UNITED STATES—Even those raised without GOD know the answer to what religion says about killing yourself:
IT’S A SIN!
When I started researching the evolution of this biblical crime, I was surprised to find 7 suicides in the bible, with Abimelech being the first who “self-killed” and Judas being the most known.
Another surprising tidbit? SUICIDE WASN’T ALWAYS CONSIDERED A SIN!
Not only did SOCRATES (depending how you look at it) kill himself, but bibleodyssey.org’s Paul Middleton points out, “carried out for country or friends, or in the face of intolerable pain, incurable disease, devastating misfortune or shame, or to avoid capture on the battlefield, suicide constituted a noble death.”
Basically, if we want to kill ourselves to help someone or justify it’s because of pain, shame, or fear of punishment, it is noble!
That sums up nearly every person who kills themself or wants to!
Of course I am cursed with argumentative disbelief. I was raised by a man that said church was the first form of government, made for a purpose: BY MAN – FOR MAN.
After reading many theological musings, I find this belief that because Jesus died on the cross for you, people can (presumably) just keep sinning?
About.com’s Christianity expert Mary Fairchild evaluates the suicides, agreeing that although tragic, it doesn’t “negate the Lord’s act of redemption”
Yael Shemesh’s Suicide in the Bible identifies 6 cases, with examples of accepted suicide in different cultures, including a Muslim dying a MARTYR even though Islam forbids taking one’s life, and Hindu women killing themselves by cremation as part of their husbands death ceremony.
My thoughts on the biblical reasoning to push the belief of suicide as an unforgivable sin are much more skeptical and dark…Probably even true!
Take a look at George Horton’s Poem Slavery from 1828, epitomizing how death was the only way to break free from cruelties. Writings such as St Augustine’s City Of God (summary) from 5 A.D., talked of “feeble minds” unable to bear “bodily servitude,” and this indicates that services humans could provide were more important than a happy soul.
The same writing that stated women shouldn’t kill themselves to stop being violated, condoned men committing suicide to prevent enemy torture. It doesn’t take much to imagine what life was like for these women who no doubt found it easier to take her own life, rather than be violated in the name of God, family, or perseverance, day after day.
I have come to realize that how God looks upon a person who commits suicide is NOT the problem.
Choosing to take your own life is accepted in other cultures. For example, in Hinduism it is accepted for people “who are tormented by terminal diseases or those who have no desire, ambition or no responsibilities remaining.”
The problem is that death is unpleasant, too costly, or as this NYT article says: people don’t have time for elaborate customs.
Of course, the thought that someone wants to kill themself and subject us to loss and mourning is bothersome and no one really considered legalized suicide a possibility until 2014 when Brittney Maynard’s right to die case became center stage.
We now know we have five states that allow assisted suicide. In California, Oregon, Washington, Vermont, and Montana a person meeting criteria can have lethal doses prescribed and I believe we need DEATH WITH DIGNITY in all states.
There’s 42 million survivors of child sexual abuse living in America: living corpses that are walking around with broken souls, waiting to die. Living in a world where children are aborted as an unwanted but an adult cannot do the same with their own unwanted life. So depressed that many times heroin is the choice.
It’s NOT just degenerative terminal diseases that should be considered eligible for death with dignity.
I want you to remember what I am saying when INITIATIVE 100 is on the ballot.
Think about the money to be saved, if people that didn’t want to be here, didn’t have to be.
Alternatively, think about the lives that could be saved when a depressed individual alerts their unknowing family to serious depression, just by the decision to consider utilizing death with dignity laws. Think of how many kind-hearted people will no longer be tortured by the knowledge that they didn’t know, therefore couldn’t help…
In the end, the best article about suicide for mental health reasons was written the day after Robin Williams died, by Katie Hurley, a writer whose father had done the same. She was in the position of experience, understanding how the “black hole” of depression is a problem hard to crawl out of. Katie left us with words many can agree with:
Suicide is a lot of things, but selfish isn’t one of them.
