Meaning of 意義があるかどうかは自分で判断しないかもしれません


I understand what 判断する means e.g.

彼は人を見た目で判断しない - He does not judge people by appearances.

However, I'm failing to understand what is being meant by 自分で判断しないかもしれません in
the last part of this exchange.

自分で判断しない from my understanding means something like "to not decide by
oneself". However I think I am missing something to help me understand what
she is trying to say.

A little bit of extra context:

  * 神奈様 is actually a God who wants to live as a human (and currently is) for reasons currently unknown to the reader.
  * Person 1 is the new 巫女 at the 神社 who realises that is it 'empty'
  * Person 2, not much is known about them.

> Person 2「神奈様は人として生きたがっています」
>
> Person 1 「それは私も伺いました」
>
> Person 2「それっていけないことなんですか？」
>
> Person 1 「そう願うことは悪いことではないでしょう。ですが、そこには神奈さんが神であるという厳然たる事実が立ち塞がります」
>
> Person 2「『生まれ』からは逃れられないということですか」
>
> Person 1 「あなたは、神奈さんに逃げてほしいと思いますか？」
>
> Person 2「っ……それは……」
>
> Person 1 「本当に考えなければならないことというのは、時に心を苛みます」
>
> Person 1 「ですから、味方が必要なのです。でも、耳に心地よいことばかり言う者が味方とは限りません」
>
> Person 1「対決しなければならない敵は自分――自らをそこに追いこむことはなかなか難しいことです」
>
> Person 2 「あなたはいやがられても、神奈様のためになることをするというのですか？」
>
> Person 1 「必要とあらば。でも、それに **意義があるかどうかは自分で判断しないかもしれません** 」
>
> Person 2「…………よく、わかりません。言ってることが難しいです……」




While I somewhat sympathize with Person 2 here (the line _is_ pretty cryptic),
language-wise, what Person 1 is saying is relatively straightforward. Taken at
face value, what she says is that she might not make an attempt to determine
whether her course of action has meaning or not, i.e. something along the
lines of “However, I might not (try to) determine/judge/decide whether there
is meaning to that or not”.

Since she explicitly says「自分で」, it may be that she relies on something else
(the traditional teachings of her religion, the opinion of her peers, the
voice of a higher entity etc) to guide her, and she might not make any
attempts to question this source of guidance of her own volition. The source
of guidance could also simply be a deep-rooted cognitive habit (a 'personality
trait'), i.e. this course of action might be her default choice for no
identifiable reason, and she might never have thought to doubt its validity.
Another possibility is that she actually lacks the ability to make such
decisions for some as-of-yet unknown reason.

Here,「かもしれない」is used in its usual sense ("maybe", "perhaps", "I guess", "it is
possible that"...), i.e. it introduces an element of uncertainty. This could
literally mean that she isn't sure of whether her statement is true or not, or
she might be using it out of reluctance to accept her own statement, or she
might be using it to deliberately confuse Person 2 / to keep them in the dark,
etc.

Either way, this is about as much as you can infer at this point.




While I somewhat sympathize with Person 2 here (the line _is_ pretty cryptic),
language-wise, what Person 1 is saying is relatively straightforward. Taken at
face value, what she says is that she might not make an attempt to determine
whether her course of action has meaning or not, i.e. something along the
lines of “However, I might not (try to) determine/judge/decide whether there
is meaning to that or not”.

Since she explicitly says「自分で」, it may be that she relies on something else
(the traditional teachings of her religion, the opinion of her peers, the
voice of a higher entity etc) to guide her, and she might not make any
attempts to question this source of guidance of her own volition. The source
of guidance could also simply be a deep-rooted cognitive habit (a 'personality
trait'), i.e. this course of action might be her default choice for no
identifiable reason, and she might never have thought to doubt its validity.
Another possibility is that she actually lacks the ability to make such
decisions for some as-of-yet unknown reason.

Here,「かもしれない」is used in its usual sense ("maybe", "perhaps", "I guess", "it is
possible that"...), i.e. it introduces an element of uncertainty. This could
literally mean that she isn't sure of whether her statement is true or not, or
she might be using it out of reluctance to accept her own statement, or she
might be using it to deliberately confuse Person 2 / to keep them in the dark,
etc.

Either way, this is about as much as you can infer at this point.

