To Till and to Tend

How many of us have ever given thought to what our Shabbat candles are sourced from?  I've been working at increasingly my lifestyle sustainability for years and never thought to ask.  I work for an organization, GreenMicrofinance, which brings green energy to those at the Bottom of the Pyramid; without access to grid electricity, people rely on kerosene lamps and parraffin candles.  And yes, parraffin candles - examples of which are the old familiar Shabbat candles - are sourced from fossil fuel.  I just reasearched this and came up with a wonderful post at Canfei Nesharim's site - they provide an Orthodox perspective on environmental responsibilty and have a very comprehensive post on just this question which you should definitely check out.
So what to do?  One simple, but expensive, solution is to switch to naturally sourced candles, soy or bees wax.  That way we can all keep on using our beautiful Shabbat candlesticks.
Another route would be to return to our ancient, pre-candles ritual of burning olive oil in shabbat lamps.  Pictured above is a modern version, which is quite lovely, designed by Israeli artist Nathanel Putnam.  Then there is the arts and crafts project approach.  My own personal experiment failed, so I put it out to all of you out there to share your more successful attempts.  I did find a totally neat web site which demonstrates how to recycle paper into oil wicks.  This would be a great project for educators to work on.  We really need to figure this out! Can you imagine how much fossil fuel is consumed by all the shabbat candles each Friday night?  Contributing to global warming is definitely at odds with welcoming Shabbat.
To all you problem solvers out there: the best solution would be a shabbat lamp shaped to fit INTO a shabbat candlestick, since those are the ceremonial objects we all own.  That way we don't need to all go out and buy even more stuff.  Let us share our wisdom about this.  ASAP!

I wish that I were creative enough to have created this term on my own, but alas, I must be honest, it was King Jigme Singye Wangchuck of Bhutan. In catching up on my National Geographic magazines, I read an article entitled “Bhutan’s Enlightened Experiment,” and I think I had a little bit of enlightenment myself.

In the 1960’s, Bhutan began to open its borders and peered into the wonders and challenges of modernity and globalization. Proud of their Buddhist culture and simple ways, the Bhutanese sought an entry into modernity that included good health, education and infrastructure, while maintaining the beauty and serenity of the land. To accomplish this, the King stepped away from the normal quantifier of prosperity, net dollars earned called Gross National Product.

Instead, he chose to measure his country’s success by the four pillars Gross National Happiness: (1) sustainable development (2) environmental protection (3) cultural preservation and (4) good governance. Consequently, since 1982, Bhutan has reduced infant mortality rate by 75%, increased literacy rate by 600% and life expectancy by 23 years. Meanwhile, it appears that nothing has been lost: most of Bhutan remains virgin forest and Bhutanese culture, tradition and identity remain strong. Sustainable emersion, growth and perspective in its truest form.

While there is much to learn in the brilliance of others, we can also learn from that which already rolls off our tongues.

Jewish tradition doesn’t have the clarity of the four pillars of GNH, but we do have Torah. As we sing each time we read from the Torah as a community: “Eitz chayim he lamachazikim bah, vetomcheha me'ushar. Deracheha darchey noam, vechol netivoteha shalom.” It is a Tree of Life to them who hold fast to it, and all who embrace it will be enriched. Its ways are ways of pleasantness and all its paths lead to peace.
- Proverbs 3:17-18

While I love my internship at COEJL, instead of asking my parents for money for the third time this week, I decided to get a minimum wage summer job at a personalized cookie shop. This franchised store bakes sugar cookies, designs them, and then makes them into themed baskets. Cute and colorful as they are that is not my purpose, my purpose (and the main theme of many bloggers before me) is Bal Tashchit, the Jewish law of do not waste nor destroy.

My soon to be rant is not about the lights that are left on, the unnecessary paper that is used to make the baskets “fluffy” or the air conditioner that makes the building way too cold – it's about the cookies. Bal Tashchit and cookies? That doesn’t make sense. Who would ever want to waste a cookie? But being that these extremely overpriced cookies ($7.25 – each!) have been designed for and sitting out since Father’s Day there are no more takers. My second day on the job I watched 7 big, beautifully iced and decorated sugar cookies fall victim to the black hole of a hefty lined garbage can. I asked the girl I was working with that day “Do you guys really always throw away all these cookies?” She coolly responded “Yeah, no one is going to eat them - they’ve been sitting out for over a week.” I agreed, for if I were to spend $7.25 on a sugar cookie, I’d at least want it to be fresh. However, running through mind was the sound of my mother’s voice preaching that there are plenty of hungry people who would be more than happy to have those cookies.

The law of Bal Taschit has always surrounded food. It has evolved over time, but while it now encompasses the law of not wasting anything, a main stand for Jewish environmentalist, the original purpose was to protect all fruit bearing trees during a time of war (trees that failed to produce fruit were excluded from protection). “When, in your war against a city, you have to besiege it a long time in order to capture it, you must not destroy its trees, wielding the ax against them. You may eat of them, but you must not cut them down. Are the trees of the field human to withdraw before you into the besieged city? Only trees that you know do not yield food may be destroyed” (Deuteronomy 20:19-20). A cookie may shrivel in comparison to the importance of a fruit baring tree – even though cookies taste better than most fruit and these do come on a stick – and the war we are currently in has little relation to the well being of America’s decorative cookie industry. So, the next time I go into work and they ask me to throw out yummy cookies, I promise that they’ll find their ways to awaiting stomachs.

David Elcott's farm has started to produce its bounty. Through a guest-blog partnership with Jcarrot.org, we are excited to share David's second piece on sustainable local farming with you.  To read the first post, click here.

I couldn’t write this past month. Too nervous. The temperature dipped, I read up on all the pests and bugs and germs that could kill the seeds. The little seedlings looked so vulnerable. When it looked like the temperature would hit the low 40’s I panicked and ran out to Home Depot, bought some metal to make hoops and heavy plastic and actually hid my tomatoes, peppers and eggplants in their own private green houses. The days between Pesach and Shavuot are for counting the Omer – fifty days that according to tradition are anxiety producing because the dry winds or heavy rains could wipe out the crops and people would starve. I certainly identified with that anxiety even if I knew that the green grocer was open and waiting for my business. So, as I said, I could not write.

But now I can. It is approaching the advent of the summer, the sun is warming the earth, the rains keep the Farm, the Cornfield and the Potato Patch generously moist. The vegetation is luxuriant and lush. My son took one look at the rows of colorful lettuces, micro-greens, red rocket lettuce and a variety of multi-colored munchables whose name I do not know, and declared, “This looks just like the finest salad bowl.” Just sitting happily on my little farm, providing fresh salads – meaning about five minutes from earth to plate! I throw in cut herbs – the herb garden is growing like wild – and even a few nasturtium and broccoli leaves. I was showing Liore how the peas are starting to bloom when we both kneeled down and realized that the vines were already resplendent with edible snap peas. The watermelon radishes are sharp and tangy and look just like, well, miniature watermelons. And who would have guessed that by June 16^th we would harvest our first tomato, sliced thin for sharing and sprinkled with top- grade olive oil, Portuguese sea salt and fresh ground pepper? It is a beautiful sight. And if the corn is not as high as an elephant’s eye, the stalks are growing nicely.

The rabbit. He hopped into the garden, through the mesh fence or under the buried black mesh or somehow got in. I ran out – as my wife said, it was a good thing we do not even allow toy guns in our house since she was convinced my eyes gleamed with murder. But when I got out there, he had nibbled a few leaves and bounced happily away. If I am planning to share with my neighbors, why not allow the rabbits a bit to eat as well. A bit, okay. We will see.

Other dangers lurk. I know all about the slimy squash vine borer who waits patiently until the flower blooms and the cute little squash begins to grow. Then it pounces and you come out the next day to see mush in your field. And when I asked Liore to tell me the name of a pretty orange and black beetle, she said that you call it, “Kill on sight!” So I did. To be a farmer is to be vigilant and steadfast, like the colonists fighting the Revolutionary War, like the Israelites in the desert. Up at 6 and out to see whether everything vanished during the night. So far so good.

When Noam and Julie had their first pea or radish – don’t remember what – they recited shehechiyanu, the blessing that celebrates a wondrous new occasion, and then borey p’ree ha’adamah – blessing the vegetables that grow and flourish out of the soil. I love saying blessings, but they sound different when recited over the earth that I tilled and watered, the furrows that I hoed, the seeds and seedlings I planted, and the plants that I nurtured. Along with the rain and sun and wind and pollinating birds and bees. Vaya’ar elohim ki tov—and God saw that it was very, very good. And tasty, too.

This weekend many excited Jewish summer campers will head off to wonderful experiences of Jewish community, friendship, and fun. Jewish camping has been around a longtime, and is one of the great success stories of American Jewish life. I myself am a proud grad, along with Bob Dylan (nee Zimmerman) of Herzl Camp in Webster, Wisconsin. While many Jewish camps have added explicity green eco-programming to their curricula, too many to highlight here, even - though we invite you to describe any great Jewish environmental experiences you are familiar with - I want to focus on some so-obvious-it's-not-obvious aspects of Jewish camps.
Camping takes kids away from normal suburban/urban life, for a car-free, shopping-free, less materialistic summer. Some Jewish camps are pretty posh compared to the latrine/rustic sort, but still, they're not resorts. Emphasis is on experience and community, not on consuming.
Camps are in the country, duh. Kids get a bigger sense of nature and the natural world than in their backyard or neighborhood park. This immersion is very scary for some, but for others, it's a major turn on.
Camps provide a communal experience - some are explicitly socialist, but all emphasize the group. For kids growing up in privatistic American culture, this is a great corrective. One of my favorite aspects of my daughter's experience at Camp Galil was Clothes Trading. Girls would bring clothes they didn't wear with them to camp, and all summer they swapped outfits. If a friend got attached to a garment, or looked especially great in it, they often kept it.  No score-keeping - it was truly from each according to her style/size to each according to her mood.  One big floating  Clothing Swap. What you sent your kid off with was not what they came home with, and everyone was happy. Of course sometimes, swaps are often the unintended outcomes of camp laundry, so everyone learns not to get too attached to their stuff.
Camps assure kids they can cope without much technology. (Though some camps are being pressured to drop this.) This allows kids to establish natural rhythms, not mediated by 24/7 cell phones, texting, Ipod music, et al. It's a good break, anyway.
For the spiritually inclined, being in nature surrounded by community is unparalleled in its power. Forty years later, I still think of Kabbalat Shabbat overlooking Devils Lake....

This Guest Blogger was Rabbi Warren Stone. He is known nationally for his leadership on religion and the environment. He is the founding and current chair of the Central Conference of American Rabbis' Committee on the Environment and serves on COEJL's board. Rabbi Stone has served as rabbi of Temple Emanuel in the Washington metropolitan area in Kensington, Maryland since 1988.

"In a world where matters of faith seem so often and so tragically to divide us, there is no issue which aligns us more deeply than our shared dependence upon and sacred responsibility to this tiny planet, enfolded within its fragile atmosphere, spinning in the vastness of time and space."

Kyoto and Bali agreements calling for worldwide reductions in CO₂emissions are a critical step in the world challenge to reduce our dependence on our diminishing world oil supplies. Yet according to current research, even if the nations of the world adopt the protocols, they will be insufficient to counter the growing impact of climate change in the current century. (Pew Foundation: Beyond Kyoto: Advancing the International Effort Against Climate Change).

It is time to start thinking outside of the diplomatic box.

With all due respect to the Lieberman-Warner Climate Bill in the U.S. Senate and the hoped-for policy change it would bring, it is time to challenge both our country and world populations to take steps beyond legislation and diplomacy to begin to transform our daily lives in ways that can impact this rise in CO₂.

I recently spoke at the British Embassy at a panel on Faith and Climate Change. It was part of a Washington, DC symposium on Climate Change and Security for all the US British consulates around the country. I applaud them for seeking leaders of faith communities to voice their concerns with diplomats. I served on a panel with a Christian Evangelical environmental leader, Rev. Richard Cizik and a young Muslim woman known as "Sanjana," who started a "DC Green Muslims blog." The British consulates sought voices from the faith community because they realize that the issue of climate change will demand a populist response beyond diplomacy. Faith leaders can and must inspire and mobilize their communities on this urgent issue.

People of faith on this planet number in the billions. Teaching people of faith basic environmental values and practices can have an immense impact. Perhaps we need an 11th Commandment of walking gently upon this earth of ours and being aware of our own carbon footprint as a religious mandate. Our religious traditions all share a spiritual mandate for caring for a Godly creation. Reaching religious leaders and their communities on this issue could not be more critical. Indeed, responding to climate change has become the most significant moral and spiritual issue facing humanity today. Our ancient religious traditions are concerned with protecting life and creation in the broadest sense. In a world where matters of faith seem so often and so tragically to divide us, there is no issue which aligns us more deeply than our shared dependence upon and sacred responsibility to this tiny planet, enfolded within its fragile atmosphere, spinning in the vastness of time and space.

I experienced this common faith when I served as a UN delegate representing many Jewish organizations at the Kyoto talks in 1997. At that time I spoke along with eight other religious leaders at the largest Buddhist Temple in Kyoto as a part of the conference. We concurred that people of diverse faith traditions have a spiritual and moral responsibility to act now.

As a religious leader involved in climate change issues now for many years I believe we need a gradual paradigm shift in our very way of life. In an article in The New York Times, "What's Your Consumption Factor?" January 2, 2008, Jared Diamond pointed out that world consumption is growing at an unsustainable rate in the face of a growing world population, particularly in India and China. China has a population of 1.3 billion and growing. Our forests and natural resources will not be able to sustain this demographic explosion. Perhaps we might be able to sustain 9 billion people but multiply that in our century and you can see we are facing a consumption doomsday.

The western ethic which continually encourages more growth, more cars, more computers and media tools is fostering a road leading to disaster. Not only are we using up the world's diminishing resources, but we are also contributing to climate change and threatening the world's species in a silent genocide. We are all imperiled by climate change -- a rise in water-borne illness, the devastation of coastal lands, frequently inhabited by some of the neediest populations --with world refugees with nowhere to go. We must act now. We must listen to Hillel, who chastised: "If not now, when?"

If diplomacy is not enough, what can we do and do now?

• Let us begin by greening our government and its diverse institutions. Let the Capitol, the White House and Congress become green examples to the nation. So too, our state and local governments need to become actively engaged in greening.

There is an oft-told joke about a man in the midst of a great flood.  [for those who have heard this before, feel free to skip to the next paragraph] All about him, people are fleeing the town in droves; however, the pious man refuses assistance.  A jeep drives by and invites him to "hop on board."  The man declines, explaining, "I have faith that G-d will save me." Unable to change his mind, the jeep drives on.  A bit later, as the flood-waters rise, a rescue team drifts by the man's house in a boat. "Hop in," the captain exclaims.  "Don't worry about me," the man retorts, "I have faith that G-d will save me." Unable to change his mind, the rescue team floats by.  A bit later, the flood engulfs the man's house, leaving him to hang from the chimney for safety. A crew in a helicopter spots him and offers a ladder and a lift.  The man declines yet again, declaring with confidence that G-d will save him. The helicopter continues without him. Eventually, the man drowns and he enters heaven.  Dismayed, he approaches G-d and exclaims, "You really let me down! I had faith that you would save me and look what happened!"  "Who do you think sent you a jeep, a boat and a helicopter," G-d replies?

Though told in jest, the joke teaches a valuable lesson.  We cannot be so blinded by our political agenda that we ignore the signs in front of our eyes.  Two weeks ago, the U.S. Senate began a historic climate debate.  As I wrote on the eve of that debate, "simply forcing a national discussion about climate change is a victory."  In many respects, the climate vote was an extraordinary success. Forty-eight senators voted to move to substantive discussion on the bill.  Six others submitted statements to the record indicating that they likewise supported continued debate.  Combined, a comfortable majority in the Senate thus supports aggressive federal action on climate change.  And, as the Union of Concerned Scientists reports, many of those who voted in favor of such action had previously opposed such initiatives – even though the legislation at issue was stronger than bills the Senate has considered in the past.  Fortunately, as Senator Boxer explained, "We [now] have a road map as to where our colleagues are. We will give the road map to the next president so he knows where our colleagues are and where are the consensus areas and where are the difficult areas."

Yet, despite these accomplishments, the climate debate was, in other respects, a tragic missed opportunity.  Like the man waiting on his roof for divine intervention, many members of the Senate seem to be awaiting an intangible sign from above – ignoring the signs that G-d has already sent to Earth. On the second morning of the climate debate, opponents insisted that they were not familiar with the bill due to a handful of technical changes that had been made in its final hours.  In a move witnessed but once a decade, they insisted that the clerk read the bill – all 492 pages of it – on the Senate floor.  For most of the day – more than eight hours – the clerk droned on, reading of offsets and auctions, allocations and subsidies. 

And then G-d intervened. 

At mid-day, thunderclouds descended over Washington, D.C. The sky darkened and rain pummeled the Capitol.  I approached the building amid announcements of a "severe thunderstorm warning" on the Senate intercom system.  The National Weather Service declared a tornado watch with wind gusts of up to 70 mph, admonishing citizens to "take cover" and "move to a safe place" to avoid flash floods. My home outside the Nation's Capitol lost power for two days. 

A tornado warning is disconcerting in and of itself.  But its impact is all the more dramatic when viewed in this context.  As Senator Reid (D-NV) explained on the Senate floor, 2008 is on track to be "the deadliest year in the history of tornado deaths" in the United States.  Since January, more than 110 people have lost their lives due to tornadoes – compared to an annual average of 62.  I don't imply that a single tornado season confirms climate change, but it certainly doesn't suggest that we're heading in the right direction either.  And, if an anomalous tornado season weren't warning enough, G-d has sent a steady succession of reinforcements – in the form of flooding in the Midwest, a drought in California, and a heat wave on the east coast.

NRDC policy director, David Doniger highlighted the curious coincidence of the climate debate and the tornado advisory in his blog.  In it, he challenged readers to "draw [their] own conclusions."  As I heard the weather advisory on the afternoon of the climate debate, I had only one thought:  the bureaucracy of the political process had gone on long enough.  As thunder crashed from the heavens, G-d had sounded a wake-up alarm for 100 Senators on Capitol Hill.  "Do something," He implored.  "Assume your role as my partner in creation, and help me to repair the world."  The next morning, 54 of them heeded that warning and voted to proceed to the debate.  Unfortunately, 46 others are still waiting on their rooftops for a sign…

I wore a six-year old two-piece dress with a seafoam scoop-neck top to the weddings of my two older sons. I wore the same dress to my two youngest children’s bnai mitzvah celebrations just a few years earlier. I am hoping for more summer simkhas so I can get additional mileage out of it.

I know it is part of the American cultural ritual to buy something new for fancy events, each special occasion occasioning an expansion of the wardrobe.  I could justify my recycling of the dress by arguing that with all the money we were already spending, why unnecessarily spend more?  Truth be told, though, I liked wearing a previously worn dress.

I liked opening the school books at the beginning of the year and discovering the students from the grades above me whose karma now infused that book, binding me to them and the learning enterprise. I liked it when library books came with cards stamped with due dates that showed how often and how recently a book was taken out. I like buying used books from Amazon’s marketplace, pages smoothed and a little dog-eared by previous readers. Most of our family’s best children’s books are library discards – books once held on the laps of countless parents and children in the most tender moments of discovery. I like buying used wooden furniture studded with round water stains from iced-tea glasses accompanying long summer visits with dear old friends. I like old houses, old handbags, old chinaware.

If I could, I would live in a converted train station – imagining the people, the stories, the hellos and goodbyes, the tears and the pacing, the grumbling and the jokes that people would have told waiting for life’s little adventures to unfold. I would conjure up their voices at night and feel the vitality of life’s tidal forces.

I don’t quite understand the lust for new. New feels incomplete to me, possibilities without the wisdom to guide and temper it.  The Old gifted as New seems to me the best of all worlds.

I recently heard of an e-establishment from whom you rent toys instead of buying them. You go on line, choose age-appropriate toys for your kids from this enterprising entrepreneur, use them for however long you want and then return them and get new toys. Kind of like Netflix for toys.

And there is an outfit that rents handbags for a night.

I was talking with a potter who says that when she is stuck for a gift, she chooses a bowl from her home pottery collection,  washes it off, and Voila, instant gift. I thanked her, for she had liberated my desire to do the same.

Imagine how rich we would be if the stuff we owned was coated with a patina of lives lived fully; if the gifts we gave were crowded with our stories, our memories, our blessings. Imagine if our daily acts were added, layer by layer, onto a tel of tales, a mound of memories captured and held by the stuff of our lives.

My cousin mentioned that at her minyan, Lomdim in Chicago, they showed The Gleaners and I on Shavuot, thematically tying in the activity of Ruth to contemporary behaviors.  Gleaning is the biblical precept of leaving the corners of the fields unharvested so that the poor can collect grain for their sustenance.  In contemporary times, there is still a gleaning movement.  The Society of Saint Andrew is dedicated towards salvaging crops for the hungry, accomplishing two mitzvot at once: feeding the hungry and avoiding waste, bal tashit. 
In urban contexts, there are many food salvage programs that help feed the hungry, like Second Harvest and our local Philabundance.  Another trend developing, is called Freganism.  Fregans dumpster dive and trashpick as a life style, calling attention to the astronomically wasteful American lifestyle.  Generally fregans have opted out of a high consumption lifestyle and, not being homeless, are a different demographic than people who live on the streets.
The Internet iscleverly utilized to match givers and gleaners.  My personal favorite is freecycle.org - there are thousands of local freecycle groups where folks go daily to offer and request items.  My latest give-away was two bird-feeders that were attracting more squirrels the feathers; my next request is lined 3-hole paper.  Most households have a lot of that sitting around at the end of the school year!
Many freecyle(TM) participants post things we see on the street, dubbed "Curb Alerts".  Much akin to gleaning, people leave items up for grab on the corners of their driveways.  One question which comes up on Freecycle lists is whether it's ok for people to resell items claimed via Freecycle, on Ebay or at flea markets.  I say that's great.  It's helping people to earn income, keeps things out of the waste stream, and since the donor was obviously too lazy to bother, the reseller is offering an environmental service.  Craigs List also has a large section of free items. 
Whether you glean out of ideological conviction, for sport, or from need, it is an ancient and wonderful system!

 

Inspired by Shavuot and the celebration of receiving the 10 commandments, my mind drifted to all of those other 10 commandments out there.  Lists of “10 Actions to Save the Planet” abound – but do they really matter?

During a time when global environmental catastrophes loom large, clear and real, we may debate the impact of our individual actions.  When China is opening a new coal-based power plant every week, does my switching to an energy efficient compact fluorescent light (CFL) matter?
COEJL challenged the American Jewish community to start fighting climate change with that simple act.  During our How Many Jews Does it Take to Change a Light Bulb? campaign, Jews across America heeded the call and switched out their energy inefficient incandescent bulbs for CFLs.  From changes in homes, offices, schools and synagogues, over 80,000 CFLs were purchased, keeping approximately 29,000 tons of CO₂ out of our atmosphere.

Yes, our independent acts of environmental conservation matter.  Below is my list (I dare not call them commandments) of 10 actions with a range of required effort that will help you and your community reduce our impact on global warming.

1.  Change 5 light bulbs to energy efficient and cost effective compact CFLs ( if all American Jews did this it would be the same as taking 1.76 million cars off the road for a year)
2.  Switch out a meat meal for a vegetarian one (global livestock is responsible for 18% of CO₂ emissions and 37% of methane emissions - a greenhouse gas that is twenty times more potent than CO₂)
3.  Eat local (in the US, conventional food travels an average of 1,500 miles to reach our markets)
4.  Find new meaning in old traditions: walk or bike to synagogue (only 6% of all trips made in the US are by bike or foot)
5.  Recycle ½ of your household waste (saves 2,400 pounds of CO₂ a year)
6.  Install a programmable thermostat and drop it 2 degrees in the winter and raise it 2 degrees in the summer (saves 2,000 pounds of CO₂ a year)
7.  Eliminate “phantom loads” by unplugging unused electronics, shutting off power strips, or buying smart ones that will shut it off for you (if all phantom loads in US homes were stopped, we could shut down 17 power plants)
8.  Fully inflate your tires and improve mpg efficiency (Saves 347 lbs of CO₂ a year)
9.  Plant a tree – in your own backyard or Israel (if all Jews in America did this it, 6 million tons of CO₂ absorbed over its life)
10.  Due to the fact that CO₂ is a global gas, when you’ve taken all the actions you can, buy carbon credits to offset the rest.

As with the biblical 10 commandments, this list is only the beginning. Though it may be scary, it’s also empowering.  We - in our houses with our family, offices with our colleagues and community with our friends - can be part of the solution.