During the reign of the Khmer Rouge in Vietnam, millions were tortured and killed. In a profoundly moving editorial in the New York Times today, "My Savior, Their Killer", Francios Bizot, describes meeting his Khmer Rouge torturer decades later while he is tried for war crimes. While Bizot was freed, over ten thousand others were tortured and killed under the supervision of Kaing Guek Eav. In this essay, he describes how Kaing Guek Eav broke down when he revisited a site where over 30 years ago he inflected death and torture on thousands. I leave you with this haunting description to meditate on the nature of suffering, the poison karma of inflicting suffering on others, and what it means to forgive. Here, the former executioner speaks, as told by Bizot:
“I ask for your forgiveness — I know that you cannot forgive me, but I ask you to leave me the hope that you might,” he said before collapsing in tears on the shoulder of one of his guards.I was not there — it was a closed hearing — but those who were reported that the cry of the former executioner betrayed such suffering that one of the few survivors of Tuol Sleng screamed out, “Here are the words that I’ve longed to hear for 30 years!”
It could be that forgiveness is possible after a simple, natural process, when the victim feels that he has been repaid. And the executioner has to pay dearly, for it is the proof of his suffering that eases ours.
...We shall all be at the trial — not just as judges, but also as victims, and the accused...
The genocide of the Khmer Rouge will be judged as a “crime against humanity,” a crime against ourselves. As such, Duch’s guilt exceeds his immediate victims; it becomes the guilt of humanity, in the name of all victims. Duch killed mankind. The trial of the Khmer Rouge should be an opportunity for each of us to gaze at the torturer with some distance — from beyond the intolerable cry of the suffering, which may veil the truth of the abomination. The only way to look at the torturer is to humanize him.
Excerpted from "My Savior, Their Killer", Francios Bizot, New York Times, February 17, 2009
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2 comments:
I am not sure that I buy Bizot's argument that forgiveness is possible only after the victim feels that she has been repaid with the other's suffering. Isn't the point that the executioner suffers because of the karma generated by his acts?
-StillRiver
I can see your point. Perhaps it simply shows the inextricable link between executioner and victim in the karmic sense, and the need to go beyond one's own suffering in a very difficult and profound way.
-Nikko
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