New Jersey Jewish News
Central New Jersey Feature Story

An Elizabeth synagogue hosts a fledgling group that grounds its environmentalism in rabbinic law

by Johanna Ginsberg
NJJN Staff Writer

A steady rain on Sunday morning proved no match for Ora Sheinson of Hillside.

“Who’s coming on the hike?” she asked the group at Adath Israel on North Avenue in Elizabeth, as they were finishing their kosher organic breakfast served with utensils made from potato starch.

“It’s pouring outside,” came a reply.

“Awesome!” she said. “Let’s go.” And they did. With raincoats and umbrellas, 10 people set out for nearby Conant Park.

The walk marked the natural end of a March 10-12 shabbaton run by Canfei Nesharim, an Orthodox environmental group founded in 2003 by Sheinson and four other religious environmentalists. Sheinson, 29, an attorney practicing in the environmental group of the international law firm Latham and Watkins, lives in Hillside and is a member of Adath Israel, affiliated with Elizabeth’s Jewish Educational Center.

The weekend, supported in part by grants from Hazon and the Coalition on the Environment and Jewish Life (COEJL), drew 30 participants from outside the community.

For some, it was a relief to be among like-minded Jews — indeed, while environmentalism has taken hold in other denominations, Canfei Nesharim (Wings of Eagles) appears to be one of the first organized efforts to create grassroots interest in the environment among Orthodox Jews.

“Most frummie Yidn (Orthodox Jews) are not aware,” said participant Tikva Kohn of Monsey, NY. “They’re ignorant and apathetic about what’s going on in the environment. And some think environmentalism encourages alternative lifestyles.”

Environmentalism “is just not on [Orthodox] people’s radar screens,” agreed Canfei Nesharim executive director Evonne Marzouk.

The goals of the group are to ensure environmental topics and related Jewish laws are being taught, both in day schools and Orthodox synagogues, and to have the Orthodox Jewish community model the obligation to protect the environment.

To that end, the shabbaton focused on studying environmental sources in Jewish texts and included talks on Jewish law and the environment by Sheinson and Marzouk, as well as several sessions with Rabbi Shmuel Simenowitz, an Orthodox Jew who runs Sweet Whisper Farms, a Shabbat-observant, organic, horse-powered, kosher maple syrup farm in Vermont.

Among those struck by the sources Sheinson offered was her own rabbi, Jonathan Schwartz. Asked whether he might look more carefully at textual references in the future, he said, “Not only am I going to — already twice I pulled out sources.” The weekend had a profound impact on Schwartz, he said, adding, “An awareness will be there. We’re going to pay much more attention to our consumption, like the amount of water we use at home.”

The shabbaton was the third annual event for Canfei Nesharim, a group still in its infancy. Its founders included Orthodox Jews who had either worked or volunteered in the environmental field. Marzouk, who lives in Washington, DC, works for the Environmental Protection Agency in its Office of International Environmental Policy. Atara Weisberger of Passaic, who teaches at Ma’ayanot Yeshiva High School for Girls in Teaneck, holds a degree in natural resource management from Indiana University.

Other founders were Dan Weber, a neurobehavioral toxicologist; Lisa Beltz, who works for the Isralight educational center; and Shai Spetgang, executive director of the Canadian Environmental Markets Association and an inventor of environmental products.

Canfei Nesharim is headquartered in New York City with members, founders, and volunteers scattered around the globe. It receives institutional support through the Jewish Education Service of North America and its Bikkurim division, an “incubator” for new Jewish initiatives.

Canfei Nesharim’s e-mail list has grown to include 450 people, and a recent survey revealed that 25 percent read and use the newsletters to educate their home communities.

Not everyone at the Elizabeth event embraced the concepts offered. Jorden Brinn of Silver Spring, Md., remained skeptical. “It’s a question of where to direct my energies and what impact I want to make in the world. Some things economically don’t make sense,” he said. He called himself a “lapsed” environmentalist who wanted to see if this shabbaton might rejuvenate his interest. “I’ll let it settle” was the conclusion he reached.

It is not just personal skepticism that Canfei Nesharim is trying to overcome. Alliances with other environmental groups that don’t share the Orthodox commitment to Halacha, or rabbinic law, can prove tricky. Working with the nondenominational COEJL, Marzouk said she finds the “lock-step” environmental mentality difficult to balance with halachic imperatives. “We can’t always sign on to everything COEJL does,” she said. “I examine things very carefully to make sure they’re appropriate for us in terms of policy.”

Perhaps the overwhelming obstacle is the politics of environmentalism, and the perception among many Orthodox Jews that is is a liberal cause. “The American political scene is divided; the environment is on one side, and conservative religious values are on the other,” said Sheinson. “Our point is that conservative religious values are not just compatible with the environment but dictate environmentalism. This isn’t about what Ora Sheinson says, but what Nahmanides, the Talmud, the Torah says.”

That’s a lesson Sheinson learned as an undergraduate at Stern College for Women, where she founded an environmental club. “‘Hashem gave us the world and we have to protect it’ was not a good sell. I found that otherwise thinking people would say, ‘Show me where Jewish law says put the can in the recycling bin. Otherwise, it’s nice in theory.’” Undaunted, that’s exactly what she set out to do, and she hasn’t stopped. Canfei Nesharim’s mission is an outgrowth of her work.

“Thank God I studied in yeshiva my whole life, and I can use my background to look for [textual references],” Sheinson said. She has developed source sheets, given lectures, led Tu B’Shevat seders, and, while in law school, wrote a paper for the Columbia Journal of Environmental Law on Jewish sources and environmentalism.

Canfei Nesharim recently published “A Compendium of Sources in Halacha and the Environment,” covering everything from the Halacha of water to the conceptual rules of bal tashchit, the halachic imperative to avoid wanton destruction.

The group believes that with a bit of education, perhaps the thinking in the Orthodox world may change. As Marzouk said, “It’s not as if changing our actions for the sake of something bigger is unfamiliar to us.”

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