Now to consider the particular temporal dimension of guilt, left largely untouched in my recent treatment of guilt. Of course, the answer was given already and implicitly - the task is one of bringing the subtly said into the clear light of day.
Guilt in its temporal sense is, first and foremost, a relation towards the future - not the past. This is the truth that lies in the connection between Guilt and Debt, the Latin Debita. This, in turn, has great implications for what it means to Forgive, the question of what Forgiveness is.
I.
To be Guilty is not just a "Debt", but to be "Indebted". To this Indebtedness belongs a substantial debt to be paid - in its primary sense, the notion of Guilt exists in the temporal sense of "the Future". Thus also its normative structure: the Fact of my Guilty-Being, my Being-Indebted, is that there is something which I owe to do in the future, some duty which I must fulfill. My existence as a Guilty being determines my future as much as, and in its primary sense more than, my past. My Being-Guiltily implies the universal demand made of me in my Existing-In-Debt, that there will never not be a debt to be paid, that in some sense, my Indebtedness will never disappear, there will also be more that I not only can do but must do if I am to live up to the demand made of me.
In this sense, too, my Guilty-being in one sense overlaps and in one sense differs from my being a Sinner. My being as a Sinner is a historical fact, manifested most clearly in my past insofar as I have sinned. Yet to be a Sinner, as a person, is also always to be Guilty, and so the Sin mirrors itself onto the future: Not only have I sinned, but I will sin again - Sin being, in its very Being, that I have not paid my debt as I ought to have paid it, that I have not lived up to my duty, to the demand made of me. Yet I have not yet "Sinned" in the future, Sin (rather than Sinfulness) referring to that particular action in which Sinfulness manifests itself.
II.
My Guilt is my Guilt towards the future; my Guilt is the fact that there will always be a debt to be paid, a debt unable to be paid in full yet which I must attempt to pay. My Guilty-being in the past is different, taking on the role not of the Debt-Not-Yet-Paid but the Debt-Never-Paid-And-Never-Payable. In its Presence, my Guilt shows itself exactly as that point on which I stand, in a Present which in the Future will be Past, too. The Present becomes then The-Moment-At-Which-I-Must-Pay, a moment of Debt-Payment, of always either paying my debt, answering to the call of duty, or ignoring it. And so the Debt can keep on accumulating itself, and indeed will do so, but can do so to a greater or lesser extent. In the present, I hold in my hands that responsibility which guides and determines both my Debt to be paid now, but also which Debts will have to remain unpaid for all of Eternity.
III.
And so the nature of Forgiveness. For it becomes clear that Forgiveness, too, has a temporal sense, and not a simple one either.
Forgiveness can never be forgiveness presently. And forgiveness of past deeds has a different nature entirely to that of future wrongdoings which lie ahead.
In asking Forgiveness, of course, I ask for both: I ask that Forgiveness of those debts which I did not pay and can never pay, of those wrongdoings that cannot be undone. The fact of the eternal and unrectifiable nature of past Guilt in a sense thus demands of us also that we forgive the Other - the alternative being a life of hatred. On the other hand, it should be clear that no forgiveness can ever be a forgiveness in the sense of "cancelling" the debt unpaid. The Sin and Guilt of the Past do not disappear in their forgiveness, but are merely forgiven - their reality changed in aspect but not substance, the wrongdoing remaining a wrongdoing but becoming now a forgiven one.
And so it seems also clear how the Forgiveness of the Now maps not into the future as a Forgiveness of Sins-to-be-committed, but only a forgiveness in the sense of an acceptance that some Sin will happen, and inevitably so. Forgiveness acts as a recognition of the Same in the Other, that we are Guilty, as Beings, Existing Guiltily. And it is such that, in Penitential Act, we confess to our own Guilt and Sin, confessing in the plurality of our collective Guilty-Being rather than as individuals, and ask simultaneously one another, as one, for Forgiveness. Forgiveness is, at its core, a form of recognition, and only he who understands his own Guilty-Being can thus in truth forgive the Other, namely for that reason that we are one and the same.
IV.
The historical fact of Wrongdoing and Sin survives the giving of Forgiveness; never will I not have done wrong. And so, at the same time, it also serves as a reminder of the Guilt which I suffer and will always suffer, the debt always to be paid. This is a key part of the function of ontic Guilt as it appears to the mind and body of the Guilty in repentance of Sins past. Forgiveness is the way by which ontic Guilt becomes survivable, and in recognising our wrongdoing and having it recognised, we always simultaneously recognise our duty to do better in the future.
And so the nature of the "true" or "good" relation to Guilt also reveals itself, namely in that of recognition and acceptance. Not a passive acceptance, but an active one - an acceptance of the duty which I have and which I must fulfill. Never will my Sins disappear, nor my Guilt. But I can be made to survive it, to be able to live with it. Yet I can never forgive myself, and so we must always recall that you and I are both guilty, and likewise that our debt, in truth, is much the same.