ISJS Jainism Study Notes E5 Vol 03

Author(s): International School for Jain Studies
Publisher: International School for Jain Studies

Page 24

SCHOOL
OF
SELF STUDY IS THE SUPREME AUSTERITY
स्वाध्याय
STUDY NOTES version 5.0
their misery considered the human life as a personal affair and disregarded its religious and socio-cultural aspects. In any cultured society a human life is not only a personal matter but also a social one. Human death does not affect only the dying and the dead but also his family, friends, kith and kin and the whole society at large. When a person dies he leaves behind bereaved survivors with whom he has emotional relationships, who feel his absence and mourn for him. There are funeral rites that are attended by others. He leaves behind a society his business associates, co-workers, those with whom he has had financial dealings like the lenders, borrowers, bankers, etc. that are affected in one way or the other. However, the question arises that how much is his obligation to the society at large and to what extent he should suffer for its sake. All his obligations except the emotional ones can be taken care of with due planning and there must come a time when even his near and dear ones and the society must feel that he has suffered enough and call a halt to it by allowing him to get a gift of a painless, peaceful and dignified death.
STUDIES
Painless, peaceful and dignified death to the incurably diseased and immitigably suffering is what is intended by 'Euthanasia', which means 'good death' or 'dying well'. The Oxford Dictionary defines euthanasia as "(bringing about of a) gentle and painless death for a person suffering from a painful incurable disease, extreme old-age, etc". Yet another definition says, "Euthanasia is simply to be able to die with dignity at a moment when life is devoid of it. It is a purely voluntary choice, both on the part of the owner of this life and on the part of the doctor who knows that this is no longer a life."5 When the gift of death is made, with all good intentions, at the sufferer's own request it is referred to as 'voluntary euthanasia' or 'active euthanasia'. However, good intentions notwithstanding, the term are also equally applied to what is known as 'mercy-killing' or 'involuntary euthanasia' or 'passive euthanasia'. In this sense, too, it is intended to ease the sufferings of those sufferers such as the mind-dead victims of accidents, physically deformed and mentally incapacitated babies and others who are not in a position to make a request. On the other hand the tyrannical regimes apply it to take the lives of the old, the mentally retarded and other unwanted members of society, which are nothing but culpable homicides amounting to murders.
4 Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary of Current English, Oxford, 1990, p. 411.
5Face To Face, John and Perry, p. 515. (Q. Philosophical Study of Sallekhana), Chougule P.B., Ph. D. Thesis, Shivaji University, Kolhapur, 2001, p. 221.
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