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This article studies forgiveness and reconciliation (F/R) in patients with cancer. It focuses on the end of life, when family conflicts resurface and unfinished business challenges patients and causes spiritual distress. Forgiveness and reconciliation may intensify patient–family relationships and facilitate peace of mind and peaceful death. Existing forgiveness models and interventions focus on coping in life, yet no study has examined F/R processes until death. Our mixed-method exploratory study hypothesized that F/R processes occur in phases, repeatedly, and are spurred by approaching death. Three interdisciplinary units at a major Swiss hospital observed 50 dying patients with cancer experiencing severe conflicts with relatives, themselves, and/or with fate/God. Participant observation was combined with interpretative phenomenological analysis and descriptive statistical analysis. A semi-structured observation protocol was developed based on a 5-phase model. The protocol included space for notes (emotions, interventions, effects on dying processes). It was assessed by 20 professionals for 1 year. Analysis was supported by international interdisciplinary experts. We found that conflicts were complex and involved relational, biographical, and spiritual layers. In 62% of patients, F/R processes occurred repeatedly. Many patients died after finding F/R (22 within 48 hours). Patients indicated that imminent death, a mediating third party, acceptance, and experiences of hope motivated them to seek F/R. Although deep relationships may support F/R processes, our limited data on near-death experience/spiritual experiences restrict interpretation. Forgiveness and reconciliation processes oscillate between 5 phases: denial, crisis, experience of hope, decision, and finding F/R. Understanding F/R processes, empathy, hope, and a neutral third party may support patients in seeking forgiveness.

In the introduction to the Leviathan, Hobbes famously defends the anthropological point of departure of his theory of the state by invoking the Delphic injunction ‘Know thyself!’ of which he presents a peculiar reading thereafter. In this paper, I present a reading of the anthropology of the Leviathan that takes this move seriously. In appealing to Delphic injunction, Hobbes wanted to prompt a particular way of reading his anthropology for which it is crucial that the reader relate the presented anthropological views to his self‐conception. The anthropology of the Leviathan is thus a kind of manual for a certain kind of self‐reflection by which the reader's self‐knowledge is to be improved. Furthermore, I will argue that Hobbes' interpretation of the Delphic injunction illuminates several theoretical issues relevant to the epistemology of that kind of ‘self‐knowledge’ that was demanded by the Delphic injunction. While Hobbes does not solve all the epistemological problems related with the ideal appealed to by this inscription, he does provide some interesting insights into some general requirements that any epistemological account of Socratic self‐knowledge has to meet.

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It is not clear that art ever offers anything like knowledge. But if it does, then one should perhaps look to the self-portrait. The self-portrait is an image of an individual created by that individual, in modern times with the aid of a mirror or a camera. Self-scrutiny in a mirror, and the effort to fix the mirror image in paint or chalk, may bring understanding about the self and its social entanglement in poses and expressions. Even study of a self-portrait produced with little effort, for example, with a camera held at arm's length, may yield insights into aspects of character and personality masked by social performance. The possibilities and the limits of selfknowledge through self-portraiture are discussed with reference to an etched self-portrait by Rembrandt and to its democratic descendant, the "selfie."