Talk:Death by Suicide and Euthanasia

By Vishal Agarwal

In general, suicide as a means of escaping one’s responsibilities and challenges of life is considered a sin. Hindu tradition states that no funeral ceremonies or annual post-mortem ceremonies be performed for someone who has committed suicide, except if it is one’s mother. Sons are obligated to perform the funeral and post-funeral rites of their mother, no matter what.

There are no injunctions against suicide in the Vedic scriptures as such but some passages are interpreted to prohibit suicides by later commentators or authors of Dharma digests. For instance, Medhātithi, in his commentary on Manusmriti, interprets a verse of Yajurveda as an injunction against suicide, and as a damnation to hell for such people. The actual context however shows that the verse merely admonishes people who spend their entire lives in pleasures of the flesh and have no spiritual dimension in their lives.

The injunctions against suicide are meant to dissuade individuals from taking this drastic step. In some Dharmashāstras (e.g. Kātyāyana), even the community in which a suicide has occurred is subjected to a fine. This seems to be an acknowledgement of the failure of the community in preventing or its complicity in causing the suicide.

If a man survives after a suicide attempt, the Dharmashāstras (Yama Smriti 20-24) enjoin him to pay a fine, and also enjoin that his children and friends must also pay a fine to the state. Then, both the survivor of the suicide attempt, and his children and friends are required to perform penances. Others are asked to shun such families and not dine or dwell with them. Parāshara Smriti 4.4 states that a Brahmana who touches the corpse of a person that has died by hanging himself becomes impure and has to perform an expiation to regain his purity. Vishnu Dharma Sutra 22.56 states that no water is offered in the funeral ceremony of the person who has committed suicide. In general, suicide is considered a papa-karma (evil act with negative karmic consequences) because the human body is a gift and one ought to use it for making progress on the paths of Dharma and Moksha-

“Suicide is evil,” think in this way, I do not wish to end my body. I am fearful that if I commit suicide, I might be reborn in an even lower life-form. Mahābhārata 14.180.20

One cannot escape the effects of prior Karma through suicide. He can only delay them or split them between multiple lives. Several Hindu scriptures also warn that because suicide often results after a period of intense, uncontrollable emotions, the person might transfer into the ‘Preta-Yoni’ for eons after his death before he overcomes this state and is able to reborn.

Several exceptions to this general rule (“suicide is an evil act”) are given in Hindu scriptures, or permitted in the Hindu tradition. These cases are not regarded as ‘suicide’ (ātmahatyā) but rather as ‘self-sacrifice’ (ātmatyāga):

1. Sacrifice of their lives by soldiers during warfare.
2. Hindus are allowed to commit suicide to escape capture by an invading army. In particular, in medieval times, the Hindu womenfolk committed a mass suicide by immolating themselves before their city fell to invading Islamic invaders. For example, in the 13th century, an estimated 24000 Hindu women of the western Indian city of Jaisalmer committed a mass suicide, while their menfolk were killed in the battle for defending their city. They did so out of the fear (resulting from historical instances) that as war booty, they will be sexually abused by the Muslim soldiers, sold off as sex slaves in markets in other Muslim nations or that even their dead bodies might be defiled by the invaders. In parallel, their husbands would fight to their deaths. The ‘suicide-pact’ between Hindu wives and husbands engaged in saving their honor, religion and their homes in the face of Islamic invasions was referred to as ‘Jauhar-Shākā’ with ‘Jauhar’ referring to the self-immolation of wives and other women, and ‘Shākā’ referring to the fight till death of the outnumbered Hindu husbands and other males.
3. Brāhmaṇas are allowed to commit suicide as an atonement of serious crimes (such as murder), rather than suffer capital punishment from the state. Modern India is a secular state and this option is no longer permissible. A celebrated case is that of the Hindu philosopher Kumārila Bhatta who immolated himself in a slow burning fire to atone for his treacherous behavior towards his Buddhist Gurus.
4. As an atonement by non-Brāhmaṇas for committing heinous crimes. For example, several verses of Yājnavalkya Smriti (3.247-248) prescribe suicide to atone for the sin of murdering a Brahmana.
5. Hindu monks are allowed to terminate their lives by immersion in water or a sealed cave or by self-immolation when they believe that their worldly obligations are over. Many notable examples of Hindu saints ending their lives this way are recorded in our tradition. E.g., Saint Jnaneshvar (12-13th cent.) ended his life by entering an underground cave, whose mouth was then sealed at his request. A variant of this is monks engaging in intense meditation that could result in death as well. (E.g. Devarāhā Bābā in 1990).
6. Individuals suffering from incurable and painful diseases can end their lives (euthanasia). An ancient sacred tree (it is mentioned as an ancient tree even in scriptures that are 2000 years old) named Akshayavata in the holy city of Allahabad attracted numerous such patients who jumped into the Ganges from its branches.
7. Aged people tormented by the terminal, painful and incurable illnesses of old age may request assistance to end their lives and refuse any medical treatment (similar to hospice).
8. When death is imminent, some people refuse any further food or life prolonging medical treatment and choose to depart from their dying bodies on their own terms, willfully.
9. A small portion (less than 0.1%) of widows immolated themselves on their husband’s funeral pyre. It was believed that this sacrifice propelled the couple to a long stay in heaven, although several authoritative Hindu scriptures either ignore this practice or even condemn it. The practice was legally banned in British India in 1829 CE and even earlier in the territories of the Peshwā rulers. Several commentators on Dharma like Medhatithi condemned it as did Hindu saints like Bhagavān Swaminarayan.
10. Fast unto death to seek redress from injustice is mentioned and permitted in Hindu codes of Dharma. This was popularized in recent times by Mahatma Gandhi who often took a fast unto death against the British Rule to protest against their unjust policies. The fast is broken only if the oppressor addresses and remedies the cause of the grievance.
11. Passive resistance against violent aggression: Hinduism stresses a lot on non-violence, and in modern times, Mahatma Gandhi even used it as a tool to counter violence and aggression. In the 14th century, 12000 Hindu monks, priests and laity offered passive resistance by forming a noncombatant wall to oppose the Islamic invaders lead by Ulugh Khan who were attacking the Srirangam temple. They were butchered to mercilessly, but in the meantime, another party of Hindus managed to smuggle out sacred icons from the temple to a safe location.
12. Offer one’s life to save that of a worthy as indicated in the following verse- Those who lose their life while protecting a cow, a Brahmana, a King, a friend, their wealth or their wife go to heaven. Vishnu Dharma Sutra 3.45
13. In the Jain tradition, it is considered meritorious to end one’s life by slow starvation (‘Sallekhana’, or ‘santhārā’). Jains are very pacifist people and abhor violence and injury to all creatures. Since even normal day to day living involves injury and violence to other creatures, this mode of slow starvation is considered an atonements for all these sins of violence and injury (even though it might have been unintentional and involuntary). This practice still exists although instances are rare.
14. As a part of rituals performed towards the end of one’s life: Ancient Hindu scriptures mention the Sārasvata and Drāshadvata rituals in which the aged performer of the sacred rite followed the course of sacred rivers towards their sources in the high and cold Himalayas, where he may have eventually given up his life. Likewise, a Smriti says- The Vānaprastha can proceed in the Īshāna direction, living on wind alone, till his body fails. Yājnavalkya Smriti 3.55b

Such exceptions were not considered sins or suicide, and the individual indulging in these was entitled to all religious ceremonies upon his/her death. The current Indian laws derive in large part from British colonial laws which are themselves based on the Justinian Code that considered all acts of suicide as a sin. But as seen above, the traditional Hindu law and customs allowed for several exceptions.

But outside these exceptions, suicide in general was considered an evil act with negative karmic consequences.