DEFINITION OF SUICIDE

DEFINITION OF SUICIDE 

Briefly defined, suicide is the human act of self-inflicted, self-intentioned cessation. Suicide is not a disease (although there are many who think so); it is not a biological anomaly (although biological factors may play a role in some suicides); it is not an immorality (although it has often been treated as such); and it is not a crime in most countries around the world (although it was so for centuries). 

It is unlikely that any one view or theory will ever define or explain phenomena as varied and as complicated as acts of human self-destruction. Our own initial definition is fraught with complexities and difficulties. 

The history of our key word provides only initial assistance. “Suicide”, in fact, is a relatively recent word. According to The Oxford English Dictionary, the word was used in 1651 by Walter Charleton when he said: “To vindicate one’s self from . . . inevitable Calamity, by Sui-cide is not . . . a Crime.” However, the exact date of its first use is open to some question. Some claim that it was first used by Sir Thomas Browne in his book, Religio Medici, published in 1642. Edward Philips, in his 1662 edition of his dictionary, A New World of Words, claimed to have invented the word. The word “suicide” does not appear in Robert Burton’s Anatomy of Melancholy (1652 edition), nor in Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary (1755). Before the introduction of the word, other terms, of course, were used to describe “the act”— among them self-destruction, self-killing, self-murder, and self-slaughter. Burton’s phrases for suicide include “to make way with themselves” and “they offer violence to themselves”. The classical (and current) German term is in keeping with this tradition—Selbstmord, or self-murder. Other countries around the world have their own words and definitions. 

Suicide may today be defined differently depending on the purpose of the definition—medical, legal, administrative, etc. In the United States and Canada (and most of the countries reporting to the World Health Organization), suicide is defined (by a medical examiner or coroner) as one of the four possible modes of death. An acronym for the four modes of death is NASH: natural, accidental, suicidal, and homicidal. This fourfold classification of all deaths also has its problems. 

Its major deficiency is that it treats the human being in a Cartesian fashion, namely as a biological machine, rather than appropriately treating him or her as a motivated biopsychosocial organism. That is, it obscures the individual’s intentions in relation to his or her own cessation and, further, completely neglects the contemporary concepts of psychodynamic psychology regarding intention, including unconscious motivation. 

There is no universally accepted definition of suicide today. In fact, there never was one. Indeed, there are numerous definitions: and here is a sampling: Erwin Ringel (Austria): Suicide is the intentional tendency to take one’s own life. 

Charles Bagg (United Kingdom): Suicide is the intentional act of taking one’s life either as a result of mental illness (these illnesses frequently though not always causing distress to the individual carrying out the act) or as a result of various motivations which are not necessarily part of any designated mental illness but which outweigh the instinct to continue to live. 

Walter Hurst (New Zealand): The decision to commit suicide is more often prompted by a desire to stop living than by a wish to die. Suicide is a determined alternative to facing a problem that seems to be too big to handle alone. 

Sarah Dastoor (India): 

I vengeful, killer, hate—inspired—so I die 

I guilty, sinner, trapped—escaping life 

I hoping rebirth, forgiveness divine—live again 

Currently in the Western world, suicide is a conscious act of self-induced annihilation, best understood as a multidimensional malaise in a needful individual who defines an issue for which the suicide is perceived as the best solution.