TheShalomCenter
Rabbi Arthur Waskow, Ph. D., founded (1983) and directs The Shalom Center https://theshalomcenter.org In 2014 he was honored by T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights with their first Lifetime Achievement Award as a “Human Rights Hero.” In 2015 he was named by The Forward one of the “most inspiring” American rabbis. Beginning in 1969 with writing the original Freedom Seder and continuing with his seminal work as editor of New Menorah magazine and author of Godwrestling (1978) and Seasons of Our Joy (1982), he has been a leader of the movement for Jewish political and spiritual renewal. Waskow pioneered in the development of Eco-Judaism in theology, liturgy, daily practice, and activism -- • through his books Seasons of Our Joy; Godwrestling – Round 2; Down-to-Earth Judaism; Trees, Earth, & Torah: A Tu B’Shvat Anthology; and Torah of the Earth: 4,000 Years of Ecology in Jewish Thought; • as author of a pioneering essay on “Jewish Environmental Ethics: Adam and Adamah,” in Oxford Handbook of Jewish Ethics and Morality (Elliot N. Dorff and Jonathan K. Crane, eds.; Oxford University Press, 2013); • through the Green Menorah organizing project of The Shalom Center; • through the Interfaith Freedom Seder for the Earth and a number of climate-focused public actions drawing on and transforming traditional liturgies for Tu B’Shvat, Passover/ Palm Sunday, Tisha B’Av, Sukkot, and Hanukkah; • as a candidate for the World Zionist Congress on the Green Zionist Alliance slate; • as a participant and speaker in the World Interfaith Summit on the Climate Crisis called by the Archbishop of Sweden in Uppsala in 2008; • as a founding member (2010-2013) of the stewardship committee of the Green Hevra (a network of Jewish environmental organizations); • as a member of the coordinating committee of Interfaith Moral Action on Climate; • and as a practitioner of nonviolent civil disobedience who has been arrested in climate protests in the US Capitol, at the White House, and has undertaken civil disobedience at Philadelphia conclaves of fracking corporate leaders.
Rabbi Arthur's Blog Subscribe
Pray-in for Climate at White House — Tuesday January 15
Call To Action: A Pray-in For the Climate Dear Friends, We are facing a Climate Cliff, and we are calling upon religious and spiritual leaders, other believers and all people of good will to join us to address its danger by participating in “A Pray-in for the Climate” in front of the White House on Tuesday, January 15, 2013. Super-storm Sandy, the drastic droughts in our corn country, record-breaking Arctic ice melt, and ...
Climate Action at White House on Jan 15
Acting for The Shalom Center, I have been named to the steering committee of Interfaith Moral Action on Climate (IMAC ). IMAC has a major project under way that may be especially interesting to environmentally committed members of the Jewish community. IMAC is planning a prayerful gathering the afternoon of January 15 at the White House to call on the President to take five steps on the climate crisis: 1. Permanently refuse permits ...
What’s this Rosh HaShanah thang?
Dear chevra, When the Talmud takes up Hanukkah, it begins, “Mah zot Hanukkah, What’s this Hanukkah, anyway?” The ancient Rabbis did not like its military overtones. But they took great delight in Rosh Hashanah. It’s more than a “new year”: “Rosh” means “head” or top,” but “shanah” is from a root that means both “change” and “repetition.&rdq...
Bill McKibben Calls for Civil Disobedience Campaign in Washington DC in August 2011
By Rabbi Arthur Waskow Bill McKibben and several other leaders of the USand world-wide movement to prevent climate disaster have called for a wave of nonviolent civil disobedience at the White House gates between August 20 and Labor Day. The action will focus on convincing President Obama to withhold permits for the so-called ‘Keystone XLPipeline’ from Canada’s tar sands to flow to Texas refineries, thence to ...
4 Jewish Summer Camps Sell “Fracking Rights” that Endanger Drinking Water, Food, Health, & Climate
By Rabbi Arthur Waskow (7/14/2011) The Forward, the leading national Jewish weekly, on July 14, 2009, reported that four Jewish summer camps in Pennsylvania have signed leases with gas exploration companies to allow “fracking” –- the hydro-fracturing method of pouring tons of highly chemicalized water to smash shale rocks into releasing natural gas. The four are Starlight’s Perlman Camp, which is owned and operated by B’nai B’rith; Camps ...
When Pesach & Earth Day Coincide
Dear chevra, On Monday night exactly one week before the first Pesach Seder, The Shalom Center sponsored an Interfaith Seder for the Earth. It was held at Mother Bethel AME Church in Philadelphia, the first independent Black church in American history. The weave of blessings, poetic texts from several religious and secular-ethical traditions, bursts of song, excellent vegetarian food, and activist letter-writing to several crucial Federal and ...
