Social Justice & Advocacy Column: The Web of Life
Both from an ecological perspective and from Genesis’ point of view, goodness resides in the community, the web of life, in the relations of the whole biosphere. All organisms interact constantly with their surroundings, in an endless cycle of giving and receiving. No creature, human or otherwise, can live in isolation. “No matter how sophisticated and complex and powerful our institutions,” said Wendell Berry, “we are still exactly as dependent on the earth as the earthworms.” Ultimately our individual happiness rests on the health and well-being of the larger earth ecosystem and the common good.
Rabbi Ellen Bernstein
