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[Gomer Pyle]

I know that Christians believe that suicide is the only unforgivable sin. What if the suicide is committed because of a mental illness? The person was too mentally unstable to make rational decisions.

Robin hung himself after the onset of a particularly insidious form of dementia. He would not have done it if his mind were properly intact. How does God view suicide due to insanity?

[jimwalton]

Suicide is not an unforgivable sin. the only unforgivable sin in the Bible is a persistent rejection of God.

There aren't any verses in the Bible that talk about suicide. Some people in the Bible committed suicide (Possibly King Saul, definitely Judas), but there are no teachings in the Bible about it.

Obviously, suicide is taking a life, and the Bible does say that it's wrong to willfully take a life by violence (Ex. 20.13), but it doesn't speak specifically about suicide.

Some people consider that the Roman Catholic Church teaches that anyone who suicides goes directly to hell. While some Catholics agree to that, others don't. But what we definitely do NOT find is the Bible teaching that. The Bible never says that people who kill themselves go to hell, even though the last act they committed on this earth was murder. The teaching of Scripture is clear that your final destiny is not dependent on an action like that, but the state of your soul (with a sin nature or the nature of Jesus) at the end of life.

I think it's fair to say that murder, whether of oneself or another, is always a symptom of crossed signals in the brain. We are wired for survival, not self-destruction. I wonder if you're thinking about suicide the way the Catholic Church has taught, that anyone who suicides goes to hell. As I said, that is not a teaching of the Bible, but a theological assumption of Catholics because the victim didn't get the Last Rites. It's not a biblical teaching, however, but a RC Church teaching.

Suicide is a sin, for sure, because it's contrary to life to intentionally take a life. From what I interpret from your question, though, I don't think people who are mentally ill are held accountable for the acts they do "under the influence" of their unhealthy brains (in this particular illustration). We mourn the loss of Robin Williams, for sure, and the tragedies of all who take their own lives.