Inquiries Into the Absolute: Digest 130, Mercy Killing

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Digest 130, August 7th, 2005. Answers by His Holiness Romapada Swami Maharaja

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"Mercy" Killing

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Q: If a person is suffering for a long time, 'mercy killing' of that person is

practiced in America. Won't that affect the spiritual life of the person being

killed? How will it affect? Will the doctors also incur sin by this? Please

clarify.

 

Answer:

For clarification sake, I am assuming that your use of the term 'mercy killing'

is restricted to the category of medically assisted suicide.

 

None of us have the right to take the life of another living entity, not only

by ethical standards but by spiritual standards too; the only exception is when

it is specifically sanctioned by scriptures and that also by the authorized

upholders of law only.

 

Suicide -- and therefore likewise 'mercy killing', by logical extension -- is

not condoned by scriptures. By prematurely terminating a person's life, it is

to be understood that we are interfering with their karma. The intended purpose

may be to put an end to the person's suffering; but due to lack of

understanding the soul and its eternal nature such an action in fact prolongs

the person's suffering.

 

By nature's arrangement, the soul is awarded another gross material body after

death. But when life is ended untimely before the end of one's allotted

duration, as in a suicide for instance, it is understood that the person

suffers for the remaining period without having the opportunity for getting

another suitable body. The soul remains in the subtle body in a ghostly form,

which is an unbearable condition of suffering. In addition, they still have to

undergo, in their future life, the due reactions of karma which is the cause of

their present suffering. Thus 'mercy-killing' is not so merciful, after all,

and all parties involved incur stringent reactions.

 

A greater act of compassion for the suffering person is to consider their

ultimate well-being, both in this and future life, by providing spiritual care

and facilitating their final days with some opportunity for devotional

engagement such as hearing the Holy Names and glories of the Lord which alone

can free one from the complicated meshes of pain and death.

 

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Christ, spiritual and material relationships and morality of Lord Krsna's

conjugal pastimes, spiritual master, spirit soul/jiva/living entity):

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