SUSTAINABLE SPRING

Hello and welcome to Tikkun tips, a periodic nugget of eco-Jewish thought from your friends at the Teva Learning Center

Even when looking out at the concrete landscape of New York City where I currently live, I am amazed by the rebirth that is now all around. The trees lining my street are blooming and I notice the wonderful changes that occur between the time that I leave for work and the time that I return. This daily growth reminds me of the celebratory words we say daily in the morning prayers before the Shma:

God, with benevolence, renews daily, perpetually, the work of creation.

At the same time that the plants and birds are reclaiming New York City, I have been busy scrubbing and cleaning my apartment in preparation for Passover. The feeling of rebirth and freedom that accompanies the co-occurrence of spring and Passover provides us all with a great opportunity to gain a new sense of appreciation for God’s creation.

God is Sustainable:
It is difficult not to be inspired by the blossoming of spring. Yet, how many of us when we witness spring’s rebirth think back to the death and retreat that occurred in the fall. We should! One of the fundamental aspects of nature is that the life that is now sprouting with abundance is dependent, for nutrients, on organisms that died last fall. The siddur mentions that God renews creation both daily and perpetually. The daily growth that we now witness depends on the perpetual cycle that intrinsically connects life and death—it is through death that God sustains life. An apt Passover analogue to this system would be that without the slavery of Egypt there could be no redemption. This prayer and nature’s ability to maintain life over billions of years through the cycle of life and death brings to mind the concept of sustainability.

What is Sustainability?
In response to the environmental degradation of the post-industrial age, people started to think about how to ensure the wellbeing of our planet and its passengers in the future. A person whose actions work to preserve the wellbeing of our planet and its present and future inhabitants can be said to be living a sustainable life. Conversely, actions that degrade life on plant Earth are not sustainable. One of many definitions of sustainability, this one developed by the United Nations reads: “Sustainable development meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs.” (1)

Surprisingly, the ancient description of God’s creative power found in our daily liturgy and the definition of sustainability develop by the United Nations are quite similar. Stated simply, living a life that is sustainable is a God-like act and is, therefore, a fulfillment of the Torah’s charge to act in a God-like manner. Thus, the more we work towards sustainability the more we fulfill the imperative to be God-like.

Activist Prayers
A few paragraphs later in the morning prayers but still before Shma it says:

Merciful God… instill in our hearts to understand and elucidate, to listen, learn, teach; to safeguard, perform, and fulfill all the words of Your Torah’s teaching with love.

This prayer lays out an action plan for how one can accomplish that which the Torah teaches. Firstly, we must open ourselves up so that we can listen and learn. Go to the library, search the internet, attend classes—gain as much information as possible. However, don’t keep it a secret. Once you learn, teach your knowledge to others. Here are a few good websites to start you off: Alliance for Sustainability, The Natural Step, and the UN Commision on sustainable development.

However, awareness and knowledge are meaningless unless it leads to action; we must also safeguard, perform, and fulfill. As individuals, as family members, business owners, and voters we must act to fulfill our needs without jeopardizing the ability of future generations to satisfy theirs. Living a sustainable life requires a broadening of one’s consciousness beyond the confines of self-interest. Individualism has no place when it comes to environmental issues. We must transcend utilitarian ideas that highlight self-interest as the guarantor of overall happiness and acknowledge our responsibility to present and future humanity.

Sefirat Ha’Omer: Counting the Omer
The Torah instructs us to count each of the forty nine days between the redemption that occurred on Passover and revelation that is celebrated on Shavuot. The counting of the Omer is a great opportunity to increase our awareness of God’s Creation and to realize our responsibility to make sustainable choices. I suggest tracking the growth of one of your plant neighbors in a Spring Omer Log in order to learn more about the natural world and about yourself.

KEEP A SPRING OMER LOG

Ingredients for a spring Omer log made from one-sided or recycled paper: Use this journal to concretely focus on how God renews Creation daily. If it is your custom to pray daily, you might want to integrate your spring log into your daily prayer ritual.

• Create a journal from one-sided or recycled paper.
• Choose a plant near your home, work, or school and visit it every day between Passover and Shavuot.
• Keep track of the daily changes occurring in the plant.
• Draw pictures of the plant at different stages of spring development.
• Study the plant’s botany.
• Write a fictional account of the plant’s experience from either your perspective and from the plant's perspective or both.

Through a focused study of how God sustains creation you should better understand how and why we should live a sustainable life. Let the renewal of spring inspire you to use your freedom to embrace sustainability. Embracing sustainability and making a commitment to the well being of our planet and its inhabitants can only bring us closer to the redemption that we pray for each Passover.

DERECH ERETZ
Know any teens who want to get to know the land better through an exciting two week backpacking, rock climbing and canoeing adventure trip? Check out the Teva Learning Center and BBYO’s Derech Eretz Program July 31 – August 14, 2005 Derech Eretz

This tikkun tip was inspired by a workshop on sustainable commerce given by Terri Gibbs. For more information on Terri’s work check out the Alliance for Sustainability.

1 (U.N. World Commission on Environment & Development, Our Common Future, 1987, from a packet given by Terri Gibbs in a seminar about sustainability).

DERECH ERETZ
Know any teens who want to get to know the land better through an exciting two week backpacking, rock climbing and canoeing adventure trip? Check out the Teva Learning Center and BBYO’s Derech Eretz Program July 31 – August 14, 2005 Derech Eretz

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