People who attempt suicide usually suffer from extreme emotional pain and distress, and feel unable to cope with their problems. They are likely to suffer from mental illness, particularly severe depression, and to feel hopeless about the future.
Consider any such person who tries to hang himself from a ceiling fan. However, he is saved and taken to the hospital. Later, he gets out of his emotional outbreak but soon after that he dies due to heart attack.
So, according to Islam, what do you think whether such person will be forgiven by God or will he be treated as someone who tried to take his life?
Answer
A suicide is like a murder. The only difference is that in this case a person murders himself. There is no justification of taking a life in Islam, whether the life is someone else’s or one’s own. However, like in case of murder, in suicide too, there could be reasons why a person commits such an act. In case there is a genuine excuse, the Almighty would decide on the basis of merit of it if the crime committed could be excused or not. However, crime it would still remain.
It doesn’t matter whether the person in your example died because of suicide attempt or heart attack. If he attempted to commit a suicide and in the eyes of God there was no excusable reason for it, the person is guilty even if his attempt didn’t succeed in materializing what was attempted. The only reason why a person who performs an unsuccessful attempt at an otherwise inexcusable suicide can be excused is that he repents later. Of course, such an opportunity will not be available to a person who dies as a result of committing suicide.