The Talmud tells the following story in tractate Berachot 10a:
“There were hooligans in Rabbi Meir’s neighborhood who caused him a great deal of anguish. Rabbi Meir prayed for God to have mercy on them, that they should die. Rabbi Meir’s wife, Berurya, said to him: What is your thinking? On what basis do you pray for the death of these hooligans? Do you base yourself on the verse, as it is written: “Let sins cease from the land” (Psalms 104:35), which you interpret to mean that the world would be better if the wicked were destroyed? But is it written, let sinners cease?” Let sins cease, is written. One should pray for an end to their transgressions, not for the demise of the transgressors themselves.”

Though the plain meaning of the text seems to reduce this argument between Rabbi Mayer and his wife Bruria to a grammatical question, the commentaries suggest that their argument is actually about deeper theological issues.

Rabbi Yaakov Lorberbaum of Lissa (1760-1832) suggests that they are arguing as to how far gone these hooligans are with regard to the possibility of t’shuvah, return.   Did they have the ability as yet to change their ways?  The opinion of Beruria was in the affirmative but her husband argued that their wickedness was so ingrained, that they had inherently changed and there was, in actuality, no going back. (This of course is a highly ironic reading since Rabbi Mayer is famous for learning from his teacher Elisha ben Avuyah who was a heretic and at times Rabbi Mayer still encouraged Elisha to repent, though Elisha felt he himself had no hope for repentance.) .

Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook (1865 – 1935), the first chief rabbi of Palestine holds that Rabbi Mayer and Bruria were arguing over the nature of the human soul.  Can it become sullied by sin  that one would be practically unable to repent:  “[The opinion of Beruria was that] there is no wicked person in the world that would not rather choose to go on a good path, but alas their inclination has compelled them to do wrong.  Thus no one is hopeless such that they can not be helped through education, rebuke and guidance…it is impossible for a person to fully erase their essential goodness. (Ayn Ayah, 123)”

In our parsha, Ki Teytzey, the Torah seems to agree with Rav Kook and Bruria.   A verse in Ki Teytzey  instructs:   “If someone is guilty of a capital offense and is put to death …you must not let his corpse remain hanging overnight, but must bury him the same day. For one who is hanging is a degradation to God: you shall not defile the land that the Lord your God is giving you to possess.” (Deut. 21:22)

The talmud understands this verse to mean that when the human, who is made in the image of God, even one who has committed a capital offence, is degraded,  it is a disgrace to God because people will look and say, “ There is the image God hanging”.  No matter how sinful a person is they still retain their image of God, their holy soul, thus the door of repentance and return is always open to us.