Why Do People Commit Suicide by Fire?

[Skywizard]

http://static.ddmcdn.com/gif/blogs/dnews-files-2014-01-why-do-people-commit-suicide-by-fire-140127-670x440-jpg.jpg


A Colorado teenager intentionally set himself on fire in his high school cafeteria early Monday morning. It’s not known what the student’s motivation was, but it appeared to be a suicide attempt.

No other students were injured, and Standley Lake High School was closed for the rest of the day. The unnamed student remains in critical condition in a Denver-area hospital.

There is nothing unusual about a young man trying to take his own life. Worldwide, an estimated 10 to 20 million people attempt suicide each year. About 30,000 people die by suicide each year in America — it’s the ninth leading cause of death in the United States, and the suicide rate is higher than the homicide rate.

In America, self-immolation for its own sake is rarely a motivation. There are far less painful — and lower profile — ways to kill yourself. According to researchers at Seattle’s University of Washington who examined the socioeconomic, cultural and psychiatric patterns of self-immolation in a 2011 article published in the journal “Burns:”

“The horrific spectacles of self-burning and suicide by fire, behaviors recorded in texts ancient and modern, continue in our day … Self-immolation accounts for approximately 1% of all suicides in high-income countries (Western Europe and the United States) but this statistic is much higher in many low-income countries. Self-immolation has been reported to account for as much as 40% of suicides in some areas of the developing world and as high as 71% of suicides in specific locales.”

Motivations for Self-Immolation

The reasons for such drastic actions vary. Sometimes the motivation is religious. In India, for example, widows often threw themselves on their husbands' funeral pyres in a tradition called sati. This act of self-immolation was culturally proscribed for centuries, and was believed to assure the woman’s acceptance into heaven. Though the practice was officially banned in 1829, it still occurs in rural India.

More often, however, the motivation is protest.

Frustrated political and social activists usually see self-immolation as a powerful tool to bring international attention to their plight. Tibetan monks, for example, burn themselves to death on a fairly regular basis. Over 100 monks and nuns have set themselves on fire in protest against the Chinese government, according to The New York Times. In the early 1960s, Buddhist monks in Vietnam famously set themselves on fire in political protest as well.

A rash of protest self-immolations also characterized the recent political unrest in the Middle East.

The self-immolation trend began in Tunisia during government protests when a young street vendor named Mohamed Bouazizi set himself on fire on Dec. 17, 2010. His death the following month made him a martyr to Tunisians seeking revolution and led to the removal of that country’s president.

Fiery copycat suicides spread throughout other North African countries in 2011. Five men set themselves afire in neighboring Algeria and Mauritania. One man, Abdou Abdel-Monaam Hamadah, in the Egyptian capital of Cairo, set himself on fire outside a government office.

Police are combing through the Colorado high school student’s belongings searching for clues. Whatever the student’s motivation, there is some concern among authorities that news coverage of this student’s act might inspire copycats, and grief counselors have been dispatched.


Source: http://news.discovery.com/history/religion/self-immolation-the-macabre-mystery-140127.htm


peace...
skywizard

[Lifebringer]

They do it because the pain and mental anguish they are in, is worse to them then hell fire. In fact, most think they've gone through so much pain/hell in their lives, they figure it hurts worse than fire and they want to make sure they are gone/poof/not able to come back/be saved and they make a statement about how much pain they feel.

"It's hell out here for a soul and they want a do over."

If they are really young, it's because they've changed their mind/unconsciously about their mission. If the mission is important, then they won't be going anywhere, no matter the damage or disfigurement, if the mission is that much the more important, than their pain they fell they are in. They might have been here to guide someone that will make a difference and therefore not allowed to leave until their promise is fulfilled when they came here.:confused:

[Kryztian]

What an awful way to go. If your suicide is not successful, you will have to live with horrible burn wounds.

There are so many awful ways to commit suicide, while the humane and peaceful ways have been made illegal. If someone wants to end their incarnation here on Earth, there should be a way to do it without the anguish and horror.

[syrwong]

No one wants to die by fire, as evident in cases of about to be burned to death, most would choose to jump out from a high rise building instead. However, life is an illusion. The Buddhist monks know it very well and suicide by burning is not too uncommon. During the Vietnam war, quite a few Buddhist monks burned themselves in the street in protest of the government and the war.

A Taoist story told of an old Buddhist woman master burned herself when she knew she was going to die from old age. (and one of her pupils asked, “Is it hot?”, to which she replied, “that was a stupid question!”).

So it does not matter how you die or how suicide is chosen because the illusion is so temporary.

[conk]

What an awful way to go. If your suicide is not successful, you will have to live with horrible burn wounds.

There are so many awful ways to commit suicide, while the humane and peaceful ways have been made illegal. If someone wants to end their incarnation here on Earth, there should be a way to do it without the anguish and horror.There is a way. By drowning. Extremely peaceful, with no anxiety. Just slip into, then under the water.

[chocolate]

I have heard the drowning to be a horrible and very painful experience.
Dan Brown wrote it in one of his books.

[Tesla_WTC_Solution]

Skywizard, I believe this happens when we are in a period of extreme cultural/global upsets.

Like the case in Tunisia, credited with started Arab Spring,
and the recent cases of the disabled men in Israel who self-immolated.

It's a way of devoting the last of your energy to an extreme visual statement and plea for help.

"Normal" people might never feel the stress to such a degree that they would consider this painful method of exiting life.
However, psychic pain is very real too, and people seek escape via any means possible when it gets that bad.

:(

I consider it an omen.
Those along with the pipeline fires - something is "wrong with our energy/consciousness" as a whole.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-immolation

Self-immolation refers to setting oneself on fire, often as a form of protest or for the purposes of martyrdom. It has centuries-long traditions in some cultures, while in modern times it has become a type of radical political protest. Michael Biggs compiled a list of 533 "self-immolations" reported by Western media from the 1960s to 2002, though in this work his definition is generalized to any intentional suicide "on behalf of a collective cause."[1]

The English word immolation originally meant (1534) "killing a sacrificial victim; sacrifice" and came to figuratively mean (1690) "destruction, especially by fire." Its etymology was from Latin immolare "to sprinkle with sacrificial meal (mola salsa); to sacrifice" in ancient Roman religion. Self-immolation "setting oneself on fire, especially as a form of protest" was first recorded in Lady Morgan's (1817) France.[2][3]

It was Western media coverage of Buddhist monk Thich Quang Duc immolating himself in protest of the Buddhist crisis by the Vietnamese Ngo Dinh Diem regime in 1963 that introduced the word "self-immolation" to a wide English-speaking audience and gave it a strong association with fire.[4][5] The alternative name bonzo comes from the same era, because the Buddhist monks who immolated themselves were often referred to by the term bonze in English literature before the mid-20th century, particularly when describing monks from East Asia and French Indochina. This term is derived via French from the Japanese word bōzu (坊主) for a priest or monk, and has become less common in modern literature.[6]

Self-immolation is tolerated by some elements of Mahayana Buddhism and Hinduism, and it has been practiced for many centuries, especially in India, for various reasons, including Sati, political protest, devotion, and renouncement. Certain warrior cultures, such as in the Charans and Rajputs, also practiced self-immolation.

Two well-known Jataka tales, Buddhist myths about previous incarnations of the Buddha, concern self-immolation. In the "Hungry Tigress" Jataka, Prince Sattva looked down from a cliff and saw a starving tigress that was going to eat her newborn cubs, and compassionately sacrificed his body in order to feed the tigers and spare their lives. In the "Sibi Jataka", King Śibi or Shibi was renowned for unselfishness, and the gods Śakra and Vishvakarman tested him by transforming into a hawk and a dove. The dove fell on the king's lap while trying to escape the hawk, and sought refuge. Rather than surrender the dove, Śibi offered his own flesh equivalent in weight to the dove, and the hawk agreed. They had rigged the balance scale, and King Śibi continued cutting off his flesh until half his body was gone, when the gods revealed themselves, restored his body, and blessed him.

The Buddhist god of healing, the "Medicine King" or "Medicine Buddha" (Bhaisajyaguru) was associated with auto-cremation. The Lotus Sutra describes the Medicine King drinking scented oils, wrapping his body in an oil-soaked cloth, and burning himself as an offering to the Buddha. His body flamed for 1,200 years, he was reincarnated, burned off his forearms for 72,000 years, which enabled many to achieve enlightenment, and his arms were miraculously restored.

Zarmanochegas was a monk of the Sramana tradition (possibly, but not necessarily a Buddhist) who, according to ancient historians such as Strabo and Dio Cassius, met Nicholas of Damascus in Antioch around 13 AD and burnt himself to death in Athens shortly thereafter.[7][8]

Self-immolation has a long history in Chinese Buddhism. The relevant terms are: wangshen Chinese: 亡身 "lose the body" or Chinese: 忘身 "forget the body", yishen Chinese: 遺身 "abandon the body", and sheshen Chinese: 捨身 "give up the body". James A. Benn explains the semantic range of Chinese Buddhist self-immolation.

But "abandoning the body" also covers a broad range of more extreme acts (not all of which necessarily result in death): feeding one's body to insects; slicing off one's flesh; burning one's fingers or arms; burning incense on the skin; starving, slicing, or drowning oneself; leaping from cliffs or trees; feeding one's body to wild animals; self-mummification (preparing for death so that the resulting corpse is impervious to decay); and of course, auto-cremation.[9]

The monk Fayu 法羽 (d. 396) carried out the earliest recorded Chinese self-immolation.[10] He first informed the "illegitimate" prince Yao Xu 姚緒 – brother of Yao Chang who founded the non-Chinese Qiang state Later Qin (384-417) – that he intended to burn himself alive. Yao tried to dissuade Fayu, but he publicly swallowed incense chips, wrapped his body in oiled cloth, and chanted while setting fire to himself. The religious and lay witnesses were described as being "full of grief and admiration."

Following Fayu's example, many Buddhist monks and nuns have used self-immolation for political purposes. Based upon analysis of Chinese historical records from the 4th to the 20th centuries, Benn discovered, "Although some monks did offer their bodies in periods of relative prosperity and peace, we have seen a marked coincidence between acts of self-immolation and times of crisis, especially when secular powers were hostile towards Buddhism."[11] For example, Daoxuan's (c. 667) Xu gaoseng zhuan 續高僧傳 "Continued Biographies of Eminent Monks" records five monastics who self-immolated on the Zhongnan Mountains in response to the 574-577 persecution of Buddhism by Emperor Wu of Northern Zhou (known as the "Second Disaster of Wu").[12]

While self-immolation practices in China were based upon Indian Buddhist traditions, they acquired some distinctively Chinese aspects. An "unburned tongue" (cf. Anthony of Padua), which supposedly remained pink and moist owing to self-immolation while chanting the Lotus Sutra, was based on the belief in Śarīra "Buddhist relics; purportedly from a master's remains after cremation".[13] "Burning off fingers" was a kind of gradual self-immolation, often in commemoration of relics or textual recitations. The Tang Dynasty monk Wuran 無染 (d. c. 840) had a spiritual vision in which Manjusri told him to support the Buddhist community on Mount Wutai. After organizing meals for one million monks, Wuran burned off a finger in sacrifice, and eventually after ten million meals, had burned off all his fingers.[14] Xichen 息塵 (d. c. 937; with two fingers left) became a favorite of Emperor Gaozu of Later Jin for practicing finger burning to memorialize sutra recitions.[15] "Buddhist mummies" refers to monks and nuns who practiced self-mummification through extreme self-mortification, for instance, Daoxiu 道休 (d. 629).[16] "Spontaneous human combustion" was a rare form of self-immolation that Buddhists associated with samādhi "consciously leaving one's body at the time of enlightenment". The monk Ningyi 寧義 (d. 1583) stacked up firewood to burn himself, but, "As soon the torch was raised, his body started to burn 'like a rotten root' and was soon completely consumed. A wise person declared, 'He has entered the fiery samādhi." [17]

James A. Benn concludes that, "for many monks and laypeople in Chinese history, self-immolation was a form of Buddhist practice that modeled and expressed a particular bodily or somatic path that led towards Buddhahood."[11]

Jan Yun-Hua explains the medieval Chinese Buddhist precedents for self-immolation.[18]

Relying exclusively on authoritative Chinese Buddhist texts and, through the use of these texts, interpreting such acts exclusively in terms of doctrines and beliefs (e.g., self-immolation, much like an extreme renunciant might abstain from food until dying, could be an example of disdain for the body in favor of the life of the mind and wisdom) rather than in terms of their socio-political and historical context, the article allows its readers to interpret these deaths as acts that refer only to a distinct set of beliefs that happen to be foreign to the non-Buddhist.[18]

Jimmy Yu has shown that self-immolation cannot be interpreted based on Buddhist doctrine and beliefs alone but the practice must be understood in the larger context of the Chinese religious landscape. He examines many primary sources from the 16th and 17th century and demonstrates that bodily practices of self-inflicted violence, including self-immolation, was ritually performed not only by Buddhists but also by Daoists and literati officials who either exposed their naked body to the sun in a prolonged period of time as a form of self-sacrifice or burned themselves as a method of procuring rain [19] In other words, self-immolation was a sanctioned part of Chinese culture that was public, scripted, and intelligible both to the person doing the act and to those who viewed and interpreted it, regardless of their various religion affiliations.

During the Great Schism of the Russian Church, entire villages of Old Believers burned themselves to death in an act known as "fire baptism".[20] Scattered instances of self-immolation have also been recorded by the Jesuit priests of France in the early 17th century.[citation needed] However, their practice of this was not intended to be fatal: they would burn certain parts of their bodies (limbs such as the forearm or the thigh) to symbolise the pain Jesus endured while upon the cross.[citation needed] A 1973 study by a prison doctor suggested that people who choose self-immolation as a form of suicide are more likely to be in a "disturbed state of consciousness", such as epilepsy.[21]

In her article "Can the Subaltern Speak?", philosopher Gayatri Spivak discusses how self-immolation is a way Hindu law regulated women in pre-colonial India. According to Spivak, the necessity to commit self-immolation imprisons women in a double bind in colonial and postcolonial India.[22] In Spivak's postcolonial framework, the woman who commits self-immolation takes the form of the subaltern.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f9/Ibn_Sayyid_Murad_al-Husayni_-_Hindu_Couple_United_on_the_Funeral_Pyre_-_Walters_W64919B_-_Full_Page.jpg/392px-Ibn_Sayyid_Murad_al-Husayni_-_Hindu_Couple_United_on_the_Funeral_Pyre_-_Walters_W64919B_-_Full_Page.jpg

[Agape]

People are setting themselves on fire as living 'life torch' , it's an extreme expression of protest and ultimate sacrifice ..

there's been around 140 cases of self-immolation occurring in Tibet ( Chinese occupied territory since 1959 ) since 2007/2008 till the beginning of this year ,
proper news get out to international media scarcely due to censorship and political opinion-ship that has lots to do with fact that people are unhappy, Tibetans live as aliens in their own land ,
are controlled , manipulated to faith in China and its communist party and taken their land, language and customs away from them by all many means .
It's been very cruel to watch this .. more than 72 people since 2007 till 2011 and when I was in Dharamsala last autumn ,
we held candle vigil almost every second or third day because someone, somewhere in China self-immolated .
They were lay people as well as monks and nuns, of all ages, mostly young people though .

Most were described as 'strong willed' and sober by their friends and colleagues , calm people otherwise who tried to collect calm resolve for the act over long period of time .


One case occurred in Kathmandu , Nepal at Bodhinath Stupa just about few meters from where I lived that time and it was February 14th , 2013 .
It happened early morning and I have not seen it personally but we ( the place ) have been under heavy army guard since then ,
the monk has died within few hours as he had 3 degree burns and they could not save him.

There's been 2 cases of self-immolation here in Prague in 1969 when it was invaded by Russian army , both were young students who sat themselves on fire on the main square .. and in front of University . Both passed away .

It's very painful way to go.

[Agape]

http://www.jamyangnorbu.com/blog/2012/01/03/self-immolation-and-buddhism/

January 3rd, 2012
SELF-IMMOLATION AND BUDDHISM

The Yiddish word “chutzpah”, pronounced “huspa”, has the exact same meaning as the Tibetan word “hamba”, and even shares a passing tonal quality to it. Leo Rosten, the humorist, defined chutzpah as “that quality enshrined in a man who, having killed his mother and father, throws himself on the mercy of the court because he is an orphan.”

Dai Qingli, an official of the Chinese Embassy in Britain brilliantly demonstrated that quality in a letter to the Guardian (25 Nov. 2011) titled “Tibetan Deaths violate Buddhism”. Dai wrote, “The self-immolations of Tibetan monks and nuns were truly tragic. They were also a fatal violation of the spirit of peace and tolerance that defines Tibetan Buddhism. And, as such, these acts have met anger and disapproval from the local people and the religious community.”

Bhuchung K.Tsering of the International Campaign for Tibet (ICT) expressed himself in a similar manner in his article “This Chinese is Right About Tibetan Self-Immolation!”

“Yesterday, i.e. December 1, 2011, I was reading an article in People’s Daily by “renowned Tibetologist” Li Decheng concerning self-immolations by Tibetans in Tibet in which he says these actions are against “core Buddhist code of ethics.” He further says, “In Buddhism, particularly Tibetan Buddhism, scripture has never encouraged killings and suicide, nor has Buddhist dogma incited others to carry out killings or commit suicide.” I have no hesitation in saying I agree with him here.’

Bhuchung went on to request the Chinese that they should pay attention to the self-immolations “as it is an important social issue for China and its future.” Bhuchung also attempts to explain why Tibetans were – and I use his exact word – “indulging” in this behavior. Bhuchung and his colleagues at ICT might not approve of the self-immolations but they should realize that the monks and nuns were hardly “indulging” themselves in any way.

The Dalai Lama chose his words more carefully. In his statement to UPI on Nov 21 he said he didn’t encourage self-immolation by monks and nuns protesting China’s control over Tibet and questioned the usefulness of the acts as a protest tool. He did acknowledge that the monks and nuns had courage, but he gave the impression that it wasn’t a Buddhist thing to do.

So is self-immolation against Buddhist teachings or not?

In 1963, Thich Quang Duc, a Vietnamese monk set fire to himself at a busy Saigon intersection. The famous Pulitzer Prize winning photograph by Malcolm Browne of the burning monk sitting serenely in the lotus position surrounded by flames, became a worldwide sensation and contributed to fall of the Diem regime. At the time Beijing openly praised the action of the Vietnamese monk and distributed millions of copies of the photo (pirated of course) throughout Asia and Africa as evidence of “US imperialism”. Other Vietnamese monks and a nun subsequently set fire to themselves to protest the war.

elf-immolation appear to be an unusual though accepted Buddhist traditio in China and parts of South East Asia. There are numerous cases in Chinese history, especially during the Qing period, of such acts being performed as political protest (see Burning for the Buddha: Self-immolation in Chinese Buddhism by James A. Benn). In 1948 in the city of Harbin a monk seated himself in the lotus position on a pile of sawdust and soybean oil and set fire to himself in protest against the treatment of Buddhism by Mao Zedong’s Communists.

The main inspiration for the practice appears to be based on a teaching in The Lotus Sutra (Tib. dam chos pad-ma dkar po’i mdo). One chapter of this sutra recounts the life story of the Bodhisattva Medicine King who demonstrated his insight into the selfless nature of his body by ritualistically setting his body aflame, spreading the “Light of the Dharma” for twelve hundred years.

But I think that the spiritual motivation for the sacrifice of our young monks and nuns in Tibet might have come from another direction. Forty-five kilometers south-east of Katmandu is one of the most popular pilgrimage sites for Tibetans visiting Nepal. The hill of Namo Buddha (or Tagmo Lujin in Tibetan) is – the Golden Light Sutra (phags pa gser ‘od dam pa’i mdo) tells us – the very place where the Buddha (in a previous incarnation) gave up his body to feed a starving tigress and her four cubs. This is a popular Jataka story with all Tibetans and is often brought up in conversations whenever an example of self-sacrifice or selfless conduct is required. There are other such Jataka or Avadana stories of the Buddha giving up his life for others, a well known one from the mahakapi jataka being the tale of the Great Monkey King who died saving the lives of his “80,000” monkey subjects.

The courageous action of the thirteen self-immolators in Tibet must be seen in this specific doctrinal light. I emphatically disagree with the opinion some people are circulating that the monks and nuns burnt themselves in despair because they were not allowed to practice their religion. If that were the main concern of these monks and nuns then the logical course of action for them to take would have been to escape to India, as many others had done so before. Kirti monastery, where most of the young self-immolators had studied, even has a large branch at Dharamshala where they would have been welcome.

Hence we must see the self-immolations in Tibet as action taken for the welfare of others, for the freedom of the Tibetan people and the independence of Tibet (as some of the self-immolators expressly stated). Even the call by most of the self-immolators for the return of the Dalai Lama to Tibet must be interpreted as a call for the restoration of an independent Tibet, as the Dalai Lama is regarded as the legitimate sovereign ruler of independent Tibet, and should not merely be interpreted as a plea for the return of a personal spiritual leader, as those attempting to de-politicize the events have been claiming.

The deed of the thirteen self-immolators is not only Buddhist in an unquestionably absolute sense, but furthermore comes from within a heroic and action-oriented tradition of Buddhism. Some scholars have viewed this approach as truer to the original teachings of the historical Buddha, in contrast to the quietist, passive, even escapist perception of Buddhism which has gained more widespread acceptance, especially in the West.

The historical Buddha was a member of the warrior class, a Kshatriya. Though he accepted all classes and castes into the sangha he was given to addressing his followers thus “We are Kshatriya, all”. He did this, of course, not to highlight his own caste, but probably to lay emphasis on the qualities of commitment and courage that he required of his disciples. The sutra’s tell us that Siddhartha was a tall man of powerful build, trained in the martial arts, in which he excelled, even defeating other Shakya warriors to prove his worth for the hand of the princess Yashodhara. The warrior’s fearlessness and commitment were evident in his first attempt to achieve enlightenment, and which is powerfully represented in the Gandhara image of the Buddha, after six years of extreme self-mortification had seen his body reduced to skin and bone.


Even after he realized that his first attempt was a failure his warrior’s commitment and courage were never in doubt. The Buddha’s next method, the “Middle Way” was not an excuse for inaction, weakness or impotence. When Siddhartha finally sat under the Bodhi tree he fixed his resolve on the goal of enlightenment with an unshakable resolution. A beautiful and dramatic verse is attributed to him by some early compilers of the sutras. “Let blood dry up, let flesh wither away, but I shall not stir from this spot till Enlightenment be attained.”

A few of the titles by which Siddhartha was known after his enlightenment appear to acknowledge this heroic quality, as in “jina” or “conqueror” and “mahavira” or “great hero (also the title of the founder of Jainism).

The Bodhisattva as hero is delineated clearly in a passage from the Prajnaparimita Sutra where he is said to fearlessly lead all sentient beings out of the deep forests of samsara, fighting of attacks from “inimical forces”. At the end of this passage he asks his disciple Subhuti “If, then, more and more hostile and inimical forces should rise up against him in that forest, would this heroic man decide to abandon his family and take himself alone out of that terrible and frightening forest?” and Subhuti of course replies, “No, O Lord”.

The historical Buddha himself, when stalked by the bandit and murderer Angulimala, chose not to flee or leave the problems to others. Instead he confronted and subdued the killer through what has traditionally been regarded as magical power. No matter how swiftly Angulimala ran after the casually strolling Buddha, he could not catch up with him. About a hundred years earlier the Greek philosopher Zeno posited such a situation in his “time paradox” of Achilles never being able to catch up with a tortoise. These day physicists might explain it as a “Quantum Zeno effect”, the name which E.C.G. Sudarshan and B. Misra coined to describe “the suppression of unitary time evolution caused by quantum decoherence…”

Then there is the story of how in a previous life the Buddha killed a mass-murderer on a ship to save the lives of the other travelers on board. The context in which Buddha told this avadana story to his disciples is interesting and relevant to the overall point I am trying to make. One day a disciple noticed that the Buddha had received a wound on his feet. The disciple asked how this could happen to some one who had attained nirvana. The Buddha then told his disciples the above story. The lesson being that no one can wholly escape the consequence of a violent deed even if its performance is necessary and righteous. But there is another logical corollary to the story, that if the Buddha had chosen, for reasons of cowardice or ethical fastidiousness, not to kill the murderer and not to save those many lives, he would have committed a more far more immoral and evil act.

It is this essentially non-violent yet nuanced and dynamic interpretation of Buddhist action that is completely absent from the passive, comfortable, sanitized, hands-off, and inherently self-serving interpretation of the Dharma dominating much of the contemporary Buddhist world.

A noticeable aspect of this “New Age” Buddhism is its preoccupation with money, celebrity and a kind of low-maintenance intellectualism disseminated in a plethora of unreadable self-help books with catchy Zen style titles (Watching the Watcher, Silent Mind Holy Mind, Living Through Dying and so on). Something like this is, I suppose, prevalent in institutionalized religions worldwide, and is probably a waste of time to work yourself up about it. But I think Tibetans would wholeheartedly join me in condemning Buddhist teachers charging extortionate ticket prices for their sermons, and Dharma centers discouraging, sometimes forbidding, their members from participating in political action, even for the cause of Tibetan freedom and human rights.

And how can you argue with them when even the former prime-minister of the exile government, a Tibetan lama and learned geshe has not only not participated in any Free Tibet demonstrations but has even ordered Tibetans not to demonstrate against Chinese leaders visiting the West. Yet Samdhong Rinpoche was seen on European TV, in 2006, as one of the leaders of a major demonstration against the Swiss company SYNGENTA in India, a leading agri-business company that Indian environmentalists opposed. So perhaps the spiritual lesson here is that political activism is permissible so long as it is fashionable, profitable and does not upset Beijing. The Dalai Lama has publicly joined the opposition to the proposed oil pipeline from Alberta to Texas. I am enough of an environmentalist not to take issue with the Dalai Lama’s initiative, but I wish His Holiness had been as opposed to the Beijing Olympics or China’s “population-transfer” railway line to Tibet.

Yet the most cynical thing I have seen recently, especially in relation to the self-immolations, is a fund raising letter sent out by the International Campaign for Tibet (ICT), asking people to donate money to it because “…13 Tibetans have set fire to themselves,” This from the organization that opposes the Tibetan independence struggle, and whose senior official wrote in enthusiastic support of China’s condemnation of self-immolation as being against Buddhism.




:angel:

[Radi]

fire have cleaning force for the body and the soul i guess!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wqxy0gULa3U

[TigaHawk]

What an awful way to go. If your suicide is not successful, you will have to live with horrible burn wounds.

There are so many awful ways to commit suicide, while the humane and peaceful ways have been made illegal. If someone wants to end their incarnation here on Earth, there should be a way to do it without the anguish and horror.There is a way. By drowning. Extremely peaceful, with no anxiety. Just slip into, then under the water.

I've heard helium, set it up like an oxygen tank. drowning I can imagine being quite painful. ever swallowed water the wrong way? imagine lots of that.

with fire.... I guess it to be a big statement. the decision to end your own life generally comes from a lot of pain and misery. why would you want to inflict so much more on yourself willingly before you go?

[chocolate]

http://www.jamyangnorbu.com/blog/2012/01/03/self-immolation-and-buddhism/

January 3rd, 2012
SELF-IMMOLATION AND BUDDHISM

The Yiddish word “chutzpah”, pronounced “huspa”, has the exact same meaning as the Tibetan word “hamba”, and even shares a passing tonal quality to it. Leo Rosten, the humorist, defined chutzpah as “that quality enshrined in a man who, having killed his mother and father, throws himself on the mercy of the court because he is an orphan.”

Dai Qingli, an official of the Chinese Embassy in Britain brilliantly demonstrated that quality in a letter to the Guardian (25 Nov. 2011) titled “Tibetan Deaths violate Buddhism”. Dai wrote, “The self-immolations of Tibetan monks and nuns were truly tragic. They were also a fatal violation of the spirit of peace and tolerance that defines Tibetan Buddhism. And, as such, these acts have met anger and disapproval from the local people and the religious community.”

Bhuchung K.Tsering of the International Campaign for Tibet (ICT) expressed himself in a similar manner in his article “This Chinese is Right About Tibetan Self-Immolation!”

“Yesterday, i.e. December 1, 2011, I was reading an article in People’s Daily by “renowned Tibetologist” Li Decheng concerning self-immolations by Tibetans in Tibet in which he says these actions are against “core Buddhist code of ethics.” He further says, “In Buddhism, particularly Tibetan Buddhism, scripture has never encouraged killings and suicide, nor has Buddhist dogma incited others to carry out killings or commit suicide.” I have no hesitation in saying I agree with him here.’

Bhuchung went on to request the Chinese that they should pay attention to the self-immolations “as it is an important social issue for China and its future.” Bhuchung also attempts to explain why Tibetans were – and I use his exact word – “indulging” in this behavior. Bhuchung and his colleagues at ICT might not approve of the self-immolations but they should realize that the monks and nuns were hardly “indulging” themselves in any way.

The Dalai Lama chose his words more carefully. In his statement to UPI on Nov 21 he said he didn’t encourage self-immolation by monks and nuns protesting China’s control over Tibet and questioned the usefulness of the acts as a protest tool. He did acknowledge that the monks and nuns had courage, but he gave the impression that it wasn’t a Buddhist thing to do.

So is self-immolation against Buddhist teachings or not?

In 1963, Thich Quang Duc, a Vietnamese monk set fire to himself at a busy Saigon intersection. The famous Pulitzer Prize winning photograph by Malcolm Browne of the burning monk sitting serenely in the lotus position surrounded by flames, became a worldwide sensation and contributed to fall of the Diem regime. At the time Beijing openly praised the action of the Vietnamese monk and distributed millions of copies of the photo (pirated of course) throughout Asia and Africa as evidence of “US imperialism”. Other Vietnamese monks and a nun subsequently set fire to themselves to protest the war.

elf-immolation appear to be an unusual though accepted Buddhist traditio in China and parts of South East Asia. There are numerous cases in Chinese history, especially during the Qing period, of such acts being performed as political protest (see Burning for the Buddha: Self-immolation in Chinese Buddhism by James A. Benn). In 1948 in the city of Harbin a monk seated himself in the lotus position on a pile of sawdust and soybean oil and set fire to himself in protest against the treatment of Buddhism by Mao Zedong’s Communists.

The main inspiration for the practice appears to be based on a teaching in The Lotus Sutra (Tib. dam chos pad-ma dkar po’i mdo). One chapter of this sutra recounts the life story of the Bodhisattva Medicine King who demonstrated his insight into the selfless nature of his body by ritualistically setting his body aflame, spreading the “Light of the Dharma” for twelve hundred years.

But I think that the spiritual motivation for the sacrifice of our young monks and nuns in Tibet might have come from another direction. Forty-five kilometers south-east of Katmandu is one of the most popular pilgrimage sites for Tibetans visiting Nepal. The hill of Namo Buddha (or Tagmo Lujin in Tibetan) is – the Golden Light Sutra (phags pa gser ‘od dam pa’i mdo) tells us – the very place where the Buddha (in a previous incarnation) gave up his body to feed a starving tigress and her four cubs. This is a popular Jataka story with all Tibetans and is often brought up in conversations whenever an example of self-sacrifice or selfless conduct is required. There are other such Jataka or Avadana stories of the Buddha giving up his life for others, a well known one from the mahakapi jataka being the tale of the Great Monkey King who died saving the lives of his “80,000” monkey subjects.

The courageous action of the thirteen self-immolators in Tibet must be seen in this specific doctrinal light. I emphatically disagree with the opinion some people are circulating that the monks and nuns burnt themselves in despair because they were not allowed to practice their religion. If that were the main concern of these monks and nuns then the logical course of action for them to take would have been to escape to India, as many others had done so before. Kirti monastery, where most of the young self-immolators had studied, even has a large branch at Dharamshala where they would have been welcome.

Hence we must see the self-immolations in Tibet as action taken for the welfare of others, for the freedom of the Tibetan people and the independence of Tibet (as some of the self-immolators expressly stated). Even the call by most of the self-immolators for the return of the Dalai Lama to Tibet must be interpreted as a call for the restoration of an independent Tibet, as the Dalai Lama is regarded as the legitimate sovereign ruler of independent Tibet, and should not merely be interpreted as a plea for the return of a personal spiritual leader, as those attempting to de-politicize the events have been claiming.

The deed of the thirteen self-immolators is not only Buddhist in an unquestionably absolute sense, but furthermore comes from within a heroic and action-oriented tradition of Buddhism. Some scholars have viewed this approach as truer to the original teachings of the historical Buddha, in contrast to the quietist, passive, even escapist perception of Buddhism which has gained more widespread acceptance, especially in the West.

The historical Buddha was a member of the warrior class, a Kshatriya. Though he accepted all classes and castes into the sangha he was given to addressing his followers thus “We are Kshatriya, all”. He did this, of course, not to highlight his own caste, but probably to lay emphasis on the qualities of commitment and courage that he required of his disciples. The sutra’s tell us that Siddhartha was a tall man of powerful build, trained in the martial arts, in which he excelled, even defeating other Shakya warriors to prove his worth for the hand of the princess Yashodhara. The warrior’s fearlessness and commitment were evident in his first attempt to achieve enlightenment, and which is powerfully represented in the Gandhara image of the Buddha, after six years of extreme self-mortification had seen his body reduced to skin and bone.


Even after he realized that his first attempt was a failure his warrior’s commitment and courage were never in doubt. The Buddha’s next method, the “Middle Way” was not an excuse for inaction, weakness or impotence. When Siddhartha finally sat under the Bodhi tree he fixed his resolve on the goal of enlightenment with an unshakable resolution. A beautiful and dramatic verse is attributed to him by some early compilers of the sutras. “Let blood dry up, let flesh wither away, but I shall not stir from this spot till Enlightenment be attained.”

A few of the titles by which Siddhartha was known after his enlightenment appear to acknowledge this heroic quality, as in “jina” or “conqueror” and “mahavira” or “great hero (also the title of the founder of Jainism).

The Bodhisattva as hero is delineated clearly in a passage from the Prajnaparimita Sutra where he is said to fearlessly lead all sentient beings out of the deep forests of samsara, fighting of attacks from “inimical forces”. At the end of this passage he asks his disciple Subhuti “If, then, more and more hostile and inimical forces should rise up against him in that forest, would this heroic man decide to abandon his family and take himself alone out of that terrible and frightening forest?” and Subhuti of course replies, “No, O Lord”.

The historical Buddha himself, when stalked by the bandit and murderer Angulimala, chose not to flee or leave the problems to others. Instead he confronted and subdued the killer through what has traditionally been regarded as magical power. No matter how swiftly Angulimala ran after the casually strolling Buddha, he could not catch up with him. About a hundred years earlier the Greek philosopher Zeno posited such a situation in his “time paradox” of Achilles never being able to catch up with a tortoise. These day physicists might explain it as a “Quantum Zeno effect”, the name which E.C.G. Sudarshan and B. Misra coined to describe “the suppression of unitary time evolution caused by quantum decoherence…”

Then there is the story of how in a previous life the Buddha killed a mass-murderer on a ship to save the lives of the other travelers on board. The context in which Buddha told this avadana story to his disciples is interesting and relevant to the overall point I am trying to make. One day a disciple noticed that the Buddha had received a wound on his feet. The disciple asked how this could happen to some one who had attained nirvana. The Buddha then told his disciples the above story. The lesson being that no one can wholly escape the consequence of a violent deed even if its performance is necessary and righteous. But there is another logical corollary to the story, that if the Buddha had chosen, for reasons of cowardice or ethical fastidiousness, not to kill the murderer and not to save those many lives, he would have committed a more far more immoral and evil act.

It is this essentially non-violent yet nuanced and dynamic interpretation of Buddhist action that is completely absent from the passive, comfortable, sanitized, hands-off, and inherently self-serving interpretation of the Dharma dominating much of the contemporary Buddhist world.

A noticeable aspect of this “New Age” Buddhism is its preoccupation with money, celebrity and a kind of low-maintenance intellectualism disseminated in a plethora of unreadable self-help books with catchy Zen style titles (Watching the Watcher, Silent Mind Holy Mind, Living Through Dying and so on). Something like this is, I suppose, prevalent in institutionalized religions worldwide, and is probably a waste of time to work yourself up about it. But I think Tibetans would wholeheartedly join me in condemning Buddhist teachers charging extortionate ticket prices for their sermons, and Dharma centers discouraging, sometimes forbidding, their members from participating in political action, even for the cause of Tibetan freedom and human rights.

And how can you argue with them when even the former prime-minister of the exile government, a Tibetan lama and learned geshe has not only not participated in any Free Tibet demonstrations but has even ordered Tibetans not to demonstrate against Chinese leaders visiting the West. Yet Samdhong Rinpoche was seen on European TV, in 2006, as one of the leaders of a major demonstration against the Swiss company SYNGENTA in India, a leading agri-business company that Indian environmentalists opposed. So perhaps the spiritual lesson here is that political activism is permissible so long as it is fashionable, profitable and does not upset Beijing. The Dalai Lama has publicly joined the opposition to the proposed oil pipeline from Alberta to Texas. I am enough of an environmentalist not to take issue with the Dalai Lama’s initiative, but I wish His Holiness had been as opposed to the Beijing Olympics or China’s “population-transfer” railway line to Tibet.

Yet the most cynical thing I have seen recently, especially in relation to the self-immolations, is a fund raising letter sent out by the International Campaign for Tibet (ICT), asking people to donate money to it because “…13 Tibetans have set fire to themselves,” This from the organization that opposes the Tibetan independence struggle, and whose senior official wrote in enthusiastic support of China’s condemnation of self-immolation as being against Buddhism.

:angel:

I always saw this act of suicide as a statement (of rebellion).

Thank you Agape (and Tesla!), your last posts are priceless.
In the light of them I can understand myself a bit better. :)

I can add, that through the fire the spirit is released from the flesh completely.

[conk]

What an awful way to go. If your suicide is not successful, you will have to live with horrible burn wounds.

There are so many awful ways to commit suicide, while the humane and peaceful ways have been made illegal. If someone wants to end their incarnation here on Earth, there should be a way to do it without the anguish and horror.There is a way. By drowning. Extremely peaceful, with no anxiety. Just slip into, then under the water.

I've heard helium, set it up like an oxygen tank. drowning I can imagine being quite painful. ever swallowed water the wrong way? imagine lots of that.

with fire.... I guess it to be a big statement. the decision to end your own life generally comes from a lot of pain and misery. why would you want to inflict so much more on yourself willingly before you go? I speak from experience. My father drowned. I drowned when I was 13 years old. It was not painful. It was quite pleasant in fact. I don't need to imagine it, I died and lived through it.