יִּקַּח יְיָ אֱ׳לֹהִים אֶת־הָאָדָם וַיַּנִּחֵהוּ בְגַן־עֵדֶן לְעָבְדָהּ וּלְשָׁמְרָהּ

The Lord (Adonai) God took the man and placed him in the garden of Eden, to till it and tend it. (Bereisheet / Genesis 2:15)

To “tend.” The Hebrew can also be translated as to guard, preserve — steward — the garden. In that spirit, numerous environmental groups have been founded to encourage and/or do the work of stewarding the planet.

Our small Jewish population has produced:

Sadeh (Hebrew for field); The Midbar Project (wilderness or desert); Shoresh (root); Wilderness Torah; Jewish Farmer Network; Hazon (vision) Jewish Lab for Sustainability; Isabella Freedman Retreat; Jewish Climate Action Network; Teva (nature) Learning Center; Aytzim (trees): Ecological Judaism; Coalition on the Environment and Jewish Life; Canfei Nesharim (eagles’ wings); People’s Climate Shabbat…

…and, over the years, other national and local organizations dedicated to the not-quite-a-mitzvah (commandment) to “tend it.”

One enduring mystery of Torah is the location of gan eden/the garden of Eden. Since we can’t be certain where it was, we should adopt the view that it could have been anywhere (or everywhere). It follows then that as we work the earth, we must steward the Earth.

After the Flood, Adonai promises that “so long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night shall not cease.” (Ber / Gen 8:22) Adonai does not describe the qualities of those times and seasons; it is up to us to maintain the earth in a way that ensures times and seasons as we know them and as we need them to be.

Let us make mindful choices and live our lives as though every day were Earth Day. Because we live in the garden of Eden.

Shabbat shalom !שבת שלום