In the LDS Church, when a person teaches the principle of forgiveness, we often hear about the importance of forgetting the acts or events that caused the offense. My impression is that this supposed doctrine or principle has arisen based on the commonly-heard but non-scriptural saying “forgive and forget.”

We also often hear the negative example of someone who stubbornly states “I will forgive but I will never forget.” This is considered a negative example because it is obvious from the tone of what is being stated that resentment still exists and that forgiveness is not in fact taking place.

I can understand why that attitude is a problem and why this negative example is used.

However, I am less sure about the scriptural foundations of this “forgive and forget” idea. As far as I know, there is no scripture in the canon that teaches us that we should forget any thing.

The common scriptural injunction and emphasis, in fact, is to remember and not to forget. But what are we commanded to remember? We are told to remember God, to remember Jesus, to remember our covenants, etc.

So I don’t think we forgive because we forget something that has happened - rather, we should forgive because of the things we are commanded to remember - the things we are commanded to contemplate continuously. Perhaps the most important thing we are commanded to remember is the atonement of Jesus Christ, what He did for us in the garden of Gethsemene and on the cross.

Laying the scriptural approach aside at least momentarily, I also want to make another point. I don’t think it’s actually possible, in many instances, to forget something that has happened - particularly something that was painful. Often, maybe without consciously choosing to do so, we will mentally revisit negative experiences in our lives and mull them over.

This doesn’t mean that the “forgive and forget” saying is foolish or lacks application. Rather, I think to “forget” in this context is meant to signify that a person has arrived at a place where he or she will not actively and consciously dwell on a negative memory or experience that had previously created feelings of offense. Instead, feelings of anger and distress are replaced with a desire to forgive and a desire to feel peace.