It takes a lot of grace, mental strength, and courage to practice forgiveness—either toward the person who has wronged you or to yourself. While you may never forget how you were hurt, by forgiving, you are taking the steps toward healing yourself, spiritually, emotionally, and mentally. Should you find yourself in a place where you are ready to take the brave steps to let go of past resentment, regret, and anger, we hope this list of inspirational forgiveness quotes helps you find the inner strength to let go of the past and look toward a brighter future.
111 Forgiveness Quotes
- “If we really want to love, we must learn how to forgive.” — Mother Teresa
- “Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much.” ― Oscar Wilde
- “How unhappy is he who cannot forgive himself.” ― Publilius Syrus
- “Forgiveness is a funny thing. It warms the heart and cools the sting.” — William A. Ward
- “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.” — Martin Luther King, Jr., A Gift of Love
- “Never forget the three powerful resources you always have available to you: love, prayer, and forgiveness.” — H. Jackson Brown, Jr.
- “Never does the human soul appear so strong as when it foregoes revenge.” — Edward Hubbell Chapin
- “The stupid neither forgive nor forget; the naive forgive and forget; the wise forgive but do not forget.” — Thomas Szasz
- “It’s not an easy journey, to get to a place where you forgive people. But it is such a powerful place because it frees you.” — Tyler Perry
- “It’s one of the greatest gifts you can give yourself, to forgive. Forgive everybody.” — Maya Angelou RELATED: 100 Quotes About Peace to Inspire Serenity Every Day
- “Forgive, forget. Bear with the faults of others as you would have them bear with yours.” — Phillip Brooks
- “The man who opts for revenge should dig two graves.” — Chinese Proverb
- “Surely it is much more generous to forgive and remember than to forgive and forget.” — Maria Edgeworth, An Essay on the Noble Science of Self-Justification 14, “True forgiveness is when you can say, ‘Thank you for that experience.’” — Oprah Winfrey
- “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.” — Buddha
- “Forgiveness is the needle that knows how to mend.” — Jewel, “Under the Water”
- “All major religious traditions carry basically the same message: that is love, compassion and forgiveness. The important thing is they should be part of our daily lives.” ― Dalai Lama XIV
- “Forgiveness is a virtue of the brave.” — Indira Gandhi
- “The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.” — Mahatma Gandhi 20, “To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you.” ― Lewis B. Smedes, Forgive and Forget: Healing the Hurts We Don’t Deserve
- “To err is human; to forgive, divine.” — Alexander Pope, An Essay on Criticism
- “Forgiveness is above all a personal choice, a decision of the heart to go against natural instinct to pay back evil with evil.” — Pope John Paul II
- “As I walked out the door toward the gate that would lead to my freedom, I knew if I didn’t leave my bitterness and hatred behind, I’d still be in prison.” — Nelson Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom
- “Forgiving isn’t something you do for someone else. It’s something you do for yourself. It’s saying, ‘You’re not important enough to have a stranglehold on me.’ It’s saying, ‘You don’t get to trap me in the past. I am worthy of a future.’” — Jodi Picoult, The Storyteller
- “Throughout life people will make you mad, disrespect you, and treat you bad. Let God deal with the things they do, because hate in your heart will consume you too.” — Will Smith, “Just The Two of Us”
- “Take forgiveness slowly. Don’t blame yourself for being slow. Peace will come.” — Yoko Ono
- “Anger makes you smaller, while forgiveness forces you to grow beyond what you were.” — Cherie Carter-Scott
- “Forgiveness is a reflection of loving yourself enough to move on.” — Dr. Steve Maraboli
- “Forgive others, not because they deserve forgiveness but because you deserve peace.” — Jonathan Lockwood Huie
- “Forgiveness is healing… especially forgiving yourself.” — Alyson Noel, Evermore
- “Mistakes are always forgivable if one has the courage to admit them.” — Bruce Lee, Striking Thoughts: Bruce Lee’s Wisdom for Daily Living
- “Forgiveness is a strange thing. It can sometimes be easier to forgive our enemies than our friends. It can be hardest of all to forgive people we love.” — Fred Rogers, Wisdom from the World According to Mister Rogers
- “Forgiveness is not weak. It takes courage to face and overcome powerful emotions.” — Desmond Tutu
- “There is no love without forgiveness, and there is no forgiveness without love.” — Bryant H. McGill
- “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
- “Let’s shake free this gravity of judgment, and fly high on the wings of forgiveness.” — India.Arie, “Wings of Forgiveness” RELATED: 101 Breakup Quotes to Help You Move On
- “Forgiveness does not change the past, but it does enlarge the future.” — Paul Lewis Boese
- “Forgiveness is a funny thing. It warms the heart and cools the sting.” ― William Arthur Ward
- “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 is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.” ― Mark Twain
- “Be the one who nurtures and builds. Be the one who has an understanding and a forgiving heart one who looks for the best in people. Leave people better than you found them.” ― Marvin J. Ashton
- “I believe forgiveness is the best form of love in any relationship. It takes a strong person to say they’re sorry and an even stronger person to forgive.” — Yolanda Hadid
- “Forgotten is forgiven.” ― Scott Fitzgerald, The Crack-Up
- “Blame keeps wounds open. Only forgiveness heals.” — Thomas S. Manson
- “Before we can forgive one another, we have to understand one another.” ― Emma Goldman
- “Without forgiveness, life is governed by an endless cycle of resentment and retaliation.” — Roberto Assagioli
- “I think the first step is to understand that forgiveness does not exonerate the perpetrator. Forgiveness liberates the victim. It’s a gift you give yourself.” — T. D. Jakes
- “The remedy for life’s broken pieces is not classes, workshops, or books. Don’t try to heal the broken pieces. Just forgive.” — Iyanla Vanzant
- “We may not know how to forgive, and we may not want to forgive; but the very fact we say we are willing to forgive begins the healing practice.” — Louise Hay
- “When you forgive, you in no way change the past—but you sure do change the future.” ― Bernard Meltzer
- “When we don’t forgive, we’re not hurting the other person. We’re not hurting the company that did us wrong. We’re not hurting God. We’re only hurting ourselves.” — Joel Osteen
- “We ask for forgiveness, and we forgive others who ask us. In that way, we can experience healing, healing in our souls.” — Ed Dobson
- “Forgiveness is for you—not the other person. It’s something you do inside yourself that you feel in your body and heart that releases you from your past and frees you to live life fully.” — Barbara J. Hunt, Forgiveness Made Easy
- “Don’t ever underestimate the power of forgiveness. I’ve seen it free people. I’ve seen it lift burdens that had weighed them down and kept them from moving on.” — Buffy Andrews, A Grandmother’s Legacy
- “We are not perfect, forgive others as you would want to be forgiven.” — Catherine Pulsifer
- “Let us forgive each other—only then will we live in peace.” — Leo Tolstoy
- “Forgiveness means giving up all hope for a better past.” — Lily Tomlin
- “Forgiveness is not a feeling; it is a commitment. It is a choice to show mercy, not to hold the offense up against the offender. Forgiveness is an expression of love.” — Gary Chapman
- “Real forgiveness is a lifelong commitment. You must practice it every day.” — Richard Daly, God’s Little Book of Joy
- “He that cannot forgive others breaks the bridge over which he himself must pass if he would ever reach heaven; for everyone has need to be forgiven.” — George Herbert
- “When you choose to forgive those who have hurt you, you take away their power.” — Anonymous
- “Forgive your enemies, but never forget their names.” ― John F. Kennedy
- “The hardest thing in life is to forgive. But hate is self-destructive. If you hate somebody, you’re not hurting the person you hate, you’re hurting yourself. Forgiveness is healing.”— Louis Zamperini, Don’t Give Up, Don’t Give In
- “When a deep injury is done us, we never recover until we forgive.” — Alan Paton
- “One always begins to forgive a place as soon as it’s left behind.” — Charles Dickens, Little Dorrit
- “Forgiveness isn’t approving what happened. It’s choosing to rise above it.” – Robin Sharma
- “There are always people who can’t forgive an able man for differing from them.” — George Eliot
- “When you forgive, you heal. When you let go, you grow.” — Anonymous
- “Forgiveness is a powerful expression of the love within our soul.” — Anthony Douglas
- “Because I make mistakes, I know others do too. I’ve found when I give forgiveness, it’s me—not the other person—who benefits.” — Ellen Miller, The One Year Book of Inspiration for Girlfriends
- “Your past may be painful, yet you must forgive, move on, and thank God for it. Your past has become a learning experience for you to become a better person and father.” — Martin Henderson, Fatherhood: A Message to Men
- “Forgiveness is the final form of love.” ― Reinhold Niebuhr
- “Though I was unaware of it at the time, that simple act of forgiveness was the beginning of an entirely new level of experiencing life for me.” — Wayne Dyer, You’ll See It When You Believe It
- “Anger begets more anger, and forgiveness and love lead to more forgiveness and love.” — Mahavira
- “Acceptance and tolerance and forgiveness; those are life-altering lessons.” — Jessica Lange
- “Forgiveness has nothing to do with absolving a criminal of his crime. It has everything to do with relieving oneself of the burden of being a victim—letting go of the pain and transforming oneself from victim to survivor.” ― C. R. Strahan
- “By having a forgiving attitude, you can change your life and the lives of the people you care about most.” — Kathie M. Thomson, Managing the Blended Family
- “One forgives to the degree that one loves.” — François de La Rochefoucauld
- “Forgiveness is not something we do for other people. It’s something we do for ourselves to move on.” — Anonymous
- “Grudges are for those who insist that they are owed something; forgiveness, however, is for those who are substantial enough to move on.” ― Criss Jami, Salomé: In Every Inch In Every Mile
- “To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you.” ― S. Lewis
- “When you forgive, you love. And when you love, God’s light shines upon you.” ― Jon Krakauer, Into the Wild
- “A heart filled with anger has no room for love.” ― Joan Lunden, Wake-Up Calls: Making the Most Out of Every Day
- “I have always found that mercy bears richer fruits than strict justice.” ― Abraham Lincoln
- “Slide the weight from your shoulders and move forward. You are afraid you might forget, but you never will. You will forgive and remember.” — Barbara Kingsolver, The Poisonwood Bible
- “Forgiveness is the key to action and freedom.” ― Hannah Arendt
- “No matter how much you love someone—the capacity of that love is meaningless if it outweighs your capacity to forgive.” ― Colleen Hoover, All Your Perfects RELATED: 100 Quotes About Taking Care of Yourself
- “To forgive is wisdom. To forget is genius. Because it’s true. It’s a new world every heartbeat.” — Joyce Cary, The Horse’s Mouth
- “But remember that forgiveness too is a power. To beg for it is a power, and to withhold or bestow it is a power, perhaps the greatest.” — Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid’s Tale
- “Forgiveness is not about forgetting. It is about letting go of another person’s throat.” — William P. Young, The Shack
- “There is no revenge so complete as forgiveness.” ― Josh Billings
- “We win by tenderness. We conquer by forgiveness.” — Frederick William Robertson
- “The lesson is that you can still make mistakes and be forgiven.” — Robert Downey Jr.
- “You’ll never know how strong your heart is until you learn to forgive who broke it.” – Anonymous
- “Forgiveness is the key that unlocks the door of resentment and the handcuffs of hatred. It is a power that breaks the chains of bitterness and the shackles of selfishness.” ― Corrie Ten Boom, Clippings From My Notebook
- “One should never do wrong in return, nor mistreat any man, no matter how one has been mistreated by him.” ― Socrates
- “It’s not just other people we need to forgive. We also need to forgive ourselves. For all the things we didn’t do. All the things we should have done.” ― Mitch Albom, Tuesdays with Morrie
- “A happy marriage is the union of two good forgivers.” — Robert Quillen
- “I’m not perfect. Remember that and try to forgive me when I fail you.” ― Elizabeth Lowell, Sweet Wind, Wild Wind
- “You cannot forgive just once; forgiveness is a daily practice.” ― Sonia Rumzi
- “True forgiveness is not an action after the fact. It is an attitude with which you enter each moment.” — David Ridge
- “Forgiveness is a sign that the person who has wronged you means more to you than the wrong they have dealt.” — Ben Greenhalgh
- “A broken friendship that is mended through forgiveness can be even stronger than it once was.” — Stephen Richards
- “Once a woman has forgiven her man, she must not reheat his sins for breakfast.” — Marlene Dietrich
- “The man who forgives is far stronger than the man who fights.” — Nathan Croall
- “If you can’t forgive and forget, pick one.” — Robert Brault
- “Forgiveness keeps you from being bound by something the other person might never set right.” — Tony Evans
- “You don’t need strength to let go of something. What you really need is understanding.” — Guy Finley
- “When one forgives, two souls are set free.” — Anonymous
- “As long as you don’t forgive, who and whatever it is will occupy a rent-free space in your mind.” — Isabelle Holland
- “Most of us can forgive and forget; we just don’t want the other person to forget that we forgave.” — Ivern Ball Next, read these Bible verses about forgiveness.
