Re: [asa] a thought for earth day (tomorrow)

To supplement what Ted and George have said, I mention a very useful
book that I have reviewed in the latest issue of PSCF. Two extracts
(unedited) from my review follow. I will be happy to send my full review
privately on request.
*********************************

ENVIRONMENTAL STEWARDSHIP: Critical Perspectives- Past and Present, by
R. J. Berry (ed.), New York, NY ,T & T Clark International, 2006, 338
pages, index. Paperback; $49.50, ISBN 0567030180

This book contains 26 essays and an introduction by Berry, who is a
Professor Emeritus of Genetics at University College, London. The core
essays are updates of papers, from a 2000 conference to explore “the
Christian approach to the environment” at Windsor Castle organized by
the John Ray Initiative, by Robin Attfield (philosopher), Murray Rae
(theologian), Calvin DeWitt (environmental biologist) and James Lovelock
(biogeochemist). These are supplemented by classical
expositions/criticisms by Richard Bauckham, John Black, Anne Clifford,
René Dubos, Douglas Hall, Peter Harrison, Ruth Page, Clare Palmer, Larry
Rasmussen, Paul Santmire, Lisa Sideris, Joseph Sittler, and John
Zizioulas, plus papers written especially for this collection by Elving
Anderson and Bruce Reichenbach, Susan Bratton, Martin Holdgate, John
Houghton, Michael Northcott, Derek Osborn and Chris Southgate, plus
previously unpublished lectures by Chris Patten and Crispin Tickell.

************************************

Santmire contrasts the creation theology in the priestly and Yahwist
stories, and then that in the Book of Job. He says that the Yahwist
story, with its small-scale agrarian setting, exemplifies what sensitive
care for the earth can mean. In this theological drama the land is a
character in its own right. The human’s relationship to the animals is
depicted in terms of tangible solidarity rather than intervention.
Santmire notes that in the Bible there is no doctrine of ‘cosmic fall’.
The soil remains innocent; the divine curse rests on it because of the
disobedience of humans and because of the fruits of violence that grow
from that disobedience. The promise is that, in Christ, with the deep
human fault healed and the curse therefore removed, we humans can begin
to live in Eden again. In contrast, in Job we are led into the
experience of a wilderness. We see noble wild creatures nurtured by God,
celebrated precisely because they resist human domestication. No longer
is conquering and controlling nature part of the equation for discerning
human dignity. We have a complex and rich biblical theology of
partnership between God, humans and all other creatures.
*************************************

Don Nield

George Murphy wrote:

> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ted Davis" <TDavis@messiah.edu>
> To: "ASA list" <asa@calvin.edu>; "George Murphy" <gmurphy@raex.com>
> Sent: Monday, April 23, 2007 12:14 PM
> Subject: Re: [asa] a thought for earth day (tomorrow)
>
>
>> Concerning the history of Christian ideas about "dominion," including
>> a very
>> thoughtful and accurate refutation of Lynn White's famous claim that Xty
>> caused the environmental crisis, I recommend reading Cameron Wybrow's
>> excellent book, "The Bible, Baconianism, and Mastery of Nature." Here
>> is my
>> review:
>> http://www.asa3.org/ASA/PSCF/1994/PSCF6-94Davis.html
>>
>> This is one of the very finest books on this topic, IMO, and ought to be
>> much better known.
>
>
> I've always thought that some Christians leaped much too quickly to
> "refute" White. While it would certainly be an overstatement to say
> that Christianity necessarily leads to our "ecologic crisis," it's
> true that empirical Christianity - i.e., the way most Christians have
> read the Bible & behaved toward the natural world in accord with what
> they think it says - has contributed significantly to environmental
> problems. With some exceptions (White noted St. Francis in
> particular), humanity's relationship with the non-human world has been
> considered to have relatively little religious significance. & the
> problem goes back well before the time of Bacon. I suggest H. Paul
> Santmire's _The Travail of Nature: The Ambiguous Ecological Promise of
> Christian Theology_ (Fortress, 1985) as a good survey of Christian
> attitudes toward nature from the earliest times to the twentieth century.
>
> Christians ought to make it clear, over against non-Christian
> criticisms, that there are ways of reading scripture & doing Christian
> theology that give a proper role to the natural world. But we also
> need to respond properly - & sometimes sternly - to conservative
> Christians, & especially those with political influence, who think
> that any kind of Christians environmentalism is New Age stuff, Gaia
> worship &c. An article of mine at
> http://www.elca.org/scriptlib/dcs/jle/article.asp?aid=97 deals briefly
> with this.
>
> Shalom
> George
> http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/
>
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Received on Tue Apr 24 06:03:47 2007