By Michael Garry

Tikkun olam, which in Hebrew means “repair of the world,” has always been a guiding principle of the Jewish people, one that we teach our children and try to practice in our everyday lives.  In the modern era, tikkun olam means that Jews bear responsibility not only for their own moral, spiritual, and material welfare, but also for the welfare of society at large.

It is well-known that the welfare of the planet is now threatened by an environmental crisis called climate change, caused by unchecked emissions of carbon dioxide from fossil fuel combustion and other heat-trapping greenhouse gases.

While climate change can sound very grim, our Jewish faith can help sustain us and inspire us to action; indeed, caring for the Earth is one of the cornerstones of Judaism, and it’s found throughout the Torah. During this season of teshuvah, it is especially important for Jews to reflect on our obligation to help correct our transgressions against the environment.

The very act of creation in Genesis marks the sacred quality of the Earth, and humankind’s duty to respect, protect and preserve God’s creation. We are God’s caretakers; as it is written in Genesis 2:15, God created Adam and placed him in the Garden of Eden “to work it and conserve it.” 

There is also a body of Jewish law called the Law of Neighbors (Hilkhot Shekeinim), which states that there is no presumptive right to cause pollution that damages another’s health, no matter how long we have been doing it.

In Psalms, farmers are asked to be conscious of what they plant, not sowing their fields with mingled seeds. Proverbs stresses the importance of trees – which are a great remedy for climate change since they absorb much carbon dioxide and release oxygen. Indeed, planting trees has been a bedrock of our tradition, and a principal part of the Tu BiShvat holiday. The Torah itself is called “a tree of life.”

For Jews, Shabbat is an opportunity to step back from everyday activities, which helps preserve the environment. The Torah also stipulates a practice called Shmitta (Sabbatical Year) such that every 7th year shall be a Shabbat for the land; farmers shall not plant that year so as to not overuse the fields. People eat whatever grows on its own in the fields. In Israel, Shmitta is practiced in a lesser form to this day. 

What else can we do to reverse climate change? I’ve discovered that the climate issue becomes less overwhelming when you work in a group, not just by yourself. That can foster camaraderie and make it a joyful experience, not a grim one. So join with other like-minded people.

When you consider the lessons of the Torah, fighting climate change becomes a religious and moral issue, not a matter of politics. As Jews, we can all agree on the moral underpinning of protecting and preserving the environment for ourselves and our children. And we can spread that message to all people of good will. 

As Jews, who have historically had to survive threats to our existence, we are especially suited to helping the world adapt to and overcome the climate crisis. Which takes us back to the bedrock principle: tikkun olam.

Michael Garry is Editor in Chief for shecco, which promotes climate-friendly cooling and heating systems that use natural refrigerants. He is also the author of Game of My Life: New York Mets, published in 2015 and 2018 by Skyhorse Publishing.

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by Carol Reiman

​Scroll turners, wooden handles, trees of life, our thumbs evolved, rolled down from years to screens;
Leading us through dry sands, streams, times of manna, now of drought;
Fires of the burning bush, now woods flaming by dream homes;
Wanderers yearning for place,
kinship of community, ability to thrive;
Where do we take our strength?
When do we listen to the land, to those who warn us of what comes?
Are we as sturdy as our hopes,
As fragile as our whims,
Intemperate in our senses,
Inconsistent in our care?
Lest our drives consume us,
Let us rest in the shadows,
Break of day or rim of stars,
Calm the breath,
Listen for the source
Of streaming bounty,
Filling the cup
Of thought, body, soul,
Nestling us in gentleness,
Fluidity, adaptation,
Creation again,
Rolling us
Into life...


Carol Reiman’s spiritual resources include Rabbi Katy’s reminders of calm, Jewish and Unitarian Universalist sources, the arts, cats, and human connections.

by ​Rabbi Robin Damsky

“It’s All About the Soil.” So reads the headline for a website discussing regenerative agriculture. ​

by Rabbi Katy Allen

I've been thinking about it a lot.

Intellectually, I know I can't be perfect. Inside me, in hidden spaces, I feel like I'm not supposed to make mistakes. Which would, of course, mean seeking perfection.

Perfection is supposed to belong only to G!d, though I'm not sure I know what that means. Sometimes, when I'm able embrace my humanness, it's incredibly freeing to acknowledge that I don't have to be perfect. But I also realize there's a balance between not trying to be perfect all the time and not trying to never make mistakes.

​I experience different kinds of feelings when I think about striving toward being a better person all the time versus when I consider in a particular moment what I need to do to be as whole as possible in a particular instant and situation. Those ways of thinking are very different. Considering the moment, just this particular moment, feels doable. Thinking that I must constantly seek to improve and always strive to do the right thing becomes overwhelming.

As a climate activist, when I consider climate change, environmental injustice, and the destruction of our environments, I can feel that sense of  being overwhelmed. Listening to people confidently profess that we can absolutely turn around the course of climate change also feels like a tremendous burden that I cannot bear.

But when I stop trying to seek perfection regarding the planet and justice, I can also let go and feel a release. When I acknowledge that climate change is already happening and communities are already being devastated, and that this is simply our present reality, not my personal responsibility to fix and to create perfection in the world, I can touch my truer better self. I can let go of the weight upon my shoulders.

Neither of these mean that I stop believing we must act, but they take off the pressure. Letting go of a need to achieve perfection in the global sphere makes it easier to breathe and to think just as it does in my personal life.

Beginning during Elul and climaxing on Yom Kippur, Jewish tradition, articulated in our liturgy, makes it abundantly clear that we humans are very far from perfect. This Elul, may I fully embrace that reality. May I enter into this season of reflection and atonement humbly putting aside the need to always be right.


Rabbi Katy Allen is the founder and rabbi of Ma'yan Tikvah - A Wellspring of Hope, which holds services outdoors all year long, and the founder and President pro-tem of the Jewish Climate Action Network-MA. She is a board certified chaplain and a former hospital and hospice chaplain. She received her ordination from the Academy for Jewish Religion in Yonkers, NY in 2005 and lives in Wayland, MA with her spouse, Gabi Mezger, who leads the singing at Ma'yan Tikvah.

by Rabbi Margaret Frisch Klein

“Return again. Return again.
Return to the land of our soul.” (1)
The liturgy sings. 
I hear it in my head.
This is the season of returning.

It’s quiet here.
A steaming cup of coffee,
Billowing clouds of whipped cream.
We thought it would be different by now.
Stay at home. Wear a mask. Wash your hands.
No guests for Shabbat dinner.

Inside,
It’s quiet. So very quiet.
Too quiet.
And lonely.

Ready to begin my morning,
I choose a book
Ready to read,
I open the back door,
Coffee cup and book in hand.
Ready to sit on the deck.

The music greets me.
It is anything but quiet
While the world was healing,
The birds returned:
Gold finches, cardinals, robins, blue jays,
Canada geese, blue heron, sandhill crane.

A cacophony of color and sound.
They are the guests for New Year.
Bringing hope.
We can return too.

(1)  Neshama Carlebach, http://hebrewsongs.com/?song=returnagain
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Rabbi Margaret Frisch Klein is the rabbi of Congregation Kneseth Israel in Elgin, IL. She blogs as the Energizer Rabbi, www.theenergizerrabbi.org, She enjoys watching the birds on her deck overlooking a retaining pond (that is dangerously low with the severe drought in Northern Illinois this year) or at her dentist’s office where she gratefully watches the birds he feeds. She has noticed that the birds are more prevalent providing a noisy din during the pandemic. She hopes that the pandemic has helped the earth itself to heal, and for us to reset our priorities, living a more authentic life. She is a recipient of a Scientists in the Synagogue grant for bringing science and Torah to our families in a program called “Parsha and Planets on the Prairie.” 

by Maxine Lyons

Reflecting on my connection to t’shuvah means returning more mindfully to positive words and actions and performing mitzvot - commandments. T’shuvah also includes recognizing our connection to the earth, and for me, learning what my garden has to teach me. In a short book, Don't Throw in the Trowel, the author quips, "a garden is a sublime lesson in the unity of humans and nature.” A good garden to me is one that is well planned and cared for, and I am grateful to the Earth’s wisdom and resilience to provide the basis for plants, shrubs and trees to grow and flourish if given the correct nutrients.

As I tend my gardens, I am also practicing ways to cultivate and grow into those more healthy body, mind and spiritual aspects of wellbeing.

Through concentrated time of t'shuvah, I am focusing on refining the skills to expand my capacity to be forgiving of the broken and vulnerable places within myself and also forgiving those fragile and difficult places in dear family members and friends. Jewish law clearly outlines biblical concerns to protect the earth. I follow closely many of the more contemporary texts, writings and social justice activities that are so vitally important; they assist us in learning how to sustain the earth today that benefits all of us globally.

by Rabbi Marisa Elana James

In the park near my house is a large tree that fell last winter, the trunk slowly falling into decay thanks to four seasons of sun and rain and snow and wind transitioning it back to the soil. When I pass it on walks, I always stop to see what’s new on the slowly-rotting trunk, because I’ve learned that it’s just as beautiful as the living, flowering trees that surround it. 

Mushrooms can grow incredibly fast, seemingly appearing from one day to the next, helping break down dead wood while taking nourishment from it. And they don’t need to be exotic to be fascinating. My current favorite mushroom is the turkey tail: a wildly-common mushroom that can be found almost anywhere, in every season, growing in layered rows on dead wood. 

The big trunk in the park often has rows of turkey tails popping up, usually dark brown with lighter rings, sometimes tinged lavender to almost purple. And the landscape of the trunk changes regularly, especially after rain. 

Every year, as we enter Elul and approach the new Jewish year, I notice what I’ve lost over the previous year, but it’s often harder to see where I’ve grown. Like mushrooms after a night of rain, our growth often starts invisibly, and the evidence of our growth may seem to appear out of nowhere, unexpectedly. 

Renewal often depends on decay. The fall of the tree was dramatic, but the growth of the networks of turkey tails has been a slow blossoming, and for me, an unexpected blessing. We may think of teshuvah as only a returning to who and what we have been before, but we are more like trees than typewriters. We don’t reset to an original place; we grow into being fully ourselves in this season, in this year. We become who we are more deeply as we grow in new directions. 

This Elul, I’m taking my cue from the turkey tails, looking inside to see what small, beautiful things are growing and being nourished by the things I’m leaving behind. This Elul, I’m going to try to visit the tree daily, to remind myself that the dead wood in my soul can nourish the new growth. And this Elul, I bless us all with the ability to appreciate small miracles that emerge to delight us after a storm.