Interpretation. A Journal of Bible and Theology Volume 65 Number 4 October 2011

In This Issue

Volume 65 Number 4 October 2011

Creation Groaning

337

GUEST EDITORIAL

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RECLAIMING THE WORLD: BIBLICAL RESOURCES FOR THE ECOLOGICAL CRISIS • THEODORE HIEBERT The Bible believes this world is our home, the primary place we live and practice our faith. It provides us ways of reinventing our role in the world and gives us reasons for human faithfulness to it even when the crisis we have created for the world looks impossibly desperate.

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ECOLOGY AND THEOLOGY: ECOJUSTICE AT THE CENTER OF THE CHURCH’S MISSION • ROSEMARY RADFORD RUETHER This essay examines two major biblical and theological traditions for ecological commitment: the covenantal tradition, biblical and modern, and the sacramental tradition, biblical and modern. It also asks how we need to reclaim these traditions in the practice of the churches today.

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NEW WINESKINS • LARRY RASMUSSEN This essay explores the conversion of various Christianities to an “Earth-honoring” faith with a moral universe different from the one presently at home in most heads, hearts, and practices. Such reborn faith and morality would be new cloth, new wineskins.

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CLIMATE CHANGE • WILLIAM SCHLESINGER Atmospheric physicists show us that rising concentrations of certain greenhouse gases in Earth’s atmosphere should raise the temperature of the planet at rates, times, and places that are consistent with recent observations of ongoing climate change—that is, global warming. It will take great leadership to guide us to a sustainable future before we experience huge destructive impacts on the environment of our only planetary home.

Major Book Reviews

BETWEEN TEXT & SERMON 392

Genesis 1:1–2:3

404

– Pete Peery 396

Leviticus 25:1–24 – Uriah Y. Kim

400

– Thomas W. Mann

Revelation 21:1–28 – Carol J. Dempsey, O.P.

Climate Wars: The Fight for Survival as the World Overheats by Gwynne Dyer; Climatopolis: How Our Cities Will Thrive in the Hotter Future by Matthew E. Kahn; Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet by Bill McKibben; and The Flooded Earth: Our Future in a World without Ice Caps by Peter D. Ward

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Ecotheology and the Promise of Hope by Anne Marie Dalton and Henry C. Simmons – Rosemary Radford Ruether

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1 Corinthians by Robert Scott Nash and 2 Corinthians by Mitzi L. Minor – Frank J. Matera

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The Lost Meaning of the Seventh Day by Sigve K. Tonstad – Ben Witherington, III

418

Short Book Reviews and Notes

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Volume 65 Index

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Guest Editorial The subject of this issue of Interpretation is climate change (or less descriptively, “global warming”). It is arguably the most important theological and ethical issue of our time, overshadowing all others—war, hunger, poverty, racism—because it affects all others. Yet, public and political denial continues. The religious community ought to be in the forefront of a movement to address climate change (for one such effort, see http://interfaithpowerandlight.org). Not to do so would be like having stood aside from all previous social justice movements. The articles that follow present a rich resource (unfortunately, a third-world spokesperson was unable to complete an article). Theodore Hiebert lays the biblical foundation, arguing that the world as God’s creation lies at the heart of faith, a reality long denied by the dualism of nature versus history. The world is our true home, not heaven, and our primary identity resides in our membership in the “natural and biological community.” The Genesis creation stories are not merely a prologue to Israel’s history; they ground us (quite literally) in Earth. Just so, eschatological visions of a new world refer to a renewal of this Earth, not an otherworldly reality. The Priestly story in Gen 1:1–2:4a presents humankind “in the image of God,” ruling over all else, but that rule is both derivative and representative of God’s ultimate sovereignty, requiring protection and conservation—stewardship—of what God has declared “very good.” In fact, we do have almost God-like power, and our responsibility is to use it rather than abuse it. In contrast, in the Yahwist’s story in Gen 2:4b–25, humans are not above everything else, but created out of the same soil as plants and animals, and inextricably interconnected with them. Rather than dominating nature, humans are its domestic servants (2:15). Both creation stories in their disparate ways can inform our response to the environmental crisis of climate change. For Rosemary Radford Ruether, Christian theology must address the unprecedented possibility that humans can destroy the Earth. Recent ecological theologies fall into two types—covenantal and sacramental—the former grounded in moral law and ethics that regulate relationships, including ours with nature, and the latter grounded in an experiential “interpersonal communion” with nature, all of which is animate and interacts with God. Like Hiebert, Ruether rejects the dualism of history over nature, for God is at work not only in political struggles, but also in rain and drought (sometimes in judgment against environmental abuse). Within the covenantal tradition, Ruether singles out Sabbath legislation as requiring the rest and renewal that both people and nature need. Now we must extend the notion of the “natural rights” of individuals that developed out of this tradition to include all ecosystems as one community. Contemporary developments in international law can further extend protection to the Earth. In the sacramental tradition, God is incarnate in the entire cosmos—the universe is “God’s sacramental body”—although God is not reduced to the universe. In ancient Judaism, Wisdom personified this cosmogonic principle; in some forms of early Christianity, Christ as Word did the same (e.g., John 1). Subsequent Christology followed this tradi-

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tion in its rejection of gnostic dualism. Now we need to recite the “new universe story,” which focuses on “our relation to the whole creation.” Thus, to be complete, eco-justice must combine “covenantal ethics and sacramental spirituality.” Larry Rasmussen argues that we now live on a new and different planet, thanks to climate change, which requires a new and different construal of Christian faith and ethics. But our comfortable lifestyle and economic anxiety prevent us from using a new wineskin. Like the deniers in Jesus’ parable, we say, “The old is good,” the old being the “industrial paradigm.” Its benefits have been enormous, but our economy has ignored nature’s economy (“eco-nomics”), fueling (quite literally) “infinite growth on a finite planet.” Behind our illusions lurks a spiritual vacuum: we have, in fact, lost a sense of nature as “thou,” and see it only as a utilitarian object. Although we disclaim the dualistic language of modernity, the new language of “eco-modernity” simply disguises the old paradigm, exemplified by multinational corporations (e.g., Monsanto) who tout their environmental sensitivity while pursuing the same old business as usual with the latest technologies (in this case, a monopoly on genetically engineered seeds). Humans still act as masters. Behind all our endeavors there are numerous assumptions, perhaps best summarized by our naïve utopian faith that a capitalist system can and will produce a good life for all. Rasmussen lists numerous transitions that we must make to avert disaster, including a religious and moral one that makes “planet-keeping the common calling of all religions.” He concludes with a series of questions about how faith in a new wineskin would look. The final question is, “What kind honors creation as God’s?” William H. Schlesinger represents the scientific community. Readers unfamiliar with the causes and consequences of climate change may want to read his article first. He describes the “greenhouse” gases that normally protect the Earth from becoming too cold or too hot. Carbon dioxide, the major greenhouse gas, fluctuates naturally, and scientists can trace the levels in geologic time. For the last 20 million years, the level has not surpassed 400 parts per million (ppm). In all of human civilization (8,000 years), the level ranged from 260 to 285 ppm. But, we are now at 388 and climbing at a rate of 1.9 ppm per year. Incontrovertibly, the disproportionate rise results from our use of fossil fuels. Anthropogenic sources override natural sources—current climate change is not “normal.” Evidence of climate change is ubiquitous, from song-bird migration patterns to melting glaciers to drought in the southwestern United States. Pernicious effects range from flourishing poison ivy to the spread of malaria, acidic oceans, dying conifer forests, and a massive loss of species. Scientists project a temperature rise of 20 to 4.50 centigrade by 2200, but also warn that 20 should be the maximum. Numerous “feedback” mechanisms exacerbate warming, potentially leading to a “tipping point.” For example, ice reflects sunlight and therefore cools the Earth, but melting ice caps mean less reflection, and therefore more heat, which then melts more ice, etc. Those who deny the reality of climate change confuse weather with climate and do not see the problem in the former; or they assume, against the evidence, that current climate

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C R E AT I O N G ROA N I N G

change is a natural phenomenon; or they are not willing to sacrifice short-term economic loss for long-term prevention. What can be done? We must reduce our use of fossil fuels and increase the development of alternative sources of energy, and soon. One major step would be raising a carbon tax combined with lowering personal income tax—something that should appeal to “both sides of the aisle”! Schlesinger’s concluding sentence echoes our other authors: “We are failing in the planetary stewardship expected of us.” I conclude with three observations: 1) As Hiebert points out, biblical eschatology does not look for God to abandon and destroy the Earth, but to come and renew it. As Ruether says, we are now in the unprecedented situation in which humans have the capacity to destroy what God would renew. This is our ultimate hubris: that we can “create a new heaven and a new earth” that is not the world that God wants. Thus, Schlesinger warns that we are manufacturing “a reconfiguration of nature.” The irony is painfully apparent in reading the flood story of Genesis. God promised that the “dome” (“firmament”) of heaven would never again open its windows to destroy the earth (Gen 7:11; 8:22; 9:15); however, we are producing a “dome” of gases that threatens to do just that (see the review in this issue of The Flooded Earth on p. 404). 2) As Schlesinger suggests, we have the ability to ameliorate climate change, but so far we lack the international political leadership to take the painful steps necessary to prevent disaster: “the burden [is] left for future generations” (p. 387). Our refusal to do so evokes the biblical King Hezekiah who, when warned by Isaiah of impending catastrophe, said, “Why not, if there will be peace and security in my days” (2 Kgs 20:19). Instead, we are called to imitate the faith of Abraham, who, though informed that it would be hundreds of years before God’s promise of land came true, nevertheless lived into that promise for the sake of generations to come (Gen 15). Whatever we may think about life after death, it is time to think about life on earth after our death. 3) If climate change is our ultimate hubris, then it is also our ultimate injustice—i.e., injustice inflicted by developed nations on the undeveloped, the rich on the poor. Numerous predictions point to what will happen (indeed, is already happening) to low-lying, impoverished countries like Bangladesh. As Schlesinger puts it, “Through no fault of their own, 17 million citizens of Bangladesh may lose their homeland as a result of rising sea level.” As one Bangladeshi scientist has charged, we are committing “climatic genocide.”1 Thomas W. Mann Retired Professor of Hebrew Bible and Parish Pastor Winston-Salem, North Carolina 1 Quoted in Gwynne Dyer, Climate Wars: The Fight for Survival as the World Overheats (London: OneWorld, 2011), 56; see also the review of this book on p. 404 of this issue.

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CONTRIBUTORS THEODORE HIEBERT (Ph.D., Harvard University) is the Francis A. McGaw Professor of Old Testament at McCormick Theological Seminary. He is the author of The Yahwist’s Landscape: Nature and Religion in Early Israel (Augsburg Fortress, 2008), and has made contributions on biblical perspectives on nature to such larger works as The New Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, The Oxford Companion to the Bible, and Earth and Word: Classic Sermons on Saving the Planet (Continuum, 2007). Hiebert is currently at work on a commentary on Genesis. ROSEMARY RADFORD RUETHER is a senior scholar at the Claremont School of Theology and the Claremont Graduate University. She is the Carpenter Professor of Feminist Theology emerita at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California. Ruether taught for twenty-seven years at the Garrett Theological Seminary and Northwestern University. She graduated from Scripps College in 1954 and received her M.A. and Ph.D. from the Claremont Graduate University. Ruether is the author or editor of forty-seven books, among them the three-volume Encyclopedia of Women and Religion in North America (Indiana University Press, 2006). Her most recent books include America, Amerikkka: Elect Nation and Imperial Violence, on the history of the United States and the belief in American exceptionalism and manifest destiny (Equinox, 2007), and Many Forms of Madness: A Family’s Struggle with Mental Illness and the Mental Health System (Fortress, 2010). LARRY RASMUSSEN is the Reinhold Niebuhr Professor of Social Ethics Emeritus, Union Theological Seminary. He received his Ph.D. from Union Theological Seminary. Rasmussen is presently completing a book manuscript, Earth-Honoring Faith: Religious Ethics in a New Key (forthcoming, Oxford University Press, 2012). His vol-

ume, Earth Community, Earth Ethics (Orbis, 1996), won the prestigious Grawemeyer Award in Religion of 1997. He is a member of the United Church of Christ and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. WILLIAM H. SCHLESINGER (Ph.D., 1976, Cornell University) is currently President of the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook, New York, where his research focuses on the Earth’s biogeochemical cycles and human impacts upon them. Previously the James B. Duke Professor at Duke University, Schlesinger is the author of more than 200 scientific papers as well as the textbook Biogeochemistry: An Analysis of Global Change (Academic Press, 1997). He is a member of the United States National Academy of Sciences. THOMAS W. MANN has been a professor of religion at Princeton Theological Seminary, Wake Forest University, Salem College, and Wake Forest Divinity School. He was minister at Parkway United Church of Christ in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, from 1984 until retiring from that position in 2007. Along with other books, Mann is the author of The Book of the Torah: The Narrative Integrity of the Pentateuch (Westminster John Knox, 1988), now with a recent sequel, The Book of the Former Prophets (Cascade, 2011). Mann has also written a book on the nature spirituality of poet Mary Oliver (God of Dirt, Rowan & Littlefield, 2004), reflecting his own experience of God’s presence in nature and his concern for the issue of climate change.

Reclaiming the World: Biblical Resources for the Ecological Crisis THEODORE HIEBERT Professor of Old Testament McCormick Theological Seminary

The Bible believes this world is our home, the primary place we live and practice our faith. It provides us ways of reinventing our role in the world and gives us reasons for human faithfulness to it even when the crisis we have created for the world looks impos-

T

sibly desperate.

his past year, we offered a new course at McCormick Theological Seminary that we called “Religious Leadership for an Ecological Age.” The aim of the course was to enable our church leaders to develop a response to the environmental crisis that combined theology with practice. I taught the course with Clare Butterfield, the director of Faith in Place, an interfaith non-profit that has partnered with more than 600 congregations in Illinois—Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Sikh, Zoroastrian, Baha’i, and Unitarian—to help people of faith understand the issues of ecology and the care of creation and to create more sustainable religious communities. When we met to plan the course, I, the Bible teacher, proposed that we start the course with an introduction to the environmental crisis in order to recognize how big and serious it is, and in order to convince our students that something has to be done. Then we would look at our biblical and theological traditions to see what resources they have to help us respond. Clare, the practitioner, proposed just the opposite, that we start with the values embedded in our biblical and theological traditions. Her point was this: if the foundational resources of our faith value the world as we say they do, we should be treating the world properly whether we are facing a crisis or not. She is right, of course, so we started the class with the values toward nature in Scripture and with its view of our role in the world. We thus designed the course to make it explicit that our actions in the world should arise from our faith’s deepest values, and we discovered the practical wisdom in this approach. By beginning the course with the values toward nature in Scripture and theology, we found our students came to the crisis and the science behind it with a deeper reason than the crisis itself to engage it and take it seriously as people of faith. Our starting with scriptural values

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deepened both the interest in and the sense of responsibility for the demise of creation. Later in the course, when we became more and more overwhelmed with the size of the crisis and as we began to deal with the emotions of despair and helplessness, we discovered another less anticipated benefit of grounding our course in the resources of our faith. We found that the values of our faith and its vision for a flourishing world gave many of us the anchor and foundation we needed to keep from giving up. Our faith gave us a reason for human faithfulness even when things look impossibly bleak. This ability to endure the worst, to preserve the vision of the world the way God wants it to be and to have the strength to live out this vision, is, after all, the heart of much of Scripture, not least in the death and resurrection of Jesus. In this essay, I will lay out some of the core values that Scripture, at the very foundation of our faith, has given us, and that can provide for us a reason for faithfulness in the world at a time when the ecological crisis seems to be growing beyond our control and at a time when a faithful response by religious people has never been more urgent. I begin with a very simple, but actually radical, claim: our Scripture, at the heart of our faith, takes this world with ultimate seriousness. By this world, I mean the entire world we live in, the world we today call our natural environment. This claim is radical because we have almost completely forgotten how central the entire world of creation is to our faith. Our best biblical interpreters and theologians, for many honorable reasons, have so spiritualized our faith that our real, physical world has been demoted and even demonized as a religious concern. This claim is radical also because if we rediscover the world at the core of our faith and take it as seriously as our Scripture does, it will ask of us a new way of thinking and a new kind of living. Why have we neglected creation? How did we lose touch with the world at the center of our faith? One important reason is that, over 2000 years of reading Scripture, we developed ways of thinking—a set of interpretive lenses—that effectively masked the fact that Scripture takes this world seriously. The most problematic way of thinking and the most dangerous lens is the idea that the world can be divided neatly into spirit and matter, soul and body, God and nature. And within this clear split between spirit and matter, we have given great value to the spirit and little to matter.1 Listen to the way Augustine describes the creation of humanity at the beginning of Genesis: What we need to understand is how a man can be called, on the one hand, the image of God and, on the other, is dust and will return to dust. The former relates to

1 See George Hendry’s survey of the way Christian interpretation and thought has marginalized nature in “The Problem of Nature in Theology,” in Theology of Nature (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1980), 11–30.

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the rational soul which God by his breathing or, better, by his inspiration communicated to man, meaning to the body of man; but the latter refers to the body such as God formed it from dust into the man to whom a soul was given. . . . The soul is not the entire man, but only his better part; nor is the body the entire man, but merely his inferior part.2

This way of thinking about the world—in which spirit is good and matter is inferior— has become such a central part of our religious worldview that we hardly doubt it. We do not recognize how this approach to the world of matter—our natural environment—makes it a secondary issue, ultimately either inconsequential, because only our spiritual life really matters, or even evil, since material things are sometimes seen as distracting us from things of the spirit. In fact, this kind of thinking is not just a lens we use for reading Scripture but also a lens we use for imagining the way the world as a whole is put together. Wendell Berry describes this problem clearly: This separation of the soul from the body and from the world is no disease at the fringe, no aberration, but a fracture that runs through the mentality of institutional religion like a geological fault. And this rift in the mentality of religion continues to characterize the modern mind, no matter how secular or worldly it becomes.3

Unless we have a way to address this fundamental fracture in our thinking, I suspect that we are not going to be able to take the world seriously enough to see our ecological crisis as a matter of faith and to change our behavior accordingly. Unless we discover that to be really, deeply religious in the biblical sense is to see our material world as every bit as important to our faith as the world of the spirit, we will not be able to muster the moral and ethical urgency to respond to the crisis. Biblical images of the hills clapping their hands in the Psalms and the heavens and the earth languishing in the Prophets will seem pleasant or troubling, but they will not seem crucial. They will not seem important enough to change our thinking or acting. They will not be embraced as part of the core of our faith. The split between spirit and matter in Christian thought and in the interpretation of Scripture has strongly shaped the biblical theology movement, which divided sharply between history (the realm of God, spirit, and humanity) and nature (the realm of matter), placing history at the center of biblical thought and pushing nature to the margins. Nature, as biblical theologians like Gerhard von Rad and G. Ernest Wright understood it, was the realm of the pagan religions of Israel’s neighbors, while history was the realm of the God of the Bible.4 As such, the world of nature was not just marginal but pagan, the problematic realm of life that Israel had left behind. This way of thinking and interpretation has

Augustine, City of God 13:24; 12:23. Wendell Berry, The Unsettling of America: Culture and Agriculture (San Francisco: Sierra Club Books, 1986), 108. 4 See for example, Gerhard von Rad, “The Theological Problem of the Old Testament Doctrine of Creation,” in The Problem of the Hexateuch and Other Essays (first published in German in 1936; trans. E. W. Trueman Dicken; London: SCM, 1966), 131–43; and G. Ernest Wright, God Who Acts: Biblical Theology as Recital (London: SCM, 1952). 2 3

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made its way into the literature—commentaries, theologies, and articles—of almost everyone writing about the Bible, and we must now all be on the lookout for it.5 It is no wonder that when Lynn White blamed the Bible, in particular the stories of creation at the beginning of Genesis, for the ecological crisis, he could say, “Christianity, in absolute contrast to ancient paganism . . . not only established a dualism of man and nature but also insisted that it is God’s will that man exploit nature for his proper ends.”6 Now, here is the simple fact we need to recover. Biblical thinking about the world predates these dualistic lenses we have learned to wear, these dualistic lenses that divide the world between spirit and matter or between history and nature. Biblical thinking, therefore, provides a source for relearning and retraining ourselves about our faith. It gives us a space in which to find ways to get around some of the unproductive and dangerous habits we have developed by dividing up the world. It provides a way of looking at the world that takes it seriously. So here, I would like to describe some of the ways the Bible does this and explain how we might get behind the long tradition of the spirit/matter, history/nature dualism in Christianity in order to learn some important lessons for our modern dilemma from the biblical point of view. THE WORLD AS OUR TRUE HOME

A common way of viewing the world by Christians today is to consider it a temporary stop on a spiritual journey. As the gospel song puts it, “This world is not my home,/I’m just a passing through./My treasures are laid up,/somewhere beyond the blue.” Embedded in these words is the split between spirit and matter, in which only the world of the spirit really matters and in which this world of creation, of nature, of matter is only temporary and of no ultimate significance. But this is not the biblical view. According to biblical theologians, this world is our home. It is the place where the human race began its journey and the place where the human race will end its journey. Scripture claims that this world is our true home simply by starting the human story with creation. The biblical writers who started their story with creation did so not just because it is the only or obvious place to start, not just because it is chronologically the logical place to start, but because they were making a statement about their identity as members of creation.7 Groups typically start their stories at the foundational events that define them. For example, the biblical historian responsible for the Deuteronomistic History (Deuteronomy—2 Kings) started his story of Israel with Moses’ instructions regarding the

5 Theodore Hiebert, “Beyond Heilsgeschichte,” in Character Ethics in the Old Testament (ed. M. Daniel Carroll R. and Jacqueline E. Lapsley; Louisville: Westminster, 2007), 3–10. 6 Lynn White, Jr., “The Historical Roots of Our Ecologic Crisis,” Science 155 (10 March 1967): 1205. 7 Theodore Hiebert, “First Things First,” in Earth and Word: Classic Sermons on Saving the Planet (ed. David Rhoads; New York: Continuum, 2007), 156–62.

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law God gave at Mount Sinai, which would define Israel and determine its successes or failures thereafter. Christians, while keeping the OT in their canon, really start their story with the Gospel accounts of Christ’s life and teachings, because these properly define Christian life and thought for them. Groups within Christianity, like the Presbyterians at McCormick Theological Seminary where I teach, begin at yet more precise places, specifically with John Calvin, who defined for them what it is to be a Reformed Christian. All of these starting points are claims about the true identity of the storyteller. In the same way, the biblical writers who start their stories with creation are, in fact, making the claim that we humans are first and foremost members of God’s creation. That is our core identity. More than ancient Israelites, or Jews or Christians or Presbyterians, we are, before anything else, members of creation, citizens of the larger natural and biological community within which we were made. The world of nature gives us our first and foundational identity. The world of nature is, therefore, the primary context for the life of faith and the basic framework for all of our theology and ethics. This is true, as we shall see, of both the Priestly writer (Gen 1:1–2:4a) and the Yahwist (Gen 2:4b–3:24). But it is also true of the psalmists who frequently begin their hymns of praise with creation and then move into Israel’s own history (e.g., Pss 19, 33, 95, and 148). And it is true, too, of the authors of Israel’s Wisdom literature (Job, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes), who view human life in relation to the whole world of creation rather than in relation to the particulars of Israel’s own historical experience, a feature of Wisdom literature that caused many scholars to consider Wisdom literature to be out of the mainstream of Israelite thought.8 Biblical theologians and scholars of the last century have missed this point because of their intense interest in foregrounding history and backgrounding nature in Israelite thought. They considered these stories of creation not as essential but as mere prologue to the real story of Israel, which they claimed began with Israel’s ancestors in Gen 12 or with Israel’s escape from Egypt, or the reception of the law at Sinai in Exodus.9 They thus undermined creation as the primary point of orientation for biblical writers. And it is just this foundational nature of creation, and its source of our identity as humans, that we must recover if we are to see ourselves as true members of the natural world and as responsible citizens within it.10 If we are willing to believe that the biblical creation stories identify the world as our true home, we may be less willing to believe that the stories of new creation in the Old and New Testaments, the stories of the future reign of God, do the same. Most Christians look

8 Hans-Jürgen Hermisson, “Observations on the Creation Theology in Wisdom,” in Creation in the Old Testament (ed. Bernhard W. Anderson; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984), 118–34; Leo Perdue, Wisdom and Creation: The Theology of Wisdom Literature (Nashville: Abingdon, 1994). 9 I cite just one representative, Nahum Sarna, who stands for a whole generation of interpreters: “The theme of Creation, important as it is, serves merely as an introduction to the book’s [Genesis’] central motif: God’s role in history. The opening chapters are a prologue to the historical drama that begins in chapter 12.” (Genesis [The JPS Torah Commentary; Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1989], xiv). 10 Two of the best major efforts to recover the central place of creation in biblical faith are those by William P. Brown: The Ethos of the Cosmos: The Genesis of Moral Imagination in the Bible (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1999) and The Seven Pillars of Creation (New York: Oxford, 2010), and Terence E. Fretheim, God and the World in the Old Testament: A Relational Theology of Creation (Nashville: Abingdon, 2005).

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forward to a future heavenly home “beyond the blue,” in which this old world of creation is left behind. New Testament visions of the future, like those in the book of Revelation, are seen as pointing to a future spiritual life for believers unconnected to the world now suffering an ecological crisis. Some of the language of Revelation is so emphatic—for example, the vision of “a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away” (Rev 21:1)—that it seems obvious that the first creation will actually disappear. According to this way of reading Revelation, the world of creation that came into existence in Genesis is only a temporary reality, to be superseded by heaven or another world, perhaps more spiritual than this one in form or substance. It is, therefore, hard to see that how we treat this world could have lasting importance. In recent years, NT scholars have questioned this otherworldly reading of Revelation, claiming instead that John’s visions actually look forward to a renewal of this world rather than its abandonment or replacement.11 In his vision of God enthroned over the cosmos, John of Patmos describes God as the world’s creator and sustainer (4:11). The “woes” responding to the earth’s disasters are not accusations explaining these disasters as God’s punishment but laments about creation’s suffering under the oppression of the evil empire that ruled the world (8:13). God’s judgment falls not on creation but on the Roman empire, represented by the beasts from the sea (the ancient symbol of chaos; chs. 13–14) and by the ancient Babylonian empire that destroyed Jerusalem (chs. 17–18), which must be subdued before creation can flourish (chs. 19–20). At the climax of the book, the city of Jerusalem descends to earth, God makes God’s home in the world, and the world of creation thrives with vigor and life (chs. 21–22). God redeems the world not by drawing people up into heaven but by descending to live with them on earth, taking residence in creation and renewing it. To put it in John’s terms, “The kingdom of this world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Messiah” (11:15). Thus, creation and new creation as Scripture views them are about this world, about its flourishing, and about our flourishing within it. Barbara Rossing asks us to imagine our own cities within the image of the book of Revelation, rephrasing the vision of the New Jerusalem descending to earth in terms of our own cities: “I saw the holy city, God’s New [name of our city] coming down out of heaven. . . .” What would our new cities look like, imagined in light of God’s vision of the renewal of the earth?12 If we view the world as our Scripture does, we must also take it as seriously as Scripture does. Created by God and renewed by God, it is our true home, our authentic residence as people of faith.

11 12

Barbara Rossing, The Rapture Exposed (New York: Basic Books, 2004). Ibid., 166.

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WAYS OF BEING IN THE WORLD: HUMANS AS STEWARDS OF CREATION

If the world is our true home, the questions then arise: How are we to be good, faithful citizens within it? What kind of people are we to be? What role are we to play within God’s creation? With the ecological crisis growing faster than anyone expected, these questions take on a special urgency and seriousness. Since many of us Christians have been so absorbed in a spiritual approach to life, as we have just noted, we have not given much thought to the world as religiously important and to what this might mean for our living in it. Our task now is to bring these new questions to Scripture, to ask: If Scripture views this world as our home, then how does it imagine us living in it? Scripture, in fact, has many voices within it, so we might expect to find a variety of responses to this question there. Yet there are two overarching views of the human in the world, and both deserve our attention. The first view is developed in the creation story found in Gen 1:1–2:4a, attributed by biblical scholars to a Priestly writer or group. This viewpoint contains the most controversial idea of the human role in creation in the entire Bible, and it is the idea that is referred to more frequently than any other text when describing biblical perspectives on nature: Then God said, “Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the wild animals of the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.” (Gen 1:26)

It is this verse that has frequently brought the Bible into disrepute and that has branded the Scriptures as one of the reasons for the current ecological crisis rather than a useful resource for responding to it. This is so because the image of the human in Gen 1 is seen as elevating humans above the rest of creation and placing nature in their power to use for their own purposes, as Lynn White interpreted it in his provocative essay.13 We cannot tame or soften this idea of the human for ecological purposes by denying the distinctive place it assigns humans in the world or the power it grants them. In this creation story, humans alone are made in God’s image, a status given to no other form of life. And the Hebrew verb translated “have dominion,” ra4dâ, signifies the authority, power, and control of one person by another. It is used of the authority of kings over their subjects (1 Kgs 4:24), of officers over conscripted laborers (1 Kgs 5:16), and of household heads over their servants (Lev 25:43).14 It imagines humanity at the top of a hierarchy of life with a unique place at the top, an image reflected also in Ps 8:5–6,

Lynn White, Jr., “The Historical Roots of Our Ecologic Crisis.” Theodore Hiebert, “Rethinking Dominion Theology,” in Direction 25:2 (1996): 16–25. The related term ka4baš, “subdue,” in the phrase “subdue the earth” (1:28) also signifies potent control, since it is used to depict conquering territory (Num 32:22, 29), enslaving people (Jer 34:11, 16), and rape (Esth 7:8, Neh 5:5). 13 14

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Yet you have made them a little lower than God, and crowned them with glory and honor. You have given them dominion15 over the works of your hands; you have put all things under their feet. . . .

This is the image of the human role in the world that, more than any other, achieved classic status in the history of Christian thought. This view of the world is patently hierarchical, a viewpoint that has made many ecologists uncomfortable and critical.16 But before we dismiss this idea too quickly, we need to think about it carefully. In the first place, we must recognize that as it is expressed in Gen 1, this idea of the human has a strong limit to power built into it. The limiting factor is that human authority in nature is delegated, not absolute. Humans exercise their dominion not as autonomous rulers, but only as God’s representatives in creation. This is clear both in God’s assigning them dominion and in their being made in God’s image. In the most common usage of the expression “image of God” in the ancient Near East, the king was regarded as the image or likeness of the deity in his role as God’s representative on earth.17 If we take this customary ancient usage as a clue to its meaning here, then we can see that the expression confers not a special character or substance on the human, such as a soul or spirit differentiating them from other life, but rather a special function or position. That function was divine representation. In fact, translators have generally missed the nuance of the sequence of verbs in Gen 1:26, which properly connects being made in God’s image to ruling as God’s representative: “Let us make humanity in our image to resemble us so that they may take charge of the fish of the sea . . .” (Common English Bible; italics mine); not “Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea . . .” (NRSV and most other versions; italics mine). This representative status has profound implications. If humans rule nature as God’s representatives, then they are delegated to govern nature as God would, the God who created nature to flourish and who valued everything in nature as good (Gen 1:4, 10, 12, 17, 21, 25, 31). Such a role grants humans no right to exploit creation, but rather gives them the responsibility to ensure that everything God called good flourishes. It follows then that when, under human governance, any part of creation is harmed, damaged, or destroyed— and the accumulation of such destruction, extinction, and pollution is now everywhere in the environment around us—humans have abdicated the vocation God gave them at creation. If we adopt this role for ourselves today in its authentic biblical form, it will not add to our hubris and exploitation. On the contrary, it will call us to repentance for the damage

Hebrew ma4lak, a synonym of ra4dâ, typically used of royal rule. Besides the historian Lynn White, see also John Muir, A Thousand Mile Walk to the Gulf (ed. William Frederick Badè; New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1916), 98–99, 136–139; Aldo Leopold, A Sand County Almanac (New York: Oxford University Press, 1949), 204; and recently, Richard Bauckham, “Stewardship in Question,” in The Bible and Ecology: Rediscovering the Community of Creation (Waco: Baylor University Press, 2010), 1–36. 17 Phyllis Bird, “‘Male and Female He Created Them’: Gen 1:27b in the Context of the Priestly Account of Creation,” Harvard Theological Review 74 (1981): 137–44; Nahum Sarna, Genesis, 12; Claus Westermann, Genesis 1–11: A Commentary (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1984), 151–54. 15 16

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we have allowed and to a new responsibility to repair what we have damaged, to ensure that no new harm occurs, and to invest our power in acts that help creation to flourish. A second reason we must not dismiss this idea of the human too quickly is that in fact, it has become remarkably descriptive of modern life. While an ancient view of humanity from a world in which humans had little power over nature, this view now reflects clearly the power over nature humans have achieved in the last hundred years, in the way they have altered earth’s climate, exploited its resources, and destroyed its species of life. “Forty years ago,” writes Stuart Brand, “I started the Whole Earth Catalogue with the words, ‘We are as gods, and might as well get good at it.’ Those were innocent times. New situation, new motto: ‘We are as gods and have to get good at it.’”18 Brand believes that we have already compromised nature so thoroughly and that the crisis we have created is so urgent that only our intentional and forceful intervention will have any effect in holding it off or reducing its damage: “Whether it’s called managing the commons, natural-infrastructure maintenance, tending the wild, niche construction, ecosystem engineering, mega-gardening, or intentional Gaia, humanity is now stuck with a planetary stewardship role.”19 While not all would advocate the degree of intervention in the environment that Brand does, the stewardship role he embraces has become the primary one adopted by religious people today. In religious circles, it has become the standard way of thinking and talking about the human role in the world, and its influence has spread widely.20 This idea of humans as stewards goes back ultimately to the Priestly image of the powerful human exercising divinely delegated authority over the world of nature. And it places on the powerful human the responsibility to govern as God would the good world God created. WAYS OF BEING IN THE WORLD: HUMANS AS SERVANT S OF CREATION

While we have really found no other way of talking about the human role in the world in contemporary Christian conversations except by the language of stewardship, the Bible actually contains a second, very different way of talking about the human role. We have overlooked it because it is found in the second story of creation in Gen 2, and, through the long history of interpretation, readers have simply read it as an extension of the first. Modern scholarship has, however, shown how unique it is and what a different idea of the human in the world it contains. It contrasts sharply with the powerful image of humanity in Gen 1:26 and positions humans much more modestly in the world. It is found at the beginning of the story of creation in the Garden of Eden, attributed by scholars to the

Stuart Brand, Whole Earth Discipline: An Ecopragmatist Manifesto (New York: Viking, 2009), 20. Ibid., 275. 20 See, for example, Al Gore, Earth in the Balance: Ecology and the Human Spirit (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1992), 243. 18 19

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Yahwist (so called because this author refers to God by God’s personal name Yahweh, rendered “the LORD” in most English translations). The LORD God formed the human from the topsoil of the fertile land and blew life’s breath into his nostrils. The human came to life. . . . The LORD God took the human and settled him in the garden of Eden to farm it and to take care of it. (Gen 2:7, 15; CEB)

In this story of creation, the Yahwist places the human in the opposite position in the world when compared to the Priestly account. The human being is not made in God’s image but, rather, out of earth, in particular out of the topsoil from the fertile land Israel farmed for its livelihood. So humanity and the earth are one and the same, inseparably united with one another. When we recognize that the Hebrew term for fertile land, )a5da4mâ, is related to the term for human, )a4da4m, we see even more clearly that the Yahwist meant to link humanity with the Earth, and not with the Earth in general but with the particular landscape it inhabited. What is more, by being made out of the fertile land, humans have the same status as all other life, since God brings both plants (2:9) and animals (2:19) to life out of this same fertile land. While the Priestly writer distinguished humanity from the rest of nature by describing humans as alone made in God’s image, the Yahwist seems intent on showing that humans are not to be distinguished at all, neither from the Earth itself nor from any other form of life. This strong concept of interrelatedness rings true with our contemporary concept of ecosystems, communities of life in which humans do not exist over and against nature but in which they are a part of a web where living organisms each occupy essential niches or roles and are dependent upon one another for survival. As Wendell Berry puts it, The Creation is bounteous and mysterious, and humanity is only a part of it—not its equal, much less its master. . . . The Creation provides a place for humans, but it is greater than humanity and within it even great men are small. Such humility is the consequence of an accurate insight, ecological in its bearing, not a pious deference to “spiritual” value.21

The Yahwist’s modest, connected idea of the human reflects much more profoundly than the Priestly idea the contemporary ecological conception of humanity’s place in its larger ecosystems. It urges us to recognize our relatedness to our ecosystems and our dependence on them. It also emphasizes the fundamental scriptural notion with which we began, that, as humans are made from the earth, the earth is indeed their true home.

21

Wendell Berry, The Unsettling of America, 86–94.

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The task that God gives the first human in the Yahwist’s story is also the opposite of the task assigned to humanity in the Priestly account of creation. According to the Yahwist, “The LORD God took the human and settled him in the garden of Eden to farm it and to take care of it” (Gen 2:15; CEB). The basic and most common meaning of the Hebrew term here translated “farm,” (a4bad, is “serve.” It is used to express the service of servant to master (Gen 12:6), of one people to another (Exod 5:9), and of Israel’s service to God in its life and worship (Exod 4:23). It thus places the human being in a position subordinate to the earth. The common use of (a4bad, “serve,” for cultivation by the Yahwist and in the OT more generally must come from a sense of the vital power of the land over its creatures, and of the need for human attentiveness and submission to that power in the act of farming. Ellen Davis, in her agrarian reading of the Bible, talks about this human role as “meeting the expectations of the land.”22 This way of thinking puts the land—or creation as a whole—first. It views humanity’s role as collaborating with and taking its cues from creation rather than managing it. It emphasizes our dependence on, rather than our dominion over, the earth. This is a different language than stewardship. If we assume the Yahwist’s view of the human role in the world, then we are not stewards of nature, managing it for God, but we are its servants, put in the world by God to attend to its needs and requirements. This shifts our focus from governing to serving, from management to alignment, from taking charge of ecosystems to shaping our behavior to fit the needs and demands of the larger ecosystems of which we are a part. This shifts the locus of power from us to nature itself. Wes Jackson expresses this way of thinking about our role in nature when he describes the philosophy that undergirds the work of The Land Institute in Salina, Kansas: Ecosystem principles represent the “nature’s wisdom” end of the spectrum of knowledge, and that’s what we are thinking about and researching at The Land. It is this end which has to dominate the “human cleverness” end of the spectrum. None of us wants human cleverness to disappear. We just want to move it once and for all into a subordinate role.23

This image of servanthood evokes humility and restraint, two values that are essential if we are to bring human activity into line with the limits of creation itself. Bill McKibben attributes the increasingly dangerous speed of climate change to the orthodoxy of Western culture as he sees it, to “the central economic and social idea that more is better, that growth is necessary.”24 In response, McKibben says, we need “humility, first and foremost.” And we need restraint:

22 Ellen F. Davis, Scripture, Culture, and Agriculture: An Agrarian Reading of the Bible (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009), 28–33; she takes this phrase from the title of a collection of essays edited by Wes Jackson, Wendell Berry, and Bruce Coleman, Meeting the Expectations of the Land (San Francisco, North Point, 1984). 23 Wes Jackson is quoted here from a letter to supporters of The Land Institute, dated April 1, 1994. 24 Bill McKibben, The Comforting Whirlwind (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994), 33.

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We were born for community; we were born for service; we were born for joy; we were born to feel at home in this beautiful world; we were born to share certain unique gifts. And of those gifts, the most unique and the most paradoxical is the ability to restrain ourselves.25

Even Stuart Brand, who embraces with great enthusiasm the image of the powerful human reflected in the Priestly creation story, recognizes our limitations and urges that we pay attention to them: “The forces at play in the Earth system are astronomically massive and complex. Our participation has to be subtle and tentative.”26 Scripture thus gives us two visions of ourselves in the world. Both believe this world is our true home. And both define the first and primary human vocation as our responsibility to this world. One emphasizes our distinctiveness and our power in the world. It identifies our first responsibility as the exercise of the power God delegates to us to insure that everything God made good flourishes. The other vision emphasizes our interrelatedness with the world and with all of its life and our smallness in the world. It identifies our first responsibility to serve creation, to align our behavior with its own limits. Within the serious crisis in which we now find ourselves, we must use our own science and our own wisest judgment to decide when we must step forward, like the Priestly writer, to intervene to repair and to save nature from our harm, and when we must step back, like the Yahwist, to allow nature to flourish and to bring our lives within those limits.

25 26

McKibben, The Comforting Whirlwind, 90–91. Brand, Whole Earth Discipline, 276.

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Ecology and Theology: Ecojustice at the Center of the Church’s Mission ROSEMARY RADFORD RUETHER Professor of Feminist Theology Emerita Pacific School of Religion This essay examines two major biblical and theological traditions for ecological commitment: the covenantal tradition, biblical and modern, and the sacramental tradition, biblical and modern. It also asks how we need to reclaim these traditions in the practice of the churches today.

M

any traditional Christians feel a deep suspicion toward the ecology movement, particularly when it lays claim to theological and religious meaning. They see this as the rise of a new nature worship, something they regard as totally contrary to biblical faith. In this essay, I argue that the church’s mission of redemption of the world cannot be divorced from justice in society and from the healing of the wounds of nature wrought by an exploitative human industrial system. Furthermore, I show that this holistic perspective is central to the biblical vision of redemption. It is a Christianity that divorces individual salvation from society and society from nature that is unbiblical. This does not mean that some of the challenges directed at the biblical and Christian tradition by deep ecologists and ecofeminists1 have been totally off base. The biblical and Christian traditions do have elements that sacralize the domination and negation of body, earth, and woman. But these traditions also struggled against what they perceived to be injustice and evil, and sought to vindicate the goodness of creation and the body and their ultimate redemption against extreme dualists that saw in the material world only the manifestation of the demonic. We can reclaim these more holistic traditions to ground an ecojustice vision of redemption. Let me be clear about what I am not saying by such affirmations. I am not saying that the biblical and Christian tradition is the sole source of religious truth, the only way of access to true divinity, and therefore, only here is religious truth to be found. The great Asian religious traditions, as well as the unjustly scorned nature religions of indigenous peoples,

1 A major source of the condemnation of the Bible as the source of the Western culture of domination is Lynn White’s essay, “The Historical Roots of our Ecological Crisis,” Science (10 March l967): l203–7.

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have precious resources that need to be cultivated. An ecological crisis of global proportions can mean nothing less than a true dialogue and mutual enrichment of all spiritual traditions. Secondly, I am not saying that these biblical and Christian traditions are adequate. They need critique and reinterpretation. But I suspect that this is true of all human spiritual heritages. The global ecological crisis is a new situation. Until now, humans have assumed that nature’s power far transcended puny humans. Even biblical apocalyptic thought did not put the power to destroy the earth in human hands. The awareness that our power has grown so great that we must now take responsibility for preserving the biotic diversity of rain forests and the ozone layer of the stratosphere was unimaginable in past human experience. Although biblical and Christian traditions are not the only source for ecological theology and ethics, they are a source that must be central for us of Christian background. First, there are magnificent themes here to inspire us. Secondly, Christian people and their institutions are a major world religion and world power. They have been a major cause of the problems, but they will not be mobilized to conversion unless they can find the mandates for it in those traditions that carry meaning and authority for them. Finally, I suspect that none of us work in a healthy way if we operate merely out of alienation from our past. We need new visions. New visions have power when they are not rootless, but are experienced as based on and giving authentic understanding of our heritage. The ecological theologies of Christian inspiration at this time seem to fall into two different types, which I call the “covenantal” and the “sacramental.” The covenantal type is represented by books such as Richard Austin’s Hope for the Land.2 It draws strongly from Hebrew Scripture, and claims the Bible as the primary source of ecological theology. A second type is that of Matthew Fox’s The Coming of the Cosmic Christ and Thomas Berry’s The Dream of the Earth.3 Fox claims a biblical basis for his thought in the cosmological Christology of the NT. He also draws on Patristic and Medieval mysticism and casts a wide net of ecumenical dialogue across world religions. Protestants have generally been stronger on the covenantal tradition that searched for an ecological ethics, while Roman Catholics have tended to stress the sacramental tradition. My view is that these two traditions, covenantal and sacramental, are complementary. A useable ecological theology, spirituality, and ethic must interconnect these two traditions. Each perspective supplies elements that the other lacks. In the covenantal tradition, we find the basis for a moral relation to nature and to one another that mandates patterns of right relation, enshrining these right relations in law as the final guarantee against abuse. In the

Richard Austin, Hope for the Land (Atlanta: John Knox, l988). Matthew Fox, The Coming of the Cosmic Christ (San Francisco: Harper and Row, l988); Thomas Berry, The Dream of the Earth (San Francisco: Sierra Club Books, l988). 2 3

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sacramental tradition, we find the heart, the ecstatic experience of I and Thou, of interpersonal communion, without which moral relationships grow heartless and spiritless.4 T H E C O V E N A N TA L T R A D I T I O N , B I B L I C A L A N D M O D E R N

The notion that the Bible is anti-nature comes in part from the reading of the Bible popularized by German scholarship of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. This scholarship read into the Bible its own sharp dualism of history against nature, setting the true God of history against the gods of nature. This view does not adequately represent the biblical understanding of God and nature. Although the biblical view of God reconceives the way God is seen as related to nature, there is also a lively sense of God’s relation to and presence in nature that was overlooked in this stress on the God of History “against” nature. While God is seen as creating nature, rather than being an expression of it, nevertheless, the nature God creates is alive and enters into lively relation to God. God delights in the creatures God creates, and the creatures return this rejoicing in joy and praise. Divine blessing inundates the earth as rain, and the mountains skip like a calf, the hills gird themselves with joy, the valleys deck themselves with grain; they shout and sing together for joy. This language is typical of Hebrew Scripture. There is no reason to write it off as “mere poetic metaphor,” a judgment that reflects the modern loss of the experience of IThou relation to what we see around us. The vision of nature, of fields, mountains, streams, birds, and animals, in Hebrew sensibility, while not seen as “divine,” is still very much animate, interacting as living beings with their Creator. The modern nature/history split distorts this biblical vision. In the biblical view, all things, whether they happen as human wars and struggles for liberation in and between cities, or whether they happen as rain that brings abundant harvests, or as drought that brings disaster to the fields upon which humans depend, are “events.” In all such events, whether in cities or in fields, the Hebrews saw the presence and work of God, as blessing or as judgment. All such events have moral meaning. If enemies overwhelm the walls of the city or floods break down irrigation channels and destroy the fruits of human labor, then God is acting in judgment upon human infidelity. When humans repent and return to fidelity to God, then justice and harmony will reign, not only in the city, but in the relations between

4 This summary of the covenantal and sacramental traditions is drawn from my book, Gaia and God: An Ecofeminist Theology of Earth Healing (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1992), 205–53.

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humans and animals, the heavens and the earth. The heavens will rain sweet water, and the harvests will come up abundantly. Thus, what modern Western thought has split apart as “nature” and as “history,” Hebrew thought sees as one reality fraught with moral warning and promise. To be sure, there can be problems with reading moral meaning and divine will into events in “nature.” We would not wish to see in every flood, drought, volcanic eruption, and tornado the work of divine judgment. But when destructive floods rush down the Himalayan mountains, carrying all before them into the Pakistan delta, or drought sears African lands, then we are right to recognize the consequences of human misuse of the land, stripping the forest cover that held back the torrential rains, and over-grazing the semi-arid African soils. In these disasters today, we have to recognize a consequence of human culpability and a call to rectify how we use the land and how we relate to the indigenous people who depend on these lands. As human power expands, colonizing more and more of the planet’s natural processes, the line between what was traditionally called “natural evil,” and that was ethically neutral, and what should be called sin—that is, the culpable abuse of human freedom and power—also shifts. Hebrew moral sensibility takes on a new dimension of moral truth, in which relation to God is the basis for both justice in society and prosperity in nature, while disobedience to God’s commands of right relation brings both violence to society and disaster to nature. Hebrew genius saw divine commands of right relation between human beings and to the rest of the creation enshrined in a body of law. Aspects of this law did not seem relevant to Christians, who believed that their new relation to God through Christ allowed them to discard a good deal of it. But some elements of this legal tradition take on new meaning today, particularly the tradition of Sabbatical legislation. These are the laws that mandate periodic rest and restoration of relations between humans, animals, and land. Hebrew theology of creation rejects the aristocratic split between a leisure class divinity and a humanity that serves this divinity through slave labor that was typical of ancient Near Eastern mythology. In Genesis, God is described as both working and resting and thereby setting the pattern for all humans and their relations to land and animals in the covenant of creation. This pattern of work and rest is mandated through a series of concentric cycles, of seven days, seven years, and seven times seven years.

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On the seventh day of each week, not only the farmer, but also his human and animal work force, are to rest. “On the seventh day you shall rest, so that your ox and your donkey may have relief, and your homeborn slave and your resident alien shall be refreshed” (Exod 23:l2). In the seventh year, attention is given to the rights of the poor and to wild animals, as well as to the renewal of the land itself. “For six years you shall sow your land and gather in its yield; but the seventh year you shall let it rest and lie fallow, so that the poor of your people may eat, and what they leave, the wild animals may eat. You shall do the same with your vineyard, and with your olive orchard” (Exod 23:l0–11). At this time, slaves are to be set free (Exod 21:2) and laborers are to rest. Finally, in the Jubilee year, the fiftieth year, there is to be a great restoration of all relationships. Those who have lost their land through debt are to be restored to their former property. Debts are to be forgiven, and captives freed. The earth is to lie fallow, and animals and humans are to rest. All the accumulated inequities of the past seven times seven years are to be rectified: humans fallen into debt, loss of land and enslavement, and nature distorted by overuse of land and animals. All is to be restored to right balance. This vision of periodic redemption and restoration of right relation underlies Jesus’ language in the Lord’s Prayer. It is a vision of redemption more compatible with finitude and human limits than the radical visions of the millennium and the once for all apocalyptic end of history through which biblical scholarship has read the meaning of the term “Kingdom of God.” Modern revolutionary thinkers would have done better if they had taken the Jubilee, rather than the millennium and the apocalyptic future, as their models of historical change. Periodic renewal and restoration of right relations is a more doable and less dangerous vision than the aspiration to final perfection. Although Christians saw themselves as people of the new covenant, a covenant no longer limited to one people, the Jews, or to one land, but extended to all nations and to the whole earth, they also spiritualized and eschatologized these ideas in a way that lost the concreteness of Hebrew faith. Christians, in the early centuries, were city people, and the farmer ethic of Sabbatical legislation was less meaningful to them. In their belief in a Christ that had transcended the law, they saw themselves as mandated to ignore some good ideas, along with some bad ideas, in Hebrew legislation. The Reformation, with its stress on historical, rather than allegorical, interpretation of Scripture, brought new attention to Hebrew Scripture. In the Reformed tradition, there was a new stress on the idea of being a covenanted people, and this was identified with the

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social and political contracts binding local and national communities. Not all of this had positive results. There was a revival of tribal notions of being an elect people of God that fueled English and American religious and racial nationalisms. But another aspect of the notion of covenant as the basis of political community gave birth to the idea of citizens who contract together to form civil society, who have mutual rights and obligations, and whose leaders are accountable to the citizens. These ideas have been the foundation of modern constitutional government. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, it was assumed that these citizens were limited to white propertied males, but gradually this concept of citizenship, and with it civil rights, was extended to all adult men, and eventually to adult women. Slavery was incompatible with this idea of rights. It was gradually abolished, although more for economic than for humanitarian reasons. Although guaranteed by their relationship to particular political communities, these rights were seen in Enlightenment thought as “natural”—that is, grounded in the fundamental created nature and dignity of the human person. The rights of those not able to be responsible citizens also received protection: children, the sick, the mentally ill or retarded, and the imprisoned. Some nineteenth-century English liberals and progressive evangelicals began to claim that rights should be extended to animals as well. Beating, torture, and painful ill treatment of all kinds should be banned, whether toward humans in prisons, schools, armies, or hospitals, or toward animals in laboratories or farms. Both environmentalists and animal rights activists today draw on this tradition of “natural rights.” They seek to extend this concept to species and ecospheres and to sentient animals. Environmentalists argue that endangered species have the right to be protected against extinction, not simply because they are or might become useful to humans, but in their own right, as unique expressions of evolutionary life.5 We must ask whether the natural rights tradition is adequate for the ecological ethic we need today. Protecting an animal or a plant because it is a member of an endangered species is still a highly individualistic idea. Species are not endangered in isolation, but because the ecosystems of forest, prairie, or wetland in which they live are endangered. Ecological communities are the context in which particular animals or plants thrive or die. It is finally all ecosystems, not just wild ones, but the ones in which humans must learn to share their lives with a great variety of animals and plants, that have to be protected. We

5 As an example of this approach, see Roderick F. Nash, The Rights of Nature: A History of Environmental Ethics (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, l989).

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need an ethic that encompasses the sustaining of ecological community, not simply the members of community in isolation from each other. The natural rights tradition is limited, because it sees only the right of the individual in relation to the community, but fails to uphold the community as the matrix in which the life of the individual is sustained. What is needed is a new interconnection of the ethic of the individual and the ethic of the community, and the extension of this ethic beyond the human individual and group to the biosphere in which all living things cohere on the planet. The basic insight of the biblical covenantal tradition that we have to translate right relation into an ethic, which finds guarantees in law, is an essential element in building an ecological world order. The World Charter for Nature, signed by all members of the United Nations (except the United States) in l982, laid out the basic principles of such an ecological ethic. International treaties on climate change, protection of biodiversity and forests, the oceans and lakes, are being negotiated to set limits to human abuse of the environment. A body of international law is beginning to emerge, although all too slowly and without adequate means of enforcement, that affirms the interdependency of the global human community with the Earth community of air, water, animals, and plants. T H E S AC R A M E N TA L T R A D I T I O N

The sacramental tradition valued by Roman Catholic Christianity complements the covenantal tradition that has been emphasized by Reformed Christianity and its secular heirs. It starts with the community as a living whole, not only the human community, but, first of all, the cosmic community. The human being not only mirrors cosmic community as micro- to macrocosm, but also inter-communes with the whole cosmic body. God is seen not only as over against and “making” this cosmic body, but also as present within it. The visible universe is the emanational manifestation of God, God’s sacramental body. God is incarnate in and as the cosmic body of the universe, although not reduced to it. Hellenistic Judaism developed this vision of divine Wisdom as the secondary manifestation of God and God’s agent in creating the cosmos, sustaining it and bringing all things into harmonious unity with God.6 Strikingly, Hebrew thought always saw this immanent manifestation of God as female. Wisdom . . . pervades and penetrates all things. . . . She is a breath of the power of God, and a pure emanation of the glory of the Almighty. . . . She is a reflection of eternal light, a spotless mirror of the working of God, and an image of his goodness.

6 For the culmination of the Hellenistic Jewish cosmological spirituality, see E. R. Goodenough, By Light, Light: The Mystic Gospel of Hellenistic Judaism (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1935).

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She is but one, she can do all things, and while remaining in herself, she renews all things; in every generation she passes into holy souls and makes them friends of God and prophets. . . . She reaches mightily from one end of the earth to the other, and she orders all things well. (Wisdom of Solomon 7:24–8:1)

In the NT, this cosmogonic Wisdom of God is identified with Christ. Jesus as the Christ not only embodies, in crucified form, the future king and redeemer, but also incarnates the cosmogonic principle through which the cosmos is created, sustained, redeemed, and reconciled with God. In this cosmological Christology, found in the preface to the Gospel of John, in the first chapter of Hebrews, and in some Pauline letters, Christ is the beginning and end of all things. In the letter to the Colossians, the divine Logos that dwells in Christ is the same Logos that founded and has sustained the cosmos from the beginning. “All things have been created through him . . . and in him all things hold together.” This same Logos, through Christ and the church, is now bringing the whole cosmos to union with God. “In him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven” (1:16–20). New Testament and Patristic cosmological Christology was a bold effort to overcome the threatened split between the God of creation and the God of eschatological redemption, found in gnostic systems such as that of Marcion. This theology sought to synthesize cosmogony and eschatology, and to bring together the Hebrew creational and the Greek emanational views of the relation of the divine to the cosmic body. Being and becoming are dialectically interconnected. The Greek body/soul dualism was made more fluid, seeing body as the sacramental bodying forth of soul and soul as the life principle of the body. Irenaeus, the second century anti-gnostic churchman, sought to spell out the cosmological Christology of the NT in a comprehensive vision of redemptive history. The visible cosmos is itself both the creation and the manifestation of the Word and Spirit of God. The Word and Spirit are the “two hands” by which God creates the world, and also the ground and principle of being of the cosmos.7 Human freedom allows this connection to the divine source of being to be forgotten, and human relation to God and to each other is distorted. But God continually sends manifestations of the Word and Spirit that heal this relationship, culminating in Christ, whose work is now carried to fulfillment in the body of Christ, the church. For Irenaeus, the Christian sacraments are the paradigmatic embodiments of this process of cosmic healing.

7

Irenaeus, Against Heresies, V:18.1–3.

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The body itself, human and cosmic, is thereby regenerated, renewed, and filled with the divine presence that is its ground of being. Irenaeus sees the entire cosmos becoming blessed, and eventually immortalized by being ever more fully united with its divine source of being.8 Later, Latin Patristic thought gradually dropped the lush prophetic visions of a redeemed Earth that were part of early Christianity as being too dangerous to an empire that now claimed to be Christian. But medieval Latin thought, represented by thinkers such as Bonaventure, preserved elements of the idea of a cosmic presence of God through which we can be led upward in the “mind’s road to God.”9 Sacramental theologians of the twelfth-century Victorine School set their reflections on the sacraments of the church in the context of the sacramentality of creation. This tradition was repressed by the dualists of mind against matter, Descartes and Newton and early modern European science. But the effort to bring mind and matter, God and creation together in one unified vision lived on and was continually rediscovered in traditions of European philosophy, theology, poetry, and art. The Anglican Cambridge Platonists expressed this effort to bridge mind and matter, God and cosmos, in the seventeenth century; Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel in the eighteenth and nineteenth. In poetry, it was expressed in the English romantics Coleridge and Wordsworth; in theology, in Tillich’s view of God as ground of being. Ecological theologians of the late twentieth century, such as Thomas Berry, or Matthew Fox’s rediscovery of the cosmological Christ, represent the new impetus to rediscover and reinterpret this tradition of sacramental cosmology. Berry sees human nature relations deeply threatened by Western technological exploitation. He calls for a deep metanoia that is necessary to bring about a new ecological consciousness. This metanoia must encompass many levels, including the technological, social, and cultural. For Berry, Western people are caught between the older stories of classical civilizations and the confident mechanistic scientism of modernity, both of which are under challenge today, and the appearance of a new spirituality, rooted in the new universe story, that is waiting to be born.10 We need to create a new socio-economic incarnation of the human species into its Earth matrix. Although the technological aspects of this are necessary, the most important shift must be a renewed vision of our relation to the whole of the creation, a renewed way of telling the story of who we are. Reclaiming both the covenantal and the sacramental traditions are central to a renewed understanding of Christian redemptive hope as encompassing ecojustice. But this needs to

Irenaeus, Against Heresies, V: 2.2 and 36.3. Bonaventure, The Mind’s Road to God (trans. George Boas; ESaintLibrary.com, 2010). 10 Berry, The Dream of the Earth. 8 9

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be embodied much more deeply in our preaching, worship, and biblical study. We need to learn to reread these great traditions of covenantal ethics and sacramental spirituality in our biblical studies and teach it in our preaching. This vision needs to become a visible part of how we design our churches and worship spaces. It needs to flow out in our stewardship of the land and buildings of our church communities through a praxis of recycling and conservation of energy. It can be expressed in the transformation of our lands from wasteful overwatered lawns to natural grasses and permaculture gardens to help feed the poor. Only by embodying the vision of ecojustice in its own teaching, worship, and praxis can the church make itself a base for an ecojustice ministry to the larger community in which it stands. Ecojustice becomes central to the church’s mission only when it is understood as central to the church’s life. Anything less will lack credibility.

Issues Coming Next in 2012 January

Pentecost/Trinity Sunday fourth in the Church Year series

April

The Book of Joshua

July

The Book of Acts

October

Seminary and Church: In This Together

New Wineskins LARRY RASMUSSEN Santa Fe, New Mexico This essay explores the conversion of various Christianities to an “Earth-honoring” faith with a moral universe different from the one presently at home in most heads, hearts,

T

and practices. Such reborn faith and morality would be new cloth, new wineskins.

homas Berry’s truth, that planetary health is primary and human health is derivative, arrives as we contemplate the end of the fossil-fuel interlude of human history. Yet planetary health as prior and primary entails changes in our self-understanding, the faith we live by, and the moral universe we inhabit. “Earth-honoring” is one way to describe this renewed faith, its morality and way of life.1 He also told them a parable: “No one tears a piece from a new garment and sews it on an old garment; otherwise the new will be torn, and the piece from the new will not match the old. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; otherwise the new wine will burst the skins and will be spilled, and the skins will be destroyed. But new wine must be put into fresh wineskins. And no one after drinking old wine desires new wine, but says, ‘The old is good.’” (Luke 5:36–39)

While Jesus says “no one” does this ill-fated pouring and patching, some must have tried. Were it not so, Jesus would not have instructed his disciples and the Pharisees about it. Is there need for new wineskins and new cloth today? There is. Yet most respond with “No, thank you, ‘the old is good.’” Here is the occasion for new wineskins and cloth: the planet we were born on, came to love, and to which we have grown accustomed is no longer the planet on which we live. Earth is undergoing geo-physical change, the kind that distant times associated with geological ages, but that humans have not seen. The relatively stable “sweet spot” that has harbored all human civilizations from 10,000 B.C.E. to the present is in jeopardy. Bill McKibben, in Eaarth,2 even spells the home planet’s name differently, “incorrectly,” to make the point. We no longer live where our grandparents did. McKibben knows something else as he pushes the ethical question of what we ought,

1 2

Thomas Berry, Evening Thoughts: Reflecting on Earth as Sacred Community (San Francisco: Sierra Club, 2006), 19. Bill McKibben, Eaarth (New York: Times Books, 2010). See also the review of this book on p. 404 of this issue.

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then, to be and do. He knows what works poorly—the “fact-based apocalypse” that climatology and other environmental sciences now provide. It does not motivate change radical enough to meet the civilizational challenge we face. Evidently, few people will die for a pie chart, no matter what it graphs. Data, even sound data, do not unearth us from entrenched ways. Fact-based apocalypse comes up short as grounds for hope and the impetus to deep change.2 Differently said, nobody who is scared to death is going to tap the renewable moralspiritual energy needed for life well-lived on a new, tough planet in hard times. Those anxious about the morrow are not going to risk the right thing with new wine and cloth. Rather, to remember the words of Howard Thurman: “Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”3 This essay explores the conversion of various Christianities to an Earth-honoring faith with a moral universe different from the one presently at home in most heads, hearts, and practices. Such reborn faith and morality would be new cloth, new wineskins. The pastoral question, however, comes first: what will likely be most peoples’ response to the forebodings that science serves up with heightened regularity? Preaching and teaching fall on rocky ground, and do not take root, if they are not attuned to context. Wes Jackson’s book, Consulting the Genius of the Place, opens with this: [Joan] and I try not to interrupt one another when we are reading and having our coffee in the early morning. We are usually successful, unless an arresting piece of information or idea presents itself. One morning as she was reading The History of Love, a novel by Nicole Krauss, she interrupted with “Listen to this.” The protagonist in the story, a young man, describes a woman in his village in Poland who had paid special attention to his writings. It was when Hitler’s troops had entered Poland, and for whatever reason, this woman had moved from their village. Joan read aloud the following passage: “After she left, everything fell apart. No Jew was safe. There were rumors of unfathomable things, and because we couldn’t fathom them we failed to believe them, until we had no choice and it was too late.”4 We both fell silent. We knew what the other was thinking.5

The Jacksons were thinking this. A different planet, human-induced climate change, the unsustainability of life lived by the industrial paradigm entrenched in every domain, these are “rumors of unfathomable things, and because we [cannot] fathom them we [do

McKibben, Eaarth, passim. Howard Thurman, cited from Howard Thurman Quotes, www.thinkexist.com. Accessed 9/12/2010. Nicole Krauss, A History of Love (New York: W. W. Norton, 2006), 8. 5 Wes Jackson, Consulting the Genius of the Place: An Ecological Approach to a New Agriculture (Berkeley: Counterpoint, 2010), 3–4. 2 3 4

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not] believe them. . . .” Try, for example, convincing most United States’ Americans of the end of dirty fuels capitalism or global consumerism and the American Dream as a way of life. They will wonder, in anger, what you did with their country and faith. Try convincing them that the present obsession—“getting the economy back on track”—is very bad advice when they mean the same economy that brings geo-physical change. Then try convincing them we cannot “green” all this in time so as to retain this way of life on a diminished planet. The first and deepest response will be what Jesus said it would be, “the old is good.” First, we will not believe, then we will deny, and finally, when we must do something, we will try to put the new wine—the reality of a tough, new planet—into the old wineskins of the industrial paradigm. This condition—these are “rumors of unfathomable things, and because we [cannot] fathom them we [do not] believe them”—is the present challenge to faith communities. Helping one another face terrible truth and harsh reality without flinching, and at the same time tapping hope and renewable moral-spiritual energy for new beginnings, is the calling of faith communities when, for the first time on a global scale, Homo sapiens are “running Genesis backwards, de-creating.”6 Why will new wineskins and cloth be so difficult, and “the old” so compelling? Why does the industrial paradigm and its way of life have such a lock on us? Karl Polanyi authored a famous book in the mid-1940s, The Great Transformation: the Political and Economic Origins of Our Time. The “great transformation” is the Industrial Revolution and all that follows from it.7 While Polanyi was prescient about what would happen in the half-century after his own work, he only told us what we now all know from experience. The benefits of the great transformation have been huge. None of us wants to back-pedal in time to lifetimes half as long, none wants to live before millions and millions were lifted by modernity from the misery of poverty, none wants to return to “the Great Mortality”8 of the Plague and the scourge of pandemic disease. None wants to give up creature comforts even the rich of other epochs did not know. That great transformation in Earth/human relations was made possible by compact, stored energy in the form of “dirty” fossil fuels—oil, coal, natural gas—joined to technologies that used them en masse. For sheer material abundance, no other epoch has come close to the one begun with Thomas Newcomen’s new engine—a steam engine—in 1712.9 Yet, industrial technologies coupled to vast new quantities of accessible stored energy allowed several illusions. They still have their hold on us. We still live by them.

McKibben, Eaarth, 25. Karl Polanyi, The Great Transformation: The Political and Economic Origins of Our Time (Boston: Beacon, 1944), passim. 8 What we call “the Plague” was at the time called “the Great Mortality.” Muslim nations, who lost a portion of the population similar to Europe’s, referred to it as “The Year of Annihilation.” 9 L. T. C. Rolt and J. S. Allen, The Steam Engine of Thomas Newcomen (2nd ed.; Ashbourne: Landmark Publishing Ltd., 1998). 6 7

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Fossil fuels let humans bypass the rhythms and requirements of nature that pre-industrial populations of necessity had to observe season in and season out. We could, we thought, create our own built environment as our own preferred habitat. It would be a world created in our own image on our own terms. Soon we did not even bother to ask about the rest of nature’s demands for regeneration and renewal on its own complex, leisurely, non-negotiable terms. Humans living confidently in this radically transformed world seemingly forgot that every human economy is always and everywhere utterly a dependent part of nature’s economy. Earth’s economy is always substructure for the human economy as superstructure. When the latter is not matched to the former, trouble looms for both. Yet, we snubbed the substructure and its needs. Earth, air, fire, water, and light made no moral claims upon our lives; they evoked no responsibility. Bypassing nature’s rhythms and requirements for its own regeneration on its own terms linked arms with a second illusion—the conviction that humans could bring nature under their control and liberate humankind from futility and toil. Assuming nature’s unlimited abundance and obedience, humans could design their world with Promethean purpose. Or so we thought. We now know differently. Planetary processes are not only more complex and unpredictable than we think; they are probably more complex than we can ever think.10 They are certainly more complex than any one species can master and control. The third illusion is that scale somehow does not matter. Anyone twenty-five years of age in 2010 lived through the era when half of all the fossil fuels in human history were burned and more than half the greenhouse gases emitted at human hands sailed skyward.11 Anyone born in 1936 and still alive in 2003 was around for 97.5% of all the oil pumped and burned.12 By another measure, global consumer classes produced, transported, and consumed as many goods and services in the prodigious half century from 1950–2000 as throughout the entire period of history prior to that date.13 And the beat goes on. We still act as though we can have infinite growth on a finite planet and that scale, whatever it be, can be greened and managed. Even the notion of limits offends our way of life and its capacity to meet the “world’s needs” (meaning human needs). The biblical judgment that just enough is enough, rather than riches on the one hand, or poverty on the other, does not register with us.14 Life propelled by these illusions, when coupled with massive supplies of stored energy and the powers of modern science and technology tied to the industrial paradigm of extraction, production, and consumption for human ends, has come to mean that no precincts of

10 A paraphrase of Michael Crofeet as cited by Sam Bingham, The Last Ranch: A Colorado Community and the Coming Desert (New York: Pantheon, 1996), 345. Bingham does not give the source for Crofeet. 11 Randy Udall, “The Big Bonfire,” High Country News, December 21, 2009: 21. 12 From Wes Jackson, “Where We Are Going,” The Land Institute, p. 2. No date. Available at www.LandInstitute.org. Accessed 10/01/2010. 13 Alan T. Durning, How Much is Enough? (London: Earthscan, 1992): 38. 14 “Remove far from me falsehood and lying; give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with the food that I need, or I shall be full, and deny you, and say, ‘Who is the Lord?’ or I shall be poor, and steal, and profane the name of my God” (Prov 30:8–9).

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other-than-human nature, from genes to grasslands to glaciers, are exempt from human impact and human-induced change. The rest of nature no longer has any independent life. It belongs to the empire of its most aggressive species, even though nature’s citizens, like the citizens of all empires, may and do revolt. From a moral point of view, the primary human relationship to the rest of nature has become “use” alone, just as other-than-human nature’s primary status has become “object” alone, rather than fellow subject. As the ethos of the supposedly self-contained human bubble has displaced the ethos of the cosmos, nature as “it” has displaced nature as “thou,” ending a long and deep relationship in which nature mediated the sacred and bore the spirit of life itself. Nature as “it” in our consciousness has also displaced nature as “thou” in our religion and morality. Nature is no longer a salient source, much less the source, of moral direction and guidance. Job’s counsel goes unbidden: “But ask the animals, and they will teach you; the birds of the air, and they will tell you; ask the plants of the earth, and they will teach you; and the fish of the sea will declare to you” (Job 12:7–8). God’s creatures no longer instruct us; no creatures beyond our own species instruct us. As “resources” and “capital” only, for use only, they have nothing to say. The encapsulated human self, and human society abstracted from the rest of nature, monopolizes the moral universe. Rather than, say, creation. Likewise, the first covenant, the covenant of God with Earth, itself evoked by the escalation of human violence, is lost on us as basic moral obligation and a touchstone of faith (Gen 9). The uninvited blow to all three illusions—that we can wholly know and control nature, that its own rhythms and requirements on its own terms can be bypassed or bent to our design on our terms, and that scale does not truly matter—is every major life system in decline. Another consequence is the rude appearance of that very wild card, accelerated and extreme climate change. What restructuring the climate system means for the future of all life systems we only perceive through a glass darkly at this point, despite initial impacts. The tumultuous activity of the industrial age (some simply call it “modernity”) has brought us to the threshold of yet another transformation of Earth/human relations. Thomas Friedman calls it the “Energy-Climate Era”;15 Thomas Berry dubs it the “Great Work” of moving from the “Technozoic” to the “Ecozoic” Age.16 Every civilization and people has its historical project. In Berry’s account,

15 See Thomas Friedman, Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need A Green Revolution—And How It Can Renew America (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008). 16 See Thomas Berry, The Great Work: Our Way into the Future (New York: Bell Tower, 1999).

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the Great Work of the classical Greek world [was] its understanding of the human mind and the creation of the Western humanist tradition; the Great Work of Israel [was] articulating a new experience of the divine in human affairs; the Great Work of Rome [was] in gathering the peoples of the Mediterranean world and of Western Europe into an ordered relation with one another. . . . The Great Work [of India was] to lead human thought into spiritual experiences of time and eternity and their mutual presence to each other with a unique subtlety of expression. . . . In America the Great Work of the First Peoples was to occupy this continent and establish an intimate rapport with the powers that brought this continent into existence in all its magnificence.17

And our Great Work, the task of this and the next several generations is to effect “the transition from a period of human devastation of the Earth to a period when humans [are] present to the planet in a mutually beneficial manner.”18 For Friedman, this means moving from global flattening, global warming, and global crowding in a “bright-line” historical moment—ours—to “new tools, new infrastructure, new ways of thinking, and new ways of collaborating with others.”19 But this assumes that the next great transformation is underway. That is doubtful. What is underway, instead, is the replacement of modernity with eco-modernity. What is underway is new wine in old wineskins. To see this at work, consider the striking full-page advertisement in the June 2, 1998, New York Times—the same day the American Museum of Natural History inaugurated its Hall of Biodiversity. The ad displays an eye-catching selection of flora and fauna from around the world and across the top in large letters is the sentence: “We believe in equal opportunity regardless of race, creed, gender, kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus, or species.”20 The creatures then tumble down the page, followed by smaller-lettered text: All life is interconnected. So without a supporting cast of millions of species, human survival is far from guaranteed. This variety and interdependence of species is what’s called biodiversity. And it matters to Monsanto in particular. Our business depends on making discoveries in the world of genetic information. Information that is lost forever when a species becomes extinct. Information that offers solutions in agriculture, nutrition, and medicine never before thought possible. For a population that’s growing. On a planet that’s not.21

The logo—a growing plant—then appears next to the name and trademark: “Monsanto: Food Health Hope.” The last line is: “Monsanto is honored to be a sponsor of the Hall of Biodiversity at the American Museum of Natural History. www.monsanto.com.”22

Ibid., 1–2. Ibid., 3. 19 Friedman, Hot, Flat, and Crowded, 26–27. 20 The New York Times, June 2, 1998, A4. 21 Ibid. 22 Ibid. 17 18

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This ad is unthinkable apart from recent sciences and their impact: genetics, molecular biology, ecology, and computing sciences, especially. Its thought-world appears to be holistic thinking based in good science. The awareness of complex, living interdependence seems central. At the outset, the ad even strikes a notion of egalitarian bio-democracy worthy of Saint Francis. But as the text trails off, we are keeping company with the soft utopianism and secular promise-and-fulfillment theology of so much industrial science and technology, and not least the new biotechnologies: “Monsanto: Food Health Hope” and “solutions in agriculture, nutrition, and medicine never before thought possible.”23 We are also keeping company with human subjectivism in ethics. This moral universe not only assumes that human beings are the sole moral arbiters, it assumes that in the end the only actions that truly matter are the ones affecting human beings. No court of appeal beyond the human subject exists. And by the very bottom, right hand corner of the page, we have placed good science and a viable way of life (“Food, Health, Hope”) firmly in the hands of global ecomodern business. This sounds like new wine and new cloth, but in fact it is eco-modernity. Modernity worked with a set of famous dualisms, those long-standing boundaries of mind and matter, human culture and resistant nature, and the sharp distinctions of humans from other creatures. These have now been erased in favor of “equal opportunity regardless of race . . . phylum…class…genus, or species” in a world where “[a]ll life is interconnected.”24 Modernity also mirrored a largely mechanistic understanding of how things worked. Now ecological language has replaced the mechanistic. In short, this is new knowledge, new perception, and new vocabulary—new cloth and new wine. Yet eco-modernity’s biases and morality remain modernity’s. The day-to-day practice of science, technology, and industry features human mind and culture as the creators, controllers, and high-tech bio-cowboys who work ecosystems and genomes as they would their ranchlands. Furthermore, the creatures are generic, not particular. They are not even truly creatures, as biological individuals; they are, categorically, and simply, “information” and “resources.” Humans are thereby re-centered as masters without qualification, despite a web of interdependence; ecology, molecular biology, genetics, and evolution itself find themselves, as practiced science, in the employ of a morality that views “all things bright and beautiful,” “all creatures great and small,” even “all things wise and wonderful,”25 as information, resources, and property—in short, as pure capital. So in only one striking page, what begins as a confession of bio-democracy ends as (indispensable) user-friendly exploitation that promises, yet one more time, to do good by doing well, for profit and without

Ibid. Ibid. 25 The phrases are from the hymn “All Things Bright and Beautiful” by Cecil Alexander, 1848. 23 24

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(human) sacrifice, and all by way of processed nature, a parallel of processed food. To say it differently: genetics as a science may render us kin to roundworms, to say nothing of giraffes and bonobos. Ecology may map in gratifying detail the awesome webbing of life. And Evolution with a capital “E” may present a dynamic universe still on its pilgrim way, with us a stupendous expression of it, even if only a wink in its regime of time. Such is indeed the new cloth and new wine of recent discovery. Yet these sciences are captured by the present political economy for an ethic that retains modernity’s hubris as that is married to entrepreneurial courage and engineering confidence. (“The old is good.”) Life is chiefly a production, management, and security problem, subject to technological remedies based in rigorous science and the magic of the market. Life is not a species problem, or a problem of the human soul or spirit, or a matter of evil and injustice and things going wildly awry on a regular basis by incremental means. The eye is still the arrogant eye.26 The clincher is an irony we may miss, precisely because we live encased inside the industrial paradigm. Monsanto’s advertisement is an expensive endorsement of biodiversity, which is worthy of its own hall and the public’s education. Yet Monsanto’s very purpose is to capture as much of the market as possible for a very small number of seeds they control. The purpose is to simplify the stock, not diversify it, for the sake of market control and profit. So rather than, as the company says, proudly supporting the new hall that is making the case for preserving local biodiversity, Monsanto’s practices undercut it. The eco-modern vocabulary of the advertisement speaks ecology’s language, while the company’s practices fail to learn from and support evolution’s way of adapting to changing conditions (preserving and enhancing biodiversity). This frame of mind and industrial drive was already present in 1963 when the classic book that launched the environmental movement was published, Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring.27 Monsanto, with its confidence in human knowledge to control nature, issued a parody of Carson entitled “Desolate Spring.” It pictured America, not laid waste by pesticides, as Carson suggested, but laid waste by insects “on and under every square foot of land . . . and yes, inside man.”28 Monsanto need not be singled out. It is only one illustration and only the tip of the iceberg. Scolding this version of “Food, Health, Hope” avails little if we do go no deeper, to the underlying way-of-life assumptions. They support far more than Monsanto. If we undertake ethical analysis and ask what is the culture of modernity, eco-modernity and industry—“the power industry, the defense industry, the communications industry, the

“The arrogant eye” is a theme in Sallie MacFague, Super, Natural Christians (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1997). Rachel Carson, Silent Spring (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1962). 28 Reported in “Starting Over,” The New York Times Book Review, 2 September, 2007: 12. It was not only Monsanto, however, but also the chemical industry as a whole that berated and attacked Carson’s work. See Paul Hawken, Blessed Unrest: How the Largest Movement in the World Came Into Being and Why No One Saw It Coming (New York: Viking, 2007). 26 27

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transportation industry, the agriculture industry, the food industry, the health industry, the entertainment industry, the mining industry, the education industry, the law industry, the government industry, and the religion industry,” to use Wendell Berry’s list29—as a way of life, the answer goes something like this. It is certainly a dream and a promise—to supplant poverty, disease, and toil with an abundance that permits the good life as enriching, expanded choice. That dream, promise, and partial success has been irresistible. And while it remains the lure, it roots in assumptions that the planet’s condition forces us to scrutinize and then weed out. Here are the assumptions: Nature has a virtually limitless storehouse of resources for human use. Humanity has the commission to use and control nature. Nature is malleable and can be reconfigured for human ends. Humanity has the right, perhaps even the calling, to use nature’s resources for an improvement in the material standard of living. The most effective means to elevate material standards of living is ongoing economic growth. The quality of life itself is furthered by an economic system directed to ever-expanding material abundance. The future is open, systematic material progress for the whole human race is possible, and through the careful use of human powers humanity can make history turn out right. Human failures can be overcome through effective problem-solving. Problem-solving will be effective if reason and goodwill are present, and science and technology are developed and applied in a free environment. Science and technology are neutral means for serving chosen ends. Modern science and technology, coupled with democracy, have helped achieve a superior civilization. What can be scientifically known and technologically done should be known and done. The things we create are under our control.

29

Wendell Berry, “Does Community Have a Value?” in Home Economics (San Francisco: North Point Press, 1987), 179.

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The good life is one of productive labor and material well-being. The successful person is the one who achieves. Both social progress and individual interests are best served by achievement-oriented behavior in a competitive and entrepreneurial environment. A work ethic is essential to human satisfaction and social progress. The diligent, hardworking, risk-taking, and educated will attain their goals. There is freedom in material abundance. When people have more, their freedom of choice is expended and they can and will be more.30

In sum, the “great transformation” of the past 300 years displays the same frame of mind and same anthropocentric universe, whether in modern or eco-modern form. This fossil-fuel interlude mirrors the arrogant eye and cultural chauvinism of one-way domination ethics, human subject to useful object. It conceives all things, living things included, as capital, information, and resources. Though no modern would admit it, this is the continuation of a master/slave ethic, with nature the slave. But let us assume that the terminus of the industrial era and our way of life on its terms is in sight. What then do we face as poignant reality, and what transitions move us from “here” to “there” as the Great Work? Consider this summary. •We

do not see the world as it is; we see the world as we are. Creatures of symbolic consciousness—the kind of creature we are—have no unmediated apprehension of nature, their own nature included. Our notions of nature, not raw nature, shape our response. This holds for our apprehension of other humans as well. How do we gauge the other? Do we join, ignore, or dismiss him? Is she friend, foe, or immaterial? Is she means or end, sometimes one, sometimes the other, or both together? We do not understand the world we have and our way of life until we interrogate our perception at these deep levels—the underlying assumptions, common biases, and reigning desires about the human and the more-than-human world. Because we see the world as we are, not as it is, there is a vital link between faith and cosmology. How would an Earth-honoring faith apprehend creation and the world becomes the next question, albeit not one that can be pursued here (except for the questions at the end of this essay).

30 This is an adaptation from the list Bruce D. Birch and I used in The Predicament of the Prosperous (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1978), 44–45. I also used it in the volume with Daniel C. Maguire, Ethics for a Small Planet (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1998), 88–9.

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•The

planet is not aging gracefully. New basic works are mandatory (new wineskins). To cite Gustave Speth, “all that we have to do to destroy the planet’s climate and biota and leave a ruined world to future generations is to keep doing exactly what is being done today, with no growth in the human population or the world economy.”31 Apocalypse requires no more than leveling out the trends of 2000 C.E. and pushing on from there. But of course they are not leveling out. The curve still climbs. It took all of human history to attain the economy of $7 trillion reached in 1950. Now $7 trillion is added each decade. The logic of nature’s economy has been no match for the logic of industrial capitalism’s.

•The

planet is small and natural systems do not grow. There are not more rivers to discover and dam, more oceans to fish and drill, more land masses to settle and till, more atmospheres to breathe and pollute. Yet human impacts grow larger relative to the planet’s natural systems. We already use so much water that too little is left for the rest of life. We already capture 40% of nature’s photosynthetic output, leaving too little for other life. Deforestation and topsoil loss exceed reforestation and soil formation. Nature begs for new first works.

•The

god of the world’s secular religion since the Industrial Revolution has been material economic growth, whether sponsored by socialism or capitalism. It has been a blockbuster Broadway show with an unlimited run. Yet, unless triumphant capitalism can be wholly “ecologized,” and nature’s economy made its foundation, capitalism will destroy that upon which it depends. Unfortunately, Mother Nature does not do bailouts.

•New technologies in energy, transportation, construction, and agriculture are vital. So

is wringing large efficiencies from what we already have, together with some preemptory conservation of resources. But how far and how fast revolutionary technologies can come on line for widespread use, in the face of entrenched resistance on the part of people and companies who are threatened by competition and obsolescence, means that it is foolish to trust blindly in technology and plead in desperation (or dance) at its altar. Multiple strategies, including significant changes in human desires and habits, are required.32 How significant? Thomas Berry says the task is to reinvent the human at the species level.33 •Doing

first works over entails several long-haul transitions.

31 James Gustave Speth, “Towards a New Economy and a New Politics,” Solutions, Issue No. 5, available online at http://thesolutionsjournal.com, n.p.. Accessed 11/07/2010. 32 All these bullet points except the first combine the discussion of Speth with my own. Even when not quoted directly, they draw from Speth, “Towards a New Economy and a New Politics.” Solutions, Issue No. 5, passim. Accessed 11/07/2010. 33 See the chapter, “The Viable Human,” in Berry, The Great Work, 56ff.

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A perspectival transition in which we understand ourselves as a species among species no longer inhabiting the same planet Homo sapiens have known for a very long while. Altered perception includes a certain reenchantment that counters the “disenchantment” of the world (Max Weber) by which nature was rendered little more than a repository of resources for human use. Reenchantment restores to human consciousness, feeling, and morality nature as a community of subjects, the bearer of mystery and spirit, the ethos of the cosmos itself. An economic transition in which economics and ecology become “eco-nomics.” Economics embeds all economic activity within the ecological limits of nature’s economy and pursues the three-part agenda of production, relatively equitable distribution, and ecological regenerativity. Growth as a good is not precluded, provided it is ecologically sustainable and regenerative for the long term, reduces rather than increases wealth and income gaps, and bolsters rather than undermines the capacity of local and regional communities and cultures to nurture and draw wisely upon their cultural and biological diversity. In all events, “the first law of economics must be the preservation of the Earth economy.”34 A demographic transition in which human population levels off or slowly declines and the negative per person impact on the rest of nature gives way to mutual enhancement with other life. A polity transition in which the basic conception of democratic capitalism shifts, if indeed democratic capitalism is retained. It shifts from a) a society that fosters virtually unrestricted liberty to acquire and enjoy wealth, in which the right to property and its uses is more basic than the right to use government as an equalizing force, to b) a society that fosters the common good through the process of democratizing social, political, and economic power in such a way that the primary goods of the commons—earth, air, fire, water, and light—are cared-for requisites of the common good, a good for both present and future generations of humankind and otherkind. A policy transition in which policies are as integrated as nature itself. Climate change, poverty, energy, food, and water are all interlaced in the planetary economy. They, and the wicked problems they represent, cannot be siloed and targeted separately for either analysis or solutions. Integrated policies need to mirror the systemic char-

34

Thomas Berry, “Conditions for Entering the Ecozoic Era,” The Ecozoic Reader, Vol. 2, No. 2 (Winter, 2002): 10.

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acter of nature’s own integral functioning, just as human technologies must cohere with the technologies of the natural world.35 And a religious and moral transition in which, because planetary health is primary and human well-being derivative, the center of ethics shifts from the encapsulated human self and society to the ecosphere as the relational matrix of our lives and responsibility. Human creatures, embedded as nature in nature, are inseparable from the rest of nature from which we have evolved, upon which we depend, and whose fate we share. The center of ethics is no longer the self. Nor is it even the human cast over against nature, as though these were separate, distinct entities. Creation and Earth’s economy are the moral bottom line, with us and our welfare and power responsible to it and its God. This makes planet-keeping the common calling of all religions in the same moment that the moral framework stretches beyond a fixation on the human species so as to include responsibility for the societal, the biophysical, and the geo-planetary, together. It may seem feeble to finish this essay by posing questions. Yet these are faith questions. More precisely, they are the questions of a faith matched to our responsibilities before God at this time of hard transition on a tough, new planet. They are the questions of an Earthhonoring faith. What kind of faith is life-centered, justice-committed, and Earth-honoring, with a moral universe encompassing the whole community of life, the biosphere, and atmosphere together? What kind imports the primal elements—earth (soil), air, fire (energy), and water—into the moral universe and centers them there? What kind interrogates past traditions of spirituality to ask for their contributions to new first works, new wineskins and cloth? What kind alerts us to past pitfalls? What kind uses a single stringent criterion—contributions to an Earth ethic and robust Earth community—as the plumb-line that measures all impulses and aspirations? What kind illumines our responsibility, offers well-springs of hope, and generates renewable moral-spiritual energy for the hard season ahead? What kind is savvy about the play of power and privilege in light of the creatures we are and the world we have? What kind offers the type of security that permits risk when we are absent the firm plateau and sure confidence we had when Earth seemed endless and nature free for the taking? What kind welcomes the end of the dirty fuels interlude and despoiling consumerism? What kind honors creation as God’s?36

Thomas Friedman, “Connecting Nature’s Dots,” The New York Times Week in Review, 23 August, 2009: 8. A book-length treatment of these questions and replies to them is part of a book in preparation: Larry L. Rasmussen, Earth-Honoring Faith: Religious Ethics in a New Key (forthcoming, Oxford University Press, 2012). 35 36

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Climate Change WILLIAM H. SCHLESINGER The Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies Millbrook, New York Atmospheric physicists show us that rising concentrations of certain greenhouse gases in Earth’s atmosphere should raise the temperature of the planet at rates, times, and places that are consistent with recent observations of ongoing climate change—that is, global warming. The unfolding impacts of this climate change will affect human habitation, health, and economics, and the persistence of various species in natural ecosystems during the course of this century. Much debate stems from what to do about these impacts, focusing on the cost of changing our energy infrastructure that is now dominated by fossil fuels. Alternative futures exist, but it will take great leadership to guide us to a sustainable future before we experience huge destructive impacts on the environment of our only planetary home.

INTRODUCTION

It is early fall as I write this in Millbrook, New York, which just finished its hottest summer on record. The National Weather Service reports that such record temperatures extended across the United States during 2010. Satellite views of our planet show rising sea levels and melting polar ice at the highest rates seen during the past thirty years. And on our annual summer vacation to Maine, I heard the locals talk of the first appearance of Lyme disease, a tick-borne illness, normally found only in southern New England. Meanwhile, the leadership of the U.S. Senate scuttled a bill that might have curbed our emissions of carbon dioxide and other “greenhouse gases” to the atmosphere, reflecting the mood of the electorate across our nation. Why is there such a disconnect between our understanding of climate change, the early symptoms of a planetary fever, and the public’s willingness to believe, let alone act, as if global warming is real? THE GREENHOUSE EFFECT

The physics of the greenhouse effect have been known for more than 150 years, since John Tyndall1 put different types of gases in laboratory chambers and noted how some of them absorbed heat (infrared) radiation, while they passed visible light without

1

John Tyndall, Heat: A Mode of Motion (New York: D. Appleton and Co., 1865).

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incident. Indeed, even early naturalists were witness to Earth’s greenhouse effect when they noted that a night without clouds was likely to be much colder than a humid or cloudy night preceded by the same late afternoon temperature.2 Water vapor absorbs heat that is reradiated from the Earth’s surface, and it is easiest to sense this effect at night, when it is not overwhelmed by incoming radiation from the sun. The term, “greenhouse effect,” stems from the observation that sunlight passes through glass relatively easily, warming the inside of glass houses, whereas infrared or heat radiation is unable to pass so readily in the opposite direction. The inside of a greenhouse, an automobile, or a passive solar home gets warm on a sunny day and retains the heat for a long time after sunset. The Earth has a natural greenhouse effect that derives from water vapor, carbon dioxide (CO2), methane, and a few other “radiatively active” gases in its atmosphere.3 And we should be thankful for it! Without its natural greenhouse effect, the temperature of our planet would be 330 centigrade cooler than today, and all water on Earth’s surface would be frozen. Look at Mars—a planet with a thin atmosphere and not much CO2 —and you see a cold planet without much greenhouse effect.4 Carbon dioxide freezes on Mars’ south pole to form dry ice. In comparison, Venus, with a thick atmosphere largely composed of CO2, has a surface temperature of 4740 C, much hotter than it would be (540 C) without its huge greenhouse effect. T H E C A R B O N C YC L E

Studies of Earth’s greenhouse effect are closely tied to our understanding of the movement of carbon between the land, oceans, and atmosphere on Earth.5 Most of this carbon moves as carbon dioxide; for instance, the transport of carbon in soils eroded by rivers to the sea (500 million tons per year) is dwarfed by the release of carbon dioxide from soils to the atmosphere by the action of decomposing organisms (75,000 million metric tons per year). Atmospheric scientists focus on CO2 because it is a powerful greenhouse gas, which has shown remarkable variations in its concentration in the atmosphere through Earth’s history. Water vapor is also a greenhouse gas, but with so much liquid water exposed on Earth, the concentration of water vapor in the atmosphere varies largely as a function of Earth’s temperature, not vice-versa.6 Moreover, the average molecule of CO2 spends about five years in the atmosphere, versus about nine days for water vapor.

2 For example, reflecting on the formation of dew and mist in his journal, November 20, 1853, Henry David Thoreau notes, “there is most dew in clear nights, because clouds prevent the cooling down of the air; they radiate the heat of the Earth back to it” (ed. Bradford Torrey; The Writings of Henry David Thoreau: Journal, March 5–November 30, 1853 [Boston, Houghton Mifflin and Company, 1906], 513). The effect of a clear night is also seen in the Christmas carol, Good King Wenceslas, in the stanza, “Brightly shone the moon that night, tho’ the frost was cruel” (1853). 3 Gavin Schmidt et al., “Attribution of the Present-day Total Greenhouse Effect,” Journal of Geophysical Research 115 (2010): doi:10.1029/2010JD014287. 4 The dominant gas in the Martian atmosphere is CO2 (95%), but the atmosphere is less than 1% of that on Earth. 5 William H. Schlesinger, Biogeochemistry (San Diego: Academic Press, 1997). 6 Andrew A. Lacis et al., “Atmospheric CO2: Principal Control Knob Governing Earth’s Temperature,” Science 330 (2010): 356–59.

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The important greenhouse gases spend enough time in the atmosphere to have a significant effect. Every year, CO2 moves in and out of the oceans and in and out of land vegetation, mostly forests. In the ocean, CO2 dissolves in cold, dense waters, which tend to sink to the deep ocean near the poles of the Earth. Carbon dioxide returns to the atmosphere when the deep waters upwell to the surface at warm tropical latitudes, such as off the coast of Peru, where nutrient-rich deep waters support an important historical fishery. Carbon dioxide dissolves in seawater in proportion to its concentration in the atmosphere, so as atmospheric CO2 concentrations rise, more will enter the ocean’s waters. Carbon dioxide also enters the ocean as a result of its uptake by marine algae—phytoplankton—some of which die and sink to the deep sea. Land plants take up CO2 in photosynthesis and return CO2 to the atmosphere via their own metabolism or that of fungi and bacteria, which decompose the vast amount of vegetative material that is produced by land plants each year. Fires also return CO2 to the atmosphere. The small amount of plant production that escapes decomposition is stored in soils, peat bogs, and sediments. During periods of Earth’s history when there have been vast interior swamplands, large amounts of plant material escaped decomposition and formed coal. Similar sedimentary deposits of organic matter in the oceans formed petroleum. Today, we drill for oil in old sedimentary rocks exposed on land and buried in shallow seas. Through geologic time, there have been large variations in the concentration of CO2 in Earth’s atmosphere. Of course, no one was here to measure it or take samples for later analysis, so we study these changes in atmospheric CO2 indirectly, using proxies. A proxy is something that leaves a record of the changes in Earth’s prior condition. The relative content of boron isotopes in certain marine sediments, largely limestone, is a proxy for changes in the acidity of seawater as a result of changes in atmospheric CO2 concentrations. With such proxies, we are able to reconstruct the past variations in atmospheric CO2 and ascertain what may have caused them. Extensive volcanic activity is one such cause; CO2 rose during the Eocene and Oligocene, reaching levels >1300 parts-per-million7 (ppm) 33 million years ago, as a result of widespread volcanic emissions. Other records show that the Earth’s climate was also very warm at that time and cooled as CO2 declined.8 Using the same boron-isotope proxy, we know that the concentration of CO2 in Earth’s atmosphere has not risen above 400 ppm during the past 20 million years.9

7 Environmental scientists use the unit parts-per-million or ppm, to express the concentration of trace substances in whole numbers. For instance, today, the concentration of CO2 in Earth’s atmosphere is close to 0.0388% or 388 ppm, meaning that for every 1 million liters of gas one might collect in a tank, 388 liters will be CO2. 8 Paul N. Pearson, G. L. Foster, and B. S. Wade. “Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide through the Eocene-Oligocene Climate Transition,” Nature 461 (2009): 1110–13; R. M. Owen and D. K. Rea, “Sea-floor Hydrothermal Activity Links Climate to Tectonics: The Eocene Carbon Dioxide Greenhouse,” Science 227 (1985): 166–69. 9 Paul N. Pearson and M. R. Palmer, “Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide Concentrations over the Past 60 Million Years,” Nature 406 (2000): 695–99.

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Our understanding of fluctuations in atmospheric CO2 during the past 800,000 years is more straightforward than for earlier times, because we are able to analyze the bubbles of gas buried in layers of snow and now trapped in the Antarctic ice pack. This record shows that CO2 has varied between 170 and 290 ppm, in regular oscillations that correspond to glacial intervals of the Pleistocene.10 These oscillations in Earth’s climate are linked to variations in the Earth’s orbit around the sun and variations in its inclination on its axis. (The Earth wobbles on its axis like a spinning top.) Interestingly, at the end of each ice age, the temperature rose before the rise in CO2. Carbon dioxide may have reinforced the return to warmer temperatures, but it apparently did not initiate the change. The last ice age of the Pleistocene ended about 12,000 years ago, when we entered the relatively stable climate conditions of the modern epoch, the Holocene. This is not to say that the ice ages are over, only that with an anthropocentric view, we have given a different name to the stable conditions of Earth’s recent, recorded history, including all human civilizations beginning about 8,000 years ago. From the start of the Holocene until the Industrial Revolution, the Earth’s temperature and CO2 have been remarkably constant, with CO2 ranging only from about 260 to 285 ppm.11 The recent rise in CO2 to today’s value of 388 ppm is unprecedented, and the increase continues at a rate of about 1.9 ppm per year. The economic activity of the Industrial Revolution has been powered by fossil fuels— coal, oil, and natural gas. In a very real sense, humans are extracting the products of past plant growth on Earth, bringing fossil organic materials to the surface and burning them— releasing captured sunbeams! By one estimate, each year we are burning the organic materials that represent plant growth over 400 years of Earth’s history—perhaps deposited 300 million years ago.12 If we were burning small amounts of fossil fuels, then the Earth’s carbon cycle could compensate for the CO2 added to the atmosphere. More CO2 would dissolve in the ocean’s waters and more CO2 might be assimilated (and a little bit stored) by land plants. The current rapid rise in CO2 in Earth’s atmosphere is a rate problem. By burning fossil fuels, we are adding CO2 more rapidly than the natural cycles can accommodate it, and we have not created a counterbalancing force that takes CO2 out of the atmosphere. Indeed, another major human impact stems from tropical deforestation, which releases CO2 to the atmosphere when tropical forests are burned and their soils are cultivated. As much as 20% of the current human emissions of CO2 to the atmosphere may stem from forest destruction.

10 Dieter Luthi et al., “High-resolution Carbon Dioxide Concentration Record 650,000–800,000 Years before Present,” Nature 453 (2009): 379–82. 11 Jacqueline Fluckiger et al., “High-resolution Holocene N2O Ice Core Record and its Relationship with CH4 and CO2,” Global Biogeochemical Cycles 16 (2002): doi; 10.1029/2001GB001417; C. MacFarling Meure et al., “Law Dome CO2, CH4 and N2O Ice Core Records Extended to 2000 BY,” Geophysical Research Letters 33 (2006): doi: 10.1029/2006 GL026152. 12 Jeffrey S. Dukes, “Burning Buried Sunshine: Human Consumption of Ancient Solar Energy,” Climatic Change 61 (2003): 31–44.

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C L I M AT E C H A N G E

Physicists tell us that higher CO2 in Earth’s atmosphere should warm our planet—the fundamentals of the greenhouse effect. Records from tree rings13 and ice cores14 show a rise in temperature during the past 150 years, corresponding to the rise in CO2. Historical records of the extent of sea ice, the spring break-up of ice on rivers and lakes, the spring flowering of plants and bird migrations, all indicate unprecedented warm temperature during the past few decades. Satellite measurements show an increase in Earth’s surface temperature, particularly in northern latitudes, over the past 30 years.15 Even the oceans’ temperature has warmed over the past 40 years.16 But, beyond human activities, how do we know that there are not other factors that might be responsible for the current warming or that might reverse it sometime in the near future? How can we separate the human effects on Earth’s greenhouse effect from natural variations? For this, we need to consider the Earth’s radiation budget in slightly more detail. Incoming solar radiation delivers about 340 W/m2 (watts per square meter) to the Earth. The natural greenhouse effect warms the planet about 330 C by trapping 153 W/m2 of outgoing radiation.17 For the past 30 years or so, there has been a small increase in the sun’s luminosity (+0.12 to 0.16 W/m2).18 By comparison, the human impact to radiative forcing due to increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases currently adds about 2.3 W/m2 to the natural greenhouse effect—about 20 times the change in solar forcing. A substantial component of that warming derives from higher concentrations of water vapor in Earth’s atmosphere, as a result of warmer temperatures. Aerosols and some clouds tend to cool the atmosphere by increasing the reflectivity of the Earth to incoming radiation. We see the effect of aerosols in the first few years after major volcanic eruptions, such as Mount Pinatubo, which add sulfate aerosols to the stratosphere. This cooling effect disappears within a few years, because aerosols drop out of the atmosphere fairly quickly. The overall reflectivity or albedo of the Earth, as measured by changes in “earthshine” seen on a New Moon, is about 30%.19 Earth’s albedo has apparently increased slightly in recent years (i.e., global dimming), presumably due to particulate air pollutants.20 Increases in aerosols due to human activities are thought to reduce the current

13 Michael E. Mann, R. S. Bradley, and M. K. Hughes, “Global-scale Temperature Patterns and Climate Forcing over the Past Six Centuries,” Nature 392 (1998): 779–87. 14 Lonnie G. Thompson et al., “A High-resolution Millennial Record of the South Asian Monsoon from Himalayan Ice Cores,” Science 289 (2000): 1916–19. 15 National Research Council, Reconciling Observations of Global Temperature Change (Washington: National Academy Press, 2000) 16 Tim P. Barnett et al., “Penetration of Human-induced Warming into the World’s Oceans,” Science 309 (2005): 284–87. 17 IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007). W/m2 is a timeless expression of the receipt of energy. If you place a 100-Watt bulb on a square meter of land, it adds 100 W/m2 to that unit of the Earth’s surface. The total energy received in a day would be 2400 W or 2.4 kW/hr. 18 P. Foukal et al., “Variations in Solar Luminosity and their Effects on Earth’s Climate,” Nature 443 (2006): 161–66; R. T. Pinker, B. Zhang, and E. G. Dutton, “Do Satellites Detect Trends in Surface Solar Radiation?” Science 308 (2005): 850–54. 19 P. R. Goode et al., “Earthshine Observations of Earth’s Reflectance,” Geophysical Research Letters 28 (2001): 1671–74. 20 Kaicun Wang, R. E. Dickinson, and S. Liang, “Clear Sky Visibility Has Decreased over Land Globally from 1973 to 2007,” Science 323 (2009): 1468–70.

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global radiative forcing by about 1.2 W/m2. It is interesting to note that aerosol concentrations were higher and temperatures were lower during the last glacial period, but the cause and effect relation of these observations is unknown. Besides CO2 and water vapor, a variety of other gases contribute to Earth’s greenhouse effect, including methane (CH4, natural gas) and nitrous oxide (N2O), which is best known from the dentist’s office. The majority of the annual emission of these gases is natural, although both have human sources as well. Methane is released from the leakage of natural gas from wells and pipelines, and from an expanding cultivation of rice and cattle. Nitrous oxide is released from fertilized soils. The atmospheric lifetimes of methane (12 years) and nitrous oxide (>100 years) are such that they contribute substantially to Earth’s greenhouse effect, versus other potential greenhouse gases, such as ammonia (NH3) and ozone (O3), which would also be important if it were not for their short persistence in the atmosphere. Various industrial gases, such as chloroflurocarbons (CFCs) and nitrogen trifluoride (NF3, a solvent in the computer industry), are also potent greenhouse gases, with long atmospheric lifetimes. Methane, nitrous oxide, and these industrial gases have all increased in concentration in Earth’s atmosphere since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. Nitrous oxide is particularly worrisome, since it is rising at a rate of 0.3%/year, and destined to rise even faster as fertilized agriculture expands globally. C L I M AT E C H A N G E I M PAC T S

All evidence suggests that humans are having an impact on the radiation budget of the Earth, and that human-induced global warming exceeds our effects on processes that might cool the planet. The human impacts on the Earth’s radiation budget are also well in excess of all known natural variations, such as in the sun’s luminosity, although it is possible that a future gigantic volcanic eruption might drastically cool the planet for a few years. How are the human effects on climate predicted? In the same way that atmospheric scientists have built models to predict our daily weather—with much success relative to a few decades ago—they can build models that predict the behavior of the Earth’s atmosphere over longer periods. General circulation models for the atmosphere consider parcels of air in vertical stacks to the top of the atmosphere and in horizontal divisions extending from pole to pole. Each of these cubes contains a parcel of the atmosphere that reflects, passes, or absorbs radiation entering from outside the Earth or re-radiated from its surface.

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The parcel is heated and circulates, potentially exchanging gas and heat with adjacent parcels, as the Earth undergoes its seasons. If clouds form and become supersaturated at the predicted temperature, rain or snow falls from that parcel to the Earth’s surface. These models are immensely complicated, often requiring supercomputers to operate. Their performance is best validated by comparing their predictions for past climate, for periods when we have historical records or proxies to check the results. A large number of these models have been built, which allow different teams of atmospheric scientists working independently to derive and check predictions. Disagreements typically produce heated discussion, but they have helped to refine the current generation of general circulation models and achieve some consensus about future climate trends. Nearly all climate models predict that a substantial warming of the atmosphere (20 to 4.50 C during this century) will accompany increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. The predicted warming of future climate is greatest near the poles, where there is normally the greatest net loss of infrared radiation. For the same reason, the models predict that future nighttime and wintertime temperatures will be most likely to show the greatest changes relative to today’s conditions. Presumably, the oceans will warm more slowly than the atmosphere, but eventually, warmer ocean waters will allow greater rates of evaporation, increasing the circulation of water through the atmosphere. Water vapor also absorbs infrared radiation, so it is likely to accelerate further the potential greenhouse effect. Thus, most models predict that higher concentrations of CO2 and other trace gases in the atmosphere will make the Earth a warmer and more humid planet. The effects of rising CO2 include a fertilizing of plant growth and increasing acidity of seawater. As a reactant for photosynthesis, CO2 stimulates plant growth by 15–18% when the concentration rises from 350 to 550 ppm, as seen in long-term field experiments with forests and agricultural crops.21 Unfortunately, high CO2 also stimulates the growth of weeds, poison ivy, and other plant allergens.22 Higher levels of CO2 also cause additional CO2 to dissolve in seawater, where it forms carbonic acid. Recent measures indicate a greater level of acidity in seawaters, as indicated by a drop of 0.06 unit in the pH of seawater in the North Pacific since 1991.23 In the face of higher acidity, which dissolves their carbonate skeletons, many coral reef ecosystems are threatened by rising CO2. The greatest concerns from rising CO2 stem from its effects on climate. Mean global temperatures are anticipated to rise 20 to 4.50 centigrade by the end of the twenty-first cen-

21 Stephen P. Long et al., “Food for Thought: Lower-than-expected Crop Yield Stimulation with Rising CO2 Concentrations,” Science 312 (2006): 1918–21; Richard Norby et al., “Forest Response to Elevated CO2 is Conserved Across a Broad Range of Productivity”" Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, U.S. 102 (2005): 18052–56. 22 Lewis H. Ziska, P. R. Epstein, and W. H. Schlesinger, “Rising CO2, Climate Change, and Public Health: Exploring the Links to Plant Biology,” Environmental Health Perspectives 117 (2009): 155–58; Jacqueline E. Mohan et al., “Biomass and Toxicity Responses of Poison Ivy (Toxicodendron Radicans) to Elevated Atmospheric CO2,” Proceedings of the National Acadmey of Sciences, U.S. 103 (2006): 9086–89; Shannon L. LaDeau and J. S. Clark, “Pollen Production by Pinus Taeda Growing in Elevated Atmospheric CO2,” Functional Ecology 20 (2006): 541–47. 23 Robert H. Byrne et al., “Direct Observations of Basin-wide Acidification of the North Pacific Ocean,” Geophysical Research Letters 37 (2010):doi: 10.1029/2009GL040999; Scott C. Doney, “The Growing Human Footprint on Coastal and Open-ocean Biogeochemistry,” Science 328 (2010): 1512–16.

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tury. Already, dramatic losses of sea ice are recorded in the Arctic24 as well as a net loss of ice from the Antarctic ice pack.25 While melting sea ice, which is floating on the ocean surface, does not affect sea level, melting continental glaciers contribute to the current 3.5 millimeters per year (mm/yr) global rise in sea level—up from 0.8 mm/yr 100 years ago.26 Warmer arctic conditions also lead to the loss of permafrost, which has retained huge stores of dead organic matter and peat during the Holocene. As these soils thaw, the organic matter decomposes, releasing more CO2 to the atmosphere, exacerbating global warming.27 Another positive feedback to global warming will follow the loss of polar ice itself. Normally, this ice contributes significantly to Earth’s albedo, but when it melts, it exposes the ocean surface or land, which is normally less reflective than ice to incoming solar radiation. Rapid changes in climate associated with global warming have several indirect effects on human health and well being. Many diseases that are transmitted by insects, especially mosquitoes, occur in climatic regions that are defined by conditions of temperature and moisture. A warmer, wetter world in the future is likely to allow an expansion of the occurrence of malaria, dengue fever, and other insect-borne diseases, or require a substantial human investment to prevent it.28 Anticipated effects on plant diseases are similar. Already, a northward expansion of the hemlock woolly adelgid, due to warmer winters, is thought to be responsible for the loss of hemlock from northeastern forests.29 Noah Diffenbaugh and his colleagues show potential expansions in the range of the corn-borer and other insect pests of major crops, which could threaten the breadbasket of major foods in the Great Plains.30 While some crops may grow better in warmer conditions, many of the world’s major crops show lower yields.31 Even wine growers should expect a shift in the

24 Mark C. Serreze et al., “Perspectives on the Arctic’s Shrinking Sea-ice Cover,” Science 315 (2007): 1533–36; R. Kwok and D.A. Rothrock, “Decline in Arctic Sea Ice Thickness from Submarine and ICESat Records: 1958–2008," Geophysical Research Letters 36 (2009): doi: 10.1029/2009GL039035. 25 J. L.Chen et al., “Accelerated Antarctic Ice Loss from Satellite Gravity Measurements,” Nature Geoscience 2 (2009): 859–62. 26 J. A. Church and N. J. White, “A 20th-century Acceleration in Global Sea-level Rise,” Geophysical Research Letters 33 (2005): doi.10.1029/2005GL024826; M. A. Merrifield et al., “An Anomalous Recent Acceleration of Global Sea Level Rise,” Journal of Climate 22 (2009): 5772–81. 27 Ellen Dorrepaal et al., “Carbon Respiration from Subsurface Peat Accelerated by Climate Warming in the Subarctic,” Nature 460 (2009): 616–19; Edward A. G. Schuur et al., “The Effect of Permafrost Thaw on Old Carbon Release and Net Carbon Exchange from Tundra,” Nature 459 (2009): 556–59; Walter G. Oechel et al., “Acclimation of Ecosystem CO2 Exchange in the Alaskan Arctic in Response to Decadal Climate Warming,” Nature 406 (2000): 978–81. 28 Mercedes Pascual et al., “Malaria Resurgence in the East African Highlands: Temperature Trends Revisited, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, U.S. 103 (2006): 5829–34; Simon Hales et al., “Potential Effect of Population and Climate Change on Global Distribution of Dengue Fever: An Empirical Model,” Lancet 360 ( 2002): 830–34. For alternative views, see David J. Rogers and S. E. Randolph, “The Global Spread of Malaria in a Future, Warmer World,” Science 289 (2000): 1763–66, who suggest that the spread of malaria with global warming will be rather modest, and Peter W. Gething et al., “Climate Change and the Global Malaria Recession,” Nature 465 (2010): 342–45, who argue that in the past increased economic development has reduced the incidence of malaria and will do so in the future. Neither of the latter papers offers an indication of the costs involved and the ability of the developing world to pay the cost to prevent a greater global incident of malaria for humans. 29 Margaret Skinner et al., “Regional Responses of Hemlock Woolly Adelgid (Homoptera: Adelgidae) to Low Temperatures,” Environmental Entomology 32 (2003): 523–28; Jeffrey S. Dukes et al., “Responses of Insect Pests, Pathogens, and Invasive Plant Species to Climate Change in the Forests of Northeastern North America: What Can We Predict?” Canadian Journal of Forest Research 39 (2009): 231–48. 30 Noah S. Diffenbaugh et al., “Global Warming Presents New Challenges for Maize Pest Management,” Environmental Research Letters 3 (2008): doi: 10.1088/1748-9326/3/4/044007. 31 David B. Lobell and C. B. Field, “Global Scale Climate-crop Yield Relationships and the Impacts of Recent Warming,” Environmental Research Letters 2 (2007): doi: 10.1088/1748-9326/2/1/014002; David B. Lobell et al., “Prioritizing Climate Change Adaptation Needs for Food Security in 2030,” Science 319 (2008): 607–10.

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optimal range for wine production from California to points northward.32 Many models for future climate indicate a substantial drying in the southwestern United States, an area of rapid current population growth and limited water supply.33 In the eastern United States, predictions of the effects of climate change on the distribution of forest species show sugar maple being eliminated from most of its present range, persisting only in Canada.34 There are substantial changes in the predicted range of southern pine species, which should be of major concern to all those who depend on the current forest products industry of that region. The range of many bird species in New York State has already shifted northward during the past several decades,35 and in many areas of the eastern United States, springtime migrating birds are arriving earlier from the South.36 Simultaneous, but disconnected, shifts in insects, birds, and plant species threaten a reconfiguration of the major components of nature in many areas. It is likely that some species will lose the entire envelope of climate that now supports their existence.37 Chris Thomas and colleagues predict a loss of 18 to 35% of species with the global warming expected in this century.38 TIPPING POINTS

Some global change scientists speculate that the human impacts on climate may carry us to a planetary threshold or tipping point, beyond which our impacts on the Earth will have been so large that a return to prior conditions will be impossible, even if we were to cease our actions.39 For instance, a complete loss of Arctic ice may so increase the absorption of solar radiation and warming in the northern latitudes that the frozen conditions would not return, even if emissions of CO2 and the amount accumulated in the atmosphere were to decline substantially. A warming of the Arctic ocean may lead to the degassing of methane from the ocean sediments, where it is now held frozen in sediments known as methane hydrates. This release of methane would dramatically increase the concentration of this greenhouse gas in the atmosphere, exacerbating global warming, and minimizing that chance that the planet could ever return to something resembling the conditions of the Holocene. The geologic record shows evidence of past, catastrophic degas-

32 M. A. White et al., “Extreme Heat Reduces and Shifts United States Premium Wine Production in the 21st Century,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, U.S. 103 (2006): 11217–22. 33 P. C. D. Milly, K. A. Dunne, and A. V. Vecchia, “Global Pattern of Trends in Streamflow and Water Availability in a Changing Climate,” Nature 438 (2005): 347–50; Richard Seager et al., “Model Projections of an Imminent Transition to a More Arid Climate in Southwestern North America,” Science 316 (2007): 1181–84. 34 Louis R. Iverson and A. M. Prasad, “Predicting Abundance of 80 Tree Species Following Climate Change in the Eastern United States,” Ecological Monographs 68 (1998): 465–85. 35 Benjamin Zuckerberg, A. M. Woods, and W. F. Porter, “Poleward Shifts in Breeding Bird Distribution in New York State,” Global Change Biology 15 (2009): 1866–83. 36 Jessica Vitale and W. H. Schlesinger, “Historical Analysis of the Spring Arrival of Migratory Birds to Dutchess County, New York—A 123-Year Record,” Northeastern Naturalist 18 (2011), in press. 37 John W. Williams, S. T. Jackson, and J. E. Kutzbach, “Projected Distributions of Novel and Disappearing Climates by 2100 A.D.,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, U.S. 104 (2007): 5738–42; Terry L. Root et al., “Fingerprints of Global Warming on Wild Animals and Plants,” Nature 421 (2003): 57–60. 38 Chris D. Thomas et al., “Extinction Risk from Climate Change,” Nature 427 (2004): 145–48. 39 Timothy M. Lenton et al., “Tipping Elements in the Earth’s Climate System,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, U.S. 105 (2008): 1786–93.

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Interpretation 387

sing of methane from ocean sediments, with large effects on Earth’s climate and its biota.40 Of course, tipping points are speculative, but even remote probabilities of their occurrence have garnered the attention of security and defense communities in our government. More than one past civilization is thought to have perished as a result of past climate change and drought.41 DENIAL

In the face of so much evidence that humans are changing the composition of the atmosphere, that the changes will warm the planet, and that the warming could be costly to human health, economics, and welfare, why do we see so much denial? I believe the reasons are many. First, it is difficult for people to grasp that an odorless, colorless, unreactive gas like CO2 could be this harmful, especially when it is measured in parts-per-million. No one wakes up feeling like the CO2 levels are awfully high this morning. Except at exceptional levels, CO2 does not produce direct impacts on human health, like mercury, ozone, or urban aerosols. Second, people have difficulty separating the concepts of weather and climate. As Mark Twain put it: “Climate is what you expect, weather is what you get.”42 For instance, even though I know that the average temperature will be warmer in July than in January, the path from January to July will not be a uniform, gradual rise, especially in Millbrook, New York. I could easily imagine a warm spell in February, and at least a few days when it seems like winter has returned in April. When I dress for work each morning, I focus on the weather. It is difficult to perceive a change of a few degrees in mean annual temperature per decade, when the fluctuations in daily values are often much larger than the expected change in climate. Those who deny climate change like to point out that there has been little change in the global temperature since 1998, even though the first decade of this century (2001–2010) is the warmest on record. In fact, the mean decadal temperature has increased every decade since 1960.43 Third, even while they accept that the climate has warmed about 10 centigrade during the past century and may warm further in the coming years, many believe that these changes are part of the natural cycle of things over which we have little control. This belief persists in the face of unquestionable evidence that variations in the sun’s luminosity have been minor over this same interval and that the human impact on atmospheric aerosols is

40 Miriam E. Katz et al., “The Source and Fate of Massive Carbon Input During the Latest Paleocene Thermal Maximum,” Science 286 (1999): 1531–33. 41 Peter B. deMenocal, “Cultural Response to Climate Change During the Late Holocene," Science 292 (2001): 667–73. 42 Katharine Hayhoe and Andrew Farley, A Climate for Change (New York: Faith Words, 2009). 43 James Hansen, The Storms of My Grandchildren (New York: Bloomsbury, 2009).

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adequately included in current global climate models and likely to decline in the future as we reduce air pollution emissions.44 Waiting for the next glacial epoch is no way to respond to rapid climate change induced by human activities. Fourth, the impacts of global warming are often seen as a future problem—something that will appear slowly—so we can deal with it later. I hope that is the case, but the evidence for past rapid climate change and future tipping points does not give much consolation that this belief is right. Careful studies of the climate change at the end of the last glacial age show short intervals (decades) in which the mean annual temperature in Greenland rose as much as 90 centigrade over a couple of decades—a greater rate of change than we predict for the ongoing global warming.45 Growing up in the stable conditions of the Holocene, we forget that the Earth’s climate can change dramatically in short periods.46 Finally, the human impacts on the climate are a classic case of the tragedy of the commons.47 Using fossil fuels, like gasoline, is convenient. We each feel that our small daily contribution to the rise of CO2 in Earth’s atmosphere cannot possibly have much effect. If your neighbor is concerned about climate change, then let him cut back. But, the collective inputs from nearly seven billion of us, over 365 days a year, over decades is likely to result in a doubling of CO2 in the atmosphere in less than 200 years. Fossil fuels have simultaneously allowed more people than ever before to live at higher levels of nutrition, health, and mobility and with the amenities of light, heat, and clean water, but also allowed the human population to grow beyond the carrying capacity of the planet.48 How and when we adjust to reality will be an interesting time in history to be alive. In sum, we know that rising concentrations of CO2 will raise the temperature of Earth, and we are fairly certain that this will have effects on our food supply, our health, the flooding of major cities, and the persistence of species of plants and animals that share the planet with us. Why are we reluctant to provide planetary stewardship? W H AT T O D O ?

The most direct way for us to avoid the consequences of global warming is to reduce dramatically our use of fossil fuels. When we mine coal and extract oil and gas, we bring carbon from the crust to the surface of the Earth, where it is burned, returning ancient CO2 to the modern global carbon cycle. Several recent accounts suggest that we must limit the total emissions of carbon dioxide (and other greenhouse gases), not to exceed 1 trillion

44 Peter A. Stott et al., “External Control of 20th-Century Temperature by Natural and Anthropogenic Forcings,” Science 290 (2000): 2133–37. 45 Kendrick Taylor, “Rapid Climate Change,” American Scientist 87 (1999): 320–27; Jeffrey P Sveringhaus and E. J. Brook, “Abrupt Climate Change at the End of the Last Glacial Period Inferred from Trapped Air in Polar Ice,” Science 286 (1999): 930–34. 46 Richard B. Alley et al., “Abrupt Climate Change,” Science 299 (2003): 2005–10. 47 Garrett Hardin, “Tragedy of the Commons,” Science 162 (1968): 1243–48. 48 Marcus M. Wagernackel et al., “Tracking the Ecological Overshoot of the Human Economy,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, U.S. 99 (2002): 9266–71. Humans exceed the carrying capacity of the planet when their emissions of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere exceed the capacity of nature to absorb that CO2 and store it in wood, soil, or ocean sediments.

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tons, if we are to limit global warming to less than 20 C, which many believe is the maximum temperature change that will not produce huge impacts to life on Earth.49 To date, we have emitted about 45% of that target, and we are poised to emit the remainder by 2050 or sooner.50 Alternatively, if we were to change our current trajectory and replace the existing fossil fuel facilities, at the end of their useful lifetimes, with alternative energy technologies, we could potentially limit atmospheric CO2 concentrations to 430 ppm and avoid the most costly of the global warming effects.51 It may not be easy, but the choice is clearly defined. Fossil fuels are so integral to our current social and economic systems that it is difficult to envision how we will implement the necessary reductions without major societal disruption and increases in the cost of energy. It is tempting to place today’s economy over tomorrow’s uncertainties. Nevertheless, the costs of inaction and the burden left for future generations are too large to ignore. Those who are impoverished today are likely to suffer the most from changes in climate in the near future.52 Through no fault of their own, 17 million citizens of Bangladesh may lose their homeland as a result of rising sea level. Reductions in the use of fossil fuels are best achieved by a combination of increased efficiency and transitions to alternative energy sources (wind, solar, geothermal) that are not based on fossil carbon. For the latter, time is short. Until recently, the availability of cheap sources of fossil fuels has inhibited incentives to look for alternatives and motivated the existing energy supply chain to work hard to codify its continued dominance of our economy. While elaborate schemes have been proposed to limit the emissions of CO2, I believe that a tax on emissions of fossil carbon will be the simplest, fairest, and most effective way for us to reduce our impacts on climate. The revenue from a tax on carbon could be used to reduce personal income taxes, so that we shift from taxing productivity to taxing resource use. The point is to motivate a lower use of fossil fuels in favor of alternative, carbon-free energy sources. Various schemes have been proposed to use geoengineering to solve the global warming problem. Many geoengineering schemes, such as the capture of CO2 from power plants and its deep injection into the ground, are fairly expensive, but straightforward and potentially without many negative impacts. Others, such as seeding the oceans with iron to stimulate the growth and carbon uptake by phytoplankton or adding sulfate aerosols to the stratosphere, where they might reflect incoming solar radiation, are potentially more problematic. In both cases, we know very little about the ancillary impacts of these actions on

49 Myles R. Allen et al., “Warming Caused by Cumulative Carbón Emissions Towards the Trillionth Ton,” Nature 458 (2009): 1163–66. 50 Scitor Corporation, Progress Towards the Two-degree Cap. Science and Impacts of Climate Change Technical Note (McLean, Va: Scitor Corporation, 2010). 51 Steven J. Davis, K. Caldeira, and H. D. Matthews, “Future CO2 Emissions and Climate Change from Existing Energy Infrastructure,” Science 329 (2010): 1330–35. 52 Marie Lynn Miranda et al., “The Environmental Justice Dimensions of Climate Change,” Environmental Justice 4 (2011): 17–25.

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the biosphere. I believe that it will be much less risky to curb CO2 emissions at the source than to try to gather up the CO2 or mitigate its impacts at a later time. The point is this: time is short, and we must get on with a program of action. We are failing in the planetary stewardship expected of us.

*With thanks for helpful comments from Gerald North, Douglas Fisher, and Lisa Dellwo Schlesinger

Interpretation 391

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Between Text & Sermon Genesis 1:1–2:3

PETE PEERY Montreat Conference Center Montreat, North Carolina

IN A CONGREGATION I ONCE SERVED, we engaged in a major renovation of the church building. It was a structure that had been built and rebuilt over a period of about a hundred and thirty years. As we got into the project, the cost estimates were blown out of the water. Asbestos was found. Broken roof trusses were discovered. Frayed electrical wiring was revealed. Sewer lines were uncovered that had been emptying into the soil under the building rather than into the city sewer. A member of the building committee who was a building contractor himself, in reflecting on the mess before us, commented, “Give me an open lot with nothing on it. It’s a lot easier to build something there than to build something out of the stuff of an existing structure.” “In the beginning when God began to create . . .” (an alternative reading of Gen 1:1 in the NRSV), “stuff ” was there. The Earth was a “formless void”—to4hu= wa4bo4hu= in the Hebrew. That formless void included earth, darkness, a watery deep. It was something desolate and unproductive (Terence E. Fretheim, “Genesis,” The New Interpreter’s Bible, vol. 1, Abingdon, 1994, 342). But it was something. It was not nothing. It was “stuff.” There is biblical witness to God creating ex nihilo (Isa 45:18; Rom 4:17; John 1:3). This text does not deny that prerogative of God. But in this narrative of creation, God begins with “stuff.” The God portrayed here is a God who “prefers to rework tangible chaos into something ‘good’” (Richard Boyce, Feasting on the Word, Year B, vol. 4, Westminster John Knox, 2008, 221). Perhaps that is the core of the gospel proclaimed in this text. The consensus of scholars is that this narrative is the work of the Priestly writer. That writer addressed this text to exiles in Babylon. And those exiles were confronted with all kinds of “stuff.” Their lives were immersed in to4hu= wa4bo4hu=. There was the “stuff ” of dislocation; the “stuff ” of beloved Jerusalem lying in ruins; the “stuff ” of having their identity as the people of Judah crushed; the “stuff ” of their nation itself being utterly demolished; the “stuff ” of Yahwistic faith, centered on worship at the Jerusalem temple, being brought to nought; the “stuff ” of seeing every day the gods of their captors in charge; and the “stuff ” of being rendered powerless nobodies with no good future imaginable. The sixth century B.C.E. for Israel in Babylon is a long way from the twenty-first century C.E. for Christians in the post-Christendom culture of the western world. But the historical context of this text that is situated in the chaos of exile is the hermeneutical bridge provided for today’s preacher to walk across. Most practicing pastors/preachers know that their congregations are mired in an inordinate amount of “stuff.”

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As I write this article, our nation is involved in three wars; unemployment hovers above 9 % with thousands of “discouraged workers” not even noted in the statistics; public schools are being “de-funded”; radiation is leaking into the ocean and air in Japan; turmoil is breaking out across North Africa and the Middle East; fuel prices are skyrocketing; congregations that once thrived struggle to keep their median age below sixty and then are hammered by judgments that the church is “deathly ill.” Topping off all of this “stuff ” is the personal turmoil and relationship-fraying lifestyles of being “on” all the time through texting, voicemail, email, and social media. This is mixed into diminished real incomes and shaken financial security for a good majority of persons. Disconcerting, chaotic “stuff ” is engulfing people in this culture. Into this context, this narrative speaks. It speaks of the God who wills to utter a word not into nothingness, but into the “stuff.” It speaks of the God whose creative intention is to bring “fundamental newness and uniqueness” (Fretheim, “Genesis,” 342) out of the existing “stuff ” God encounters. The narrative speaks of wholeness, dependable order, fruitfulness, and liveliness as aspects of the newness God brings out of the mess of existing “stuff.” Note the sevenday structure of the text, based on the Hebrew notion of the perfect number that represents wholeness. Sense as well the faithful rhythm proclaimed in the cadence of “God said . . . . God saw that it was good. . . . there was evening and there was morning. . . .” Add to this the dependable patterns sorted out of the pre-existing chaos: light and darkness; waters and dry land. Then notice the calling forth of the earth’s fruitfulness and of living creatures, including humankind, out of what had been a mess of unproductive desolation. The narrative also speaks of God’s amazing yearning not to remain alone in the shaping of the “stuff.” Note the summons, “Let the waters bring forth . . .” (Gen 1:20), and “Let the earth bring forth . . .” (Gen 1:24). The created order itself is invited to join in the divine act of enlivening what had been chaos. The formation of humankind in the divine image is a major part of God’s desire not to be alone in God’s creative work. Human beings, bearing the divine image, are summoned to be fruitful, to fill and subdue the earth (best understood perhaps as cultivating it; see Fretheim, “Genesis,” 346), and to have dominion over (again perhaps best understood as nurturing and tending, giving care to; Ezek 34:1–4; Ps 72:12–14) the living creatures—whether those creatures swim, fly, crawl, or walk. Entrusting the care of these creatures to humankind is an amazing affirmation of God’s summons to human beings to join in as participants in God’s calling forth of life out of the abyss of the black hole of chaotic “stuff.” One of the lectionary settings suggested for this text is that of the Easter Vigil, the First Service of Easter. It appropriately appears in that setting every year. In the midst of the darkness, in the face of utter desolation and dislocation, this text speaks of a God who is not overwhelmed by the deep, the darkness, the lifeless void, the utter mess of

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to4hu= wa4bo4hu= that is beyond all imagining. The God who “began to create” (in my opinion the better reading of Gen 1:1), is still creating order out of chaos. Read on through the biblical story and what do we find? At the exodus: “I will sing to the LORD, for he has triumphed gloriously; horse and rider he has thrown into the sea.” (Exod 15:1) In the midst of exile: “Do not remember the former things, or consider the things of old. I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?” (Isa 43:18–19) At the tomb: “Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here. Look, there is the place they laid him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him. . . .” (Mark 16:6–7) When the dominance of empire seems to have crushed the way of life once beloved: “I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God . . . And the one who was seated on the throne said, ‘See, I am making all things new.’” (Rev 21: 1–2, 5a) And everyday in face of the “stuff ” of overwhelming anxiety: “Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.” (Luke 12:32)

Richard Boyce is perceptive in declaring that this narrative serves as a way of holding onto hope when all signs of order in our lives have been destroyed and we must look out for signs of the creative work of God beyond our control. If God is still creating order out of chaos in the succession of day and night, maybe God will one day create order once more out of chaos in the lives of God’s people. Hold on, and do not lose hope. (Boyce, Feasting on the Word, 222–3)

Boyce has it right. God still begins with a bunch of “stuff ” and makes it all new.

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396 Interpretation

Leviticus 25:1–24

OCTOBER 2011

URIAH Y. KIM Hartford Seminary Hartford, Connecticut

IN 2008, TWO FORMER SPEAKERS OF THE HOUSE, Nancy Pelosi and Newt Gingrich, made a commercial together, sponsored by former Vice President Al Gore’s organization that is dedicated to solving the crisis of global warming by promoting a cleaner energy future. In so doing, they set aside other political disagreements and came together to advocate an agenda that goes beyond party politics and is much bigger than the interests of the United States. Indeed, it involves all creatures on Earth, not only humans or Americans. One can even say that it is a matter of salvation for all of God’s creation. It is surely helpful and informative to hear the overwhelming majority of scientists and politicians agree on the need for humans to do something about global warming, but we also need to ask what the Bible and the Christian tradition say about this issue. Since Lynn White Jr.’s provocative article in 1967 (“The Historical Roots of Our Ecologic Crisis,” Science 155 [10 March 1967]: 1203–7), which blamed the worldview of many western Christians for contributing to environmental crises, there have been both critics and defenders of the Bible in its relation to the problem. Environmental advocates have argued that the Bible supports the kind of anthropocentrism that puts human interests above all others, resulting in exploitation and degradation of the environment for human benefits, and that its eschatological visions discourage the need to care for the present Earth. These are serious accusations that need careful considerations from all Christians. David G. Horrell (The Bible and the Environment: Towards a Critical Ecological Biblical Theology, Equinox, 2010), summarizes three responses to such criticisms and to the current environmental issues. One group of interpreters is not bothered by environmental critics of the Bible at all; in fact, they agree that the Bible fully supports the view that humans have the right and duty to use the Earth for all its worth for the sole benefit of mankind. This group, therefore, rejects the environmental agenda but upholds the authority of the Bible. Another group also agrees with some criticisms laid on the Bible but fully advocates the environmental agenda. This group acknowledges that the Bible can be read as being environment-friendly; however, this group also notes that there are some parts of the Bible that support a stance against the environment. This group therefore reads certain parts of the Bible with suspicion and resistance and derives its pro-environment agenda more from authorities outside the Bible. A third group defends the authority of the Bible, but, unlike the first group, it supports the idea of taking care of the Earth. This group tries to retrieve the Bible’s ecological wisdom by either appropriating neglected texts or reinterpreting familiar texts in order to show that the Bible “offers positive and valuable resources for a stance of environmental action and concern” (The Bible and the Environment, p. 11). In the end, Horrell proposes that what is required is not only a careful reading of biblical texts but also a reorientation of the way we read the Bible in relation

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to the environment. That is, we obviously need to understand biblical texts in their historical, traditional, and contemporary contexts, but what the Bible says about the environment must be of first importance in our theological reflection, so that Christians can develop a more environment-friendly consciousness. A S A B B AT H O F C O M P L E T E R E S T F O R T H E )E R E S 9 ( L E V 2 5 : 1 - 7 )

Walter Brueggemann notes that the Hebrew word )eres@ can be translated as either “earth” or “land” and implies two different theological views on the environment (“The Earth: A Theology of Earth and Land,” Sojourner 28 [October 1986]: 28–32). As “land,” )eres@ belongs to humans and is “always assigned, owned, and occupied” through historical and political process. As “earth,” )eres@ belongs only to God and can be imagined to be something other than human property. I agree with Brueggemann’s suggestion that we need to hold on to both views, but perhaps we are living in such a time when we need to prioritize a theology of earth before a theology of land. We are very familiar with God’s command to the Israelites to observe the Sabbath, with the Priestly writer’s grounding the practice in God’s creation (Gen 2:2–3 and Exod 20:8–11). But we seldom remember that God also commanded the )eres@ to observe the Sabbath. Leviticus 25:1–7 mentions this idea three times: “. . . the land shall observe a Sabbath for the Lord” (v. 2); “. . . there shall be a Sabbath of complete rest for the land, a Sabbath for the Lord” (v. 4); and “. . . it shall be a year of complete rest for the land” (v. 5). This Sabbath is grounded in human cooperation rather than on creation. Without human collaboration, )eres@ cannot observe its rest. One practical ramification of this Sabbath is that it limits the use and often excessive exploitation of )eres@ by humans. Or one can interpret this passage to mean that humans have responsibility to take care of the Earth. As responsible and even generous toward )eres@ as these admonitions may sound, such statements focus once again on humans. They view )eres@ from our perspective, as our property. This passage, however, also invites us to shift our attention to )eres@ and to see it as something much more than merely or even primarily our possession. Does )eres@ have rights of its own, independent from human interests? Does it have a responsibility to observe the Sabbath for the sake of God, even without human cooperation? Perhaps environmental problems, which are causing inconvenience to humans, could be the Earth’s response to God’s command to take a complete rest from being part of human productivity, and a way for the Earth to take a stance against being treated simply as a resource to be exploited for human benefit. T H E J U B I L E E C O M M A N D F O R T H E )E R E S 9 ( L E V 2 5 : 8 – 2 4 )

In the ancient Near East, a land-release proclamation like the Jubilee law was not uncommon. Newly enthroned kings would cancel debts and allow the debtor to return land to his family, similar to modern-day presidents promising tax cuts to win support from their citizens. According to Jacob Milgrom (Leviticus 23–27: A New Translation with

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Introduction and Commentary [The Anchor Bible, 3B; Doubleday, 2001]), in sharp contrast with a similar law from Israel’s neighbors, the biblical Jubilee was both universal (it applied to all Israelites rather than being limited to a king’s retainers) and cyclical (God ordained it rather than its being dependent on an earthly king’s whim). Milgrom, however, notes that the Jubilee law is of the type that is governed by social mores rather than enforceable by the use of sanctions. People were morally and spiritually obligated to keep the law, but there was no prescribed punishment for not observing it. Moreover, the people who owned the land would not have been enthusiastic about practicing it. Therefore, even though it was meant to be implemented, the Jubilee law probably was not practiced due to resistance from the rich and the political leaders and the lack of accountability to the law. Still, the Jubilee is a strange law from our modern perspective. According to the Jubilee law, people cannot own)eres@. One can only lease the use of )eres@ for a specified number of years before the year of release. The land is on loan, since it belongs ultimately to God: “The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is mine; with me you are but aliens and tenants” (Lev 25:23). The principle that creates a Jubilee year seems too impractical to put it into practice. Today, we are also faced with making inconvenient decisions. It is more expensive to buy green products that leave smaller amounts of carbon prints than regular products. It is inconvenient to recycle or decompose garbage. We do not want to pay more taxes and fees to protect our environment or to invest in cleaner energy. Most people care more about their pocketbooks than about the Earth with which we share our destiny. Christians, however, know that in some mysterious ways, the )eres@ is also part of God’s salvation history (see Rom 8:18–23). And God commands us to play an instrumental role in saving the )eres@: “Throughout the land that you hold, you shall provide for the redemption of the land” (Lev 25:24). The )eres@ needs a critical number of people who are willing to reduce their consumption and to make green choices in order for the Earth to recover. Perhaps it will take committed Christians who see caring for )eres@ as a vital feature of our moral and spiritual response to the God who has entrusted us with that calling and to whom all the Earth belongs.

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GOOD PREACHING TRANSFORMS LIVES Doctor of Ministry in Biblical Preaching

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400 Interpretation

Revelation 21:1–8

OCTOBER 2011

CAROL J. DEMPSEY, O.P. University of Portland Portland, Oregon

WITH CONFIDENCE AND POETIC GRANDEUR, John relates the vision that he had had of a new heaven and a new earth. This vision is by far the most stunning of all John’s visions recorded in the book of Revelation, because it speaks of radical transformation, a deep sense of unity, and an enduring hope. What the poet Isaiah proclaimed centuries earlier (Isa 65:17–25), John now sees (Rev 21:1–8). Isaiah’s words offered hope and direction for his people who had suffered the loss of land, temple, the holy city Jerusalem, and population when the Babylonians invaded Judah, sacked it, and exiled many of its people to Egypt and Babylon. John’s vision offers hope and direction to the community of believers in John’s day who are living in times of persecution under Roman rule. Just as the Babylonians were defeated, so also the Romans will suffer defeat. As powerful, oppressive nations rise one by one, so they will fall, one by one. As portrayed by the biblical writers in both the Old and New Testaments, these international events involving the nations and powerful peoples are all part of God’s work in preparation for the new heaven and the new earth whose cornerstone will be peace, with God dwelling among humankind. John’s vision helps to draw the book of Revelation to a close while inspiring readers and believers today that, indeed, the vision of the new heaven and the new earth goes before us even as it gradually unfolds in our midst. This new heaven and new earth—hinted at in the prophets, lived out by Jesus, and anticipated with enthusiasm in the book of Revelation—is the vision toward which all of life is to be oriented. John opens the story of his vision with a simple description: Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. (Rev 21:1)

The passing away of the first heaven and the first earth alludes to the old world order, one characterized by transgression (Gen 3; Mic 2:1–11), violence (Hos 4:1–2; Amos 1:2– 2:16), poor leadership (Mic 3:1–12), with nations reaping divine wrath because they have acted unjustly toward Israel and one another (Jer 46:1–51:58). Revelation 21:1 echoes the sentiments of Isa 43:18–19a: Do not remember the former things, or consider the things of old, I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?

What Isaiah foreshadowed in his time, John now sees in his vision. Within the vision of the new heaven and the new earth, John also sees that the holy city Jerusalem has become “new,” and now descends out of heaven from God. This

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image of the new Jerusalem resembles a bride adorned for her husband. Love has been rekindled and relationship has been renewed. A city once devastated and ravaged because of its sinfulness is now transformed and has become beautiful. As the spatial imagery of descent from heaven serves to emphasize divine initiative, the marriage imagery suggests a recommitment of God to the holy city, and the holy city’s recommitment to God, as in the early days of the covenant when God had first chosen and adorned Jerusalem before the city sank into a life of sordidness and infidelity to God and God’s ways (see Ezek 16: 1–58; Lam 1). A new covenant is about to be made (cf. Ezek 16:59–63), and the once desolate city, beaten down, lying in ruins, and residing in dust is about to be changed into a beautiful woman who is God’s “delight,” whom God will once again marry (cf. Isa 60–62). What was divinely promised by the poet Isaiah is soon to be a reality, as foreshadowed by John’s vision. In Rev 21:2, the “new Jerusalem” has now become a symbol for God’s people, redeemed, transformed, and made holy once again by God (cf. Isa 62:12; Matt 5:14). This Jerusalem—this people—has come down from God. In Rev 21:3–4, John continues to describe a most glorious picture. John not only sees a new heaven, a new earth, and a new Jerusalem but also hears a loud voice. The speaker remains obscure but since the voice comes from the throne, one could speculate that it is the voice of an angelic being. This voice proclaims glad tidings: See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them; he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more; for the first things have passed away.

A people transformed by their God now become God’s dwelling place. The human community has been changed into the embodiment of God to become the transparent glory of God. Through the human condition, God will be made manifest and will be glorified. The imagery in v. 3 suggests the wedding of God to the human community, and the human community wedded to God. This transformation will have endless joy, peace, and life as its fruits, because when the first things—the old order—have passed away, all suffering, tears, and even death itself will be ended. Life will be “heaven on earth,” and no separation will exist between these two realities. The God who dwells “above” will also dwell “below,” drawing heaven and earth together into a unified whole with one God dwelling in the midst of all, and all dwelling in the midst of God. Thus, the human community has become the tent, the tabernacle, the temple of the living God. This image of the human person as the temple of the living God is an image preached by Paul (1 Cor 3:17; 2 Cor 6:16; Eph 2:19–22) and brings Jesus’ mission and ministry to fulfillment (see John 10:16) and Isaiah’s and Micah’s visions to fruition (cf. Isa 2:1–4; Mic 4:1–5). Another voice speaks in vv. 5–8. This voice is from the one seated on the throne and,

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though unidentified, is presumably the voice of God who makes three statements. The first part of the statement, “See, I am making all things new” (v. 5a), reinforces the theological point that the transformation about to occur will not be accomplished by the sole efforts of human beings. God will act through the human condition (cf. Isa 32:14–15; Joel 2:28–29). The fact that the transformation is expressed by means of the present progressive verb tense indicates that the transformation is already occurring even though it is part of a vision. Furthermore, the transformation that Paul saw taking place in believers’ lives (cf. 2 Cor 3:18; 4:16–18; 5:16–17) will also occur on a cosmic scale as the old order passes away, giving way to a new style of leadership and a leader whose reign will usher in universal peace and security for all (cf. Isa 9:1–7; 11:1–9; 32:1–8; 65:17– 25). The work, mission, and ministry that Jesus had begun will be brought to completion. In the second part of the statement, God proclaims: “Write this, for these words are trustworthy and true” (v. 5b). The command is given to assure the preservation of the vision for future generations and to validate God’s intentions and work. These words also function as a segue to the third divine statement: “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. . . .” (v. 6a-b). The use of the prophetic perfect tense assures John and the later hearers and readers of the text that, indeed, what God has promised and what John has foreseen will take place and will be brought to completion. All comes from God and all will be with God and return to God. In the new age, there will be one God loving God’s self because all will have been transformed by God and into God. The last part of vv. 6–8 is a series of divine promises. Water is a symbol of life and is a feature of the messianic age (cf. Isa 12:3; 41:17–18; 44:3–4; Ezek 47; Zech 13:1; 14:8). In these verses, John reminds his community to remain faithful to and trusting of God despite all hardships that they are enduring and will endure. Verse 7 echoes the language of covenant first heard in Exod 6:7. To those who remain faithful to God, God will remain faithful as in the days of old. In v. 8, John puts on notice all those who support the Roman economic and political infrastructure. Through this vision, every person, every nation is exhorted to remain faithful to God and to live life accordingly. Those who do not will suffer a “living hell.” In sum, the vision of the new heaven and the new earth has existed since the times of the prophets and has persisted through the ages. This vision of transformation, unity, and peace is the hope for our entire planet and the light by which we are called to walk.

Interpretation 403

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Major

OCTOBER 2011

Reviews Climate Wars: The Fight for Survival as the World Overheats by Gwynne Dyer Oneworld, Oxford, 2010. 296 pp. $17.00. ISBN 978-1-85168-814-2. Climatopolis: How our Cities Will Thrive in the Hotter Future by Matthew E. Kahn Basic Books, New York, 2010. 274 pp. $27.00. ISBN 978-0-465-01926-7. Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet by Bill McKibben New York Times Books, New York, 2010. 261 pp. $15.00. ISBN 978-0312-54119-4. The Flooded Earth: Our Future in a World Without Ice Caps by Peter D. Ward Basic Books, New York, 2010. 274 pp. $26.95. ISBN 978-0-465-00949-7.

INHERENTLY, THE SUBJECT OF CLIMATE CHANGE IS, in my judgment, the most important theological and social justice issue of our time. While none of these books addresses theological issues directly, Bill McKibben makes several such allusions. Gwynne Dyer and Peter Ward focus on the causes and consequences of climate change, and McKibben and Matthew Kahn on coping with it. Dyer and Ward provide occasional scenarios of the future as distant as 2215, stories even more frightening than the discursive sections. One example: sea level rise causes Bangladeshis, desperate for land and food, to crash through a barrier erected by India, whereupon India annihilates the Bangladeshis with nuclear weapons (Ward, pp. 212–15; cf. p. 156; McKibben, pp. 82–85). In Climate Wars, Dyer focuses on political and military tensions that will inevitably increase due to climate change. Rising sea levels, shifting weather patterns, loss of agricultural lands, mass starvation, waves of migration, and soaring world populations will drive nations to desperate measures for self-preservation. Water is likely to be the bone of contention far more than oil; food will make gold seem like fool’s gold. “There is a probability of wars, including even nuclear wars, if temperatures rise 2 to 3 degrees Celsius. Once that happens, all hope of international cooperation to curb emissions and stop the warming goes out the window” (p. xii). Four conclusions drive Dyer’s concern. First, climate change is happening a lot faster than previ-

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ously thought (cf. McKibben, ch. 1). Second, individual efforts are useless without international action to “decarbonise our economies wholesale”—“preferably, 80 percent cuts by 2030” (p. xiii). The ineffectiveness of conferences like Kyoto and Copenhagen reveals the unlikelihood of such action. “Global politics . . . is proving to be as messy and incoherent as democratic politics at any other level” (p. 212). If the world stopped cold turkey using fossil fuels and switched to alternatives, we could arrest climate change, but we lack the will. Third, we are not likely to accomplish the needed cuts, so we must invent scientific and engineering coping mechanisms as soon as possible. Such “fixes” give us some hope of at least ameliorating the effects of climate change (cf. Ward, pp. 203–211; contrast McKibben, p. 100). Fourth, rich countries will have to accept deeper cuts in their own emissions and help fund poorer countries’ adoption of new energy technologies. Otherwise, “The pain will be unequally shared . . . and it is this business of winners and losers that poses the greatest threat to global order” (p. 55; cf. Kahn, pp. 176–83). Volcanoes were among the causes of past mass extinctions of species. But as Dyer notes, “This time around, however, we are the volcanoes” (p. 262). The title Climatopolis suggests that Kahn provides the most optimistic view, making his acknowledgment of the perils of climate change all the more telling. Kahn, who teaches economics and the environment, argues that most people will not alter energy use sufficiently to reduce climate change, nor can we fix the problem technologically. But humans have adapted to disasters in the past, and “we will save ourselves by adapting to our ever-changing circumstances” again (p. 7), thanks to self-interest and capitalism. “Whether it’s Twitter, or solar panels, or the Tesla electric vehicle, the innovative capitalist culture will allow us to make a Houdini-style escape from climate change’s most devastating impacts” (p. 8)—and, of course, make savvy entrepreneurs rich. This is how climate change looks from Wall Street! One example of adaptation and innovation: houses that can float up to twelve feet above ground level for places like New Orleans or the Netherlands (p. 34; note the implication regarding sea level rise). Cities with both foresight and funding will survive and thrive, others will collapse. On the other hand, government efforts in disaster relief often “increase the degree of climaterelated risks that a population faces” (e.g., New Orleans, p. 45). Contrary to predictions of international war (as in Dyer), Kahn predicts growing cooperation (but possible civil war in third-world countries; pp. 8, 162). Contrary to worries about a great flood (cf. Ward), Kahn thinks it “a high probability that no storm will take place” (p. 12) or that coastal flooding will not happen suddenly. Contrary to those who fear the consequences of mass migrations, Kahn argues that they will simply reduce the cost of restoring abandoned areas (p. 42). He acknowledges that wealthy people (and nations) will suffer less from climate change than the poor, and will not be particularly altruistic in helping them (pp. 40–41; ch. 7); on the other hand, climate change in developing countries provides opportunities “for investment projects offering a high rate of return” (p. 186). Obviously, Kahn does not share McKibben’s disparagement of growth. The fact that capitalism causes climate change presents a “delicious irony,” in that capitalism will protect us from it as well (p. 236). Nevertheless, “Reducing carbon emissions now will make the future challenge to adapt easier to face” (p. 237). In Eaarth, McKibben maintains that the effects of climate change, described in detail, already mean that we failed “to preserve the world we were born into,” and must learn how to live in a radically changed world (p. xv, hence the spelling, “Eaarth”). Climate change forces us to rethink the desirability of unlimited economic growth. “You grow too large, and then you run out of oil and the

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Arctic melts” (p. 95). Here is the irony in the economic mantra “too big to fail” (p. 104)! What we need instead of growth is “graceful decline” (p. 99, his italics), surely an economic oxymoron! In fact, McKibben readily admits to having “subversive thoughts” (p. 104). His proverbial model is “less is more.” “Maintenance is our mantra,” not expansion (p. 123, his italics). Local economies must replace national and global ones (e.g., locally grown food instead of agribusiness, small banks instead of conglomerates, local or regional energy production instead of Exxon’s). Such localizing could enrich our sense of community, connected by the internet. Accordingly, McKibben has launched the website www.350.org (referring to the goal of 350 parts-per-million [ppm] of atmospheric CO2), our only hope, he argues, in the face of national and global political failure. In The Flooded Earth, Ward refutes climate change deniers who say that patterns like sea level rise are simply natural cycles. Ward, a paleontologist, shows that, in fact, our use of fossil fuels since 1800 has produced an unnatural climate change, and that “we are on the cusp of the most rapid rate of sea level rise in Earth history” (p. 10). This type of catastrophe has happened before in the event that probably lies behind the biblical flood story and others. Around 5600 B.C.E., the Mediterranean Sea rose and broke through its eastern shore, creating the Black Sea. “Noah and the geological record tell us that sea level can change, and relatively quickly. The fastest way is through the melting of ice. And melting ice is precisely what is going on right now” (p. 22). A reasonable estimate suggests a sea level rise of 3 to 5 feet by 2100, which “will cause major changes to our world” (p. 38). Much later, an increase of some 240 feet is possible (p. 56). Sea level rise results from melting ice caps, ice sheets, and glaciers, currently underway. Numerous “feedback” problems compound climate change. Ice reflects sunlight, and thus heat, whereas water absorbs the heat, so melting ice caps both result from global warming and augment it. Similarly, thawing tundra releases methane, a potent greenhouse gas, causing further warming, and more thawing. Some of the consequences of sea rise, especially in coastal areas, will include increased destruction by storm surges and flooded cities, resulting in enormous financial losses and mass migrations. Salinization of agricultural land and fresh water will destroy huge food-producing areas. Two examples: “even an 8-inch rise in the Bay of Bengal will displace 10 million Bangladeshis” (p. 156); “a very real possibility that by the end of this century, the United States will not be able to feed its people without importing food” (p. 150). Ward’s warning is “apocalyptic” indeed (p. 218), prophesying the possibility of “the greatest mass death of humans in all of history” (p. 63). I speak of him as “prophesying” because he acknowledges the label of “being a Cassandra,” but says that what he really is is “scared” (p. 35). So should we all be. Ward does not note the irony of his Noachic analogy, but we may. Humans are producing a “dome” (“firmament”) of gases that threaten to flood the Earth, reversing what God had promised never to do again (Gen 7:11; 8:22), perhaps the ultimate act of hubris. We are creating a “new heaven and a new earth” (Rev 21:1; cf. McKibben, p. 25). In fact, when Ward talks about the need to “stall the sea in its tracks and avert chaos” (p. 200), he unconsciously evokes the biblical chaos monster that God has held in check (Job 38:8–11). But as Dyer says, “we are the volcanoes”—we have become the monster of chaos. Thomas W. Mann RETIRED PROFESSOR OF HEBREW BIBLE AND PARISH PASTOR WINSTON-SALEM, NORTH CAROLINA

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Ecotheology and the Practice of Hope by Ann Marie Dalton and Henry C. Simmons Religion and the Environment. State University of New York Press, Albany, 2010. 183 pp. $70.00 (cloth). ISBN 978-0-43843297-7. IN THIS CLEARLY AND CONCISELY written book, Henry Simmons and Anne Marie Dalton confront what they see as a major problem with texts on ecology and ecotheology: they tend to evoke feelings of despair. The problems of human ecological destruction of the Earth are so monumental and all-pervasive that it is hard to see any avenue of hope. They suggest that the possibility of hope might arise from the concrete practice of alternative ways of living that give tangible evidence that it is possible to create different societies that are sustainable. To test this hypothesis, they examine the major expressions of ecological theology to see how these texts are generating concrete practices of alternative living that might constitute a practice of hope. They begin by examining the idea of how humans create a “social imaginary” that becomes the dominant and accepted worldview of a society. Ecological criticism has faulted the social imaginary created by modern capitalism, showing that it is responsible both for the practices of ecological destruction and its justification as normal and acceptable. How has ecological theology been responding to this dominant social imaginary? The authors then detail the emergence of ecological theology and explore the ways this theology is shaping new imagined futures. They consider such prominant ecological theologians as Joseph Sittler, Thomas Berry, Rosemary Radford Ruether, and John Cobb, all of whom began to pose the problems of ecological crisis and a theological response to it between 1954 and the 1970s. Simmons and Dalton show how these thinkers are, in effect, shaping a new social imaginary that is making the ecologically destructive way of life unacceptable, but also helping people imagine alternative possibilities. These ecotheological explorations are becoming increasingly complex. They have gone beyond simply the question of the dominant society and its destructive habits. They are contextualizing the issues in terms of its relation to women, to racial differences, to social class, and different cultures. They are making it possible to think both globally and locally, to situate the effects of ecological destruction and the need for alternatives in terms of many local contexts within the overall world system that is problematic. Simmons and Dalton examine the way ecotheology is making use of science and the relation of scientific knowledge to their own critical theology. Several scholars, such as Thomas Berry, are making use of science to create a new cosmology, drawing on the scientific understanding of plane-

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tary history that is far larger and longer than traditional Christian understanding of the creation story. But others, such as Sallie McFague, draw on ecological science itself to analyze the causes and cures of ecological destruction. In the final chapter, the authors come to the critical issues. Are ecotheologians not only creating a new social imaginary of ecologically sustainable societies, but also inspiring practical ways of life that can constitute a “practice of hope”? They discover that church congregations that take on the ecological issue are often productive in creating real practices of hope. Such church congregations in the United States and Canada are often elderly, with a majority over fifty. Many have a majority of women. Their average size is about 150 people, within which they have small bonded groups of about 15 people each and working groups of about 50 people. Can such communities be useful in dealing with a global issue of such difficulty? Surprisingly, yes! They cite the “grandmother hypothesis” to show that human longevity in relation to production of children has built into it a role of grandmothers in the survival and raising of grandchildren. The best large groups for action are about 150 people, with working inner groups of 15 and 50 members. Religious congregations, once activated on ecology, have unique resources to transform their own institutions and their ways of life to demonstrate what ecological living would look like. Concretely, some of the best examples of ecological living are being practiced by such ecologically transformed local religious communities. Here, the social imaginary of a new ecologically sustainable society is being expressed in concrete examples of the practice of hope. Rosemary Radford Ruether CLAREMONT GRADUATE UNIVERSITY CLAREMONT, CALIFORNIA

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1 Corinthians by Robert Scott Nash Smyth & Helwys, Macon, Ga., 2009. 486 pp. $60.00. ISBN 978-1-57312-082-1. 2 Corinthians by Mitzi L. Minor Smyth & Helwys, Macon, Ga., 2009. 280 pp. $45.00. ISBN 978-1-57312-538-3. WITH THESE TWO VOLUMES, the Smyth & Helwys Bible Commentary series continues to establish itself as an outstanding series of commentaries for pastors and students. Each volume begins with a brief introduction and outline of the epistle. The commentary that follows is divided into two parts: “commentary” and “connections.” The first part (“commentary”) provides an exegesis of the text based on its logical divisions as determined by the outline provided in the introduction. The exegesis, which is narrative in style, discusses questions of language, history, and literary forms without getting bogged down in complicated philological and textual issues. The second part (“connections”) considers how the text applies to life, with a view to its use in the classroom or pulpit. The most distinctive aspect of the series, however, is its extensive use of text and illustration sidebars, which provide historical information, outlines, definitions, quotations, comments on the history of interpretation, photographs, and works of art. A number of icons classify these sidebars into four categories: language-based tools, cultural context, interpretation, and additional resources. The volume on 1 Corinthians, for example, has over 300 text sidebars and nearly 100 illustration sidebars. The shorter volume on 2 Corinthians provides over 125 text sidebars and nearly 50 illustration sidebars. This extensive use of sidebars, as well as an accompanying CD of the entire text, makes this a new kind of commentary for a new generation of students. Robert Scott Nash’s volume on 1 Corinthians is a model of exegetical clarity that provides readers with a sure and engaging exegesis of this letter. It structures the text as follows: “The Beginning” (1:1–9); “The Problem of Divisions” (1:10–4:21); “Disciplining Immorality” (5:1–6:20); “Marriage and Sexual Relationships” (7:1–40); “Eating Food Offered to Idols” (8:1–11:1), “Spiritual Gifts” (12:1– 14:40); “The Resurrection of the Body” (15:1–34); and “Final Matters” (16–24). Throughout, Nash reminds readers of the big picture and the context and rhetoric of the text. Accordingly, even when he deals with technical exegetical questions, he highlights the overall narrative that 1 Corinthians creates. Nash makes use of rhetorical and social science criticism, but does not allow it to determine his

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exegesis, which remains firmly focused on the theological dimensions of the text. Moreover, while he is aware of the historical and cultural circumstances that influenced Paul, he does not employ a hermeneutic of suspicion that pretends to know the text better than the author who wrote it. As I read through Nash’s commentary, I was especially appreciative of his use of Greco-Roman background material to interpret the text. For example, when discussing marriage and sexual relationships in ch. 7, he notes that in Roman society, the failure of a wife to follow her husband’s religion would have been viewed as insubordination; consequently, wives who became Christians would have posed a threat not only to their non-Christian husbands, but also to the welfare of the city as well. Making use of this cultural background, Nash provides a plausible reading for the difficult passage regarding head attire for women when praying and prophesying at worship (11:2–16). He maintains that Paul was arguing against the practice of certain married women who removed their head coverings (which signified that they were married) when praying or prophesying. Given the cultural meaning of such head attire, Paul would have viewed this behavior as detrimental to the church. A similar phenomenon occurs in Paul’s instruction that women be silent (14:33b–36). Instead of viewing this text as a non-Pauline interpolation, Nash suggests that it has to do with honor and shame, since wives were speaking in a public setting in a way that brought shame upon their husbands. Reading these difficult passages in light of their cultural and historical background, Nash helps readers to understand why Paul wrote as he did. Other parts of this commentary are equally illuminating. In discussing 1:10–4:21, Nash argues that the cause of the divisions threatening the Corinthian community “stemmed from a perspective that Paul considered contrary to his basic message and his vision for the ekkle3sia in Corinth” (p. 76). In his exegesis of 8:1–10:1, he takes the position that these three chapters form “a single literary and rhetorical unit free of insertions from other letters” (p. 235). Whereas some of the Corinthians maintained that eating food sacrificed to idols was not a problem because the deities to which the food was sacrificed did not exist, Paul disagreed and viewed any food associated with idols as off limits to believers. Finally, in his extended exegesis of ch. 15, on the resurrection of the dead, Nash maintains that the problem was not total disbelief in an afterlife so much as it was a refusal to believe that the body would be raised from the dead. Nash has provided us with a first-rate commentary. Professional exegetes will appreciate the manner in which he has assembled and presented a great deal of primary and secondary literature. Students and pastors will profit from the way in which he relates this material to everyday life. Mitzi Minor’s commentary on 2 Corinthians is a worthy companion to Nash’s volume. Although it does not provide the extended introductions or detailed outlines to each section that Nash’s commentary does, it offers a reliable and engaging reading of a difficult text. Like Nash, Minor provides a narrative exegesis that regularly reminds readers of the overall story of 2 Corinthians. Accordingly, this is the kind of commentary that one can read from cover to cover. Like Nash, she has a deep respect for the text, but she is also more inclined to question it. This is especially evident in her discussion of Paul’s remarks about Eve in 11:3. Aware of the harm that some biblical texts have wrought, she notes that “however effective this image of the unfaithful woman may have been as a rhetorical device for the prophets and Paul, it has had a hugely negative effect on women throughout history” (p. 208).

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Minor structures her commentary in this way: “Greeting and Prayer” (1:1–11); “The Issues Surface” (1:12–2:13); “Paul’s Defense of His Ministry and Himself ” (2:14–7:4); “So, The Issues Are Settled?” (7:5–16); “The Issues Are Not Settled” (8:1–9:15); and “Things Get Worse: A New Letter and a Showdown Visit” (10:1–13:14). The literary integrity of 2 Corinthians is the most pressing question that confronts any commentator of this letter. Is the writing we possess the letter that Paul wrote, or is 2 Corinthians a composite letter composed of several Pauline fragments? While other recent commentators and I have argued for the literary integrity of this letter, Minor argues that 2 Corinthians is a composite writing, made up of two earlier Pauline letters. According to her reconstruction, Paul composed 2 Corinthians 1–9 after writing the emotional letter to which he refers in 2 Cor 2:3–4 (a letter that has been lost). The purpose of chs. 1–9, then, would have been to mend relations with the Corinthians and to encourage them to resume the collection for Jerusalem, which they had begun a year earlier. The abrupt change of tone and content in 1 Corinthians 10–13 suggests to Minor and others that these chapters belong to a second letter occasioned by a fresh crisis at Corinth. This crisis occurred when visiting apostles, opposed to Paul, formed an alliance with those Corinthians whose patronage Paul had refused. In response to this crisis, Paul wrote the stinging letter now embedded in chs. 10–13, which a later editor purportedly appended to chs. 1–9. Although I imagine the occasion of 2 Corinthians differently than Minor does, I willingly acknowledge that she has provided an insightful and ecumenical exegesis of the text. Nash and Minor approach their tasks in slightly different ways, but their volumes ultimately complement each other. Studied in tandem, their works provide students and pastors with a good entry point into the Corinthian correspondence. Frank J. Matera THE CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF AMERICA WASHINGTON, D.C.

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The Lost Meaning of the Seventh Day by Sigve K. Tonstad Andrews University Press, Berrien Springs, Mich., 2009. 575 pp. $29.99 (cloth). ISBN 978-1-883925-65-9. IN AN ELEGANT AND WIDE-RANGING attempt at biblical theology, Sigve Tonstad argues that the majority of Christendom needs to recover the observance of the seventh day, the Sabbath. His concern, however, is not just with the loss of a “day of rest” or a particular ritual pattern to the Christian week, but with theology: “the character of the seventh day is misconstrued if it is seen as a national or religious marker of identity and not as a theological statement. To the extent that it is a part of God’s story, it cannot be suppressed indefinitely. It must reassert itself to complete its God-ordained mission; it cannot remain permanently in exile” (p. 5). As might be expected, Tonstad addresses the seventh day in the OT and the NT, and postbiblical issues raised by the eclipse of the seventh day. Such issues include the alienation between Christians and Jews, the estrangement of Christians from the material world, and the loss of understanding of the theological depth of the seventh day observance. It is clear that he sees the eclipse of seventh-day observance as one of the direct causes of some of these problems, not surprisingly, since he is an ardent Seventh Day Adventist. Much of Tonstad’s case hangs on his reading of Gen 2:1–3, and as one reads his exposition of this text, one begins to see where the argument will go: “By the act of hallowing the seventh day God drives the stake of divine presence into the soil of human time” (p. 21). This sentence is characteristic of the rhetoric of this book, as it abounds in potent metaphorical images. However, what Gen 2:1–3 says is that God ceased (shabbat) from creating. The God who made it all by speaking, and who neither slumbers nor sleeps, hardly needed rest after a week’s work. Genesis 2:1–3 indicates that on the seventh day, God was not actively involved in doing some creative work; rather, God sat back and enjoyed what had just been accomplished, seeing that it was very good. The seventh day itself is not the capstone of creation. If anything deserves that title, it is the creation of woman last of all. Rather, the seventh day is the day when one takes time to appreciate the creation that is already finished. And what exactly does it mean to say God finished his work on the seventh day? Does it mean God created this day especially and set it apart from all other days? In my view, the work in question cannot be the day itself, since the Hebrew says God finished it “on that day.” The activity in view must surely be God’s blessing and hallowing of the day. Blessing and hallowing, while not a materially creative work, can nonetheless be said to be an activity. And when it comes to that, Jesus said that God is always working in some sense (John 5:17). The seventh day is not a special creation of God. Indeed, one could argue that the seventh day is still ongoing, as God has still not ceased from

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God’s inaugural creation work. In Gen 2:1–3, there is no statement that “there was evening and morning, a seventh day.” Of the institution of a Sabbath worship pattern, Genesis says nothing at all at any point! This institution awaits the rise of God’s people Israel and God’s encounter with them in the wilderness and beyond, and is part of the Mosaic covenant God makes with God’s newly rescued people. Tonstad rejects the usual scholarly logic that Sabbath observance came into play in the Exodus tradition (Exod 16, 19) and should be distinguished from the seventh day of creation material in Gen 2. He prefers unitive readings of Genesis, following Jewish scholars such as U. Cassuto and N. Sarna. In his view, the Sabbath must be seen as an ordinance of creation for all time. The net effect of this hermeneutical move is that the Sabbath and its observance rests on all humankind. It is not a rite set up only for God’s chosen people, for Israel alone. One of the problems with a good active theological mind that works synthetically, as Tonstad’s does, is that it tends to over-read texts, by reading more theology into them than is there. Tonstad, for example, wants to see the seventh day, and God’s benediction on the seventh day, not merely as a retrospective evaluation of the goodness of God’s creative work, but also as prospective of redemption. He suggests that the “orientation of the seventh day from the beginning oscillates between memory and hope, between the reality of Paradise Lost and the Prospect of Paradise Regained, the oscillation of hope is stronger than the oscillation of memory. In its original configuration, the seventh day must be seen as promise as much as memorial. It forecasts that God’s ‘very good’ will be sustained, transforming the human experience into a journey of hope” (p. 59). Genesis 2:1–3 is clearly retrospective, not prospective. It does not in itself promise anything about the future, nor does it establish a particular pattern of Sabbath observance. That clearly comes later, when there is a people, Israel, to do such observing. That is not to deny the connection between the seventh day in Genesis and the later Israelite worship pattern. The latter definitely is grounded in the former, but the two are not the same. Nor in Gen 2:1–3 is there any attempt to connect the seventh day to a remedy for what happens afterwards, namely the Fall. One of the interesting ideas in this book is that the Sabbath is a symbol, like a flag—something that participates in the reality to which it points. It points to God’s ceasing from his creative activity, and as such when Israel observes shabbat, they participate in cessation from creative activity. Just as people react violently in the United States to flag burning, so Exodus says death is the penalty for violating the Sabbath, as it is sacred. When Tonstad turns to the NT, he faces the challenge of explaining the critique of Sabbath praxis found in various places, especially in Paul’s letters. Here, one finds one of the most basic flaws in Tonstad’s theology: his lack of understanding of covenant theology. The new covenant is not the same as, nor a mere renewal of, any of the old covenants in the OT. The sign of the new covenant is baptism, a change of sign from circumcision, signaling a change of covenant. And when covenants change, worship praxis normally changes as well. Jesus spoke of this in John 4 when he said that now that the kingdom is coming, worship that is confined to some specific place (or for that matter, some specific time) is no longer the order of the day. Rather, worship in Spirit and in truth, wherever and whenever, is the order of the day. It comes as no surprise, then, that neither Jesus nor Paul reaffirm Sabbath praxis for their fol-

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lowers. Indeed, Paul warns his converts against requirements to practice the Sabbath, or new moons, or Jewish festivals (Col 2:16) and affirms that “some judge one day to be better than another, while others judge all days to be alike. Let all be fully convinced in their own minds. Those who observe the day, observe it in honor of the Lord” (Rom 14: 5–6). Had Paul believed his converts should continue observing the Sabbath, he could never have written these verses. What we do find in the NT is the beginning of worship on the Lord’s Day, the first day of the week. This practice is in full swing in the early second century church (cf. 1 Cor 16:2; Rev 1:10; Ign. Magn. 9:1; Justin Martyr, 1 Apol. 97; Pliny, Epist 10:96). Despite Tonstad’s arguments, it is not true that worship on Sunday owes its origin either to Hellenism, anti-Judaism, the worship of Sol Invictus in the Empire, or the decrees of Constantine. It began as a celebration of Easter and resurrection in early Christianity long before Constantine was born, and it probably eclipsed the continued praxis of Sabbath by some Christians due to the fact that waning numbers of Jewish Christians continued to worship in that fashion (even into the fourth century). But this eclipse was not just a matter of attrition, it was a matter of theology. What eclipses the seventh day, according to NT theology, is the eighth day and its observance. The day of the week on which God began the first creation (Sunday) is the day on which God began the new creation in the resurrection of Jesus. And what God’s people need far more than rest or even restoration is resurrection, for when one rises from the dead, one finally shakes off the weariness of the old fallen mortal flesh. Thus, one needs and studies Sabbath no more. Christians are an Easter people, a people called to live out of, into, and toward our own resurrection, grounded in the resurrection of Jesus. Christian worship praxis should be based not on the Mosaic Sabbath praxis, nor even on the old creation seventh day praxis, but on the new creation praxis, which signals where God and God’s people are going, not merely where we have been. The old creation rest was very good, but it was but a foretaste of glory divine. The Lord’s Day is the flag Jesus planted in the ground one April morning in 30 C.E. It is the one Christians should wave and cheer now and evermore, for it is the ensign of our own future “for we shall be made like him,” even in our flesh. The attributes of Sabbath were not merely transferred to the Lord’s Day, they were transcended by the Lord’s Day. Ben Witherington, III ASBURY THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY WILMORE, KENTUCKY

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Reviews

Creation: A Biblical Vision for the Environment by Margaret Barker T & T Clark International, New York, 2010. 326 pp. $29.95. ISBN 978-0-567-01547-1.

IN THIS DENSE AND disjointed book, British biblical scholar Margaret Barker boldly reconstructs the biblical vision for creation held by the “first Christians.” The resulting study distinguishes itself from the many works that mine the Bible for its ecological value. While conversant with science and ecology, Barker sets her sights on retrieving the symbolladen “ethos” of creation as understood by early Christians. This takes her not only into the Scriptures, but also into various extra-biblical sources. Enoch, Philo, and Origen, for example, are heavily featured. The book, however, is not just a valiant attempt at reconstructing an ancient worldview. It is a passionate recovery of profoundly relevant reflections on humanity’s place and role in God’s “incredible creation.” In Barker’s unnuanced estimation, biblical scholarship has flatly ignored the pervasive theme of creation in the Bible in favor of history. But the time has come to correct this lopsided focus, especially now. Hermeneutically, Barker takes on both the literalists, who overlook the symbolic power of biblical language, and the “textual archaeologists,” who have nothing theological to say. Barker submerges the reader into the richly evocative world of early Jewish and Christian interpretation, which despite its variety offers, according to her, a coherent vision of creation, one that is temple-centered. According to biblical and later interpretive tradition, the temple represents Edenic creation in which Adam was once its high priest. Atonement, thus, becomes the central means for restoring creation. Wisdom, too, plays a prominent role. Barker’s study offers a richly theological resource for bringing ancient biblical interpretation into conversation with contemporary issues of ecology. It is also rough going. Her style of presentation is frequently midrashic: the discussion can swing wildly from one biblical text to another, to a passage from Philo to a comment made by a modern economist or ecologist, all on a single page!

Barker’s study revels in making connections here, there, and everywhere, however slight they may seem. It is hard to tell where intertextuality ends and stream of consciousness begins. Nevertheless, readers are in store for a breathtaking ride. Warning: this book may induce mental whiplash! But in recovering, readers will be amazed all the more at how rich a resource the Bible is for inspiring greater love and care for God’s creation.

WILLIAM P. BROWN COLUMBIA THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY DECATUR, GEORGIA

Biblical Prophets and Contemporary Environmental Ethics by Hilary Marlow Oxford University Press, New York, 2009. 338 pp. $120.00 (cloth). ISBN 978-0-19-956905-2.

THIS BOOK BEGINS WITH a usefully broad overview in two chapters of how biblical representations of creation and its teleology have been understood through the centuries, from the early church to contemporary scholarship. Hilary Marlow shows that until the latter part of the twentieth century, with a few “inspirational rather than influential” exceptions such as Francis of Assisi (p. 41), the prevailing Christian reading is that “non-human creation . . . has a functional role with regard to human beings” (p. 50). She then offers a brief critical review of new attempts to develop an ecologically sensitive hermeneutic; this serves as the foundation for her own exegetical work with Amos, Hosea, and First Isaiah. Through the study of rhetorical structure, themes and imagery, semantics and figurative language, Marlow shows how each text highlights different aspects of the “ecological triangle,” a model for configuring relationships among God, humanity, and non-human creation. A final chapter explores how the message of these texts may bear upon contemporary discussions of environmental ethics. “The principle of interconnectivity” is the basis for a biblical and ethical model that allows for a fresh understanding of the place of humans in the world, within a complex of relations—in community, with God, and with the

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non-human creation. Marlow addresses perhaps the topic of greatest urgency for the church in scholarly rather than popular mode. The book provides excellent background for anyone working or teaching in the area of Bible and ecology. It covers much ground— historically, theologically, and exegetically—with admirable brevity and great clarity; the superb bibliography points the way for further work. Texts are well chosen to show different ways in which the Prophets represent interactions among non-human creation, God, and humanity. Throughout, Marlow displays good theological and exegetical sense; in contrast to the Earth Bible Project, she never loses sight of the resolute theocentricity of the prophetic texts. Moreover, she shows that their imagery and rhetoric is not casually chosen, but targeted to yield a theologically acute reading of the world. The excellent treatment of creation theology within First Isaiah corrects the tendency of biblical scholars to focus exclusively on Second Isaiah in this regard. One quibble: for Hosea, more might be done with Canaanite religious literature, especially as it illumines “the converse of heaven and earth” (Hos 2: 20–25). Overall, Marlow certainly demonstrates how the Prophets can help equip the church to exercise essential moral leadership in our time.

ELLEN F. DAVIS DUKE DIVINITY SCHOOL DURHAM, NORTH CAROLINA

The Garden of God: A Theological Cosmology

istering to a created world in need of healing and redemption. García-Rivera employs the works of Teilhard de Chardin and Hans Urs von Balthasar, and argues that we need an aesthetic that enables us to see the “form” of life in its evolutionary development. Though science has spoken well of life’s “how,” it has not thought enough about life’s “what” and “where,” not giving adequate attention to the quality of life and the prospect of its dynamic wholeness and abundance. The result has been a technological culture that thrives at the expense of creation. Rather than appreciating the universe as God’s garden to enjoy and live into, we have come to see Earth as something to consume and then escape from on the way to a better future time. The real strength of this book is that it asks us to reconsider basic themes in soteriology and eschatology. In particular, by using aesthetic appreciation and a renewed attention to “place,” GarcíaRivera shows that Christ’s reconciliation of heaven and earth enables Christians and the church to participate here and now in God’s reconciling and healing life. “If in the incarnation God opens Godself to the cosmos, then in the ascension, Christ opens up the cosmos to God” (p. 59). The cosmic Christ equips us to see the cosmos as a shared home that is beautiful and vibrant in its life-giving character. He enables us to see the world as a garden that is to be received as gift and lived with in ways that promote creativity, responsibility, and delight. Through this relatively short book, GarcíaRivera introduces us to themes that deserve wide discussion and further development.

by Alejandro García-Rivera

NORMAN WIRZBA

Fortress, Minneapolis, 2009. 157 pp. $22.00. ISBN 978-0-

DUKE DIVINITY SCHOOL

8006-6358-2.

THOUGH THE EARLY CHURCH spoke frequently about the cosmic dimensions of Christ’s life and ministry, this insight has not been adequately understood, developed, and utilized. In The Garden of God, Alejandro García-Rivera, professor of systematic theology at the Jesuit School of Theology at Berkeley, argues that the twenty-first century church needs to recover and promote a uniquely theological cosmology that brings into conversation the Trinity and contemporary scientific research. This cosmology teaches us what it means to be at home in the universe, and it will guide the church in min-

DURHAM, NORTH CAROLINA

Wind, Sun, Soil, Spirit: Biblical Ethics and Climate Change by Carol S. Robb Fortress, Minneapolis, 2010. 195 pp. $20.00. ISBN 978-08006-9706-8.

THE ART OF READING THE Bible ecologically is diversifying, and Carol Robb’s book is one of the most distinctive contributions to date. A professor of Christian social ethics, Robb delves deeply into the biblical text, but not where one might expect. With one notable exception (Ps 104), Robb by and

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large avoids the creation accounts and focuses almost exclusively on the Gospel accounts of Jesus’ ministry and the epistles of Paul. Her effort is commendable and innovative, but not as effective as it could have been. Before addressing the complexities of biblical interpretation for the sake of ethical reflection, Robb discusses the intricacies of the Kyoto Protocol and the various reports issued by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Robb helpfully sorts out the differing scenarios of energy policy planning measured in terms of environmental effectiveness, community sustainability, and protection of biodiversity. The transition to her discussion of biblical texts is made by posing the question: what vision of the world is needed to attain a more sustainable future? Such a vision can make a significant contribution to the more technological discussions of policy and practice, namely, the vision of the “Kingdom of God” in contrast to the “Kingdom of Oil.” God’s “kingdom,” according to Robb, is more an “inheritance” than a hierarchy, and it is visionary more on a communal than on a cosmic (i.e., apocalyptic) level. Robb begins with a nuanced discussion of her critical approach to the biblical texts, which involves identifying her own social location apart from that of first-century Palestine. In the process, Robb discovers that the idea of “stewardship” in the NT has little ecological value. Moreover, she rules out apocalyptic texts because they foster a posture of indifference, or worse, of aggression toward creation (which is actually a distorted reading of such texts). For Robb, it is the imperial presence of ancient Rome in the NT that bears a hermeneutical connection with the first-world countries of today, particularly the United States. The biblical texts have all to do with resisting the ideology of empire, with forming communities of solidarity and resistance, with fostering an ethos of “democracy and equality” (p. 133). Ethically, Robb shows the way toward a biblical vision of community and justice. Hermeneutically, her way is not the only way to get there.

WILLIAM P. BROWN COLUMBIA THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY DECATUR, GEORGIA

OCTOBER 2011

Greening Paul: Reading the Apostle in a Time of Ecological Crisis by David G. Horrell, Cherryl Hunt, and Christopher Southgate Baylor University Press, Waco, 2010. 333 pp. $34.95. ISBN 978-160258290-3.

THIS BOOK, THE FRUIT of the collaborative efforts of David Horrell, Cherryl Hunt, and Christopher Southgate, provides a constructive and intentionally Pauline theology in response to the present ecological crisis. Recognizing the distinction between our present concerns and those of the apostle, they attend carefully and critically to the textual and contextual details of the Pauline letters (with special focus on Rom 8:19–22 and Col 1:15–20), while also putting these elements into conversation with evolutionary science. Thus, they construct a fundamentally new Pauline theology and ethical paradigm for our contemporary global situation. At the heart of this project is the authors’ attempt to discern the explicit and implicit creational narratives found in Rom 8:19–22 and Col 1:15–20. Although Rom 8:20–21 hints at a past demise of creation, in their reconstructed Pauline paradigm the authors omit a reference to a “fall” in light of the finding of evolutionary science that humans did not in fact introduce decay and death into the world. The revised Pauline narrative they propose instead stresses the movements of creation, reconciliation, and new creation. Theologically and ethically, this narrative implies that, while the consummation of God’s reconciliation of all creation ultimately depends on God, humans are invited to participate in the liberation of their “potential” for other-regard through Christ: The final liberation of creation might then be taken to await human discovery of the significance of that potential, the effect of the freedom that comes from being not merely creaturely selves but self-transcended selves, after the example of Christ and in fellowship with him. (p. 138) Since Paul calls people to live in line with God’s larger salvific purposes—particularly, reconciliation and new creation—and so to live on behalf of human and nonhuman others, this Pauline narrative of creation powerfully counters ecologically harmful depictions of the human place in creation, such as those purveyed by capitalism and consumerism,

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which encourage people to seek their own comfort, pleasure, and convenience at the expense of the flourishing of the rest of creation. The exegetical, theological, and ethical riches found in Greening Paul will promote invaluable reflection not only among Pauline scholars but also all Christian ministers and educators who desire to understand our pressing ecological crisis in light of Scripture. Although some readers may conclude that the authors lean too heavily on evolutionary perspectives, other readers may think their project remains too Pauline. Notwithstanding these potential concerns, Greening Paul will prove to be a stimulating conversation partner for all involved.

PRESIAN BURROUGHS DUKE DIVINITY SCHOOL DURHAM, NORTH CAROLINA

Creation Untamed: The Bible, God, and Natural Disasters by Terence Fretheim Baker Academic, Grand Rapids, 2010. 160 pp. $19.99. ISBN 978-0-8010-3893-8.

RECORD FLOODS AND snowstorms, intense hurricanes, severe drought, devastating earthquakes, melting ice caps—these events raise urgent questions for people of faith: Why does God allow such tragedies to happen? How do we understand God’s interaction with the forces of nature and human suffering that often results when nature’s fury strikes? How might the varied traditions of the Bible help us respond to experiences of tragedy and suffering? Terence Fretheim takes up these very practical and theological questions in Creation Untamed. Fretheim begins in Gen 1-2, in which God created the world as “good,” not perfect, and the possibility of human suffering within a dynamic creation as part of that goodness. The second chapter studies the flood story of Gen 6–9 as a disaster made more intense by human sin and God’s judgment on human violence. In ch. 3, Fretheim argues that the book of Job urges humans to press vigorously for answers to questions of why disasters happen, even as the book finally recognizes that some mystery will remain. Chapter 4 examines the wide variety of biblical responses to human suffering, and ch. 5 considers the important role of prayer (the prayers of Moses, lament, and intercession) in relation to God, humans, and disasters.

The book originated as lectures given at two seminaries for students and pastors, and retains the accessible and engaging qualities of a skilled lecturer and teacher, qualities for which Fretheim is well known. He wisely acknowledges that we cannot easily discern God’s ways with precision in individual natural disasters (as some religious types tried to do in the case of Hurricane Katrina or the earthquake in Haiti). At the same time, God is not aloof, but deeply involved in situations of disaster and suffering, whether in judgment, divine grief, or in working for something good that may arise out of great tragedy. Along with affirming such deep interaction with the world, God’s options may also be limited by prior divine commitments or by the accumulated effects of human sin over time. This set of essays would form an excellent resource for a study group of pastors, seminarians, or lay people who want to follow a reliable and engaging guide into the depth and complexity of the biblical witness of how God works in the world, relates to humans, and interacts with the harsh realities of suffering and disaster.

DENNIS OLSON PRINCETON THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY PRINCETON, NEW JERSEY

Be Very Afraid: The Cultural Response to Terror, Pandemics, Environmental Devastation, Nuclear Annihilation, and Other Threats by Robert Wuthnow Oxford University Press, New York, 2010. 294 pp. $29.95. ISBN 978-0-19-973087-2.

FROM THE PEN OF PROLIFIC Princeton University sociologist Robert Wuthnow comes another learned volume. The bulk of the book (chs. 2–8) is a perceptive description of life in a nuclear-haunted world, in a world of weapons of mass destruction, in a world of pandemics, and in a warming world. For those of us who remember many of the events recounted—“duck and cover” drills in the 1960s, the record-setting hot summer of 1988, the spring 2003 outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS)—the book reads like an all-toofamiliar anthology of bad dreams. Wuthnow’s question is this: With our now constant sense of vulnerability and threat, what effect has this awareness had on us, and how might

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we act more intelligently? He claims that “The contemporary perils that threaten to kill hundreds of millions of people have been a strong motivating force for action” (p. 206). He further argues that our responses to peril are more than merely technocratic or political in nature; they are, rather, “driven by the need to make sense of our very humanity” (p. 2). We are meaning-making creatures who tell stories not only to provide order to events, but also to help solve problems and face the fragility of our own lives. This search for meaning via narrative is central to our various responses to peril. So far so good. In his concluding chapter, Wuthnow addresses how we might act more intelligently, given the reality of peril. He notes that an awareness of fragility and vulnerability can be a powerful incentive for action, and, in fact, much action has been taken in response to previous threats, e.g., the founding of the Atomic Energy Commission and the Centers for Disease Control. But, as he admits, there is considerable mistrust of these organizations. In addition to noting that “the bias for action in face of potential danger carries costs . . . as well as benefits” (p. 222), what advice might Wuthnow have? I wish for more guidance, prudential as well as moral, for living amidst the perils. He hints at the comfort of religion, but does not go very far with it. What words of wisdom might Wuthnow have for how best to live in a perilous world? Perhaps this is asking that he write a different book. As an insightful exposition of the perilous times in which we live, Be Very Afraid is a very fine book.

STEVE BOUMA-PREDIGER HOPE COLLEGE HOLLAND, MICHIGAN

The Bible and Ecology: Rediscovering the Community of Creation by Richard Bauckham Baylor University Press, Waco, 2010. 226 pp. $25. 00. ISBN 978-1-60258-310-8.

RICHARD BAUCKHAM’S MAIN point appears in the subtitle: all of creation constitutes an interdependent community in mutual relationship under the sovereignty of God. Much of the discussion involves exegesis of Gen 1 and 2, but other texts provide a welcome and more complete picture (Job 38–41, Pss 104, 148; Isa 11:6–9; 34–35), including

OCTOBER 2011

some NT ones (Matt 6:25–33; Rom 8:18–23; Col 1:15–20; John 1). Bauckham insightfully delineates the meaning of human dominion as stewardship within creation (Gen 1:26, 28). After assessing some major objections to the language, he argues that dominion need not signify “domination and exploitation” (p. 2), and that stewardship remains a compelling definition (and limitation) of humanity’s role, that is, “care and service” (p. 2). Similarly, “subduing” the land (Gen 1:28) is not violence but the struggle necessary for agriculture (p. 18), and multiplying and filling the land is simply “behaving like other species” (p. 19). Although there are similarities to some secular views of nature as community (e.g., Aldo Leopold), and some that Bauckham sees as “pantheistic” (e.g., Thomas Berry), the Bible pictures “a theocentric community of creatures” (p. 88, italics his). Some texts—especially Job—put us “in our place,” and suggest an “appreciation of wild nature” and wilderness (p. 114) as inherently good and valuable, even if not always benign to humans. Moreover, just as creation can praise God (Ps 148), so it can mourn human immorality with ecological consequences (e.g., drought; Hos 4:1–3, 23–28; Jer 12:4; Rom 8:18–23; there are also several allusions to climate change). The final chapter, “From Alpha to Omega,” reflects Bauckham’s scope, which is both cosmic and canonical, tying creation’s story together in “the biblical meta-narrative” that constitutes an “eco-narrative,” in which a new creation will appear as an “ecotopia.” One problem with the book is the redundancy that results from returning to aspects of Gen 1 and 2 repeatedly, although the varying perspectives enrich our understanding. Sometimes Bauckham seems bent on imposing his own ideology, e.g., vegetarianism versus violence against animals—something that even God failed to support (Gen 9:1–7; pp. 24, 122–25)! One may also ask if Bauckham has imported a Christian eschatology into the HB at places where it is not evident (pp. 25–26, 115, 124), and how such eschatology relates to contemporary cosmology. Will wolves really become vegetarians, and how would an “ecotopia” correspond to a cosmic “big crunch”? Despite these minor shortcomings, the book would be stimulating for preachers and fruitful for Bible study groups.

THOMAS W. MANN RETIRED PROF. OF HEBREW BIBLE & PARISH MIN. WINSTON SALEM, NORTH CAROLINA

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Climate Justice: Ethics, Energy, and Public Policy by James Martin-Schramm Fortress, Minneapolis, 2010. 232 pp. $20.00. ISBN 978-08006-6362-9.

THE TOPIC OF CLIMATE change seems nearly ubiquitous these days, from news reports that the general public is skeptical of climate change to scientific evidence of its negative environmental effects. While there are many recent books on climate change, only a few address this issue in any depth from a Christian perspective. For example, Christianity, Climate Change, and Sustainable Living by Spencer, White, and Vroblesky (Hendrikson, 2009) is admirable for its clear presentation of the science and in-depth attention to the biblical and theological issues, but it does not dive very deeply into the nitty-gritty of policy. Detailed analysis of energy and climate policy informed by a clear Christian ethical framework is the signal contribution of James Martin-Schramm’s new book. It focuses on conventional and alternative energy options (chs. 2–3) and international and United States’ climate policy (chs. 4–5). These sections of the book are framed by a succinct yet informed discussion of ethics (ch. 1) and an illuminating case study of greenhouse gas reductions at Martin-Schramm’s own academic institution (ch. 6). His main argument is that an ethic of ecological justice—involving the four moral norms of sustainability, sufficiency, participation, and solidarity— “addresses human-caused problems that threaten both human and natural communities and considers both human and natural communities to be ethically important” (p. 26). Climate Justice is well-written and clear, with many helpful charts, graphs, and figures. It is extensively footnoted and includes a helpful glossary of terms. The book offers thorough and fair assessments of the various energy and climate options, with reasoned arguments for why some policies are better than others. It shows detailed familiarity with the specific issues and gives explicit attention to various ethical criteria and guidelines. Indeed, one of the strengths of the book is that the four moral norms are fleshed out into twelve energy policy guidelines for assessing various energy policy options and fourteen ethical criteria for evaluating climate policy proposals. Many authors writing on

OCTOBER 2011

this issue stay in the realm of general ethical principles. Martin-Schramm self-consciously follows the path laid down by the Eco-Justice Program of the U.S. National Council of Churches to develop the middle-level moral maxims needed to apply his ethical norms to the concrete issues of energy and climate change policy. In short, this is a most helpful book on understanding and evaluating climate justice.

STEVE BOUMA-PREDIGER HOPE COLLEGE HOLLAND, MICHIGAN

Old Testament Theology, Vol. 3: Israel’s Life by John Goldingay InterVarsity Academic, Downer’s Grove, Ill., 2009. 912 pp. $50.00 (cloth). ISBN 978-0-8308-2563-9.

AFTER PREVIOUS BOOKS subtitled Israel’s Gospel (2003) and Israel’s Faith (891 pages, 2006), John Goldingay of Fuller Seminary completes his Old Testament Theology project with this volume. The object of the study is “Israel’s life: not the life Israel actually lived (which is also often critiqued) but the life the First Testament reckons Israel should/could live or should/could have lived” (p. 13). The book falls into three parts: “Living with God” (Submission and Celebration, Prayer and Thanksgiving); “Living with One Another” (Family and Community, City and Nation); and “Living with Ourselves” (Spirituality and Character, Leaders and Servants). Goldingay is above all a theologian, always honing in on the God question. Thus, the first part begins with sections on “Obeying YHWH,” “Revering YHWH,” “Trusting YHWH,” “Serving YHWH,” and the like. While thorough in scope, the presentations are enlivened by fresh turns of phrase (Isaac loves “Rebekah, Esau and stew” [p. 67]), and humor (“But God is not our buddy. There is nothing egalitarian about our relationship with God. God is— well, God. Come on” [p.129]). I found especially insightful the discussions of “Relating to Life and Death” and “Relating to Time and Stuff,” both under the heading of “Spirituality and Character.” Goldingay is convinced that Christians ignore the potentially invigorating connections between the “First Testament” and our theology and lives: “It is not surprising that the secular world does so. It is grievous that the church does so” (p. 837).

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Judging from the author index, Goldingay’s favorite theologians are the good company of Barth and Brueggemann, Heschel and Hauerwas, Milgrom and Miller. Going through this volume was like sitting in on lectures from a well-informed, wise, and witty lover of the OT. Goldingay’s positions might be described as evangelically secular, reflecting the southern California setting where the work was produced, “where the sun shines in the winter and where every band comes to play” (p. 11). He concludes with a suggested Decalogue for the twentyfirst century. Here are some samples: “Praise God at dusk and at dawn. Relax and sleep for the time in between. Grow things to eat . . . . Keep out of department stores and shopping malls (beware the Internet, too). . . . On Thursdays, pray laments for people who are suffering….” (p. 839). I enjoyed the book, learned from it, and recommend it.

JAMES LIMBURG, PROFESSOR EMERITUS LUTHER SEMINARY ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA

Studying the New Testament: A Fortress Introduction by Bruce Chilton and Deirdre Good Fortress, Minneapolis, 2011. 174 pp. $15.00. ISBN 978-08006-9735-8.

AS BRUCE CHILTON AND Deirdre Good state in their preface, this book represents a substantial rewriting of their earlier volume, Beginning New Testament Study (SPCK, 1986). Chilton, the Bernard Iddings Bell Professor of Religion at Bard College, and Good, Professor of New Testament at General Theological Seminary, have taken on two challenges of writing something more than a traditional introduction to the NT: to make the reader familiar not only with the specifics of its twenty-seven books, but also with the “cumulative impact of its message” and “to move beyond the phase of starting study into study itself ” (pp. 1–3). The introductory material includes a very brief overview of basic critical methods, leaning heavily on the traditional historical-critical package. A chapter on dictionaries, translations, and commentaries includes a welcome section on reliable websites. Each chapter throughout the text includes recommended bibliographies, explanatory text boxes and tables, maps, and illustrations (regrettably not in

color, so they are sometimes hard to decipher). An excellent glossary is included at the end for easy reference. The arrangement of the book also facilitates the authors’ aims by providing brief analyses of individual books and an overview of the whole. After the introductory material, the book is divided into four chapters: “Jesus and His Social World”; “Paul and His Letters”; “The Gospels”; and “Catholic and Apocalyptic Writings.” All chapters have exercises that are designed for critical study of the text. There is also an accompanying website for students and teachers. The authors point out many aspects of NT study critical for beginners: for example, the simple fact that “[a]ll translation is interpretation” (p. 10). Many arguments, like the connection between the catholic and apocalyptic writings (pp. 151–156), are ingenious and well-supported from the evidence. Unfortunately, all too often, conclusions that are either speculative or contentious are presented as fact. One of the most egregious examples occurs in the chapter, “Gospels Before the Gospels.” While there is no question that an oral tradition of Jesus’ teachings pre-existed both the Gospels and the Epistles, the claim that Mary Magdalene is the “single most important conduit of stories concerning Jesus’ exorcisms” (p. 101) is entirely unsupported by the slim evidence given. Similar instances detract from the book’s overall usefulness, particularly for a critically naïve reader.

GAIL P. C. STREETE RHODES COLLEGE MEMPHIS, TENNESSEE

The Trial Narratives: Conflict, Power, and Identity in the New Testament by Matthew L. Skinner Westminster John Knox, Louisville, 2010. 224 pp. $34.95. ISBN 978-0-664-23032-6.

MANY INTERPRETERS HAVE focused on the trial narratives in the NT from the perspectives of history, theology, and apologetics. Recognizing the dramatic nature of these trial scenes, Matthew Skinner contends that the New Testament narratives offer more nuanced reflections [than sweeping, often inaccurate generalizations] on how Jesus and his gospel ‘fit’ within the sociopolitical landscape of the ancient world. (p. vii)

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After a helpful introductory chapter that orients readers to the nature, method, and contents of the book, Skinner presents an overview of “trials in ancient life and literature.” The next four chapters each focus on one of the four canonical Gospels and treat the various Gospel accounts of Jesus’ trial. Subsequent chapters cover the trials in Jerusalem (Acts 4–8), the trials in Philippi and Thessalonica (Acts 16–17), and Paul on trial (Acts 21–28). A brief final chapter summarizes the conclusions of the foregoing chapters and reflects on the sociopolitical place of Christians in the ancient world. At the outset, Skinner summarizes his own work succinctly: By analyzing each trial in light of its place within a larger narrative, in light of the sociopolitical situation in which the trial is set, and in light of the action that occurs in the forensic drama, we discover that the trials do more than depict guiltless defendants faithfully facing the jurisdiction of presiding authorities. They also present the matter conversely: these defendants and the gospel message they represent issue their own claims or judgments upon those authorities and, by extension, upon the reigning values that those authorities represent and pursue. (pp. 2–3) Skinner makes his case well. He analyzes and comments on the various NT trial scenes in a manner that keeps the overall work from becoming unduly repetitive. In studying the materials that he has identified as trial scenes, Skinner employs a judicious combination of predominantly narrative analysis and a modicum of historical-critical method. This mixture of methods keeps the literary dimensions of the study from flying off into creative fantasy by introducing a healthy dose of historical materials, and it keeps the historical-critical work from pressing the text of the NT into a kind of flat history through the use of narrative analysis. On the whole, this book makes a solid contribution to NT studies. It will find the largest and most appropriate audience among seminarians, graduate students, and pastors, though NT experts will be rewarded by reading the work.

MARION L. SOARDS LOUISVILLE PRESBYTERIAN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY LOUISVILLE, KENTUCKY

OCTOBER 2011

Jesus and Marginal Women: The Gospel of Matthew in Social-Scientific Perspective by Stuart L. Love James Clarke & Co., Cambridge, 2009. 259 pp. $42.50 (cloth). ISBN 978-0-227-17316-9.

THIS BOOK SEEKS “to understand the topic of gender in Matthew not in isolation but in association with the polity, economics, religion, education, and kinship ties of Palestinian society of the first century as they in turn were informed and governed by Rome and the values and socio/political ideology of Greco-Roman society” (p. 1). Stuart Love utilizes significant social-scientific models— honor/shame, healing in non-Western societies, taxonomy of illness, patron/client, rites of passage—to illuminate the role of women within Matthew’s Gospel and within Matthew’s own community. Love focuses on four Matthean accounts: the hemorrhaging woman and the ruler’s daughter (9: 9–26), the Canaanite woman and her daughter (15: 21–28), the woman who anoints Jesus (26:1–16), and the women at the cross and tomb (27:55–61; 28:1–10). He draws nuanced conclusions from this study. Vis-à-vis those who view Matthew’s community in “egalitarian” terms, Love portrays this community as “deeply surrounded and embedded in advanced agrarian norms” (p. 62), and thus within a patriarchal social structure. At the same time, he views the Matthean community as a “surrogate Christian household guided by alternative social and ideological criteria based on Matthew’s vision of Jesus’ mission” (p. 62). Love’s study is rich with stimulating exegetical insights. He highlights the radical social disparities between the hemorrhaging woman and the ruler’s daughter, illustrating the widely inclusive character of Jesus’ ministry to women. Love depicts the Canaanite woman as a “wise woman” among the “wise women” of Israelite history. He portrays the woman who anoints Jesus as an “unwitting prophet” whose “singular prophetic act” both prepares Jesus for burial and aligns her with the faithful prophets of Israel’s “little tradition” (p. 184). Love employs a “rites of passage” model to argue that the women at the cross and tomb are not a Matthean afterthought, but rather “supply the vital and indispensable tie” connecting the broken journey of Jesus’ male disciples as they move from “liminality” to “aggregation,” namely the new and cli-

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mactic task to which Jesus commissions them in 28:18–20 (pp. 217–18). Love appears to be exegetically confused, however, about the collective identity of “the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (e.g., pp. 126, 148), sometimes defining this category individualistically as “lost sheep” within “the house of Israel” (e.g., pp. 132, 135, 147). Love’s hermeneutical conclusions appear to derive predominantly from a pragmatic twenty-first-century “sociological perspective” (p. 236) rather than from his own carefully-argued Matthean exegesis.

DOROTHY JEAN WEAVER EASTERN MENNONITE SEMINARY HARRISONBURG, VIRGINIA

Methods for Matthew edited by Mark Allan Powell Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2009. 261 pp. $85.00 (cloth). ISBN 978-0-521-88808-0.

WITH THE SO-CALLED linguistic turn in Western philosophy, there is now a widely held view in humanities and social sciences that language constitutes reality. As the preface of this book points out, this new awareness of the constructed nature of reality came relatively late in academic biblical studies. Nonetheless, its impact is highly significant. It is not an overstatement to say that the discipline of biblical studies in the twenty-first century is going through a paradigm shift. The “classical” historicalcritical method is alive and well, but it has been seriously challenged by new interpretive approaches that grant the reader a significant role in the construal of the meaning of the text. This has led to a proliferation of introductory books on methods in biblical studies with varying degrees of clarity and depth. In that regard, Methods for Matthew is a welcome and unique contribution to methodological discussion in contemporary biblical scholarship. This book presents six different exegetical methods that are considered most relevant in current Matthean scholarship, and each of them is discussed by a scholar who has published extensively in the respective field: historical-critical method by Hagner and Young; literary approaches by Powell; feminist criticism by Wainwright; historical Jesus studies by Evans; social-scientific approaches by Malina; and postcolonial criticism by Segovia. Each chapter begins with a description of the theoretical principles and procedures and moves on to a dem-

onstration of its application to one of two select Matthean texts (8:5–13 and 27:57–28:15). The six methods are well selected. Because the Gospel of Matthew is always in the fore/background in each chapter, even the theoretical section avoids abstraction and generality and has a clear focus and a concrete dimension. The focus on only two Matthean passages has obvious advantages. However, since different passages are conducive to different exegetical methods, it might have been better if each scholar had been allowed to choose a Matthean passage that he or she considered illustrative for the chosen method. There is a fair amount of overlap between chapters, which demonstrates that boundaries among different methods are not always hard and fast. Overall, this book is an excellent introduction to exegetical methods as applied to Matthew.

EUGENE EUNG-CHUN PARK SAN FRANCISCO THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY SAN ANSELMO, CALIFORNIA

Keys to First Corinthians: Revisiting the Major Issues by Jerome Murphy-O’Connor Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2009. 307 pp. $99.00 (cloth). ISBN 978-0-19-956415-6.

ANYONE WHO HAS engaged in research on 1 Corinthians in recent years is aware of the important contributions made by Jerome Murphy-O’Connor. His sixteen articles on 1 Corinthians, published between 1976 and 1993, are conveniently reprinted here as a single volume. Murphy-O’Connor provides a postscript to each, detailing the responses of other scholars to his proposals and responding to criticisms. Readers are thus brought up to date with subsequent research and apprised of his current thinking. The articles are all technical and in many, there is extensive discussion of issues of Greek grammar and of textual variants. In other respects, the nature of the articles is varied. Some deal with the interpretation of small portions of text, while others present a wider interpretation of a longer passage or broader issue. Into the latter category fall most obviously “Freedom or the Ghetto (1 Corinthians 8:1–13; 10:23–11:1),” which explores the principles involved in Paul’s advice about food sacrificed to idols, and “Eucharist and Community in 1 Corinthians,” which deals with various aspects of

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1 Cor 11:17–34. Two articles address the interpretation of 1 Cor 11:2–16 and the issue of head-covering during prayer. The articles are thus centrally concerned with the intentions of Paul as an author and with his theology. However, there is one article that discusses an important aspect of the situation of the Corinthian church, and it has undoubtedly been the most influential in the volume. In “House Churches and the Eucharist,” Murphy-O’Connor draws on archaeological evidence from the villa of Anaploga to suggest that problems in the celebration of the Eucharist at Corinth arose from those believers of higher social status being accommodated by the host in the triclinium (dining room), while those of lower social status found themselves in the less desirable space of the atrium. The article has been reprinted elsewhere several times and feeds into the ongoing wider debate about the social status of the early Christians. There has been much recent discussion of whether it is likely that any early Christians would have been of sufficient status to own such a property. The postscript is perhaps here a little too narrowly focused, failing to draw out fully the significance of the article for this wider debate. Yet this is a minor criticism of what is overall an excellent volume.

STEPHEN CHESTER NORTH PARK THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY, CHICAGO, ILLINIOS

1, 2 & 3 John by Peter Rhea Jones Smith and Helwys, Macon, Ga., 2009. 311 pp. $50.00 (cloth). ISBN 978-1-57312-086-9.

THIS COMMENTARY, by Peter Rhea Jones, who teaches at the McAfee School of Theology of Mercer University, exhibits many of the features that are becoming identifying characteristics of the Smyth and Helwys Bible Commentaries. Along with the text, some pages include brief summaries that are virtual feasts of rich information. This volume on the Johannine Epistles includes impressive small reprints of pieces of art and concise summaries of especially relevant information (e.g., the rundown of passages that describe a number of major themes of the discussion, such as sin in the Fourth Gospel). At times, however, these overly “busy” pages seem to get in the way of absorbing

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and reflecting the essential thought of the commentary itself. The subparts of Part 1 of the book (entitled “Orientation on John”) are labeled correspondingly: “God Is Light,” “God Is Righteous,” and “God Is Love.” The central section, “God is Love,” is divided into two subsections: exhortation to love and the importance of believing in Jesus and Christ, Son of God, 1 John 5:1–12. An epilogue is entitled “Celebration of Certitude,” 1 John 5:13–21. Part 2, “Orientation to 2 and 3 John,” includes sections on each of these two epistles. The volume is accompanied by a CD, which provides a number of valuable research tools. The effectiveness of the book is strengthened by Jones’ use of contemporary references for illustrative purposes, for example, John Westerhoff ’s proposal that “[t]he church needs three generations . . . a generation with a memory, a generation with a commitment to action, and a generation with a vision” (p. 79). The use of other contemporary references for illustrative purposes includes the Godfather film series to demonstrate the “Dark Vision of Prevailing Evil” as an insight into 1 John 5:19 and Leslie Weatherhead’s story of his youth as an example of 1 John 3:22. Jones summarizes his approach to the Epistles of John and its value for preaching as he concludes his discussion of 1 John 1:1–14: in this Johannine model of witnessing announcement, we find a model of homiletics that questions preaching that is not directed toward the Christ event, that invites passion in preaching, that has something to offer (eternal life, fellowship with God, meaningful community), that bears witness to things heard and seen and touched, that knows a rather unselfish satisfaction.” (p. 28) I commend Jones for his use of gender-inclusive language—a practice that merits widespread use. Of course, no book is without shortcomings. Sometimes Jones’ illustrations seem overly simplified (e.g., the Betjeman story and verse on p. 131). Other ideas seem strange or at least terribly hypothetical, such as his suggestion that 1 John 2:12–14 might “reflect or outline a sermon or lesson” (p. 73). At times, it seems that his attention to clarity for the reader alters the original content of the passage, as when Jones speaks of believers loving one another: “It is not too much to say that by the

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epistemology of faith the apostolic community ‘knew’ in the sending” (p. 188). Scattered throughout the book are pithy summaries and statements worthy of mention. One notable example is Jones’ statement, “Jesus embodies the fully realized human, inviting us to become ourselves, scars and all” (p. 172). In general, I find this commentary to be admirably recommendable, and believe it to be among the best of those with which I am familiar.

ROBERT KYSAR, Professor Emeritus CANDLER SCHOOL OF THEOLOGY EMORY UNIVERSITY ATLANTA, GEORGIA

Thinking with the Church: Essays in Historical Theology by B. A. Gerrish Eerdmans, Grand Rapids, 2010. 287 pp. $25.00. ISBN 978-

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more or less explicitly by surveying a broad terrain of German- and English-speaking theology on such themes as revelation, faith and morals, the Calvinist tradition, atonement, and the Eucharist and the grace of Christ. Readers familiar with Gerrish’s work will not be surprised to find heavy doses of Calvin and Schleiermacher, but many will also enjoy several essays on the Princeton theologian Charles Hodge and his engagement with the Calvinist tradition in a nineteenth-century American context. Each of the essays offers fresh new insights to the careful reader, whether theologian, historian, pastor, or seminarian. Gerrish invites readers to engage these diverse figures in the immensely rewarding work of thinking critically with the church, both to appropriate their best insights and to carry on in our own time and place their task (and ours) of faith seeking understanding, not as apes but as disciples.

0-8028-6452-9.

IN HIS MOST RECENT collection of essays (three of which are published here for the first time), B. A. Gerrish continues to set the standard for the discipline of historical theology. Combining the historian’s attention to context and development with the systematician’s concern for the appropriateness and relevance of Christian claims in the present, Gerrish offers twelve essays on such diverse figures as J. G. Fichte, Charles Hodge, and, of course, John Calvin and Friedrich Schleiermacher. This is the latest of an impressive list of publications urging theologians and pastors to do the necessary and highly rewarding work of thinking critically with the church. In a particularly illuminating reference to Calvin’s understanding of tradition, Gerrish summarizes the thesis of the entire collection in a way that is particularly instructive for anyone wishing to delve into the riches of the Christian tradition in order to speak meaningfully and faithfully to their own time and place. Quoting Calvin, “our constant endeavor, day and night, is to form in the manner we think will be best whatever is faithfully handed on by us.” And perhaps even more illuminating is a reference immediately following this quotation: “as [Calvin] sometimes puts it less technically, there is a difference between a disciple and an ape” (p. 122). As Gerrish demonstrates in each essay, the work of historical theology is more than simply descriptive; it is itself constructive of the tradition it hands over. Each of the essays assumes this task

BRENT A. R. HEGE BUTLER UNIVERSITY INDIANAPOLIS, INIANA

The Judaizing Calvin: Sixteenth-Century Debates over the Messianic Psalms by G. Sujin Pak Oxford University Press, New York, 2010. 216 pp. $65.00 (cloth). ISBN 978-0-19-537192-5.

THE STRIKING TITLE OF this book is taken from a polemical treatise published three decades after Calvin’s death by Lutheran theologian Aegidius Hunnius. Hunnius argued that Calvin was guilty of interpreting the OT in a way that undermined Christian truth. Calvin’s interpretation of eight “messianic” psalms (Pss 2, 8, 16, 22, 45, 72, 110, and 118) figured prominently in Hunnius’ critique. Sujin Pak studies the exegesis of these psalms by Martin Luther, Martin Bucer, John Calvin, and by the lesser known Hunnius and his Reformed opponent, David Pareus. Pak argues that Hunnius was correct in understanding that Calvin had departed from the established Christian exegetical tradition. This tradition maintained that these psalms were literal prophecies of Christ’s incarnation, suffering, crucifixion, resurrection, exaltation, and future reign and that they taught central Christian truths, including the two natures of Christ and the doctrine of the Trinity. Luther agreed with the earlier tradition that

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these psalms were direct prophecies of Christ. His exegesis was also characterized by harsh traditional rhetoric that presented the Jews as enemies of Christ. Bucer, while moving beyond Luther in some ways, retained the traditional view that these psalms directly taught the two natures of Christ and the Trinity. Calvin departed from this tradition in emphasizing that the psalms were literally about David, and ought not be read as direct prophecies of Christ’s life nor as instruction about the two natures of Christ or the Trinity. Calvin’s exegesis also lacked the harsh anti-Jewish rhetoric of earlier interpreters, and his use of rabbinic interpretation was constructive and nuanced. Pak concludes that, while she does not believe that Calvin should be regarded as “modern” in his approach, his interpretations did “foreshadow” some emphases that were later adopted by modern interpreters. This thoroughly researched and carefully argued book is free from technical jargon, and its lucid style certainly would have appealed to Calvin. Its audience should extend beyond those who have an academic interest in sixteenth-century theology, exegesis, and polemics. It should be of interest to those who want to explore the link between biblical exegesis and confessional identity and to those who are interested in the polemical use of the Bible in the context of Jewish-Christian relations. The book will benefit anyone who wishes to understand how those on whose shoulders we stand wrestled with the perennial issue of how the OT is to be understood and applied in the life of the church.

DAVID L. PUCKETT THE SOUTHERN BAPTIST THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY LOUISVILLE, KENTUCKY

Finding Language and Imagery by Jennifer L. Lord Fortress, Minneapolis, 2010. 93 pp. $ 12.00. IBSN 97808006-6353-7.

JENNIFER L. LORD engages the intricacies of language and imagery through detailed guidance for preachers in their continuous process of learning about this demanding vocation. Throughout this book, Lord chooses the resurrection story as the “resurrection speech” that encapsulates the whole task of preaching, a framework from which one

can approach and make sense of the task. She develops the idea of the sermon as communication, then explains how this communication act is intricately connected to communication theories, and how these theories are connected to forms, reasoning, and ways of preaching. Lord engages important aspects of the sermon process: interpreting, imagining, writing, preparing, editing, and planning with words and imagery. She offers her own beautiful sermon to exemplify what she is proposing, and addresses a vast number of issues in preaching that are not often recognized. I am delighted that she engages inclusive language, something that is completely dismissed in some books on preaching. However, a couple of issues troubled me. The very complex theories of communication she describes are given very little space for explanation. Lord is a brilliant thinker, sharply describing each of these theories and relating them to various forms of preaching. However, even if one consults the chart at the end of the book, due to the short accounts of these theories, learning can be compromised by oversimplification. The other problem is pedagogical. She provides one well-structured approach to sermon preparation that has to do with one way of learning and engaging materials and methods. This approach can be of great help to many. However, there are many other, culturally different, learning approaches to preaching, listening styles, sermon preparation, time of deliverance, use of space, etc. We must be aware that there are very different learning possibilities and cultural assessments to the sermonic task. Thus, issues of sentimentality, humor, tone, and grammar can entail a very different way of expanding, learning, and wrestling with sermonic language and imagery. Nonetheless, Lord’s book is a call to pay attention to things that make for good and responsible sermons. One can surely learn a great amount in this book. If one were to take her work to class, and I certainly would, one could explore plural ways to engage different languages and imageries from the experiences of diverse ethnic, cultural, and racial communities.

CLÁUDIO CARVALHAES LOUISVILLE PRESBYTERIAN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY LOUISVILLE, KENTUCKY

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Desiring the Kingdom: Worship, Worldview, and Cultural Formation James K. A. Smith Baker Academic, Grand Rapids, 2009. 238 pp. $21.99. ISBN 978-0-8010-3577-7.

IN THE FIRST OF A proposed three-volume series on cultural literacy, James K. A. Smith challenges epistemological assumptions that privilege cognitive theological arguments and doctrinal discourse over the formative nature of liturgical praxis in the life of the church. In a wide-ranging essay, Smith relentlessly pursues his case for broad notions of Christian education that are grounded in the embodied experience of worship. Smith builds on the work of Charles Taylor in order to press the case for the church to cultivate “social imaginaries”: “Liturgies aim our love to different ends precisely by training our hearts through our bodies” (p. 25). In his analysis, Smith develops a helpful critique of the persuasive way that we are formed and influenced by our participation in the “secular liturgies” of the mall, sports events, and universities. In these arenas, Smith points to the telos that is embedded in each and the carefully constructed role that desire plays in forming the participants. By way of contrast, Smith looks at elements in the order of worship and sketches out ways in which they provide different formative experiences. Christian practices work on a “fundamentally precognitive, affective level” (p. 191). In making this claim, Smith is careful to avoid charges of devaluing the place of cognitive reflection. Instead, he seeks to level the playing field by asserting the primary character of embodied learning while maintaining an important place for rational reflection. The book offers a critique of worship that is primarily didactic and overly concerned with the transmission of information, but Smith’s support for what he calls “historical worship” fails to acknowledge the cultural influences that shape all of worship. He also does not attend to issues of power: who gets to identify what constitutes historical worship? Smith’s discussions of the role of worship in cultivating a social imagination are particularly helpful. They call the church to work to counter the epistemological claims and demands that are embedded in the secular liturgies that surround us.

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This is an important book that deserves attention particularly from Smith’s intended audience: evangelicals who may be leery of liturgical language and ritual analysis. Pastors and Christian educators alike will benefit from a careful study of this monograph and readers will look forward to the upcoming volumes that promise to expand on this work.

PAUL GALBREATH UNION PRESBYTERIAN SEMINARY RICHMOND, VIRGINIA

A Peaceable Psychology: Christian Therapy in a World of Many Cultures by Alvin Dueck and Kevin Reimer Brazos, Grand Rapids, 2009. 288 pp. $24.99. ISBN 978-158743-105-0.

QUAKER PREACHER AND artist Edward Hicks’ painting The Peaceable Kingdom conveys a coterie of animals in a tranquil moment. Lions and lambs, children and cougars, rams and wolves, bears and leopards lounge together on a bucolic landscape. In a similarly bold statement, Alvin Dueck and Kevin Reimer offer a “peaceable psychology” that is “comfortable with multiple approaches, including hermeneutic and symbolically sensitive approaches” (p. 191). They proceed with noteworthy attention that honors the particularity of a client’s (counselee’s) religious culture, the communal dimensions of a client’s religion, the value of speaking in the client’s “mother tongue,” and a commitment to peace and justice. Dueck and Reimer reinforce the “inextricable link between culture, religion, and language” (p. 158). The peaceable psychologist is willing to lay down her/his power so that others, particularly clients, can be empowered. While Dueck and Reimer write for the field of psychology, their primary conversation partner seems to be the American Psychological Association. Western psychologies have been used to promote American empire, to foster superiority of Western therapeutic techniques over indigenous approaches to therapy, and to encourage a trade language over “mother tongues.” All of these realities have subdued marginal voices and assumed a politics of sameness. “Psychologists have been involved in interrogations in Guantanamo and Iraq that have brought down international condemnation. Then there is that silent form of violence that occurs when American psychology exports its par-

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adigms uncritically, thereby displacing local psychologies” (p. 218). Dueck and Reimer present a “politics of difference” in their multilingual psychology. The foundation of a Christian approach to this peaceable psychology is based on the person of Jesus Christ. The Christian message is “cooked and presented within the calabashes of culture” (p. 224). The book ends too quickly on this tantalizing note and leaves the reader desirous of recipes for such an earthly banquet. The content of this book is highly commendable to those in counseling, ministry, and therapeutic training. Unfortunately, the format is the greatest hindrance to the flow of material. A Peaceable Psychology is a collection of previously written essays and reads as such. The chapters lack a fluidity among themselves that hinder the currents of content. In Hicks’ painting, The Peaceable Kingdom, a viewer would hope that the presence of Christ would keep the cougar from pouncing on the child whose hand is extended, or restrain the wolf from eating the young girl. Many who are minorities, survivors of violence, or formerly colonized people would be reluctant to give up hard-earned power, and Dueck and Reimer do not ask them to do this. However, more examples, cases, and “steps toward peace” that address issues of sinfulness and greed and their antidotes, would embolden cautious readers to trust the vision that the authors develop with passion and faithfulness.

JEANNE STEVENSON-MOESSNER PERKINS SCHOOL OF THEOLOGY DALLAS, TEXAS

Christmas: Festival of Incarnation by Donald Heinz Fortress, Minneapolis, 2010. 274 pp. $25.00. ISBN 978-08006-9733-4.

THIS BOOK WAS A fascinating read in the weeks before Christmas. Fortress calls it a “cultural history,” and indeed it is that, but it is also sophisticated theological analysis, biblical exegesis, liturgical and musical commentary, and social critique. Donald Heinz is Professor of Religious Studies at California State University, Chico. His main thesis is that “this evolution of a religious festival displays the risky course of Incarnation in the world” (p. 124).

The art, music, pageantry, and popular forms that developed around the incarnation do not represent a fall from some “golden age,” but rather take seriously the material world in which God has come to engage us. Christmas has been celebrated not only as the church’s holy day, but also in sometimes heartfelt ways by ordinary people who do not consult theologians. Here, one may discern an enormously important issue that requires more attention: how can we affirm and honor popular religious culture while also guarding the integrity of the church’s public confession? Heinz describes customs both secular and religious, from the origins of gift-giving to Santa Claus to commercialized holiday. His analysis of how Protestantism contributed to the secularization of Christmas is provocative. Against the preReformation Christmas, which tended to be marked by celebratory excess, the Puritans outlawed Christmas altogether. The holy day thus suppressed, Christmas resurfaced in secular forms, and Heinz asks whether “The ironical contribution of Protestantism to the celebration of Christmas was to help empty holiday of any residual holy day” (p. 83). As Christmas gained ground culturally, it began to be taken over by consumer capitalism. Heinz sees a point of tension between the church’s faith and consumerism, which the church has challenged only superficially. The early church’s affirmation of the Lordship of Christ delegitimized the claims of Caesar, but “[c]apitalism’s close embrace of Christmas goes unnoticed because of the subterfuge of the separation of church and state, the labeling of all challenges to capitalist world domination as dangerously ‘fundamentalist’ (or earlier, ‘Communist’), and the fencing of economic life from religious inspection” (p. 226). Heinz calls for the church to discover, in its own past, vital elements essential for the kairos, but missing from the contemporary menu, such as classical liturgy. “To participate in a Christmas Eucharist is to venture inside God’s imagination” (p. 231). While charming, this book is also profound, suggesting urgent questions that the church cannot afford to ignore.

RONALD P. BYARS, Professor Emeritus UNION PRESBYTERIAN SEMINARY RICHMOND, VIRGINIA

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Preaching Master Class: Selections from Will Willimon’s Five-Minute Preaching Workshop edited by Noel Snyder Cascade, Eugene, Ore., 2010. 125 pp. $17.00. ISBN 978-160608-915-6.

FEW PEOPLE HAVE GIVEN as much thought to the art and craft of preaching as Will Willimon. As a practitioner of preaching, and now as a bishop with preachers under his care, Willimon knows the central importance of the preaching event. But Preaching Master Class is not a book on the technique of preaching. Instead, it is a compilation of essays that address a wide range of issues confronting those who would dare stand behind a pulpit. These essays first appeared in the quarterly Pulpit Resource, a lectionary-based journal that seeks to stoke the homiletical imagination. In addition to the comments on the lectionary texts, Willimon included a reflection on the practice of preaching, a “five minute preaching workshop.” Noel Snyder has taken thirty-four of those essays and grouped them into categories like “Special Issues in Preaching,” “Preaching and the Text,” and “Preaching, the Church, and the World.” The presumption of the book is that preaching is akin to a craft in which an apprentice draws from the wisdom of a skilled artisan, on the way to developing his or her own style. Willimon knows there are limits to what can be taught in a book: “As with any art, preaching is an alloy of gifts and training, natural inclinations and cultivated dispositions” (p. 22). All of us bring our own “natural inclinations” to the preaching task, and so in these essays, Willimon’s focus is on our “cultivated dispositions,” e.g., how we approach the text, getting out of the way of the text, the use of humor, and the pros and cons of topical preaching and lectionary preaching. Willimon has read all the experts in the field of preaching, and draws from their wisdom. These essays, however, do not have the feel of an expert telling the rest of us how to preach. Instead, they have the feel of a preacher who is absolutely persuaded of the importance of preaching, entering into a conversation with those who are engaged in the same holy work. Any preacher, no matter how long they have been at it, will find this a worthy conversation. Reading the book may not turn us

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into better preachers, but it will make us want to become better preachers, which Willimon would likely count as a victory.

EDWARD A. MCLEOD, JR. FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH RALEIGH, NORTH CAROLINA

Preaching Romans: Proclaiming God's Saving Grace by Frank J. Matera Paulist, Collegeville, Minn., 2010. 122 pp. $14.95. ISBN 9780-8146-3318-2.

FRANK MATERA TELLS HIS readers that he decided to write Preaching Romans after he had preached from Romans on sixteen consecutive Sundays. He explains that the exercise was personally enriching, and that his aim through this book is to provide encouragement and assistance to other preachers so that they too would choose and feel able to preach on texts from Romans, both on Sundays and on weekdays. Matera’s approach to providing this encouragement and assistance is twofold, and draws on his expertise as both a highly regarded scholar (he references his 2010 commentary on Romans in the Paideia Series, Baker) and a preacher active in parish ministry. On the one hand, with regard to the message of Romans, he provides a brief synopsis, outline, and thoughts on key themes in Romans, along with his own homilies and summaries of passages from Romans used in the Catholic Sunday lectionary (Year A), and the Catholic Weekday lectionary (I). On the other hand, with regard to the craft of preaching, Matera shares his understanding of the function of preaching, and his own thought process in constructing homilies of no more than five to seven minutes in length that are intended to persuade believers to “do what they already know they should do” (p. 4) and to point them to the Eucharist (in Catholic liturgy) that will always follow. Clearly, this book is most valuable for preachers who use the same lectionary and liturgy as Matera. For others, the lectionary references may well be confusing: no resources are provided to compare and contrast the Catholic Lectionaries with the Revised Common Lectionary. Additionally, the brevity of the homilies and their repeated connection to the Eucharist may well be disappointing to those accustomed to preaching fifteen to twenty

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