10 | JUNE 16 • 2022 

opinion
Jewish Environmental Thought Is Not Ready 
for the Climate Crisis. But Our Tradition Is.

 S

moke from California’s 
fires is regularly bad 
enough to tint the sun 
on the other side of the country. 
Pakistan and India just experi-
enced a devastating heat wave. In 
the Middle East, 
temperatures 
have risen by 1.5 
degrees Celsius, 
more than twice 
the global average.
Climate change, 
and its punish-
ing effects, are 
here, and getting worse, yet 
Jewish thinking and advoca-
cy on climate change are still 
stuck in prevention mode. The 
Jewish organizations that have 
blossomed to meet the political 
moment, not to mention the 
rabbis, activists and rank-and-
file Jews who are engaged on this 
issue, are largely focused on one 
bottom line: Judaism demands 
that we care for the planet before 
it is too late.
This sentiment remains 
important, and I support it, but 
it cannot be the only Jewish 

message for the moment. This 
is because “we” — the Jewish 
people — are likely powerless to 
affect the environment on a scale 
that would make a difference. It 
is also because, whether we like 
it or not, it is too late. As a schol-
ar interested in the Jewish future 
and as a member of a research 
team devoted to Judaism and the 
natural world, I believe it is time 
to expand our understanding 
of what “Jewish environmental 
thought” can be.
The problems with main-
stream Jewish approaches to 
addressing climate change, 
which scientists say is rapidly 

approaching a breaking point, 
are twofold.
First, unlike many other envi-
ronmental problems, climate 
change can’t be meaningfully 
curtailed through individual 
behavior; for better or worse, it is 
primarily in the hands of nation-
al governments and the energy 
sectors that they regulate. 
In the United States, it is 
largely for the worse: Legislative 
deadlock and the current 
Supreme Court’s deregulato-
ry impulses make it hard to 
imagine tighter regulations on 
emissions, and domestic political 
polarization severely hampers 

America’s ability to exert influ-
ence over the 85% of global 
emissions that are produced out-
side its borders. These realities 
undermine much Jewish think-
ing on climate change. 
Rabbis can tell their congre-
gants that they should care for 
the planet until they’re blue in 
the face, but if their ideas are to 
be greeted with something other 
than a nod of agreement, a wist-
ful sigh and eventual indiffer-
ence, they cannot solely focus on 
the possibility of political change.

IT’S TOO LATE
Second, the “it’s too late” 
piece is harder to hear. Even if 
humanity radically changes its 
ways in the next decade, as the 
Intergovernmental Panel on 
Climate Change says it must, 
disasters aggravated by climate 
change are already here, and 
many people — especially young 
people — operate under the 
assumption that they will get 
worse. Despite this, messages 
from Jewish leaders largely con-
tinue to focus on prevention, 
frequently insinuating in the 

David Zvi 
Kalman 
JTA

PURELY COMMENTARY

ety where they performed shaliach mitzvah 
tzedakah by delivering $1,500 in tzedakah that 
they raised from the Hillel community prior 
to their trip. 
Many of the graduating eighth graders were 
part of the first class of 2-year-olds when Hillel 
opened its Early Childhood Center (ECC) in 
2010, meaning these “lifers” have the distinc-
tion of being the first class of Hillel students to 
enjoy 12 years of Hillel Day School education. 
The eighth graders were able to bring their 
Hillel experience full circle with get togethers 
throughout the school year with their 4- and 
5-year-old ECC buddies. 
Prior to their Israel trip, the eighth graders 

and their ECC buddies learned about Israel 
together before the ECC students gave their 
buddies a blessing and wished them safe 
travels. After the eighth graders returned, 
they played games and shared stories about 
the experience with their ECC buddies. As 
these ECC students complete their preschool 
experience and head to kindergarten, many of 
them shared how excited they are to one day 
be Hillel eighth graders so they can travel to 
Israel with their classmates. 

Amy Sapeika is communications coordinator at Hillel 

Day School of Metropolitan Detroit.

continued from page 6

Dane Zeff and 
Evan Bronstein

Land scorched by heat waves in Mumbai, India, May 2022

SATISH BATE/HINDUSTAN TIMES VIA GETTY IMAGES

