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Sallekhanā is not Suicide
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the sanctity of law and as the same would be unenforcible by any authority or in any court of law.
The practice of Sallekhanā cannot interfere with public order, health or morality. In fact, any person observing a monk or a nun practising the vow of Sailekhana will feel spiritually elevated and ethically purified at the sight of one who has renounced all the worldly belongings and desires, and whose sole objective is to attain salvation by being liberated from the travails of the body. Such a sight would be edifying to the individual and a lesson on piety to the society.
It is impossible for each and everybody, to adopt the vow of Sallekhanā because it requires the devotee to possess an unshakeable conviction that the soul and the body are separate, that the body is the result of accumulated karmas and that liberation from karmas is possible only by an austere life of supreme conduct founded on right faith and knowledge.
The vow is adopted by a person who has purified his mind and body by austerity, repentance and forgiveness; has freed himself from all passions and afflictions; and has ceas. ed to have any attachment towards men and matters in the world. With ill-will or malice towards none, he stands detached from the world and becomes deeply engrossed in meditation on his self which is perfect knowledge and bliss. He meets death with joy, engrossed in the purest form of meditation.
uch death is the death of liberation and not of bondage as is the case with suicide; it is spiritual or pious death, being sanctioned by religion, consistent with the highest code of spiritual knowledge and conduct.
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