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‘Green’ Ideas in the Wisdom Tradition

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 January 2009

Katharine J. Dell
Katharine J. Dell
Affiliation:
Ripon College CuddesdonOxford 0X44 9EX
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Extract

In this paper I shall be applying a modern-day issue to ancient texts. My intention is to illuminate understanding of the ancient texts and to try to stimulate dialogue between the Bible and a major concern of today. I do not intend to suggest that the authors of these texts had any environmental awareness in the terms we might use nowadays. However I find outlooks and presuppositions in their thought that can be illuminating for our own concerns and even guide us in attitudes we might adopt towards our environment.

Type
Research Article
Information
Scottish Journal of Theology , Volume 47 , Issue 4 , November 1994 , pp. 423 - 452
Copyright
Copyright © Scottish Journal of Theology Ltd 1994

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References

1 Naess, Arne, ‘The Shallow and The Deep, Long-Range Ecology Movements: A Summary’, Inquiry 16 Oslo, 1973, pp. 96–100.Google Scholar

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5 Since Naess, Devall and Sessions there has been some debate as to whether ‘deep ecology’ needs to involve any ethical principles. Fox, W., Transpersonal Ecology, Boston and London, 1990Google Scholar, has persuaded Devall and Sessions that their attempt to make distinctions between the self and nature in ethical terms was in fact symbolic of the need to break down distinctions between the self and what has traditionally been thought to lie outside it. We should, they say, accept identification with nature to recognize that this is the true self rather than the selves that we formerly thought we were, and that this is where self-realization lies. Psychological transformation is what is needed, not axiology or ethics. Sylvan, R., ‘A Critique of Deep Ecology’, Radical Philosophy 40, pp. 2–12 (part 1)Google Scholar; 41 pp. 10–22 (part 2), is still convinced that if they are going to have anything interesting to say about practice, the Deep Ecologists should adhere to some position about value and ethics. This position is now known as ‘deeper’ ecophilosophy in the light of this debate. I am therefore adopting the original Deep Ecology perspective as opposed to later modifications. I am grateful to Robin Attfield for alerting me to these developments.

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11 Devall and Sessions in their 1985 Deep Ecology left open the possibility of a Christian statement of Deep Ecology. They have now moved away from the position which opened up this possibility. However there is no reason why such a statement should never be attempted, difficult as it is to reconcile with Deep Ecology as it has now developed.

12 This qualification is made by deeper ecophilosophers such as R. Sylvan. However I wish to adopt a moderate holistic position which sees the strong distinctions between humanity and nature to have been overdone. This I see as a feasible interpretation of Devall and Sessions in relation to their 1985 position. It may fall between the ‘deep’ and ‘deeper’ ecologies.

13 Scholarly debate has for some time considered the position of the doctrine of creation in Israelite thought. Is there an interrelationship between all areas of creation theology, starting with the J document of the Pentateuch and culminating in the words of Deutero-Isaiah including early psalmic praise and later wisdom literature or can we find a separate creation tradition in the wisdom tradition which has very little to do with the saving history approach of other Israelite literature? D. Hubbard, The Wisdom Movement and Israel's Covenant Faith’, Tyndale Bulletin 17 (1966), argues that ‘Theologically wisdom has as one of its functions an explication of Genesis 1–2’ (p. 22). G. von Rad found in certain psalms and in wisdom hymns to creation such as Job 38f. evidence for a doctrine of creation which existed independently from an early stage but which was never allowed to attain a separate existence apart from soteriology (‘The theological problem the Old Testament doctrine of creation’, ZAW66 (1936) reprinted and translated in The Problem of the Hexateuch and other essays, London 1966).

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28 J. Barr, ‘Man and Nature: The Ecological Controversy and the Old Testament’.

29 Baker, J. A., ‘Biblical Views of Nature’, Liberating Life, eds Birch, C., Eahin, W., Daniel, J. B. Mc, New York, 1990, chapter 1, pp. 9–26.Google Scholar

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32 Dell, K. J., The Book of Job as Sceptical Literature, BZAW 197, Berlin & New York, 1991CrossRefGoogle Scholar, chapter 2. R. Johnston in ‘Wisdom Literature and Its Contribution to a Biblical Environmental Ethic’ sees ‘openness to change’ as a characteristic of wisdom so allowing for diverse opinion such as is evidenced in the post-exilic wisdom books. He writes, of the wisdom material, ‘A… consequence of wisdom's rootage in experience is an openness, a certain liberality in viewpoint. There is in all of wisdom's admonitions an element of dialectic. Because the teaching of wisdom is not authoritative command but advice, it is discussable’ (pp. 76–7).

33 The assumption that a theology of creation is inferior to a theology of salvation is probably a legacy of the struggle with Nazi ideology which also the reason why von Rad's positive evaluation of creation, which now seems obvious, was so bold in Germany in the 1950s to 1960s.

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38 Hermisson, like von Rad, perceives that our modern distinction between ‘nature’ and ‘history’ does not exist in ancient Israel. He argues that wisdom is characterized by a world that is ‘unitary’. He writes, ‘ancient wisdom starts from the conviction that the regularities within the human and the historical-social realm are not in principle different from the ones within the realm of nonhuman phenomena. Therefore “nature wisdom” and “culture wisdom” are not as far apart as it may seem at first. Knowledge of the world and the education of man belong together.’ (‘Observations on the Creation Theology in Wisdom’, p. 44.)

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48 Zimmerli, W., ‘The Place and Limit of the Wisdom in the Framework of the Old Testament Theology’, Scottish Journal of Theology 17 (1964), pp. 146–158 (p. 155).CrossRefGoogle Scholar To put his phrase in context, I quote Zimmerli's full sentence: ‘It is an unfailing evidence of the anthropological starting-point of Wisdom that it is precisely in its field that the question of theodicy (in which God is challenged by man) arises more emphatically than anywhere else in the Old Testament’ (p. 155).

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57 One can compare itwith metaphors which use the image of the tree of life found in Proverbs 15:4, ‘A gentle tongue is a tree of life, but perverseness in it breaks the spirit’, or with 3:18, which talks of the figure of wisdom: ‘She is a tree oflife to those who lay hold of her; those who hold her fast are called happy.’

58 It is noteworthy that chapters 25–27 show a particular interest in nature. This is part of the collection of ‘Proverbs of Solomon’ by the men of Hezekiah. Perhaps we could tentatively suggest that these Proverbs of Solomon attempt to reflect what is usually seen as Solomon's kind of wisdom as mentioned in Kings and thus represent a more primitive part of the wisdom exercise. Interestingly references to God are lacking in this section.

59 In 25:26 water is used of purity in a simile: ‘Like a muddied spring or a polluted fountain is a righteous man who gives way before the wicked.’

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62 R. K. Johnston, Ibid.

63 Johnston, R. K., ‘Wisdom Literature and Its Contribution to a Biblical Environmental Ethic’, in Granberg-Michaelson, W., Tending the Earth, Michigan, 1987, (p. 76).Google Scholar

64 Ibid.

65 Ibid.

66 Rad, G. von, Old Testament Theology, Volume 1, (p. 425).Google Scholar

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72 Rad, G. von, Old Testament Theology, volume 1 (pp. 426–427)Google Scholar, cf. his article ‘Some Aspects of the Old Testament World-View’, Evangelische Theologie II (1964), reprinted and translated in The Problem of the Hexateuch and other essays, London, 1966.

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75 However Zimmerli tries to link the two by arguing that: ‘The sapiential theology of creation can gain full life only when it dares to believe that the creator is the God who in free goodness promised Himself to His people. Israel became acquainted with this God, who is faithful to His people through judgement and wrath, when it encountered God in history. In the framework of an Old Testament theology, the sapiential theology of creation will be recalled to the God who joined Himself to His people by His encounter with them in history’ (p. 158).

76 Zimmerli, W., ‘The Place and Limit of the Wisdom in the framework of Old Testament Theology’, Scottish Journal of Theology 17 (1964), pp. 146–158 (p. 155).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

77 Rad, G. von, ‘Some Aspects of the Old Testament World View’ (p. 161).Google Scholar

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80 Rad, G. von, Old Testament Theology, volume 1, (p. 450).Google Scholar

81 The wisdom literature and deep ecology (1980s style) can each be seen as antidotes to exaggerated distinctions between God, humanity and nature, both stressing interrelatedness instead.

82 This tendency may have sprung from a deep-seated exclusivism within Judaism and Christianity.