The other day I was watching the Al Pacino-starrer movie "You Dont Know Jack", which was based on Dr Jack Kevorkian also called Dr Death for being the most vociferous voice calling for legalizing mercy-killing or euthanasia of terminally ill people and claiming to have euthanised 130 patients. He was later found guilty and sentenced to jail for 33 years. Although I am not very sure if doctor-assisted suicide of terminally ill people should be allowed, since the individual himself/herself may not be in a position to make rational decision but it reminded of an old question , how can a secular state not only deny right to end one's own life but also criminalize it.
(Check out my earlier post- Musings On Mortality)
Although I started this post with reference to Stoic philosophy, it is also the school that most opposes it.
In fact Stoicism does hold suicide as cowardly and wrong. For is not Stoicism the phrase used today to describe the human trait of being able to endure hardship and pain without flinching or complaining ? Yet, if you look into history of Stoic school, nearly ever major philosopher starting from Zeno of Citium, Cleanthes , Chrysippus , Cato the Younger, Lucretius and Dionysius committed suicide while the reason of the death of most Stoic philosophers is not known. ( read somewhere that Epictetus did it too ) . Seneca, Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius (famous Stoic philosophers) have always held that killing oneself is preferable to living in misery.
So how can a school of thought that criticizes suicide, have almost all great teachers commit suicide ? Perhaps, not all instances in which a person kills himself should be considered suicide. Jainism doesn't consider the practice of Santhara as suicide but an act of religious piety. It is not random but institutionalized with certain procedures to be followed. The main reason why suicide is always considered wrong is because it is seen as a desperate measure by a hopeless persons too cowardly and weak to face harsh reality or suffering from one or more mental illness from an huge list of mental illnesses.
Yet the ancient Romans, Samurai (committing hara-kiri), Janissaries and similar classes were seldom diagnosed with any of these illnesses. It is presumed that a long term process indicates the decision is more rational as opposed to impulsive ones. However, in each of these instances, it is emotion that drives the motive, in a manner glorifying death. But the Stoic view seeks to undermine death, the fear which makes us do a lot of things. True disrespect to death can only come when it comes to be seen as any other incident. Of course it requires wisdom,courage and clarity of thought but they need not be planned. After all, Zeno died by holding his breath after he fell and broke his toe, the next greatest Stoic master Chrysippus died in a fit of laughter !
In fact, in his essay "On Suicide", Arthur Schopenhauer argues that the Stoics considered suicide as a noble and heroic act and law against it imposed by the clergies since neither the Old Testament nor New Testament forbid it. The basic assumption based on which suicide is considered crime is that it always involves violence, even if against self. This assumption may be correct in many instances,such as when self-killing is carried out a fit of rage or anger. But violence is not always necessary.
We must not forget that whether consciously or sub-consciously we fight to stay alive every moment. We fight to live for a purpose and to add some value to the human society. For instance, today itself, anti-corruption activists have gone on fast for an indefinite period unless the government takes urgent steps. Pragmatically speaking, there is very little chance of them starving themselves to death, they are after all leaders,but the very concept involves non-violent sacrifice of self for a noble cause. However in individual cases it becomes difficult to identify, but under no circumstance can the two methods be equated, the latter requires determination and resolve. Perhaps this is what JK Rowling mean't when she wrote, ..he greeted Death as an old friend, and went with him gladly, and, equals...
I began this post with a quote from Harry Potter book, it is only fair that I end it citing another.
"To a well organized mind death is the next great adventure" - Albus Dumbledore, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's stone.
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