Sermon: Why Environmentalists should be proud of God- Terumah 2010

Written by Writings & Sermons by others — 23 February 2010

In the Torah it took God 34 verses to create the entire universe.  Just Chapter One of Genesis and three verses of Chapter two.  How long did it take the Israelites to build the rather simpler Mischan – the Desert Temple?   More than 600 verses of the Torah from this Torah portion and the next four.   Why is this?  It was not just because getting any group of Jews to agree how to complete a building project is always a very time consuming challenge – as anyone who has been part of the group working to renew the Alyth Bimah will attest.  Rather it is because whilst is it not so difficult for God to build a home fit for humanity, it is extremely difficult for humanity to make a home fit for God.

This morning I want to concentrate on one particular feature of this home for God’s presence – the main material out of which is was built – Acacia wood – Atzei Shittim.

The Acacia tree is really rather remarkable.  It is common to all desert areas of the world for which it is specially adapted.  Acacias can survive in areas where the annual rainfall is less than 4cm – that’s the rainfall of a serious single downpour in London.  It can withstand temperatures of well over 120 degrees Fahrenheit even when within 12 hours the night-time temperature falls below 0.

Acacias will put out roots more than 100 feet long in order to be able to draw some moisture for their survival.  Their leaves are tiny in their surface area so that as little water as possible is lost by evaporation but spread out wide in an umbrella like expanse so that they can take in the maximum sunshine for photosynthesis.  The tree produces no edible fruit, just hard seed pods.  Some species produce the very useful thickening agent – gum Arabic – which would also have been used in the making of the ink with which our Sifrei Torah were written and also helps to give jellybeans their distinctive texture!   Large quantities of this gum are bought by soft drink companies to stabilise their cola drinks and that’s why a friend of mine is currently working in Darfur to help the impoverished residents to make some money from tapping their Acacia trees.

The wood of the Acacia tree is hard, and dense and heavy – not ideal, you might have thought, for the building of furniture or even less a portable desert temple but it is what was asked for in God’s description of the Tabernacle – for  no fewer than 13 elements of the Mischan:  the ark and its poles, the table of showbread and its poles, the brazen altar and its poles, and the incense altar and its poles, all the poles for the hanging of the curtains as well as the supports [boards]. In short, all the structural features of the tabernacle were constructed of acacia wood.

When Solomon built his temple, as described in the Haftarah portion he didn’t use acacia wood – instead he used cedar – a cultivated also non fruit bearing tree for which he would have had to send to Lebanon to obtain the quantities that he wanted.  The Rabbis asked why, when God gave the design for the Tabernacle was Acacia wood specified as the only wood for construction, and why then was Cedar wood used for the Temple.  The answer they gave in the midrash Shemot Rabbah 35:2 was that “God set an example for all time, that when a man is about to build his house from a fruit-producing tree, he should be reminded: If, when the supreme King of kings commanded the Temple to be erected, His instructions were to use only such trees as are not fruit-bearing– though all things belong to Him;–how much more should this be so in your case?”

Essentially the answer was that Acacia wood was specified as it was God’s wish for us to learn to preserve our environmental.  Fruit trees were necessary for the substance of life – better to use the trees such as Acacia and Cedar that will not deplete the stock of these necessities for human existence.  If we are environmentally conscious in our day then we know that the worst kind of wood to use for our homes, offices and furnishings are tropical hardwoods harvested from the rainforests whose fruit for us is the very oxygen we breathe.  Neither the tabernacle nor the temple was built from mahogany or teak – however attractive they might be.  If the most holy structure every known to the Jews could be made from the wood that was the least damaging to the environment then so can our homes and our furniture.

When we build our Synagogue we too are trying to create a place in which we can come to experience God’s presence.  What does Alyth do to ensure that we use the modern day equivalent of Acacia wood in the way in which we build and run our Synagogue?   The Shul’s Executive and Council asked itself this question a few months ago.  The result was a group under the leadership of Paul Alter and David Brodie which has worked hard to create a sustainability report for the Synagogue – presented at the Alyth Executive last Monday night.  It covered all kinds of aspects of the shul – from the heat losses that come from our windows, to the way our radiators work, our lighting, recycling, transport methods and much more.  The group has even investigated placing solar panels on our vast expanse of roof – not such a crazy idea as much of the cost of this would be defrayed by a government grant to encourage us to conserve energy, whilst here in the Bet Tefillah our prayers from Pesach onwards for dew brought by plentiful sunshine would gain new meaning!

It is the hope of this group and the aim of our Alyth Executive that in the coming year this power, heat and energy intensive building will considerably reduce its demand on the resources of Earth whilst remaining a thriving second home for our community.

Our Alyth Social Action Group aims to inspire us to go a step further in this very Jewish work of Bal Taschit – observing the Mitzvah not to destroy.   Jewish environmental consciousness is not of course just about our places of worship.  It is about our personal lives and how each of us conserves the resources of the earth.  So on Sunday March 14th we are holding the Big Green Alyth Morning where we invite you to Join Rabbi Mark Goldsmith and Hannah Weisfeld of the Big Green Jewish Website and I  for a special Sunday morning learning how to make our lives more sustainable.

Events include:-Good to grow – what you could grow in five pots, I want to eat Kosher but I love the planet /  do you follow Abel and Cole or Aaron and Moses, Ethical Simcha workshop, Making your business / place of work more sustainable, What actually happened at Copehagen and will we have forgotten about it in a couple of years and Ride your bike to Alyth How to change a tyre and how to be safe on your bike and Sustainability drama workshop from Tzedek.

Our Torah portion tells us that, as we heard in the portion of Noah and will hear again in the portion of Behar in Leviticus when the Sabbatical cycle conserves agriculture and again in the portion of Shoftim in Deuteronomy when we are told to conserve trees even in a time of war – that conservation and environmental consciousness are religious issues for Jews – they are Mitzvot, not only twenty first century concerns.

Optimism says that change in our behavior as consumers over the coming years will reduce the effects of the carbon emissions that are causing global warming. But you do need a lot of optimism – and to recognize that consumer behaviour change can only be part of the solution.  A massive change is also needed from industrial carbon emitters.

Only 14% of the carbon emissions which produce global warming come from residential use – Electricity generation is responsible for the largest share—42 percent. Transportation generates 24 percent of global emissions. Industrial processes account for 20 percent.  This means that its not going to be enough for us as individuals to change our behaviour or consuming patterns – we are going to need to bring pressure to bear on business to preserve the world which Judaism tells us it is humankind’s responsibility to steward and care for – the real meaning for our day of the Genesis verse which gives Adam dominion over the world.

I have long been convinced, as many will have heard me say in this Synagogue before, that we have a responsibility as shareholders and unit trust holders and pension fund investors in the corporations of the world.  We must make it clear to the businesses in which we are invested, the actions that we need them to take beyond the making of profit and generating financial shareholder value.  It seems to me, and of course to the many millions of people whose investments are guided by the principles of socially responsible investment, sometimes called ethical investment, that a businesses performance should be judged worthy of investment not only by the money that it makes today but also by the social and environmental responsibility that it displays in its activities.  Judaism requires us to pursue justice for our fellow people and also to steward the planet with care so surely our sources of income should be  those which conform to these standards.

That does not mean take your money out of, disinvest from every business which has a negative impact on the environment – the world is there for us to use,  What it does mean is that we should use the power that we have as shareholders or fund holders to persuade companies to follow good practices that have as little impact as possible and look out for investment opportunities in well run companies that follow the best environmental practices.  All of this can be difficult to do as an individual but there are a wealth of fund managers who will help with Socially Responsible or ethical investment funds that they offer.

The Acacia tree has been able to spread throughout the world, to be present in five continents by being extraordinarily sparing in the resources that it uses.  It has meant that Acacia thrives in what to other plants are completely inhospitable environments.  It will cope with pretty much whatever the natural environment has to throw at it.  Just as the Acacia was used to build the framework for the Jew’s first sanctuary so too, Alyth, our beloved Shul must, we ourselves and our families must and the businesses which create the economy that sustains us to be sparing in our use of resources so that we can truly maintain the framework for a livable world