Blog
Rev. Lynn Ungar - “Pandemic”
In her poem “Pandemic,” writer and minister, Lynn Ungar asks readers to reframe our current crisis as a holy time for rest and restoration, much like the Jewish sabbath
Species Loneliness
It feels as though this global pandemic is separating us and making an already individualistic society even more isolated. But what if this didn’t have to be the case? What if we could find community among the trees?
Sabbath Gone Viral — Green Sabbath and “Sheltering in Place”
Can social distancing teach us to properly value one another? Can “shelter in place” remind us of how little we actually need to run after the fulfilment of illusory “needs” implanted by advertising and social pressure? Can the spread of an “unnatural” pathogen jar us to greater awareness of how unhealthy our world-systems are?
The Sabbath in an Era of Climate Change
Here we bring you the article from our director, Jonathan Schorsch, that originally inspired the Green Sabbath Project.
We humans face a set of dire ecological crises, the results of what many now call the Anthropocene Era, the era of human modification of earth’s planetary systems. These crises—global warming, altered weather, species extinction, the threats of various kinds of toxic pollution, the proliferation of garbage, soil erosion, desertification, declining freshwater supplies, and so on—constitute not only an absolutely real imminent threat to the future well-being of humankind, but also, it sometimes seems, a modern manifestation of the various litanies of biblical curses.
Talia Schneider, “Preparation for Catastrophe, Shmita (the Sabbatical Year) and Permaculture”
Schneider is one of Israel’s leading permaculture practitioners and teachers. This talk in Hebrew touches on shabbat. Schneider is one of Israel’s leading permaculture practitioners and teachers. Thank you to Daniel Lis, of Bern, a big fan of permaculture and food forests, for sharing this video with us. Daniel helped start a rooftop garden at his synagogue.
Az Yeranen - Then the Trees of the Forests Will Sing
Az Yeranen (Then the trees of the forests will sing), a piyyut, a traditional liturgical song in Hebrew, for Tu Bshvat, the Jewish holiday of trees.
The piyyut was composed by the Ben Ish Chai (Rabbi Yosef Chaim, 1832-1909), the great Baghdadi spiritual leader and scholar, and sung by Rabbi David Menachem. Thanks to Ezra Orlofsky, who works at a hydrogeochemistry lab in Israel, for sending this in. It would make a beautiful shabbat song.
The first stanza:
Then the trees of the forests will sing / Before God, the mightiest of the mighty,
Arousing melodies and songs / I will sing a new song.
Hello.
Welcome to the Green Sabbath Project blog. It is my honor and delight to initiate this forum.
Fifty years ago, the United Nations called for an environmental sabbath or earth rest day, to be celebrated once a year (in June). The planetary agenda introduced in the accompanying booklet, called Only One Earth, urges protection against “climate change and global warming,” among other environmental ills.