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Extending the Table

— by Our Community

More thoughts from the Garden

Since I began my sabbatical, my reflections keep bringing me back to the Garden of Eden. On Tuesday evening, I went to see Avatar with my family. The plot is simple – good over evil, profit versus stewardship of the land, false entitlement and disregard versus living in concert with others. For all intents and purposes, the movie is a futuristic retelling of Disney's Pocohantas awash in phenomenal special effects.

As I watched this movie however, I kept asking myself the proverbial “what if”. What if the writer of Genesis had substituted ‘caretaker’ or ‘stewardship’ for the word ‘dominion?’ My reference is to the end of the creation story, after humanity has been created and God gives them ‘dominion’ over the created order. For years I have tried to convince myself that the correct translation of the original Hebrew had to be something different, but my transliteration searches keep coming up as ‘dominion.’

‘Dominion’ is a derivative form of ‘dominance,’ which for me is such an aggressive word. It seems the Judeo-Christian tradition historically has been to dominate and control creation. A few years back I read an internet article that claimed the Bush administration's lack of regard for the environment was rooted in the former president's theological understanding of creation. The issue. it appears. was two- fold. First, that humanity had the God-given right to dominate creation. And second, preservation of creation was senseless as we grew closer to the end time with each passing day. Basically, the attitude was, so what if we destroy the Earth, God is going to anyway.

So my question continues to be, how would our lifestyle be different if God had made us stewards or caretakers of the land? Would European history have been less violent? Would humanity as a whole be more concerned with co-existence than with possession and dominance of the land? For this answer I have to leave behind scripture and seek out cultures that are not influenced by “the Book” as all of Europe, and much of the Middle-East are, and turn my attention to the creation stories of the indigenous people of North America.

In indigenous stories of creation, the Creator is most often represented as female, and humanity is often part of the first stages of creation as opposed to the latter. Nowhere in their stories is humanity given dominance but many times made co-creators or “helpers” in the creation process.  There is also a sense of inter-relatedness within their language with the primary reference to Mother Earth becoming in someway an archetype or the root of their innate understanding of other parts of nature being sibling relationships. Finally, if my recollection of courses taken while an undergrad serves me correctly, indigenous people, prior to the arrival of European settlers, had no concept of “owning” land.

I realize as I write this blog, that it would be very easy to romanticize indigenous religion as better, and blindly assert that indigenous people led perfect lives of peaceful co-existence prior the arrival of European settlers. But this we know is not true. However, what this mindful foray into the “what if” tells me is, if God had not given humanity dominion over creation, but stewardship, our primal understanding of our relationship to creation would probably very different. Issues of environmental sustainability, justice, and righteousness perhaps would not be ongoing discussions of cerebral concern and activism, but more an innate part and more natural part or our ongoing relationship with creation and each other.

Just another thought from the Garden.

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