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I’ve finally found a good opportunity to write on this topic. Orthodox Jews too often fail to care about the environment and the world. Maybe this is because they associate environmentalism with the “left” and the “liberal”, or because it is too difficult to keep both torah and environment, or because it’s not torah, and therefore bittul torah, or they just assume that God will fix everything for them. But these are usually excuses for simple apathy, or laziness.

Truthfully, I’m not sure that the Orthodox are that much worse than the general apathetic population, but unnecessary strictures and customs make people more wasteful than they could be; and I feel that this is a way that the Orthodox are doing quite the opposite of setting a good example for the Jewish and non-Jewish world.

So first some reminders on why we should care:

• The law of Bal Tashchit (בל תשחית) expanded from Deut. 20:19, and described by Rambam as a prohibition of “all waste … such as burning clothes for no reason, or breaking a vessel for no reason.”¹
• As a chesed to future generations (presumably pre-messianic) by saving the resources on the planet.
• To avoid the burden of those that slave to provide us with the resources.²
• Possibly following the law of the land (דינא דמלכותא דינא). Although legislation on water reduction and recycling is limited, it is clearly within the legal ideology of a country in drought. One could say it is derekh eretz.
• Assuming environment and resource presevation is a good thing for the world, we should practice it as a light unto the nations, or maybe as tikkun olam.³

Organisations like Canfei Nesharim focus on providing resources for the Orthodox community to learn about and support the environment, but I will illustrate here a few of the issues I have encountered:

Washing

Often I see this procedure for washing hands:

1. Turn on tap with cup under it.
2. When cup is overflowing pour over hands 6 times (with or without turning off the tap), emptying the cup.
3. Put the cup back under the tap and let the next person wash.

The shi’ur (quantity) of water legally required for washing hands is a revi’it. That’s the same amount as one is meant to drink at kiddush, and is about an eighth of the standard washing cup. There is no requirement to have the cup overflowing, nor to empty the entire cup,⁴ nor to keep the tap running. And there is good reason to use only the minimum: fresh water is one of the most limited resources in many parts of the planet.

Some claim that overflowing the cup is a custom (a virtue!). It purportedly shows that they are not wanting, and that God has given them all. But surely saving the water is a greater virtue.⁵

Paper

Since the advent of photocopiers and home/office printing, shiur notes⁶, parshat hashavua sheets, and newsletters at synangogues have been printed out by the thousands. Page after page of tree pulp is shot out of printers and placed before patrons of the synagogue or the beit hamidrash. But they are rarely all used, but people often refuse to recycle them because of their kedusha which would require them to be disposed of in a geniza or by burial.

But that is more stringent than the halakha. I have seen teshuvot from Shlomo Riskin and Michael Broyde that suggest that only 7 particular names of God, in Hebrew, need to be put in the geniza. If these are not present on the sheet, it needs careful disposal, but with care it can probably be recycled.

Accepting strictures upon the letter of the law can be good, but chumrot that lead to forbidden waste and the like⁷ cannot be accepted. For the quantities of such material that we now produce, we clearly need to pursue the path of recycling rather than burial of documents of which the halakha does not strictly require the latter.

Plastic

Because of the combined difficulties of (a) washing up on Shabbat; (b) many guests; (c) kashrut issues, meal hosts on Shabbat tend to supply plastic plates and utensils. These non-recyclable, non-biodegradable, fossil-fuel-based products tend to be unnecessary. In the long run, these “disposables” aren’t as cheap as they look, and the washing up may be worth it. Even if not, there are natural alternatives that lunch hosts should be aware of.

So, Orthodox Judaism, join the rest of the world: reduce, reuse, recycle.

Notes:

1. Sefer Hamitzvot Negative Commandment 57 [↩]
2. Canfei Nesharim brings a great story of Yisroel Salanter using the minimum amount of water to wash, and explaining to his students the burden on his maid who had to carry the water. They extend this to the general over-expenditure of resources in deficiency. [↩]
3. This term, “fixing the world”, is over-used by environmentalist Jews, and particularly those “liberals”. I don’t really approve of its use in this context, but I thought this article would be incomplete without its mention. [↩]
4. Except possibly when washing after waking up in the morning, but certainly not before a meal. [↩]
5. At greater length, see this article. [↩]
6. Double-sided, of course! [↩]
7. Some chumrot also create other anti-social behaviours, and in my opinion these also need curbing when the actual law is not at stake. [↩]