The Atonement–Forgiveness Dyad: Identification With the Aggressed

Abstract

In an effort to assuage the dystonicities of guilt and anxiety, the atoner forms an identification with his victim. Such an identification is, for the most part, unconscious and, to follow Racker's categorization, is either a concordant or a complementary one, with each pattern generating a distinct atonement narrative. Atonement is synonymous with neither reparation nor guilt, although each of them contributes to its formation and vicissitudes.

Prominent in relational scenarios within the work of atonement is the search for a punitive “bad-enough object,” an external, self-recruited gratifier of the internal need for punishment. Later atonement scenarios are often thematically linked to earlier fantasies of destruction of the maternal breast (in Kleinian theory) or to the unfolding of the classical Oedipal tragedy.

Atonement and forgiveness are constructed between the people involved, rather than being granted by one or attained by the other. Atonement wishes shape a number of partial identificatory processes that, when activated, form the ambience of the atoner–forgiver dyad. These include elements of repair, reconciliation, and repentance.

The plotlines of Crime and Punishment and The Brothers Karamazov reflect Dostoyevsky's emerging understanding of the atonement process, from an earlier focus on Raskolnikovian self-torment to an Alexian (Karamazov) vision of reparative benevolence. Revenge and atonement are closely linked, with atonement often representing revenge against the self, taken on behalf of a complementarily-identified-with victim. This article provides some clinical manifestations of atonement, representing a continuum of greater or lesser psychopathology.