What is the Jewish view on euthanasia?

Answer 1

Well, it's not a simple thing....."Traditionally" the precept is to "choose life", and therefore any intentional taking of life, including one's own, is prohibited. But no definition of life is given.

Before modern medicine, and in particular before mechanical life-support systems were developed (first the "iron lung" and today the "ventilator"), people pretty much died when their bodies gave out. And people usually knew when that was happening. There are cultures where especially "aged" people (and that can vary) would go off to die -- think of Moses going off to die when he knew it was time. Like most people today, Jews are having a very difficult time deciding what to do for people, loved ones in particular, whose bodies have pretty much shut down but can be "kept alive" mechanically. And once someone is hooked up to a machine, whether to withdraw it.

So as with other religions, the concept is that if death just "occurs", that's okay, and that can include choosing not to put someone on a ventilator. But "hastening" death is not okay. But the dilemma is that today "medicine" can keep a body going much, much longer than it would on its own, so is removing "life support" simply acknowledging that but for the machine the body would not function on its own and "die" or is that "hastening" the inevitable. Stricter rabbis tend to see it as "hastening" even if the methods used to mechanically support a person can amount to what some might consider "torture" while liberal rabbis tend to view sustaining life mechanically as virtually unethical.

As to assisting a person who is suffering constant, excrutiating pain to commit suicide, well, iftpretty much falls under the same kind of reasoning but even "liberal" thinkers, rabbis and others alike, are really unable to publicly endorse suicide because it hastens death.

Answer 2

Orthodox Jewish belief strictly forbids euthanasia. Among non-Orthodox groups, the issue has no concensus, and generally falls under the category of personal views.