19 When you besiege a city for many days to wage war against it to capture it, you shall not destroy its trees by wielding an ax against them, for you may eat from them, but you shall not cut them down. Is the tree of the field a man, to go into the siege before you?
20 However, a tree you know is not a food tree, you may destroy and cut down, and you shall build bulwarks against the city that makes war with you, until its submission.
… These verses toward the end of the parashah, Deuteronomy 20:19-20, form the basis for the mitzvahbal tashchit, “do not destroy.” While the verses themselves deal specifically with cutting down trees during war, the Sages extended their meaning to cover all forms of wasteful destruction. They taught that anyone who deliberately wastes our resources, either natural or man-made, violates the law.
For over 3,000 years Jews have been concerned about the environment. Although these instructions are specifically directed to the care of fruit trees during war, the lesson gleaned from them has far-reaching implications for life on this planet. Our ancestors understood that life depends upon preserving the land. Although they didn’t use words like “ecology,” “global warming,” or “environmental crisis,” they clearly understood and respected these concepts.
The tree in the Torah text is read by the Sages as a metaphor. They understood that the prohibition to destroy fruit trees implies that it is forbidden to destroy anything that was beneficial to humankind. Maimonides’ Mishneh Torah tells us that a tree may be cut down if it damages other trees or causes harm to neighboring fields. According to Maimonides, the Torah only forbids willful destruction. We are not precluded from making use of God’s creations but are warned against unnecessarily destroying gifts of nature. Needless cutting down of a fruit-bearing tree is forbidden not only in wartime, but at all times. Similarly, we may not destroy or waste anything useful, whether it be food or money or clothing.
In the creation story in Genesis 1:28, humankind is granted dominion over the earth. The same biblical passage that gives us this dominion also requires that we care for the earth; we are reminded that even as we till the earth, we must also preserve it. God’s command to “rule the fish of the sea, the birds of the sky, and all the living things that creep on earth” gives us the responsibility to guard the world. Because God created the natural world, it is sacred. It is ours on loan, to be used and cared for. We are granted both dominion and stewardship of our world; therefore we are not to pollute its water or air or waste its precious resources.
As a child in religious school, one of the first stories I heard was that of Honi and his planting of the carob tree. When asked why he was planting a tree that would not bear fruit until long after his death, he replied that when he came into the world he found carob trees that had been planted by those who came before him, so he was doing the same for his descendants. It’s a simple story that we tell every Tu BiSh’vat, but one that teaches an age-old truth.
Today’s environmentalists raise the same concern as Honi. Since the mid-twentieth century, we have become aware that restoring our planet’s diminishing resources is a crucial issue. The destruction of tropical forests, lumbering without reforestation, burning of land, and the general wasting of other natural resources will leave future generations with diminished resources. Just over forty years ago, author Rachel Carson warned of the dangerous effects of our lifestyle on the environment. Silent Spring spoke of our reckless attempt to control our environment by the use of pesticides and warned that destroying the balance of nature would ultimately do more harm than good.
Since Carson’s best-selling publication, others have written on the same subject. Just ten years ago, Al Gore, in his book Earth In the Balance, wrote of his conviction that only radical rethinking of our relationship with nature could save our ecology. Whether or not we believe that we must save our resources because God has commanded us to do so, we cannot ignore what we have done to our world or sit idle without trying to correct the mistakes we’ve made.
Judaism does not separate people from nature. We’re taught that the earth is one unit, just as God is one. Whatever affects plant and animal life affects humans as well. If we destroy other kinds of living things on this earth, we are also destroying ourselves. The most important lessons we can teach our children are that not only do all living things depend upon each other, but also what we do today affects what the world will be like tomorrow. Each generation is linked to the next by its actions. Like Honi, we depend on what those who came before us did, as our children will depend upon us. Whether it is wartime or peacetime, we must care for the natural resources entrusted to us.
Your Guide
Throughout the Bible, we are urged to respect creation and not waste or destroy. Living things range from the human being to the simplest of species, and the rich variety of nature is to be cherished. In addition, Jewish tradition is distinctly linked to trees and to water; in fact, our Torah is referred to as the “Tree of Life.” Jewish tracts entreat us time and again to respect and enhance trees and water.
Torah has a multitude of verses regarding the care of our resources. How do we decide which ones to follow? Do we pick and choose only those that affect us personally, or do we move beyond our own neighborhoods, cities, and even countries for the betterment of all humankind?
How, in this age of technology, can we ensure that we don’t do more damage to our natural resources-our drinking water, our rivers, the soil, or the air?
When our military goes into another country to liberate it, as we have recently done in Iraq, do we have any obligations to the people of that country regarding the protection of their natural resources?
Make a ‘Handmade Midrash’ that draws on how you understand this text in light of the distinctions you explored in your community of inquiry. Make your midrash from colored construction paper by tearing forms out of the paper and sticking them onto a background sheet of paper.
Handmade Midrash is a process of interpretation developed by Jo Milgrom. Her process has a number of stages:
Text Study
Creation of an artwork
Discussion in small groups
Reflective writing on what you can learn through looking at what you created more carefully.
Return to the text
The artwork is created through tearing paper and attaching it to a background. It is not about creating a realistic kind of picture, but capturing ideas and representing them – often through symbolic representation –the torn paper represents ideas in relation to one another. It doesn’t require you to be ‘good at art’ as you can represent ideas through abstract shapes, a blob, color, etc.
After you have created your midrash, divide into small groups to share what you have done and what it means. Here what other people see in what your midrash. Describe what was the hardest and easiest elements to do, what role color plays in your midrash, why you placed things where you did, how the parts relate to one another, etc.
After the discussion, take some time to do some reflective writing. You might like to think about some of the following prompts: Did anything surprise you in what you constructed? In what people saw in it? How did the ideas come together? How does what is happening in the picture relate to your own feelings and thoughts about the world you live in? How does it relate to your own feelings and thoughts about the Divine human connection?
Interview two people in your family or community about the following:
Is there any kind of food that you personally choose not to eat? Why?
Do you think that what you eat affects your health?
Do you think that what you eat affects your mood?
Do you think you can look at what someone eats and draw any conclusion about their lifestyle? Their values?
Do you think that what you choose to eat or not eat can makes you a better person?
Do you eat meat? Do you think this affects the kind of person you are?
In the account of creation God blesses us and tells us and gives us all seed bearing plants to eat. In Noah, after the flood he tells he blesses us again, but this time he also allow us to eat meat. Why do you think God changes his blessing? Do you think we should eat meat?
Look upon this land— Touch it. Sand under your bare feet, The squish of mud, Silky coat of cat, Soft rose petals, A smooth round rock, Rain on your face.
Touch it with your eyes. Cherry trees blossoming pink, Lake of blue and summer sky, The green of life, Purple grapes and apples red, Moon rising yellow, Orange sun going down.
Touch it with your ears. Splatter of rain, Crack of thunder, Wind whispering, Birds singing, The crying of babies and puppies, Kittens and ducklings.
Touch it with your nose. Pine-scent of woods, lilacs blooming, new-mown grass, smoke of chimneys, strawberries in the sun.
Touch it with your tongue. Lick of sugar, Tang of lemon, ginger, or spice, Bite of cold snow, Gulp of pure water.
Look upon this land— Touch it. Touch it in every way you can, For this land is part of you, And you are part of it.
Given into your care is this earth. See how beautiful it is. Be careful not to spoil it, For if you destroy the world, There will be no one after you to restore it.
(Molly Cone, Listen to the Trees, UAHC press, 1995, pp. 42-43)
Molly Cone was a well known children’s author, having published over 45 books. She was a founding member of Temple Beth Am in Seattle.
Which of these blessings are asked for and which given without asking? Do you think this makes a difference? Who or what are the blessings directed toward – how does it change the thing being blessed?
Divine Blessings Does the blessing recognize something (a quality) that is already present or does it create something new? What is the meaning of the blessing? What is intended by the blessing?
Human Blessings Does the blessing create something new or recognize something (a quality) that is already present? Is the blessing freely offered? What is intended by the blessing?
And God blessed them [Adam and Chava], and said to them: ‘Be fruitful, and multiply [be many], and fill the earth, and bring it under your control [subdue it]; and have command over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the heavens, and all living things that crawl upon the earth. And God said: ‘Here, I give you all plants that bear seeds, that are upon the face of all the earth, and all trees, in which there is fruit of the tree that bears seeds—for you they shall be for eating.
And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said to them: ‘Be fruitful and multiply [be many], and fill the earth. And the fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon all the wildlife of the earth, and upon all the fowl of the heavens, and all that crawl on the soil, and all the fish of the sea – into your hand are they given. All things crawling about that live, for you shall they be, for eating, as with the green plants, I now give you all of it. However – flesh with its life, its blood, you shall not eat.
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