By Alan
S. Cajes, PhD[1]
One of the passages in the Bible that has
perturbed me as a Christian Catholic and as someone whose work involves
environmental management states: "Be fertile and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it. Have
dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, and all the living
things that move on the earth."[2]
When I was younger, this
passage is alright because I have been taught in school that “man” is the apex
of creation. As I gain more experience in undertaking environment-related
teaching and research tasks, however, this biblical decree started to trouble
me. Did God really command that we, human beings, subdue (to bring somebody/something under control,
especially by using force)[3] our planet and have dominion (authority to rule; control)[4] over the non-human forms of life? If yes, is this a
reason why we have the propensity to cause damage to our environment?
The usual answer that I get
from persons I asked about my concern is that we need to understand the context
of the passage and that the text should not be taken literally. This answer did
not put a closure to what has been my concern for quite some time – to
understand the meaning and implication of the biblical passage.
As it turned out, there are
others who find the passage problematic. Thomas Berry, in a paper that he read
at Harvard University said:
“The university can be considered as one of the four basic establishments that determine human life in its more significant functioning. These four are the government, the church, the university and the commercial-industrial corporation - the political, religious, intellectual and economic establishments… They all presume a radical discontinuity between the non-human and the human with all the rights given to the human to exploit the non-human.”[5]
Berry did not say that the Church committed an error because of its interpretation of Genesis 1:28. He also did not criticize the wording of the passage. He said that “the creation story in Genesis 1 is the story of the victory of the Heavenly Father God over the Mother Earth God. The first commandment, therefore, is ‘Thou shalt have no Mother Earth God.’”[6] This was Berry’s response to the questions asked by Daniel Spencer, who “was struggling to make sense of the Genesis creation accounts’ themes of human dominion and stewardship in light of my geological understandings of Earth’s origins and my concerns for how dominion interpreted as domination had contributed to massive ecological degradation.”[7]
In 1966, Lynn
White delivered a lecture entitled “The Historic Roots of Our Ecological Crisis”
at the American Association for the Advancement of Science. White
claimed that the roots of the ecological crisis could be linked to the
Judaeo-Christian theology, which separated humans from nature and then made
humans dominate nature. He said:
“Christianity
inherited from Judaism not only a concept of time as nonrepetitive and linear but
also a striking story of creation. By gradual stages a loving and all- powerful
God had created light and darkness, the heavenly bodies, the earth and all its
plants, animals, birds, and fishes. Finally, God had created Adam and, as an
afterthought, Eve to keep man from being lonely. Man named all the animals,
thus establishing his dominance over them. God planned all of this explicitly
for man's benefit and rule: no item in the physical creation had any purpose
save to serve man's purposes.”[8]
White pointed out
that modern Western science, which enabled humans to exploit nature, “was cast
in a matrix of Christian theology” and that the impetus for the “dynamism of
religious devotion” was “shaped by the Judeo-Christian dogma of creation.” He
said that the “implications of Christianity for the conquest of nature would
emerge more easily in the Western atmosphere… The Christian dogma of creation,
which is found in the first clause of all the Creeds, has another meaning for
our comprehension of today's ecologic crisis.”[9]
In 1972, Arnold Toynbee wrote “The Religious
Background of the Present Environmental Crisis’ stating that the solution to
the environmental problems is possible if humans revert from the Weltanschauung[10] of
monotheism to the Weltanschauung of pantheism, an older and universal world view.
He asserted that the present-day assault against nature is due to the influence
of a religious cause that gave rise to monotheism. He claimed that the command
to have dominion over other creatures in Genesis 1:28 allowed the directed
humans to exploit nature. In a 1973 article, he said:
This
doctrine is enunciated in one sentence in the Bible. “And God blessed them, and
God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and
subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the
air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.” (Genesis I, 28)…
Genesis I: 28 gave the license; Genesis III: 19 provided the incentive. In
1663, this read like a blessing on the wealth of Abraham in children and
livestock; in 1973, it reads like a license for the population explosion and
like both a license and an incentive for mechanization and pollution.”[11]
In 1975, John Passmore wrote “Attitudes
to Nature” saying that the predatory attitude against nature is present in the
writings of St. Paul. To Passmore, the Graeco-Christian arrogance became
Christianity’s official position until recent times. This attitude of Passmore
is based on his reading of Romans 8:21 “that the creation itself will be
liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of
the children of God (New International Version).” Passmore takes on the
position that Paul considers creation as merely an instrument for human
liberation.
A year before White’s classic paper, Pope
Paul VI promulgated Guadium et Spes (Joy and Hope"), the Pastoral
Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, on December 7, 1965. The
document stated:
“For
man, created to God's image, received a mandate to subject to himself the earth
and all it contains, and to govern the world with justice and holiness; a
mandate to relate himself and the totality of things to Him Who was to be
acknowledged as the Lord and Creator of all. Thus, by the subjection of all
things to man, the name of God would be wonderful in all the earth.”[12]
This declaration
did not sit well with some people, who were concerned about the anthropocentric
slant of this passage. Emeka
Obiezu expressed disappointment that “…the Second Vatican Council
continued this apparent arrogant and
dominion theme…that excludes any ecological concern.”[13] Joseph
Xavier was cautious: “It may not be an exaggeration to say that there is an ‘anthropological
concentration’ in Gaudium et Spes.”[14]
He explained, however, that this “anthropological orientation… is very
important for fundamental theology today.”[15] Thirty
years later, the same theme was noted by Larry Rasmussen in John Paul II’s
encyclical, Evangelium Vitae (Gospel
of Life). It states:
“Everything in creation is ordered to man and
everything is made subject to him: "Fill the earth and subdue it; and have
dominion over ... every living thing" (1:28); this is God's command to the
man and the woman... We see here a clear affirmation of the primacy of man over
things; these are made subject to him and entrusted to his responsible care,
whereas for no reason can he be made subject to other men and almost reduced to
the level of a thing.”[16]
The issue that I am trying to resolve is
whether the passage in Genesis 1:28, specifically the terms “subdue” and “dominion”,
can be interpreted as a license to destroy the natural environment. As has been
shown earlier, there are scholars who consider the anthropocentric slant of the
passage as the root cause of the current ecological crisis, and that the
Catholic Church has been reluctant to give up such anthropological orientation.
Despite this reluctance, it should be pointed out that the Catholic Church has
always placed Genesis 1:28 in the context that humans are beings created in the
image of God, thus humans have the responsibility to take care of the Earth as
the “co-operator with God in the work of creation.”[17]
In 2015, the Church finally addressed the
issue squarely when Pope Francis issued an encyclical, "Laudato si',
mi Signore," or "Praise be to you, my Lord. It states:
“We are not God. The earth was here before us and
it has been given to us. This allows us to respond to the charge that
Judaeo-Christian thinking, on the basis of the Genesis account which grants man
“dominion” over the earth (cf. Gen 1:28), has
encouraged the unbridled exploitation of nature by painting him as domineering
and destructive by nature. This is not a correct interpretation of the Bible as
understood by the Church. Although it is true that we Christians have at times
incorrectly interpreted the Scriptures, nowadays we must forcefully reject the
notion that our being created in God’s image and given dominion over the earth
justifies absolute domination over other creatures. The biblical texts are to
be read in their context, with an appropriate hermeneutic, recognizing that
they tell us to “till and keep” the garden of the world (cf. Gen 2:15). “Tilling”
refers to cultivating, ploughing or working, while “keeping” means caring,
protecting, overseeing and preserving. This implies a relationship of mutual
responsibility between human beings and nature. Each community can take from
the bounty of the earth whatever it needs for subsistence, but it also has the
duty to protect the earth and to ensure its fruitfulness for coming
generations. “The earth is the Lord’s” (Ps 24:1); to him
belongs “the earth with all that is within it” (Dt 10:14). Thus God
rejects every claim to absolute ownership: “The land shall not be sold in
perpetuity, for the land is mine; for you are strangers and sojourners with me”
(Lev 25:23).”[18]
Pope Francis
emphasizes that human dominion “over
the universe should be understood more properly in the sense of responsible
stewardship.”[19]
He explains, “Once the human being declares independence from reality and
behaves with absolute dominion, the very foundations of our life begin to
crumble.” This is possible, he said, quoting John Paul II’s Cenesimus Annus, because “instead of
carrying out his role as a cooperator with God in the work of creation, man
sets himself up in place of God and thus ends up provoking a rebellion on the
part of nature.”[20]
Incidentally, the Hebrew word khabash (subdue) is used when one is
dealing with a hostile enemy. When used in relation to the environment, it
could mean that “we subdue the earth because without such
subjugation the harshness of nature would yield death for us rather than
life.”[21] In
this sense, “subdue” becomes synonymous with an Old English word tammian (Latin, domare; Greek, daman)
which means to tame or to make nature “not afraid of people,
and used to living with them.”[22] On the other hand, the Hebrew word radah (dominion) is used in the royal sense (kings have dominion over
their subjects and territories). It means “to have dominion, rule, dominate”[23]
or “authority to rule;
control.”[24]
The same word, however, is used in the Scriptures to mean something else:
· “You shall not
rule over him with severity;”[25]
· “…of Israel, you
shall not rule with severity;”[26]
· “And the upright shall rule over them in the morning;”[27]
· “May he also rule from
sea to sea.”[28]
Of particular interest
is Psalm 72 (A Psalm of Solomon) entitled “The Reign of the Righteous King.” It
depicts a ruler (one who has dominion) as righteous, just, and savior.[29] Thus
dominion can be taken in a positive sense or what Pope Francis calls “stewardship”
because the Earth belongs to God and we are the stewards of God’s creation.
The rise of Pope Francis is, in a way, a
fulfillment of Lynn White’s proposal that was included in his 1966 paper. He
said:
“Possibly
we should ponder the greatest radical in Christian history since Christ: Saint
Francis of Assisi…Francis tried to depose man from his monarchy over creation
and set up a democracy of all God's creatures.
…The
greatest spiritual revolutionary in Western history, Saint Francis, proposed
what he thought was an alternative Christian view of nature and man's relation
to it; he tried to substitute the idea of the equality of all creatures,
including man, for the idea of man's limitless rule of creation. He failed….Since
the roots of our trouble are so largely religious, the remedy must also be
essentially religious, whether we call it that or not. We must rethink and
refeel our nature and destiny. The profoundly religious, but heretical, sense
of the primitive Franciscans for the spiritual autonomy of all parts of nature
may point a direction. I propose Francis as a patron saint for ecologists.”[30]
At last, a new version of Saint Francis put an end to the controversy. I
am pleased to be a witness of this unfolding. Toynbee did say that “only
a change in world view[31]
could heal the planet.”[32]
This new world view brought about by the new interpretation of the Genesis 1:28
approximates what Berry calls the ecozoic era or “the geologic era that Earth is entering – when humans live in
a mutually enhancing relationship with Earth and the Earth community.”[33]
As Berry said:
"In
this new context every component of the Earth community would have its rights
in accord with the proper mode of its being and its functional role. In each
case the basic rights would be for habitat and the opportunity of each being to
fulfill its role in the natural systems to which it belongs. Humans would be
obliged to respect these rights." [34]
[1] Associate Member, National Research Council of the Philippines; Member, American Association for the Advancement of Science
[2] Genesis 1:27
“God created man in his image; in the divine image he created him; male and
female he created them;” 1:28 God blessed them, saying: "Be fertile and multiply;
fill the earth and subdue it. Have dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds
of the air, and all the living things that move on the earth." (NAB).
[5] Thomas
Berry, "The University: Its Response to the Ecological Crisis", a
paper delivered before the Divinity School and the University Committee on
Environment at Harvard University.
[6] Quoted by
Daniel T. Spencer in “Thomas Berry: An Overview of His Work,” http://thomasberry.org/assets/attachments/Worldviews_ThomasBerryReviewEssay_Spencer_2017.pdf.
[7] Daniel T.
Spencer, “Thomas Berry: An Overview of His Work.”
[8]
Lynn White, “The Historic Roots of Our Ecological Crisis,” https://www.cmu.ca/faculty/gmatties/lynnwhiterootsofcrisis.pdf
[9] Lynn
White, “The Historic Roots of Our Ecological
Crisis.”
[10]
“A particular philosophy or view of life,” https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/us/definition/english/weltanschauung?q=weltanschauung.
[11] Arnold
Toynbee, “The Genesis of Pollution,” The
New York Times (September 16, 1973).
[12] Guadium
et Spes: 34. This passage cites as references Gen. 1:26-27; 9:3; Wis. 9:3;
Ps. 8:7 and 10.
[13] Emeka
Christian Obiezu, Towards a Politics of Compassion:
Socio-Political Dimensions of Christian Responses to Suffering (AuthorHouse: August 14, 2008.
[14] Joseph
Xavier, “Theological Anthropology of ‘Gaudium et Spes’ and Fundamental Theology,”
Gregorianum Vol. 91, no. 1 (2010):
124-136.
[15] Ibid., p.
133.
[16] Evangelium
Vitae: 34.
[17] John Paul
II, Encyclical Letter Centesimus
Annus: 37, http://www.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_01051991_centesimus-annus.html.
[18] Laudato si': 67.
[19] LS: 116; Love
for Creation. An Asian Response to the Ecological Crisis, Declaration of the
Colloquium sponsored by the Federation of Asian Bishops’ Conferences (Tagaytay,
31 January-5 February 1993), 3.3.2.
[20] John Paul
II, Centesimus
Annus.
[21] Genesis
1:28, To “Subdue” and “Have Dominion Over” Creation, https://christopherbrown.wordpress.com/2009/01/03/genesis-128-to-subdue-and-have-dominion-over-creation/.
See also https://biblehub.com/str/hebrew.
[22] https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/us/definition/english/tame_1?q=tame.
[25]
Leviticus
25:43 (NAS).
[26]
Leviticus
25:46 (NAS).
[27]
Psalm 49:14
(NAS).
[28]
Psalm 72:8
(NAS).
[29] Psalm 72:
1-4 .
[30] Lynn
White, “The Historic Roots of Our Ecological Crisis.”
[31] In simple
terms, it refers to “a person’s way of thinking about
and understanding life, which depends on their beliefs and attitudes”, https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/us/definition/english/world-view?q=world+view.
[32] Arnold
Toynbee, “The Genesis of Pollution.”
[33] What does
Ecozoic mean?, https://ecozoictimes.com/what-is-the-ecozoic/what-does-ecozoic-mean/.
[34] Thomas
Berry, “The Great Work: Our Way into the Future.”(Bell Tower: New York, 1999),
80.
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