Oldal 60 [60]
58 — JUDIT FARKAS
their respective faiths to underline that nature and all living beings are creations
by God, or constitute part of the divine essence, or are endowed with some
supernatural attribute. This would make any act of destroying or exploiting nature
a sin committed against the supernatural and, therefore, environment-friendly
behavior a religious duty.‘
An excellent example of the linking of religion and environmental awareness is the
book series published by WWF, each volume covering the relationship between nature
and a major world faith:
Batchelor, Martine — Brown Kerry (eds.) Buddhism and Ecology, 1992.
Breuilly, Elisabeth — Palmer, Martin (eds.) Christianity and Ecology, 1992.
Khalid, Fazlun M. — O’Brien, Joanne (eds.) /slam and Ecology, 1992.
Prime, Ranchor: Hinduism and Ecology, 1992.
Rose, Aubrey (ed.) Judaism and Ecology, 1992.
Connecting religion and ecology is also supported by researchers who claim that
both are involved in an attempt to understand the non-human world and explore
the interaction between humans and the non-human realm.
Science is the primary, allegedly authentic source of knowledge about the
working of the physical world. Religion can give answers to mystical experiences,
to the desire for an all-embracing comprehension and to having a common ethical
orientation which science — alone — fails to provide for many people (Rigby 2017:
275). “The science of ecology describes how organisms interact with other
organisms, energy, and matter in complex systems that determine the abundance
and distribution of organisms. Religion asks what the value of those organisms is,
why they exist, what their purpose is, and what duties they may owe each other
or to an other-worldly Creator” (Hubbell — Ryan 2022: 137). In addition to its
ambition to understand the world, scientific research is also motivated by the
aspect of utility. In its pursuit of an understanding of the world, religion seeks
answers and guidance to the place and task of human beings, that is how religion
is the strong law governing human behavior. “Worldviews determine how we see
the world, a sort of permanent corrective lens that brings some things into focus
and obscures others” (Hubbell — Ryan 2022: 135). People live by worldviews that
reflect and approve of the social, economic, political and religious order (Eaton
2017: 125-126). That is why religion and the study of religion are important in
environmental protection and also in EH.
In this process, a fundamental role is ascribed to re-reading the Holy Writs
from an ecological-environmentalist viewpoint. Jenkins contends that however
strange some of the sacred texts might sound to modern ears, if we consider their
specific historical and ecological contexts, we can interpret them as local practices
of the running of a sustainable society (Jenkins 2011). In the most famous debate
on the connection between damaging nature and religion, the leading role was
played by the re-reading and interpretation of a holy scripture, the Bible. This
‘On this topic, see, among others, Bron Taylor’s Introducing Religion and Dark Green Religion,
Taylor 2010. On the connection between Abrahamic religions and the ecological crisis, and the
polemic on the issue, see Kay 1998; Livingstone 1994; Taylor 2010, 2016; White 1967.