I. INTRODUCTION: THE ETHICS OF SUICIDE
II. SELECTIONS
Egyptian Didactic Tale (c. 1937-1759 B.C.)
Dialogue of a Man With His Soul
The Vedas, and Upanishads, and Purana (c. 1500-c.500 B.C.)
Rigveda
Chandogya Upanishad
Isha Upanishad
Brahma Purana
Padma Purana
Skanda Purana
Jabala Upanishad
The Hebrew Bible and Apocrypha (c. 12-1st centuries B.C.)
Genesis: The Prohibition of Bloodshed
Exodus: The Ten Commandments
Judges: Samson and the Philistines
I Samuel-II Samuel: Saul and his Armor-Bearer
Job: The Sufferings of Job
Daniel: Shadrach, Meschach, Abednego and the Fiery Furnance
II Maccabees: The Suicide of Razis
Homer (c. 8th century B.C.)
The Iliad: The Deaths of Hector and Achilles
Dharmashastra (c. 600 B.C.-200 A.D.)
Gautama Sutra
Apastamba Sutra
Vasishtha Sutra
Laws of Manu
Vishnu Smriti
The Jain Tradition (599-527 B.C. to 5th century A.D.)
Acaranga Sutra: The Seventh Lecture, called Liberation
Upasaka-Dasah: Ten Chapters on Lay Attenders: The Story of Ananda
Tattvartha Sutra: Passionless End is Not Suicide
Confucius (551-479 B.C.)
The Analects
The Book of Filial Piety
Sophocles (c. 496-406 B.C.)
Euripides (c. 484-406 B.C.)
Suppliant Women: The Suicide of Evadne, Watched by her Father
The Hippocratic Corpus (c. 450-c.350 B.C.)
The Hippocratic Oath
About Maidens
Plato (c. 424-c. 348 B.C.)
Apology: Socrates on Being Condemned to Death
Phaedo: The Death of Socrates
The Republic: On Medicine
The Laws: Recidivist Criminals and Penalties for Suicide
Aristotle (384-322 B.C.)
Mencius (c. 372-c. 289 B.C.)
Qu Yuan (c. 340-278 B.C.)
Chrysippus (c. 280-c. 206 B.C.)
The Stoics’ Five Reasons for Suicide
Sima Qian (c. 145/135-86 B.C.)
Records of the Grand Historian
The Basic Annals of Xiang Yu
The Assassin and his Sister
Letter in Reply to Ren Shaoqing
Cicero (106-43 B.C.)
Tusculan Disputations
On Ends
On Old Age
The Questions of King Milinda (c. 100 B.C.)
Livy (59 B.C.-17 A.D.)
The History of Rome: The Rape of Lucretia
Seneca (4 B.C.-65 A.D.)
Letter 70: On the Proper Time to Slip the Cable
Letter 77: On Taking One’s Own Life
Letter 78: On the Healing Power of the Mind
Valerius Maximus (fl. c. 14-c. 37)
Pliny the Elder (23-79)
Of God
Nature of the Earth
What Diseases are Attended with the Greatest Pain
Ignatius of Antioch (c. 35/50-c. 107)
Josephus (37-c. 100)
The Defeat at Jotapata
The Fall of Masada
Plutarch (c. 46-c. 120)
Moralia: The Women of Miletus
Parallel Lives: Cato the Younger
The New Testament (c. 50-c. 125)
Matthew: The Death of Jesus and the Suicide of Judas
Acts: Paul Prevents a Suicide
I Corinthians: The Body as Temple
Philippians: Paul in Prison: On the Desire to Die
Lotus Sutra (c. 50-c. 200)
Former Affairs of the Bodhisattva Medicine King
Tacitus (c. 55-c. 117)
The Annals: The Death of Seneca
Epictetus (c. 55-c. 135)
How From the Doctrine of Our Relationship to God We Are To Deduce its Consequences
How We Should Bear Illness
Of Freedom
Pliny the Younger (62-113)
To Calestrius Tiro
To Catilius Severus
To Marcilius Nepos
To Calpurnius Macer
Justin Martyr (c. 100-165)
The Second Apology: Why Christians Do Not Kill Themselves
Clement of Alexandria (c. 150-c.215)
The Praises of Martyrdom
Those Who Offered Themselves for Martyrdom Reproved
Tertullian (c. 160-c. 220)
To the Martyrs
The Crown of Martyrdom
Bhagavad-Gita (3rd century)
Genesis Rabbah (compiled 3rd-5th century)
Plotinus (204-270)
On Happiness
On the Primal Good and Secondary Forms of Good
“The Reasoned Dismissal“
Lactantius (c. 240-c. 320)
Eusebius (c. 260-339)
Ambrose (337/340-397)
Of Virgins: Letter to Marcellina
Augustine (354-430)
The City of God
On Free Choice of the Will
The Babylonian Talmud (3rd-6th centuries)
Bava Kamma
Avodah Zarah
Gittin
Semahot
Bana (c. 595-c. 655)
Harsha-Carita, The Death of the Great King: On Sati
Kadambari
The Quran (traditional date c. 632-c. 650)
Surahs 2.54, 2.154, 2.195, 2.209, 3.145, 3.169-70, 4.29-30, 4.66, 4.74-80, 9.111, 18.6
Hadith: The Sayings of Muhammad (7th-9th century)
Ya’qub al-Qirqisani (c. 890-c. 960)
The Book of Lighthouses and Watchtowers
Ahmad ibn Fadlan (fl. 920s)
The Risala: By the River Volga, 922: Viking Ship Burial
Abu Hayyan al-Tawhidi (c. 923-1023)
Jetsun Milarepa (c. 1052-c. 1135)
Abu-Hamid Muhammad al-Ghazali (1056-1111)
Revival of the Religious Sciences
Tosafot (12-14th centuries)
On Avodah Zarah 18a
On the Torah: Concerning Genesis Rabbah (Genesis 9:5)
Henry de Bracton (c. 1210-1268)
On the Laws and Customs of England: Where a Man Commits Felony Upon His Own Person
The Norse Sagas (c. 1220-c. 1400)
Ynglinga Saga: Odin Marks Himself with a Spear
Gautrek’s Saga: The Family Cliff
Njal’s Saga: The Burning of Njal
Thomas Aquinas (c. 1225-1274)
Summa Theologiae: Whether One is Allowed to Kill Oneself
Angela of Foligno (c. 1248-1309)
The Book of Divine Consolation of the Blessed Angela of Foligno
Abu’Abd Allah Muhammad ibn Batutta (1304-1368/69)
Rihla: On Sati and Religious Suicide
Thomas More (1478-1535)
Utopia
A Dialogue of Comfort Against Tribulation
Martin Luther (1483-1546)
Francisco de Vitoria (c. 1483/92-1546)
Lecture on Homicide
Commentary on [Thomas Aquinas] Summa Theologiae IIa II ae Q. 64 A.5
John Calvin (1509-1564)
Solomon ben Jehiel Luria (1510-1573)
Yam shel Shelomoh On Bava Kamma 8:59
Central and South American Indigenous Cultures (documented 1519-1621)
CENTRAL AMERICA
Aztec
Codex Chimalpopoca: The Death of Quetzalcoatl (1570)
Letters from Mexico (Hernán Cortés, 1519-20)
General History of the Things of New Spain (Bernardino de Sahagún, c. 1565)
The Festival in the Month of Tóxcatl
The Sun, Moon, and Stars, and the Binding of the Years
Chimalpopoca’s Victory in Death (Juan de Torquemada, 1609-15)
In Defense of the Indians (Bartolomé de Las Casas, 1548-1550)
Maya
History of the Twins Hunahpu and Xbalanque
How the People Obtained Fire (dictated in K’iche’, c. 1554-1558; Francisco Ximénez, c. 1701)
An Account of the Affairs of Yucatán
Ixtab: Goddess of the Gallows (Diego de Landa, c. 1570)
CARIBBEAN PEOPLES
Natural History of the West Indies
Suicide on the Death of the Chief (Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo, 1526)
La Historia General de las Indias
Suicide, Smallpox, and the Arrival of the Spaniards (Francisco López de Gómara, 1552)
Suffering at the Hands of the Spaniards (Girolamo Benzoni, 1565)
SOUTH AMERICA
The Incas
The Incas: The Burial of Wives (Pedro de Cieza de León, 1553)
Natural & Moral History of the Indies
Of Superstitions They Used to the Dead (José de Acosta, 1589)
The Extirpation of Idolatry in Peru
What Those Who Hang Themselves Really Are (Pablo José de Arriaga, 1621)
Michel de Montaigne (1533-1592)
Of Cannibals
A Custom of the Island of Cea
Abu’l Fazl ibn Mubarak (1551-1602)
Biography of the Emperor Akbar: On Jauhar and Saka
John Donne (1572-1631)
Robert Burton (1577-1640)
John Sym (1581c.-1638)
Lifes Preservative Against Self-Killing
Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679)
Leviathan
A Dialogue of the Common Laws of England
Baruch Spinoza (1632-1677)
Samuel von Pufendorf (1632-1694)
Of the Law of Nature and Nations
John Locke (1632-1704)
Of the State of Nature
Of Slavery
Samuel Pepys (1633-1703)
Huang Liuhong (1633-c. 1710)
A Complete Book Concerning Happiness and Benevolence
North American Indigenous Cultures (documented 1635-1970)
NORTHEAST
Ojibwa
Mrs. Cochran Becoming a Windigo (R. Landes, 1932-1935)
Micmac
The Gaspesians: Suicide, Shame, and Despair (Chrestien Le Clercq, 1675-1686)
Huron
Le Jeune’s Relation (Jean de Brebeuf; Father Paul Le Jeune 1635-1636)
The Suicide of Children (Anthony F.C. Wallace, citing LeMercier, 1600s)
Iroquois
Suicide (Father Joseph François Lafitau, 1712-17)
Suicide of the Widowed (Baron de Lahontan, 1703)
The Song of Death (Baron de Lahontan, 1703)
Seneca
Murder and Suicide (Mrs. Mary Jemison, 1817)
The Code of Handsome Lake (Edward Cornplanter, Arthur C. Parker, 1850, 1913)
The Suicide as Earthbound (Jesse Cornplanter)
SOUTHEAST
Cherokee
Varieties of Shame: Time of Death, Pollution, and the Disfigurement of Smallpox (James Adair, 1775)
Natchez
The Favorite Wife of the Chief Sun (Jean-Bernard Bossu, 1751-1762)
GREAT PLAINS
Comanche
Elderly Persons “Thrown Away” (Ernest Wallace & Edward Adamson Hoebel, 1933, 1945)
Suicide from Overwhelming Shame (Edward Adamson Hoebel, 1940)
Arapaho
The Rarity of Suicide; When the Camp Moved (M. Inez Hilger, 1935-1942)
Sioux
Suicide among Sioux Women (John Bradbury, 1809-1811)
Cheyenne
Two Twists in Battle (Karl N. Llewellyn and Edward Adamson Hoebel, 1941)
Mandan
Smallpox and the End of a Household (Alfred W. Bowers, 1930-1931)
Crow
Crazy-Dog Wishing to Die (Robert H. Lowie, 1913)
The Lowest of the Low (William Wildschut, 1918-1927; 1960)
Gros Ventre
Singing the ‘Brave-Song’ (Regina Flannery, 1940-1948)
Blackfoot
Suicide to Avoid Marriage (George Bird Grinnell, 1888)
The Sandhills (Adolf Hungry Wolf, 1977)
Kit-sta-ka Rejoins her Husband After the Sun Dance (Walter McClintock, 1910)
When Wakes-Up-Last Murdered All of his Children (Walter McClintock, 1968)
SOUTHWEST AND THE GREAT BASIN
Navajo
Notes on Navajo Suicide (Leland C. Wyman and Betty Thorne, 1945)
The Destination of Witches and Suicides (Leland C. Wyman, W.W. Hill, and Iva Ósanai, 1942)
Reasons for Suicide (D. Leighton and C. Kluckhohn, 1947)
Ending One’s Life by Wishing to Die (Franc Johnson Newcomb, 1915-1940)
Crazy Violence (B. Kaplan and D. Johnson, 1964)
Navajo Suicide (Jerrold E. Levy, 1965)
Hopi
Making Arrangements for Suicide (Edmund Nequatewa, 1936)
How the Hopi Marked the Boundary Line (Edmund Nequatewa, 1936)
Girls Going Qövisti (Mischa Titiev, 1932-1940)
Ute
Postmenopausal Women (John Wesley Powell, 1867-1880)
Pueblo
Suicides as Cloud Beings (Elsie Clews Parsons, 1939)
Ritual Revenge (Ruth Benedict, 1934)
Jicarilla Apache
Apache War Customs (M.E. Opler, 1936)
Mojave
The First Death: Matavilye, and Suicide in Childbirth, Weaning, and Twins (George Devereux, 1961)
WEST AND NORTHWEST COAST
Pomo
Psychological Suicide (B.W. Aginsky, 1934-35)
Wintu and others
Suicide in Northeastern California (Erminie W. Voegelin, 1937)
Klamath
The Stigma of Suicide (Lucy Thompson, 1916)
Salish
Strained Sex Relations (V. F. Ray, 1928-1930)
Suicide by Hanging (W. Cline, 1930)
Kwakiutl
Shame (Ruth Benedict, 1934)
Talkotin
Barbarities Practised on Widows (Ross Cox, citing M’Gillivray 1794-1795)
Tlingit
Holding Others Responsible for Suicide (Aurel Krause, 1881-1882; 1956)
Slaves: An Honor to Die at the Master’s Funeral (Albert F. Niblack, 1887)
Paying Damages for Suicide (Livingston F. Jones, 1893-1914)
Kaska
Suicide and Intoxication (John Joseph Honigmann, 1943-1945)
Daidoji Yuzan (1639-1730)
Increase Mather (1639-1723)
Chikamatsu Monzaemon (1653-1725)
John Adams (1662-1720)
An Essay Concerning Self-Murther
Cotton Mather (1663-1728)
Memorable Providences Relating to Witchcrafts and Possessions
Charles Gildon (c. 1665-1724) [New Selection, in preparation]
Apology for the Suicide of Charles Blount
Isaac Watts (1674-1748)
A Defense Against the Temptation to Self-Murther
Montesquieu (1689-1755)
Volatire (1694-1778)
Caleb Fleming (1698-1779)
A Dissertation Upon the Unnatural Crime of Self-Murder
John Wesley (1703-1791)
David Hume (1711-1776)
Of Suicide
Letter to John Home of Ninewells
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778)
William Blackstone (1723-1780)
Commentaries on the Laws of England
Paul-Henri Thiry, Baron d’Holbach (1723-1789)
Immanuel Kant (1724-1804)
Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals
The Metaphysical Principles of Virtue: Man’s Duty to Himself Insofar as He Is an Animal Being
Lectures on Ethics: Duties Towards the Body in Regard to Life
Cesare Beccaria (1738-1794)
Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)
A Bill for Proportioning Crimes and Punishments in Cases Heretofore Capital
Letter to Dr. Samuel Brown
Olaudah Equiano (c. 1745-1797)
Richard Hey (1745-1835)
Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832)
Principles of Penal Law
Principles of Judicial Procedures
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832)
The Sorrows of Young Werther
Truth and Poetry: From My Own Life
William Godwin (1756-1836)
Enquiry Concerning Political Justice
Memoirs of the Author of a ‘Vindication of the Rights of Woman‘
Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1762-1814)
The Science of Ethics as Based on the Science of Knowledge
Ephraim Zalman Margolioth (1762-1828)
Ann Louise Germaine de Staël-Holstein (1766-1817)
On the Influence of the Passions
Reflections on Suicide
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831)
Novalis (1772-1801)
Jean-Étienne-Dominique Esquirol (1772-1840)
Mental Maladies: A Treatise on Insanity
Rammohun Roy (1774-1833)
Thomas De Quincey (1785-1859)
Essays in Philosophy: On Suicide
Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860)
The World as Will and Idea
Studies in Pessimism: On Suicide
Giacomo Leopardi (1798-1837)
Dialogue between Plotinus and Porphyry
John Stuart Mill (1806-1873)
Autobiography
Deaths of Casimir Perier and Georges Cuvier
Penal Code for India
Diary, March 8, 1854
On Liberty
Forbes Winslow (1810-1874)
The Anatomy of Suicide: Can Suicide Be Prevented by Legislative Enactments?
Karl Marx (1818-1883)
Florence Nightingale (1820-1910)
Note, Christmas Eve, 1850
Nightingale’s draft novel
Draft for Suggestions for Thought to Searchers After Religious Truth
Notes on Nursing for the Labouring Classes
Note to Benjamin Jowett
Reflections on George MacDonald’s Novel, Robert Falconer
Truth and Feeling
Notes on Egypt: Mysticism and Eastern Religions
Oceania Indigenous Culture (documented 1820-1983)
MELANESIA
Fiji
The Principal Wife of the Chief (William Mariner, 1820)
Elderly Parents and the Time to Die (Charles Wilkes, 1845)
Deaths of the Old Chief and his Wives (Thomas Williams, 1858)
Solomon Islands
Tikopian Attitudes Towards Suicide (Raymond Firth, 1967)
Papua New Guinea: Kiriwina/The Trobriand Islands
Suicide as an Act of Justice
Expiation and Insult: Jumping from a Palm (Bronislaw Malinowski, 1916, 1926)
The Kaliai: Good Death, Bad Death (David R. Counts and Dorothy Ayers Counts, 1983-84)
MICRONESIA
Guam
A Tale of Two Lovers: Tying Their Hair Together (Freycinet, 1819)
Chuuk
Sea Spirit Spasms (Frank Joseph Mahony, (1950-1968), 1970)
Group Rejection and Suicide (Thomas Gladwin and Seymour Bernard Sarason, 1953)
POLYNESIA
Samoa
“Who Will Go With Me?” (George Turner, 1884)
Tonga
The Love-Sick of Vavau (Basil Thomson, 1886-1891, 1894)
Niue Island
Traditions of Niue (Edwin M. Loeb, 1926)
Pukapuka, Cook Islands
After Defeat in Fighting: Burying Oneself Alive (Ernest Beaglehole and Pearl Beaglehole, 1938)
Marquesas
The Native Culture in the Marquesas: Coconut Rites for Suicide
Marquesan Legends: Tahia-noho-uu (E. S. Craighill Handy, 1920, 1930)
Mangareva, Gambier Islands
Cliff Suicide: The Privilege of Women (Te Rangi Hiroa [Sir Peter H. Buck], 1938)
NEW ZEALAND
The Maori Myth of Tane The Myth of Rakuru (John White, 1887)
Maori: Tupu and Mate (J. Prtyz Johansen, 1954)
The Spirit (Frederick Edward Maning, 1922)
The Dying Maori Chief and his Old and Young Wives (Frederick Edward Maning, 1922)
HAWAII
The Secrecy of the Bones of a Chief (Laura C. Green and Martha Warren Beckwith, 1926)
Fyodor Dostoevsky (1821-1881)
Robert Ingersoll (1833-1899)
Is Suicide a Sin? Colonel Ingersoll’s Reply to His Critics
A.B. Mitford, Lord Redesdale (1837-1916)
Arctic Indigenous Cultures (documented 1840-1940)
Eskimo of Diomede Island
Father and Son (Edward Moffat Weyer, 1932)
Aleut
Are the Aleut Prone to Commit Suicide? (Veniaminov, 1840)
St. Lawrence Eskimo
Notes on Eskimo Patterns of Suicide (Leighton and Hughes, 1940)
Ingalik
Suicide as Shameful or Insane (Osgood, 1937)
Copper Eskimo
Death Taboos (Rasmussen, 1921-1924)
Suicide as Rare (Jenness, 1913-1918)
Eskimo of Cumberland Sound
Man’s Two Souls: The Afterlife (Boas, 1883-1884)
Caribou Eskimo
Moral Rights, Social Obligations (Birket-Smith, 1921-1924)
Netsilik Eskimo
Famine; On the Treatment of the Aged (Rasmussen, 1921-1924)
Iglulik Eskimo
The Moon Spirit (Rasmussen, 1921-1924)
Death, and Life in the Land of the Dead (Rasmussen, 1921-1924)
Those Who Were Left Behind (Rasmussen, 1921-1924)
Hudson Bay Inuit
Desertion of Old Women (Turner, 1882-1884, 1889-1890)
Eskimo of Baffin Island
Theological Questions (Hall, 1860-1862)
Tribal Life (Bilby, 1923)
Labrador Eskimo
Respect for the Aged (Hawkes, 1914)
Greenland Eskimo
The Old Woman and the Cliff (Nansen, 1893)
Eduard von Hartmann (1842-1906)
William James (1842-1910)
The Principles of Psychology
Is Life Worth Living?
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900)
Thus Spake Zarathustra: Voluntary Death
The Twilight of the Idols: A Moral for Doctors
African Traditional Sub-Saharan Cultures (documented 1853-)
African Origin Myths
Man Desires Death (Hans Abrahamsson)
Dogon
The Souls of the Dogons (Solange de Ganay, 1937-1939)
LoDagaa
Restraining the Bereaved to Prevent Suicide (Jack Goody, 1962)
Akan
The Detection of Witches: Ordeal and Punishment
Ashanti
Law and Constitution: A Suicide’s Trial (Capt. R. S. Rattray, 1929)
Funeral Rites for Babies and Kings (Capt. R. S. Rattray, 1923-1927, 1929)
The Price of Intrigue with Women of Royal Blood (A. B. Ellis, 1887)
Fante
Killing Oneself “Upon the Head of Another”: The Tragedy of Adjuah Amissah (Brodie Cruickshank, 1853)
Gã
The Prohibition of Death (M. J. Field, 1937)
Ewe
The Criminality of Suicide (A.B. Ellis, 1890)
Yoruba
The Kings of the Yoruba (Samuel Johnson, 1897)
Yoruba Laws and Customs: Suicide (A. K. Ajisafe, 1924)
Igbo
Evil Spirits (Northcote W. Thomas, 1913)
Sacrifices, Death, and Burial (G. T. Basden, 1938)
A Murderer Must Hang Himself
An Old Woman’s Prearranged Funeral (G. T. Basden, 1921)
Zulu
The Timely Death
Godusa: The Old Woman and the Antbear’s Hole (R.C.A. Samuelson, 1929)
Ukugodusa: The First Woman Who Became a Christian (L. H. Samuelson, 1912)
The Burial of a King (R.C.A. Samuelson, 1929)
Banyoro
The Ghost of a Suicide
Dinka
The Folktale of the Four Truths
Burial Alive: The Master of the Fishing-Spear
Hindu Widow, Anonymous (1889)
The Plight of Hindu Widows as Described by a Widow Herself
Sigmund Freud (1856-1939)
The Psychopathology of Everyday Life
Contributions to a Discussion on Suicide
Mourning and Melancholia
The Psychogenesis of a Case of Homosexuality in a Woman
The Economic Problem of Masochism
Emile Durkheim (1858-1917)
Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935)
The Living of Charlotte Perkins Gilman
Suicide Note, August 17, 1935
The Right to Die
Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869-1948)
Indian Home Rule
An Autobiography: The Story of My Experiments with Truth
Non-Violence in Peace and War
Alfred Adler (1870-1937)
Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961)
John Haynes Holmes (1879-1964)
Virginia Woolf (1882-1941)
Mrs. Dalloway
A Room of One’s Own
Journal, May 15, 1941
Letter to Leonard Woolf
Paul Tillich (1886-1965)
Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951)
Mao Zedong (1893-1976)
Szmul Zygielbojm (1895-1943)
Letter to the President and Prime Minister of the Republic of Poland
Paul-Louis Landsberg (1901-1944)
Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945)
Ethics: The Last Things and the Things Before the Last
Albert Camus (1913-1960)
The Myth of Sisyphus
Notebooks 1935-1951
Japanese Naval Special Attack Force (Kamikaze Corps) (b. 1920s, d. 1944/45)
Kamikaze Diaries
Last Letters Home (1944-1945)
Murtaza Mutahhari (1920-1979)
The Martyr: On Jihad, Suicide and Martyrdom
Thich Nhat Hanh (1926-)
Vietnam: Lotus in a Sea of Fire: In Search of the Enemy of Man
Mary Rose Barrington (1926-)
Daniel Callahan (1930-)
Reason, Self-determination, and Physician-Assisted Suicide
Peter Y. Windt (1938-)