I’ve seen so many people anxious about whether they’ve committed the unforgivable sin. (And no, they have not.) Let’s look at what they’re talking about, why they are very sadly confused, and why we should all revel in our hope!

There are three passages in the synoptic gospels, all of which say more or less the same thing, though with different contexts. Matthew 12:22-32:

12:22 Then they brought to him a demon-possessed man who was blind and mute. Jesus healed him so that he could speak and see. 12:23 All the crowds were amazed and said, “Could this one be the Son of David?” 12:24 But when the Pharisees heard this they said, “He does not cast out demons except by the power of Beelzebul, the ruler of demons!” 12:25 Now when Jesus realized what they were thinking, he said to them, “Every kingdom divided against itself is destroyed, and no town or house divided against itself will stand. 12:26 So if Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself. How then will his kingdom stand? 12:27 And if I cast out demons by Beelzebul, by whom do your sons cast them out? For this reason they will be your judges. 12:28 But if I cast out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has already overtaken you. 12:29 How else can someone enter a strong man’s house and steal his property, unless he first ties up the strong man? Then he can thoroughly plunder the house. 12:30 Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters. 12:31 For this reason I tell you, people will be forgiven for every sin and blasphemy, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. 12:32 Whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven. But whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.

Mark 3:20-30:

3:20 Now Jesus went home, and a crowd gathered so that they were not able to eat. 3:21 When his family heard this they went out to restrain him, for they said, “He is out of his mind.” 3:22 The experts in the law who came down from Jerusalem said, “He is possessed by Beelzebul,” and, “By the ruler of demons he casts out demons.” 3:23 So he called them and spoke to them in parables: “How can Satan cast out Satan? 3:24 If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom will not be able to stand. 3:25 If a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand. 3:26 And if Satan rises against himself and is divided, he is not able to stand and his end has come. 3:27 But no one is able to enter a strong man’s house and steal his property unless he first ties up the strong man. Then he can thoroughly plunder his house. 3:28 I tell you the truth, people will be forgiven for all sins, even all the blasphemies they utter. 3:29 But whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven, but is guilty of an eternal sin” 3:30 (because they said, “He has an unclean spirit”).

Luke 12:8-12:

12:8 “I tell you, whoever acknowledges me before men, the Son of Man will also acknowledge before God’s angels. 12:9 But the one who denies me before men will be denied before God’s angels. 12:10 And everyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but the person who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven. 12:11 But when they bring you before the synagogues, the rulers, and the authorities, do not worry about how you should make your defense or what you should say, 12:12 for the Holy Spirit will teach you at that moment what you must say.”

Matthew and Luke both say that speaking against the Son of Man will be forgiven, and Mark says “all sins” and “all blasphemies” will be forgiven. But all three say that whoever blasphemes/speaks against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven. Look, people say, here’s the unforgivable sin! If only we can figure out what it is! Maybe it’s suicide! Or dying having committed an unconfessed mortal sin! (Or maybe that’s the same thing!) But it’s probably that one terrible thought I had when I was eight! I’M SO WORRIED I STEPPED ON THE MAGIC TRIPWIRE AND THE ARBITRARY SCARY LEGALIST GOD HATES ME NOW AND THERE’S NOTHING I CAN DO!!!!!

First, this conception of God is totally incompatible with the character of God. People whose idea of God is that he’s trying to find an excuse to destroy us all aren’t going to be talked out of that with a blog post. If that’s you, you need to practice rest. Learn that God is good, and loves you. If someone told you otherwise, they were lying to you.

But back to the text. Let’s point out a couple problems with “the unforgivable sin.” Then we’ll talk about what’s actually going on here.

First, that word “unforgivable.” The text never says anything cannot be forgiven. It says something will not be forgiven. That’s a subtle difference, but an important one. God is capable of forgiving all things. But some things he will not.

Second, “the” is a problem. Because there is another case where Jesus says God will not forgive! In Matthew 6:14-15:

6:14 “For if you forgive others their sins, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. 6:15 But if you do not forgive others, your Father will not forgive you your sins.

And again in Matthew 18:23-35:

18:23 “For this reason, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his slaves. 18:24 As he began settling his accounts, a man who owed ten thousand talents was brought to him. 18:25 Because he was not able to repay it, the lord ordered him to be sold, along with his wife, children, and whatever he possessed, and repayment to be made. 18:26 Then the slave threw himself to the ground before him, saying, ‘Be patient with me, and I will repay you everything.’ 18:27 The lord had compassion on that slave and released him, and forgave him the debt. 18:28 After he went out, that same slave found one of his fellow slaves who owed him one hundred silver coins. So he grabbed him by the throat and started to choke him, saying, ‘Pay back what you owe me!’ 18:29 Then his fellow slave threw himself down and begged him, ‘Be patient with me, and I will repay you.’ 18:30 But he refused. Instead, he went out and threw him in prison until he repaid the debt. 18:31 When his fellow slaves saw what had happened, they were very upset and went and told their lord everything that had taken place. 18:32 Then his lord called the first slave and said to him, ‘Evil slave! I forgave you all that debt because you begged me! 18:33 Should you not have shown mercy to your fellow slave, just as I showed it to you?’ 18:34 And in anger his lord turned him over to the prison guards to torture him until he repaid all he owed. 18:35 So also my heavenly Father will do to you, if each of you does not forgive your brother from your heart.”

(Notably these are both unique to Matthew.)

So now we have a couple of questions.

Firstly, why does Jesus bring up blasphemy when he does? Well, in Luke he talks about blasphemy in the middle of some other instructions, there’s no apparent trigger for that specific subject. But in Matthew and Mark it’s in response to some people (Pharisees or Judean Torah-scholars) respond to Jesus healing a man by saying “he heals by the power of demons!” It is, as Jesus points out, an absurd response. It’s not just weird or sad, it’s literally incoherent. Nobody could possibly think their response made any sense at all. Something about their nonsense is at least adjacent to speaking against the Holy Spirit.

Secondly, what do these two unforgiven sins have in common? Why is failure to forgive others tied to speaking against the Spirit?

The Matthew 18 parable is particularly instructive at the end. We read it in English and wonder, “This makes no sense.” (That’s usually a good indicator we should start digging and not stop until we hit gold.) “How can this man be put in jail _until _he comes up with an absurd amount of money? How is he supposed to do that from prison?” And now we get into some Greek oddities, because the Greek is actually ambiguous. It’s more like the servant is put in jail “until he clears the debt.” But which debt? It can mean “until he pays what he owes,” but it can also mean “until he forgives what is owed to him!” (I suspect the ambiguity is intentional; either will do, but only one is within his power.) This understanding makes more sense of the parable. In Matthew 6, Jesus says we will not be forgiven if we do not forgive, but failure to forgive isn’t a one-time action, it’s a state. God will not forgive us if we do not forgive others, but we can come to forgive others and God’s forgiveness will be waiting.

Is the same true of speaking against the Spirit? Suppose speaking against the Spirit is a state, the state of being in which one can see incontrovertible evidence of your own wrongness and still make up whatever insanity you have to to ignore that evidence and keep living your own way. If the Spirit works in us to heal and change us, to make us able to repent, then speaking against the Spirit can be rejecting our own need for repentance. Every one of us is sick, but only those who know their sickness will receive the physician. As CS Lewis put it, it’s incoherent to think God can take you back if you will not go. There are two kingdoms, and God in his mercy lets us be part of his kingdom where all debts are forgiven, and find life there. But if we will not, we remain part of the kingdom of death, where all debts are enforced, and we must inevitably die there.

As a final note, 10,000 talents is an interesting number. Much has been made of just how much money that is, but I find it interesting that “10,000 talents” is something we’ve seen before, if we know our Hebrew scriptures: it’s a reference to the story of Esther. The man who owed a king 10,000 talents in that story was Haman, who tried to annihilate the Jewish people. Even Persian Hitler has healing available to him, if only he’ll take it.

So do you, no matter what you’ve done. What matters is what you do now.