argue the matter together; state the case for your innocence."
~ Bible - Isaiah 43:25-26 (NIV)

"The Lord our God is merciful and forgiving, even though we have rebelled against him;"
~ Bible - Daniel 9:9 (NIV)

"You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.'
But I tell you: 'Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you'."
~ Bible - Matthew 5:43-44

"For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins."
~ Bible - Matthew 6:14-15 (NIV)

"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest."
~ Bible - Matthew 11:28 (NIV)

"Then came Peter to him, and said,Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till seven times?Jesus saith unto him,I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven."
~ Bible - Matthew 18:21-22

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"Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord,"
~ Bible - Acts 3:19 (NIV)

"Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus,"
~ Bible - Romans 8:1 (NIV)

"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!"
~ Bible - 2 Corinthians 5:17 (NIV)

"In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God's grace."
~ Bible - Ephesians 1:7 (NIV)

"For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins."
~ Bible - Colossians 1:13-14 (NIV)

"Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need."
~ Bible - Hebrews 4:16 (NIV)

"Then he adds: 'Their sins and lawless acts I will remember no more.'"
~ Bible - Hebrews 10:17 (NIV)

"If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness."
~ Bible - 1 John 1:9 (NIV)

"My dear children, I write this to you so that you will not sin. But if anybody does sin, we have one who speaks to the Father in our defense—Jesus Christ, the Righteous One."
~ Bible - 1 John 2:1 (NIV)

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Cost of Lack of Forgiveness

"Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned."
~ The Buddha

"Not forgiving someone is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die."
~ Unknown

"For man with no forgiveness in heart, life worse punishment than death."
~ Miyagi: character in the movie Karate Kid 2

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Forgiveness is NOT…

"Forgiveness is not the misguided act of condoning irresponsible, hurtful behavior. Nor is it a superficial turning of the other cheek that leaves us feeling victimized and martyred. Rather it is the finishing of old business that allows us to experience the present, free of contamination from the past."
~ Joan Borysenko

"Genuine forgiveness does not deny anger but faces it head-on."
~ Alice Duer Miller

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Forgiving Enemies

"Always forgive your enemies - nothing annoys them so much."
~ Oscar Wilde

"It is easier to forgive an enemy than to forgive a friend."
~ William Blake

"It's said in Hollywood that you should always forgive your enemies - because you never know when you'll have to work with them."
~ Lana Turner

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Forgiving Others

"It is very east to forgive others their mistakes; it takes more grit and gumption to forgive them for having witnessed your own."
~ Jessamyn West

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Forgiving Self

"How unhappy is he who cannot forgive himself."
~ Publilius Syrus

"I don't know if I continue, even today, always liking myself. But what I learned to do many years ago was to forgive myself. It is very important for every human being to forgive herself or himself because if you live, you will make mistakes- it is inevitable. But once you do and you see the mistake, then you forgive yourself and say, 'well, if I'd known better I'd have done better,' that's all. So you say to people who you think you may have injured, 'I'm sorry,' and then you say to yourself, 'I'm sorry.' If we all hold on to the mistake, we can't see our own glory in the mirror because we have the mistake between our faces and the mirror; we can't see what we're capable of being. You can ask forgiveness of others, but in the end the real forgiveness is in one's own self. I think that young men and women are so caught by the way they see themselves. Now mind you. When a larger society sees them as unattractive, as threats, as too black or too white or too poor or too fat or too thin or too sexual or too asexual, that's rough. But you can overcome that. The real difficulty is to overcome how you think about yourself. If we don't have that we never grow, we never learn, and sure as hell we should never teach."
~ Maya Angelou

"People can be more forgiving than you can imagine. But you have to forgive yourself. Let go of what's bitter and move on."
~ Bill Cosby

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God and Forgiveness

"God will forgive me. It's his job."
~ Heinrich Heine

"I shall be an autocrat, that's my trade; and the good Lord will forgive me, that's his."
~ Catherine the Great

"Thank you, God, for this good life and forgive us if we do not love it enough."
~ Garrison Keillor

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Good Advice

"My desire is to be a forgiving, non-judgmental person."
~ Janine Turner

"If you can't forgive and forget, pick one."
~ Robert Brault, www.robertbrault.com

"Yes, this is what good is: to forgive evil. There is no other good."
~ Antonio Porchia, Voces, 1943, translated from Spanish by W.S. Merwin

"Forgive. It doesn't erase their crime but why should you do the time. Let go of resentment."
~ Dodinsky, www.dodinsky.com

"People are often unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered; ...Forgive them anyway."
~ Kent Keith (often attributed to Mother Teresa)

"Today, I say yes to forgiving.I commit to being for-giving loveand for-giving compassion in all areas of my life."
~ Sheri Rosenthal

"Affirmation: I forgive everyone, especially myself,for all actions and all inactions throughout my entire life."
~ Jonathan Lockwood Huie

"Never succumb to the temptation of bitterness."
~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

"Laugh when you can,
apologize when you should,
and let go of what you can't change.
Life's too short to be anything... but happy."
~ Anonymous

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How to Forgive

"The key to forgiveness is to forgive from the heart -- not from the mind."
~ Sheri Rosenthal

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Humorous

"When I was a kid I used to pray every night for a new bicycle. Then I realised that the Lord doesn't work that way so I stole one and asked Him to forgive me."
~ Emo Philips

"There's no point in burying a hatchet if you're going to put up a marker on the site."
~ Sydney Harris

"It is often easier to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission."
~ Grace Hopper

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Importance of Forgiveness

"The practice of forgiveness is our most important contribution to the healing of the world."
~ Marianne Williamson

"Never forget the three powerful resources you always have available to you: love, prayer, and forgiveness."
~ H. Jackson Brown, Jr.

"Without forgiveness, there's no future."
~ Desmond Tutu

"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

"Acceptance and tolerance and forgiveness, those are life-altering lessons".
~ Jessica Lange

"Forgiveness is the key to happiness."
~ A Course In Miracles

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Insightful

"He that cannot forgive others breaks the bridge over which he must pass himself; for every man has need to be forgiven."
~ Thomas Fuller

"One forgives to the degree that one loves."
~ Francois de La Rochefoucauld

"Forgiveness is like faith. You have to keep reviving it."
~ Mason Cooley

"It is easier to forgive an enemy than to forgive a friend."
~ William Blake

"There is no love without forgiveness, and there is no forgiveness without love."
~ Bryant H. McGill

"There is no revenge so complete as forgiveness."
~ Josh Billings

"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.

"Forgiving is rediscovering the shining path of peace that at first you thought others took away when they betrayed you."
~ Dodinsky, www.dodinsky.com

"The man who forgives is far stronger than the man who fights."
~ Nathan Croall

"What we forgive too freely doesn't stay forgiven."
~ Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960

"Without forgiveness life is governed by... an endless cycle of resentment and retaliation."
~ Roberto Assagioli

"Forgiveness is not always easy.At times, it feels more painful than the wound we suffered,to forgive the one that inflicted it.And yet, there is no peace without forgiveness."
~ Marianne Williamson

"A wise man will make haste to forgive,because he knows the true value of time,and will not suffer it to pass away in unnecessary pain."
~ Samuel Johnson

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Inspirational

"Forgiveness is a gift you give yourself."
~ Suzanne Somers

"The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong."
~ Mahatma Gandhi

"Forgiveness is the sweetest revenge."
~ Isaac Friedmann

"We are most like God when we forgive."
~ Anonymous

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Reconciliation

"It takes one person to forgive, it takes two people to be reunited."
~ Lewis B. Smedes

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Unconditional Forgiveness

"Unconditional forgiveness is the path to your own inner peace."
~ Jonathan Lockwood Huie

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You Have Forgiven WHEN…

"You will know that forgiveness has begun when you recall those who hurt you and feel the power to wish them well."
~ Lewis B. Smedes

"How does one know if she has forgiven? You tend to feel sorrow over the circumstance instead of rage, you tend to feel sorry for the person rather than angry with him. You tend to have nothing left to say about it all."
~ Clarissa Pinkola Estes

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