By Dr Jack Christian
Dark Green Religion: Nature Spirituality and the Planetary Future is a book by Professor Bron Taylor published in 2010. I found myself re-reading it this week as I was preparing a talk I am giving at my old school in December. As well as the talk it turned out to be very relevant to my own thoughts on the environment, and biodiversity in particular; the threats to the latter having been in the news quite a lot over the last two weeks. Further, and more specifically, it was very relevant to a poem I started last week about a walk I had taken in Sherwood Forest. During this walk I felt a deep spiritual link to nature; the book helped in my reflections on this walk. In this muse I simply share some of what I see as key points in the book and how I feel about them.
Taylor defines religion very broadly relying on the word’s etymological base which leads to ‘belonging or bound to’, in this case, shared beliefs. The shared beliefs of dark green religion (DGR), he posits, are the intrinsic value of nature and the interconnectedness of nature (of which humans are a part). He also offers a framework of analysis between animism and holism on the one hand, and naturalism and spiritualism on the other. Animism is almost an idiographic approach where value is placed in individual creatures, plants, and even non-living things, holism refers to systems as the object of value, for example Earth or Gaia. Naturalism sees either of these things as material with their own value and integrity which should be respected and from which we can learn and with which we could even, perhaps learn to communicate with. Spirituality adds an immaterial element to our relationship with them in the way some people believe we can communicate with God (holism) or Spirits (animism).
Throughout his book he refers to many environmentalists and other scientists, artists and philosophers and notes how difficult is to isolate most of them into just one of these categories. For example Charles Darwin was a scientist who was meticulous in trying to record his data objectively but at the same time he professed a deep affinity, connectedness even, with animals of all kinds. Further he was a Christian and believed in God. From personal experience I would say this was a pretty hard circle to square.
Taylor devotes chapters to DGR in North America; Radical Environmentalism; Surfing Spirituality; Globalization with Predators and Moving Pictures; Globalization in Arts, Sciences and Letters; Terrapolitan Earth Religion and finally DGR and the Planetary Future. In the first of these he draws on the work of Whitman, Emerson, Muir and Thoreau amongst others. Here I offer a few quotes from these giants as cited by Taylor.
It seems to me that Walt Whitman is echoing St Francis of Assissi and Emerson and Muir are drawing attention to somethings philosophers, psychologists and even neuro-scientists still argue over – what is the mind, and the mind/matter conundrum.
Thoreau offered 8 themes that Taylor suggests might be common to a universal DGR:
This complexity is emphasised in the chapter on radical environmentalism where he lists various approaches to environmentalism by numerous different authors. There are philosophers including Baird Callicott and my own hero Arne Naess, environmental historians, native American scholars, scientists and conservationists such as David Ehrenfeld, anarchists and social ecologists, critics of technology, ecofemnists such as Vandana Shiva, anthropologists and ecopsychologists such as Paul Shepherd and Warwick Fox.
Taylor reflects on the work of a variety of individuals including William C Rogers who committed suicide after being arrested for destroying offices and premises belonging to companies that were expanding into areas critical for wildlife protection. Aware he would be in prison for life he chose suicide and wrote the following:
Taylor finishes the chapter with a quotation from Paul Watson, founder of Greenpeace. This starts,
Watson is not the first or the only person to lay the blame for environmental destruction on the Christian faith. Sadly this antipathy towards (primarily monotheistic) religions, and vice-versa, is a major impediment in protecting the Earth and her inhabitants. Taylor returns to this in his concluding chapter on the planetary future.
The chapters on globalization note the attention paid to Nature in movies from Bambi to Lion King and Pocahontas (Colours of the Wind is my favourite song of all time). He also notes the interest generated by people such as Steve Irwin and David Attenborough. Under the banner of Arts, Sciences and Letters he notes that Ernst Haeckel, the zoologist who coined the word ecology was overtly spiritual about Nature. He draws on a wide range of writers from David Ehrenfeld, a scientist, to Alice Walker, author of The Color Purple and even Mikhail Gorbachov’s article Nature is My God. He notes the dark green tone of the 1988 UNESCO publication of Man Belongs to the Earth. Oh and he does an excellent deconstruction of Richard Dawkins anti-religious arguments en route.
In the penultimate chapter he wonders about the possibility of a worldwide DGR. In doing so he notes the Marxist and Feuerbach critiques of religion (as a means of obfuscating oppression) and postmodern critiques alert to hegemonic narratives. However his main focus is on the World Summit on Sustainable Development in 2002 and the diverse views that were to be found there.
The concluding chapter on DGR and the planetary future starts by noting some relevant factors:
All in all a serious book. Of course things have moved on since 2010 and personally I am not at all sure if the world is greener or not. For those who find these issues interesting Taylor is actually the editor of The Journal for the Study of Nature Religion and Culture which he founded in 2007.
On a personal note, as I said at the start of this muse I felt a spiritual connection whilst walking in Sherwood Forest recently and I am glad to find I am walking with any number of great thinkers from the past. Like them I am, at times, uncertain of this connection. The sceptic in me finds more academically acceptable reasons for my thoughts and feelings; for example am I really just reflecting preconceived notions that are the real me in an Heideggerian sense, or am connected to them through some infinite net of relationships such as the Buddhist Net of Indra. Every day my belief in the latter becomes stronger, simply through my own experiences of the world, but it is hard to shake off the humanist education of the Modern world.
Dark Green Religion: Nature Spirituality and the Planetary Future is a book by Professor Bron Taylor published in 2010. I found myself re-reading it this week as I was preparing a talk I am giving at my old school in December. As well as the talk it turned out to be very relevant to my own thoughts on the environment, and biodiversity in particular; the threats to the latter having been in the news quite a lot over the last two weeks. Further, and more specifically, it was very relevant to a poem I started last week about a walk I had taken in Sherwood Forest. During this walk I felt a deep spiritual link to nature; the book helped in my reflections on this walk. In this muse I simply share some of what I see as key points in the book and how I feel about them.
Taylor defines religion very broadly relying on the word’s etymological base which leads to ‘belonging or bound to’, in this case, shared beliefs. The shared beliefs of dark green religion (DGR), he posits, are the intrinsic value of nature and the interconnectedness of nature (of which humans are a part). He also offers a framework of analysis between animism and holism on the one hand, and naturalism and spiritualism on the other. Animism is almost an idiographic approach where value is placed in individual creatures, plants, and even non-living things, holism refers to systems as the object of value, for example Earth or Gaia. Naturalism sees either of these things as material with their own value and integrity which should be respected and from which we can learn and with which we could even, perhaps learn to communicate with. Spirituality adds an immaterial element to our relationship with them in the way some people believe we can communicate with God (holism) or Spirits (animism).
Throughout his book he refers to many environmentalists and other scientists, artists and philosophers and notes how difficult is to isolate most of them into just one of these categories. For example Charles Darwin was a scientist who was meticulous in trying to record his data objectively but at the same time he professed a deep affinity, connectedness even, with animals of all kinds. Further he was a Christian and believed in God. From personal experience I would say this was a pretty hard circle to square.
Taylor devotes chapters to DGR in North America; Radical Environmentalism; Surfing Spirituality; Globalization with Predators and Moving Pictures; Globalization in Arts, Sciences and Letters; Terrapolitan Earth Religion and finally DGR and the Planetary Future. In the first of these he draws on the work of Whitman, Emerson, Muir and Thoreau amongst others. Here I offer a few quotes from these giants as cited by Taylor.
“This is what you shall do: love the earth and sun and animals” (Whitman)
“The greatest delight which the fields and woods minister is the suggestion of an occult relation between man and the vegetable. I am not alone and unacknowledged. They nod to me, and I to them” (Emerson)
"Plants are credited with but dim and uncertain sensation, and minerals with positively none at all. But why may not even a mineral arrangement of matter be endowed with sensation of a kind that we in our blind exclusive perfection can have no manner of communication with?” (Muir)
It seems to me that Walt Whitman is echoing St Francis of Assissi and Emerson and Muir are drawing attention to somethings philosophers, psychologists and even neuro-scientists still argue over – what is the mind, and the mind/matter conundrum.
Thoreau offered 8 themes that Taylor suggests might be common to a universal DGR:
- The value of simple, natural and undomesticated (free) life.
- The wisdom of nature
- A religion of nature
- The laws of nature and justice
- An ecocentric moral philosophy
- Loyalty to and the interconnectedness of nature
- Moral evolution; the necessity of human moral/spiritual/scientific growth
- Ambivalence and enigma
This complexity is emphasised in the chapter on radical environmentalism where he lists various approaches to environmentalism by numerous different authors. There are philosophers including Baird Callicott and my own hero Arne Naess, environmental historians, native American scholars, scientists and conservationists such as David Ehrenfeld, anarchists and social ecologists, critics of technology, ecofemnists such as Vandana Shiva, anthropologists and ecopsychologists such as Paul Shepherd and Warwick Fox.
Taylor reflects on the work of a variety of individuals including William C Rogers who committed suicide after being arrested for destroying offices and premises belonging to companies that were expanding into areas critical for wildlife protection. Aware he would be in prison for life he chose suicide and wrote the following:
“Certain human cultures have been waging war against the Earth for millenia. I chose to fight on the side of the bears, mountain lions, skunks, bats, saguaros, cliff rose and all things wild. I am just the most recent casualty in that war. But tonight I have made my jailbreak – I am returning home, to the Earth, to the place of my origins”
Taylor finishes the chapter with a quotation from Paul Watson, founder of Greenpeace. This starts,
“What we need if we are to survive is a new story, a new myth, and a new religion. We need to replace anthropocentrism with biocentrism. We need to construct a religion that incorporates all species and establishes nature as sacred and deserving of respect.
Christians have denounced this idea as worshipping the creation and not the Creator. Yet in the name of the Creator they have advocated the destruction of the creation….”
Watson is not the first or the only person to lay the blame for environmental destruction on the Christian faith. Sadly this antipathy towards (primarily monotheistic) religions, and vice-versa, is a major impediment in protecting the Earth and her inhabitants. Taylor returns to this in his concluding chapter on the planetary future.
The chapters on globalization note the attention paid to Nature in movies from Bambi to Lion King and Pocahontas (Colours of the Wind is my favourite song of all time). He also notes the interest generated by people such as Steve Irwin and David Attenborough. Under the banner of Arts, Sciences and Letters he notes that Ernst Haeckel, the zoologist who coined the word ecology was overtly spiritual about Nature. He draws on a wide range of writers from David Ehrenfeld, a scientist, to Alice Walker, author of The Color Purple and even Mikhail Gorbachov’s article Nature is My God. He notes the dark green tone of the 1988 UNESCO publication of Man Belongs to the Earth. Oh and he does an excellent deconstruction of Richard Dawkins anti-religious arguments en route.
In the penultimate chapter he wonders about the possibility of a worldwide DGR. In doing so he notes the Marxist and Feuerbach critiques of religion (as a means of obfuscating oppression) and postmodern critiques alert to hegemonic narratives. However his main focus is on the World Summit on Sustainable Development in 2002 and the diverse views that were to be found there.
The concluding chapter on DGR and the planetary future starts by noting some relevant factors:
- Evolutionary change has precipitated profound changes in most religious thought.
- The diversity in DRG thought and the spread of nature spirituality in the last 150 years has, in historical terms, been breathtakingly rapid.
- Whilst social change is not normally rapid, it can be; Taylor cites the Copernican revolution as an example.
- Social change is often driven by what are perceived as grave threats.
All in all a serious book. Of course things have moved on since 2010 and personally I am not at all sure if the world is greener or not. For those who find these issues interesting Taylor is actually the editor of The Journal for the Study of Nature Religion and Culture which he founded in 2007.
On a personal note, as I said at the start of this muse I felt a spiritual connection whilst walking in Sherwood Forest recently and I am glad to find I am walking with any number of great thinkers from the past. Like them I am, at times, uncertain of this connection. The sceptic in me finds more academically acceptable reasons for my thoughts and feelings; for example am I really just reflecting preconceived notions that are the real me in an Heideggerian sense, or am connected to them through some infinite net of relationships such as the Buddhist Net of Indra. Every day my belief in the latter becomes stronger, simply through my own experiences of the world, but it is hard to shake off the humanist education of the Modern world.
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