Man cannot become attached to higher aims and submit to a rule if he sees nothing above him to which he belongs. To free him from all social pressure is to abandon him to himself and demoralize him.
Emile DurkheimRead
Maniacal suicide. —This is due to hallucinations or delirious conceptions. The patient kills himself to escape from an imaginary danger or disgrace, or to obey a mysterious order from on high, etc.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote addresses the complex psychological motivations behind suicidal actions stemming from delusions or hallucinations.
Emile Durkheim's statement explores the tragic phenomenon of maniacal suicide, highlighting how individuals may resort to self-harm to escape perceived threats or due to distorted perceptions of reality. It underscores the profound impact of mental illness on decision-making and the desperate lengths to which individuals may go in an attempt to alleviate suffering or comply with perceived divine commands.
Themes
SuicidePsychologyHallucinationsMental HealthDelusions
In practice
Example use cases
In a mental health awareness speech, this quote can be used to discuss the seriousness of hallucinations and their potential consequences.
More from Emile Durkheim
All quotes →If religion has given birth to all that is essential in society, it is because the idea of society is the soul of religion.
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A person is not merely a single subject distinguished from all the others. It is especially a being to which is attributed a relative autonomy in relation to the environment with which it is most immediately in contact.
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The roles of art, morality, religion, political faith, science itself are not to repair organic exhaustion nor to provide sound functioning of the organs. All this supraphysical life is built and expanded not because of the demands of the cosmic environment but because of the demands of the social environment.
Emile DurkheimRead
A society whose members are united by the fact that they think in the same way in regard to the sacred world and its relations with the profane world, and by the fact that they translate these common ideas into common practices, is what is called a Church. In all history, we do not find a single religion without a Church.
Emile DurkheimRead
The human person, whose definition serves as the touchstone according to which good must be distinguished from evil, is considered as sacred, in what one might call the ritual sense of the word. It has something of that transcendental majesty which the churches of all times have given to their Gods.
Emile DurkheimRead
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