Review of Euthanasia in Nations and Religions View

Mercyful killing (euthanasia) is a basic issue in bioethics. It`s common sense is the act or method of causing death painlessly, so as to end suffering as a way to deal with persons dying of incurable, Painful disease. After defining euthanasia the present research tries to investigate this phenimenon in nations and religions viewpoint. Due to the subject being important and few studies available in this area, the current study has been designed, which is a systematic narrative review. Using keyword search in the databases like Matscinet, ISI, Scopus, Google Scholar, Science direct, Pubmed, Iranmedex, Medline, Magiran using the following key words, euthanasia, medical ethics, nations, religions and pallivative care search was done. After searching the available databases with the appropriate key words, between 2010 to 2020, 72 articles have been obtained. Out of these ones, 46 articles have been selected and analyzed as the most relevant to our desired objectives. At first, we study nations and three monotheistic religions, Islam, Christianity and Judaism then other religions such as Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism and Shinto school will say about euthanasia. They have also allowed such patients the right to death according to human ethical principles and it has even been a legal practice in some countries. Reviewing the articles related to the positions of different religions in the world regarding this phenimenon show that, all Eastern and Western religions are against active euthanasia. But passive voluntary euthanasia is accepted by almost all religions if it is conditional on certain conditions. Please cite this article as: Najafian Z, Najafian M. Review of Euthanasia in Nations and Religions View. Iran J Med Law 2021; 14(55): 203-227.