Think climate change is simply a foregone conclusion? Believe that it’s somebody else’s problem?
Not so fast.
In her new book “To Forever Inhabit This Earth: An Ethic of Enoughness” (Behrman House), Baltimore resident Rabbi Nina Beth Cardin encourages Jews and others to reconsider their relationship to the environment.
The book, which comes out today, insists it is not too late to save our planet if we have the communal and personal drive.
Using spiritual teachings from Judaism and other religious traditions, the book explores how Jewish identity is inexorably tied to the natural world.
“Nature is the way that God speaks to the Jewish people throughout Torah,” says Rabbi Cardin. “We have creation. We have agricultural laws. We have sacrifices. God is seen, and spoken of, as cloud and rock and water. Our covenant is with the Land of Israel as well as with God and each other. It’s a tripartite thing.”
Rabbi Cardin says she wants the book, the culmination of two decades of environmental activism and scholarship, “to help people understand how intimately intertwined Jewish vocabulary, rituals, images, spirit is with nature and then translate that into a message of sustainability.”
Regarding the Jewish connection to the environment, Rabbi Cardin points to the Maariv evening prayer and Shacharit morning prayer.
“We talk about the sun, about light, Rosh Chodesh, the new moon,” she says. “We light the candles at sunset. … I would love this book to help people truly feel they are in communion with nature and that it hurts them when nature hurts.”
She says she hopes the book “helps people understand that Judaism has something to say about the environment. Judaism has been caring about it for 3,000 years. You own a tradition that cares about it. But in addition, [the book] shows you how you can express [your concern] in a Jewish way.”
Rabbi Cardin, who founded the Baltimore Orchard Project and the Baltimore Environmental Sustainability Network, acknowledges the task of healing the environment may seem overwhelming.
“The money and the power is still with the corporations that don’t want to get off of fossil fuels, want to have private transportation as opposed to public transportation, like [concentrated animal feeding operations] because industrial agriculture is cheaper for them, even though it’s less healthy for the world,” Rabbi Cardin says. “We have a big fight ahead of us. And the opponent is huge. So there’s a lot of work to be done.
“But we start with small acts,” she says. “I know some people say our small acts aren’t important because they don’t add up to much. It’s true. Our individual acts might not make a huge difference on the environment but in aggregate they will make a huge difference. [Also] the more you act in a certain way, the more you become that value. If it’s natural to you, then it’s not a burden. It informs everything you do and becomes a passion.”
Rabbi Cardin says she wants readers to care about the environment like they would about a loved one.
“We have certain things and people we love and we would not do something that harmed them,” she says. “It’s the same thing with nature — almost everything we do affects the world around us. I want the book to help people to care about the environment so deeply that their everyday acts are measured through a net of whether or not this is helpful or harmful to the environment.”
Rabbi Cardin views climate change and other ecological dangers as an opportunity of sorts.
“In an odd way, we’ve been handed a most humbling privilege to be alive at this pivotal moment and entrusted with determining the fate of Earth and humanity,” she says. “Our goal of establishing a thriving world for all creation must now become not just our task, but our devotion. Make it a devotion that makes us feel fuller, more complete when we do it and as if we’re not complete when we don’t do it.”
To order Rabbi Cardin’s book, visit bookshop.org or amazon.com
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