Programska knjižnica 9. Lošinjskih dana bioetike - Hrvatsko ...

EUTHANASIA IN THE LIGHT OF
JESUS’ DEATH ON THE CROSS
Social Construction of a Dignified Death
“Later, knowing that all was now completed, and so
that the Scripture would be fulfilled, Jesus said, ‘I am
thirsty.’ A jar of wine vinegar was there, so they soaked
a sponge in it, put the sponge on a stalk of the hyssop
plant, and lifted it to Jesus’ lips. When he had received
the drink, Jesus said, ‘It is finished.’ With that, he bowed
his head and gave up his spirit.” (John 19, 28–30)
Relying on the reports of the Jesus’ wail on the cross “My God, my
God, why hast thou forsaken me?!”, the author discusses the feeling of
abandonment of the contemporary human who, for example, lies terminally
ill in a hospital, and who has no choice, in order to get rid of the
suffering, but to ask someone to help him die. Did the Roman soldiers assist
Jesus, as he hung helpless on the cross, to die by giving him to drink
vinegar (or maybe poison), in order to allow him to die a dignified death
before the Sabbath (without breaking legs)?
This discussion on euthanasia the author based on the view that it is
a socially constructed fact which, like other forms of assisted dying, was
interpreted in different ways throughout history. For the meanings, that euthanasia
had and has today, have been determined according to the need of
the specific societies in the given times, which led the author to pay special
attention to the “spirit of time”, i.e. social and religious circumstances at
the time of Jesus’ life and ways of providing assistance in dying, and therefore
the reasons for using vinegar (or poison).
With this discussion the author does not want to dispute with Christian
theologians and their interpretations of this part of the Gospel, but only
wants, using this part of the Gospel, to bring forward the discussion of
“human dignity” and euthanasia as “a death worthy of the human” as terms
which have become a corny phrase of everyday speech.
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