[Buddha-l] buddha-l Digest, Vol 99, Issue 8

[Dan Lusthaus]

"An understanding of suicide in the Indian context calls for an appreciation 
of the literary, religious, and cultural ethos of the subcontinent because 
tradition has rarely permeated the lives of people for as long as it has in 
India. Ancient Indian texts contain stories of valor in which suicide as a 
means to avoid shame and disgrace was glorified. Suicide has been mentioned 
in the great epics of Ramayana and Mahabharata. When Lord Sri Ram died, 
there was an epidemic of suicide in his kingdom, Ayodhya. The sage Dadhichi 
sacrificed his life so that the Gods may use his bones in the war against 
the demons. The Bhagavad Gita condemns suicide for selfish reasons and 
posits that such a death cannot have "shraddha', the all-important last 
rites. Brahmanical view had held that those who attempt suicide should fast 
for a stipulated period. Upanishads, the Holy Scriptures, condemn suicide 
and state that 'he who takes his own life will enter the sunless areas 
covered by impenetrable darkness after death'.
However, the Vedas permit suicide for religious reasons and consider that 
the best sacrifice was that of one's own life. Suicide by starvation, also 
known as 'sallekhana', was linked to the attainment of 'moksha' (liberation 
from the cycle of life and death), and is still practiced to this day. Sati, 
where a woman immolated herself on the pyre of her husband rather than live 
the life of a widow and Jahuar (Johar), in which Rajput women killed 
themselves to avoid humiliation at the hands of the invading Muslim armies, 
were practiced until as recently as the early half of the 20th century; 
stray cases continue to be reported"

from

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3554961/



Dan