Did Jesus Commit the Sin of Suicide?

[_sock puppet]

About the most historically sure thing about the life of Jesus is that he was killed by Roman soldiers after trial and condemnation by the governing Roman authorities. The action would have the full power backing of the Roman army.

What is it that the opening post is looking to explore?

At least in the LDS version of the atonement, it was Jesus 'paying the price' of sin only because he voluntarily allowed the Roman soldiers to crucify him to death, as he had as a god the power to have stopped it. Since he could have saved himself, was his not doing so a volitional act of death, a suicide? Yes, death was the ends sought voluntarily but not for the reason of leaving this life (i.e., a suicide), but according to the atonement theory, to effect a different purpose than merely ending his mortal life. So I do not see it as a suicide so much as a necessary step to fulfilling a grander purpose. (Keep in mind, I do not believe any of it, but this is my understanding of what the LDS atonement theory posits and what I think that the OP was asking.)

sock puppet, if i understand you correctly, you're saying Jesus' case would be analogous to a soldier diving on a grenade to save his/her comrades.

Yea, I think that would be a good analogy. But it might go one step further. Jesus was supposed to have known with a certainty that there was an afterlife and as a conscious being would not be snuffed out by the mortal death on the cross. Something the soldier would not know. So I think that the soldier's nagging sense of survival means that he has, in that sense and difference than Jesus, perhaps made a greater sacrifice.

[_ludwigm]

did Jesus commit a (forgiveable) transgression when he of his own free will did what we today would call "suicide-by-cop"?

In 18th century - when cops' hands were slower... - people did it other way.

Suicide murder was a widespread phenomenon in 18th century Denmark. Instead of taking their own life, suicide candidates would kill a child or some other random person, in the hope that they would receive a death penalty.
In his new book, “A Lutheran Plague – Murdering to Die in the Eighteenth Century”, Tyge Krogh, a senior researcher at the Danish State Archives, looks into this hitherto overlooked aspect of Danish history.

Eighteenth century Danes were more religious than modern Danes. And according to the church, killing yourself meant you would end up in hell.
On the other hand, if you repented your horrible deeds just before the execution, you received a direct ticket to heaven.

This view is based on Martin Luther’s conception of Christianity.
“Luther believed that we received redemption by conceding our own sinfulness and by sincerely repenting our sins and believing in God,” says Krogh.

The final moment of life was the most important one in which to repent your sins and to affirm your faith in God – because then you couldn’t commit any more sins, he explains. So if someone with a death sentence showed sincere repentance, it was thought that the soul would receive redemption.

The wave of suicide murders swept across all Evangelical Lutheran countries in northern Europe.
Unlike the Catholic Church, Lutherans read the laws of the Pentateuch very literally – and these laws prescribed the death penalty for murder.
When God demanded the death penalty, there wasn’t much to discuss for the pious Danish authorities.

This put Denmark – and other Evangelical Lutheran countries – in a very special situation:
- On the one hand, murderers should be executed
- On the other hand, murderers who repented their sins could escape the torments of hell.
This made it attractive for suicide candidates to become murderers.

After years of suicide murder mayhem, the Danish judiciary started to realise that something wasn’t right.
The civil servants noticed that the country’s criminal code wasn’t functioning properly, but rather was the actual cause of the random killings of innocent people.
“This became such a big worry for state officials that they reacted by introducing the harshest death penalties in Danish history,” explains the researcher.

Whipped, pinched and smashed
The penalty was particularly harsh if the suicide murderer was a soldier:
Military courts sentenced suicide murderers to a weekly whipping for nine weeks leading up to the execution. When the day arrived, the executioner would use a large wagon wheel to smash as many bones as possible in the soldier's body and then fix him to the wheel where he was left to die from his injuries.
Civil courts sentenced suicide murderers to be pinched five times with red-hot tongs on their way from the prison to the scaffold. Then their hands were chopped off, followed by the head, after which the dead body was displayed on a big wheel as a warning to others.

As the harsh penalties failed to solve the problem, it was suggested that perhaps abolishing the death penalty altogether could do the trick.
This, however, flew in the face of what the Lutheran countries had been enforcing for more than 200 years, arguing that it was God’s will that suicide murderers should be executed. As a result, the proposal was initially rejected by theologians, lawyers and the government alike.
Nevertheless, the number of suicide murders just kept on growing.

But when, a decade later, in 1767, the death penalty was finally abolished, convicted suicide murderers were instead whipped once a year and were given the toughest and most degrading work tasks on offer. And this was what finally put an end to the suicide murders.
“This is how Denmark pioneered the abolition of the death penalty,” says Krogh. “But it wasn’t something people were proud of. This decision was a gross violation of the religious conception of the criminal system. Gradually, other countries started following suit, including Prussia.”

Suicide murderers exist in today’s USA
One would think that suicide murders were a thing of the distant past. But even today, these horrific murders are committed in countries that have capital punishment.
”These suicide murders actually also occur in today’s USA. Research has pointed out several murderers, who committed their crimes with the sole purpose of being executed,” he says.
“The suicide murders in the USA are nowhere near as frequent as those in the 18th century,” he adds. ”But it shows that suicide murder is a byproduct of having the death penalty. There will always be some people who are attracted by the thought of being executed – and that’s an important point to bring into the capital punishment debate.”

[_Maksutov]

The LDS Church currently endorses the teaching that says:
"Man did not create himself. He did not furnish his spirit with a human dwelling place. It is God who created man, both body and spirit. Man has no right, therefore, to destroy that which he had no agency in creating. They who do so are guilty of murder [...]"

The LDS Church also teaches that Jesus Christ was God's "[o]nly Begotten Son in the flesh." In other words, Jesus was a man like us whom God created both body and spirit. The Church further teaches that Jesus "gave His life for us" by "allow[ing]" himself to be sacrificed. Does this mean that Jesus had a choice in the matter of his crucifixion and freely chose death? Yes, the Church teaches that Jesus "[a]llowed" himself to be arrested despite his having divine power sufficient to knock back soldiers with the mere sound of his voice -- "it was the Savior who was in charge, not the armed men who came to take Him."

Based on this, was Jesus guilty of the sin of suicide/murder?

Not only was he guilty of suicide, he knowingly involved others. I think there was some deception involved.

Jesus wasn't quite the great guy everybody says, he said some mean, crappy stuff to his followers and his Mom. He made up some stories, too. I don't think he could help it entirely. Remember the household that he grew up in and the whoppers some of them (like his Mom) told.

[_SuperDell]

Just an older version of "suicide by cop".

[_palerobber]

ludwig's comment above has me thinking. if someone like Jesus were about to commit "suicide by proxy" -- depending on agents of the state to do the actual killing -- at which points in the timeline would prayers for forgiveness be productive?

obviously, one can't obtain pre-forgiveness for a sin yet to be committed, but what if someone in this situation prays after having set the plan in motion, but before the last moment at which the plan might be aborted? it occurs to me that Jesus' prayers at Gethsemane fall within this window, so perhaps in those prayers he was pleading with God for forgiveness...

Matthew 26:36-39 (KJV):
Then cometh Jesus with them unto a place called Gethsemane, and saith unto the disciples, Sit ye here, while I go and pray yonder. And he took with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be sorrowful and very heavy. Then saith he unto them, My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death: tarry ye here, and watch with me. And he went a little further, and fell on his face, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me.

there are some possible signs of remorse there (in bold), but what do we make of his plea to "let this cup pass from me"? i think most Mormons would agree that Jesus was not afraid of death or suffering, so perhaps the bitter "cup" actually refers to the cup of God's wrath (same metaphor used in Revelation 14:10).

perhaps Jesus was asking that God's wrath over his orchestrated suicide be abated.

[_Nightlion]

Brigham Young taught that Jesus did NOT have the power to resurrect himself. An angel with the Priesthood authority did it.

You missed the point. Jesus was not resurrected to an everlasting estate. He took his body back. He said it himself.

John 10:17-18
17 Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again.
18 No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father.

Brigham Young was a good Yankee Guesser. lol

[_Nightlion]

ludwig's comment above has me thinking. if someone like Jesus were about to commit "suicide by proxy" -- depending on agents of the state to do the actual killing -- at which points in the timeline would prayers for forgiveness be productive?

obviously, one can't obtain pre-forgiveness for a sin yet to be committed, but what if someone in this situation prays after having set the plan in motion, but before the last moment at which the plan might be aborted? it occurs to me that Jesus' prayers at Gethsemane fall within this window, so perhaps in those prayers he was pleading with God for forgiveness...

Matthew 26:36-39 (KJV):
Then cometh Jesus with them unto a place called Gethsemane, and saith unto the disciples, Sit ye here, while I go and pray yonder. And he took with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be sorrowful and very heavy. Then saith he unto them, My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death: tarry ye here, and watch with me. And he went a little further, and fell on his face, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me.

there are some possible signs of remorse there (in bold), but what do we make of his plea to "let this cup pass from me"? i think most Mormons would agree that Jesus was not afraid of death or suffering, so perhaps the bitter "cup" actually refers to the cup of God's wrath (same metaphor used in Revelation 14:10).

perhaps Jesus was asking that God's wrath over his orchestrated suicide be abated.

Crap. Peace out.

[_huckelberry]

if someone like Jesus were about to commit "suicide by proxy" -- depending on agents of the state to do the actual killing -- at which points in the timeline would prayers for forgiveness be productive?

Crap. Peace out.

Pretty good summary, I was thinking palerobber might be taking legalism to an absurd extreme.Then again probably nothing that serious.

[_ludwigm]

...ludwig's comment above of ...

Crap. Peace out.

Mods? Maybe?

Disabled here as offtopic?
I don't care, by the way.

It is crap, anyway.

[_palerobber]

Brigham Young taught that Jesus did NOT have the power to resurrect himself. An angel with the Priesthood authority did it.

You missed the point. Jesus was not resurrected to an everlasting estate. He took his body back. He said it himself.

John 10:17-18
17 Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again.
18 No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father.

Brigham Young was a good Yankee Guesser. lol

thanks for bringing this verse to my attention, Nightlion.

it seems to me to both reinforce my idea that Jesus, in a literal sense, took his own life (suicide), while also making it crystal clear that God has explicitly commanded him to do so.

so this can be accounted as further support for Mormonism's "Nancy Rigdon" theory of moral relativism.