B'chukotai -- 5774

B’chukotai spells it out clearly:  obey God, and God “will grant your rains in their season so that the earth may yield its produce and the trees of the field their fruit … You shall eat your fill of bread and dwell securely in your land” (Leviticus 26:4-5).  Disobey, and God “will wreak misery upon you – consumption and fever … and your foes shall dominate you.  …  Your land shall not yield its produce, nor shall the trees of the land yield their fruit” (Leviticus 26:16-17,20).  The dichotomy could not be starker.  In this week’s parsha, God is the God of the natural world.  What’s more, the land’s health – and our own – is inextricably linked with following God’s laws.

Contemporary, liberal Jews don’t generally hold that God visits natural disaster on rule-breakers.  Earthquakes, tsunamis and outbreaks of disease aren’t punishments.

But we can sense that something in our environment is shifting and, scientists tell us, human beings are responsible.  It can’t be right to throw nature off balance by taking more than can be sustained, destroying habitat, and by failing to clean up after ourselves.  It’s not healthy to satiate every immediate whim and fail to think of future generations.  There are too many of us consuming too much.

According to a report issued by the government last week, the climate has already begun to change.  (Explore the report from the U.S. Global Change Research Program at www.globalchange.gov.)

I fear a world that has too many mega-storms and not enough bees.  I worry for the refugees displaced by both flooding and drought.  I despair for civilization in general, and my son in particular.  Last week and this week, we’ve been given wake-up calls.

To learn more about Judaism and the Environment, and a religious response to climate change in Arizona, visit:

• The Coalition on the Environment and Jewish Life (COEJL) deepens and broadens the Jewish community’s commitment to stewardship and protection of the Earth through outreach, activism and Jewish learning.  www.coejl.org.
• Arizona Interfaith Power & Light mobilizes people of faith in Arizona to reduce the causes of global climate change through education, advocacy, action and prayer.   www.azipl.org.