Suicide: Is it justifiable?

Can we justify suicide? That is, under certain circumstances, can we say that to commit suicide or to take away one's own life, is alright?

For example in the Western countries, especially in the Scandinavian countries, it is legally permissible to kill oneself if the party desires so. A qualified and authorized doctor can administer the required lethal injection so that the party dies. It is usually resorted to in cases of ailments like cancer, where a patient’s end has come and she or he is in the third stage of cancer, where it is incurable and the only hope from the painful existence is death. By natural means that death might come in three weeks or take more time. Why should the patient suffer the pain for that long? So, one decides to take one’s own life to escape the misery of a painful and lingering death. It is almost like putting down a horse that has injured itself and will not be able to take part in the finest of races or like putting down to sleep your pet dog which is suffering due to some disease or the other. Of course in the latter two cases, one does not feel a pang of guilt, but out of compassion for the pet animal, people end their lives. Can we apply the same logic to a suffering human being?

A Hindu might say that it is wrong to kill oneself like that before one’s time, for a person has to pay the penalty for the wrong deeds (karma) committed in the previous lives (janma). Otherwise the bad deed will follow in the next birth also, and the person will in any case have to pay the penalty in the next life. One might as well pay it up in this life. To put it in another way, it can be argued that even if that person commits suicide in this life, there is always a hope of another life (next incarnation), where things could be better!

According to Jain religion, a minority religion in India, their Dharma allows people to voluntarily end their lives by refusing to take medicines or food or even water, especially if they are old and weak and feel that they have done their duties on earth and that now their time to go to the other world has come. In the recent interesting case of Santhara, the religions ritual of Jains of fasting unto death, which was questioned in the High Court and declared wrong by a Divisional Bench of High  Court in Rajasthan, was set aside by the Supreme court of India, restoring the religious rights of Jain community. The petitioner against Santhara ritual claimed that it was a ploy to kill off the now burdensome old and aged parents. The usually very gentle and penitential Jain community resented this and took a public procession to express their unhappiness over the issue.

In Japan we know of the famous ritual ‘harakiri,’ where by a person can take his life by plunging in the knife onto his stomach region, to restore honor to his family or clan.

Legally, all over the world, suicide or attempt to kill oneself is a crime. This of course is the result of Judaeo-Christian ethics, as spread over the world by the British in it’s hey days of colonialism. In India too, the prevailing legal scenario considers suicide as a crime and even the abettors are booked for the offence of spurring the victim to commit suicide.

Analyzing the roots of this mind-set, one goes to the Bible, which is the basis of Judaeo-Christian ethics, to see what it has to say about suicide or the right to take one’s own life. Genesis 1:27 says that 

‘God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.’ 

If this is so, then human beings are special, having been created to reflect the image and attributes of God Himself and of course, it also means that their lives are precious in the eyes of God, their Creator. So it was forbidden to kill a person, and shed his/her blood. In Genesis 9:6, it is written, 

"Whoever sheds man's blood,

By man his blood shall be shed;

For in the image of God 

He made man."

Hence came the law of 

'life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand,... '

in Exodus 21:23-24. It is further said in Exodus 20:13, 

"You shall not murder." 

According to an understanding of this provision, no one has the right to take the life of another person or oneself. It is 'blood-guiltiness,' and will have to be punished. Suicide is murder of a human being by himself/herself and it is wrong. We have no right to take the life of any person, whether some body else's or our own. In the eyes of God, our Creator, we stand guilty for such an offence. 

I am hoping that people who read this blog will know and understand that to take a life, even if it is one's own life, is wrong and not acceptable before God, our Creator and spread the word, and be a counseling agent to such people, who are at the verge of committing suicide and help save them from this error. 

God be with you.