BETRAYAL

I want to write about betrayal. What of it? What is it? How do we live with it? In Dante's "Inferno," it is the greatest sin relegated to the lowest level of hell, where Lucifer is trapped in ice for all eternity. He flaps his wings to free himself, which traps him even more firmly. In his mouth he eternally gnaws on Judas Iscariot, Brutus and Cassius--others who betrayed their masters.
    Obviously, Dante considered betrayal a"sin." Though "sin" has religious associations, it can be understood as essentially a transgression which crosses what was thought of as an inviolable boundary. Betrayal can be thought of as the greatest degree of transgression, for no matter how justified, when all is said and done, there is always collateral damage which can reverberate for the betrayed—sometimes for the rest of their lives. One can feel betrayal only if there was love and trust, and a stated or perceived commitment involved. Betrayal breaks that trust and retracts the commitment.
    It has been said that the only thing a betrayer ultimately betrays is his conscience (Joseph Conrad). That is assuming the betrayer has a conscience—sometimes yes, sometimes no. The betrayer may feel there is no other choice, circumstances have changed and he will become what has imagined only if he casts aside a vow or the one person who has trusted and loved him to the point of being vulnerable. Loving is vulnerability. Nevertheless, betrayal is a kind death, perhaps to both the betrayer and the betrayed, but for the betrayed it is the death of trust and of hope, that “thing with feathers, that perches on the soul” (Emily Dickinson). For the betrayed it may feel like and can be a death of the soul or the ability to trust anyone and anything again.
    Looking from another perspective, Barbara Kingsolver notes that "Every betrayal contains a perfect moment, a coin stamped heads or tails with salvation on the other side."  Salvation for the betrayer and maybe even for the betrayed--a paradox. The betrayer may feel he had no choice but to do the thing he had to do, while the betrayed may come to see what the reality had been all along, or what part he may have played in the inevitable--enabling or giving power to another, and that the answers to “why?” and “how?” were there all along. The betrayed's trust might have been misplaced with a person ultimately incapable of commitment, loyalty or sacrifice? And who of us can say for certain that, under certain circumstances, we might also find ourselves incapable?
    And who truly knows the nature and implications of betrayal? Except in one case—one of the most well-known betrayals which Dante included in his Divine Comedy-- that of Judas Iscariot (for a few silver coins). Here the paradoxical circumstances are clear: a predestined fate for both. Judas Iscariot was an unknowing instrument in betrayal, setting into motion the foretold and inevitable deed, sentencing his friend and teacher to death. On the other side of Judas’s betrayal was said to be salvation for humanity and redemption for the original sin of disobedience in the Garden of Eden, as the story goes. Of course, the rebellion of Lucifer after creation is also a well-known in Judaeo-Christian story, also an analogy to human compromises we make for control and independence, as Lucifer states in Milton's Paradise Lost. "Better to reign in hell than to serve in heaven." Both Judas/Christ and the God/Lucifer betrayals are paradoxes, and perhaps most betrayals are.
    Unfortunately, or fortunately (and maybe also foretold and inevitable) in our own mortal stories, neither betrayer nor betrayed sees or fully understands the nature of the betrayal, neither the paradoxes nor the consequences which may, in the end, be "for the best" bringing about some greater good and further the purpose of being human: consciousness.
    Nevertheless, the betrayed must endure the pain and suffering of i and sometimes other experiences its collateral damage of the betrayal
The real question is, will the betrayed also be able to say, as Christ did on the cross of his betrayers, “Forgive them, for they know not what they do."