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Religion and the Environmental Crisis

This booklet, based on a lecture by Seyyed Hossein Nasr, deals forcefully on the causes of the environmental crises. The author, while discussing the contrasting world-views-one centering round the philosophy of religion and the other on the notion of the complete supremacy of man (promethean man), have underpined the necessity to act as per dictate of the moral values preached by the religion for several centuries.

Nasr’s concept is clear when he states that the environmental crises have been perpetuated by man, who have declared themselves independent from God and the world. These are the people from western civilization, and a product of "worldly humanism" remained indifferent to the nature and people of other cultures. They set to conquer the globe-the resultant effect of the conquest may be gauzed by the fate of the native people in America and other places in the orient.

The western world view moulded by the renaissance and the Industrial Revolution, in fact, reveals an opposing reality – when we take into account the traditional approach of Hinduism or Islam. In Hinduism and Islam, harmony with nature is sacrosanct and in western approach nature’s role is not succinct. In actuality, the development of man as envisaged in western materialism, reflects on greed and not need and thus undermines the nature in various ways resulting in environmental crises.

Nasr’s diagnosis for the crises is based on the homeopathic approaches. He says man do not require scientific or technological formulations to save environment from utter disaster, when he has perennial sources of inspiration and directives from religious philosophy embodied in Hinduism or Islam – which for last so many centuries illuminated man. Dr. (Mrs.) Kapila Vatsyayan in her befitting foreword summarises that – "If there be harmony in the world and if man is seen as Khalifah or vicegerent of God and Nature, It is incumbent upon man to conserve nature."

Nasr has given an overall philosophical backdrop and probability of action for facing environmental crises. He however has not formalised the practicality of approach keeping in view a much complex world and human behaviour. He should have taken the issue of fragmentation in social and religious matter before presenting the possible treatment.

- A.K. Das

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