Forgiveness takes place in time. Obviously. But I shall explore the temporally extended nature of forgiveness with two particular aims in mind. First, the aim of explaining how forgiveness that must be earned through the culprit’s remorse is of the same moral genus as forgiveness whose distinct value resides precisely in the fact that the culprit has done nothing whatever to earn it. And second, the aim of explaining how acts of forgiveness can be acts of social construction, both in relation to the wrongdoer and in relation to the forgiver. Moreover, once we have these constructive mechanisms clearly in view, we are in a position to explain how certain deformations or corruptions of either kind of forgiveness are the result of their intrinsic proneness to such corruptions.