Browse Content
Life Worth Living is an initiative of the Yale Center for Faith & Culture at Yale Divinity School.
Who do we answer to?
Alice Walker on Responsibility to the Natural World
Life Worth Living Team
"But finally, after much discourse, I understood what the trees were telling me: Being an individual doesn’t matter..."
Listen on
Alice Walker reminds us that, to the environment, humans exist as one collective force, with all of us holding a collective responsibility to care for our world.
Quote + Question + Context
Who do we answer to?
It is said that a chain is only as strong as its weakest link—in the same vain, Alice Walker reminds us that, to the environment, humans exist as one collective force, with all of us holding a collective responsibility to care for our world. After a conversation with the trees, she comes to a series of realizations about human environmental impact:
[.alt-blockquote]"The summer before this encounter I lived in the northern hills of California, where much logging is done… Well, said the trees… you butcher us, you burn us, you grow us only to destroy us… But I, as an individual, am innocent, I said. Though it did occur to me that I live in a wood house, I eat on a wood table, I sleep on a wood bed.[.alt-blockquote]
[.alt-blockquote] But finally, after much discourse, I understood what the trees were telling me: Being an individual doesn’t matter. Just as human beings perceive all trees as one (didn’t a U.S. official say recently that ‘when you’ve seen one tree, you’ve seen ’em all’?), all human beings, to the trees, are one. We are judged by our worst collective behavior, since it is so vast; not by our singular best. The Earth holds us responsible for our crimes against it, not as individuals, but as a species—this was the message of the trees. I found it to be a terrifying thought. For I had assumed that the Earth, the spirit of the Earth, noticed exceptions—those who wantonly damage it and those who do not. But the Earth is wise. It has given itself into the keeping of all, and all are therefore accountable.”[.alt-blockquote]
[.alt-blockquote-attribution]-Alice Walker, Living by the Word, (pp. 141-42).[.alt-blockquote-attribution]
Questions
- Have you ever felt responsible for the actions of someone else? Why? How did it impact your own actions?
- How would your life have to change if you accepted responsibility not just for your own actions but for those of others - even humanity itself?
- How would your relationships with others change if you accepted this account of collective responsibility?
- Take a moment to consider some of the most prominent elements of the natural world near you. If these beings could talk, what would they say?
Quote + Question + Context
Who do we answer to?
It is said that a chain is only as strong as its weakest link—in the same vain, Alice Walker reminds us that, to the environment, humans exist as one collective force, with all of us holding a collective responsibility to care for our world. After a conversation with the trees, she comes to a series of realizations about human environmental impact:
[.alt-blockquote]"The summer before this encounter I lived in the northern hills of California, where much logging is done… Well, said the trees… you butcher us, you burn us, you grow us only to destroy us… But I, as an individual, am innocent, I said. Though it did occur to me that I live in a wood house, I eat on a wood table, I sleep on a wood bed.[.alt-blockquote]
[.alt-blockquote] But finally, after much discourse, I understood what the trees were telling me: Being an individual doesn’t matter. Just as human beings perceive all trees as one (didn’t a U.S. official say recently that ‘when you’ve seen one tree, you’ve seen ’em all’?), all human beings, to the trees, are one. We are judged by our worst collective behavior, since it is so vast; not by our singular best. The Earth holds us responsible for our crimes against it, not as individuals, but as a species—this was the message of the trees. I found it to be a terrifying thought. For I had assumed that the Earth, the spirit of the Earth, noticed exceptions—those who wantonly damage it and those who do not. But the Earth is wise. It has given itself into the keeping of all, and all are therefore accountable.”[.alt-blockquote]
[.alt-blockquote-attribution]-Alice Walker, Living by the Word, (pp. 141-42).[.alt-blockquote-attribution]
Questions
- Have you ever felt responsible for the actions of someone else? Why? How did it impact your own actions?
- How would your life have to change if you accepted responsibility not just for your own actions but for those of others - even humanity itself?
- How would your relationships with others change if you accepted this account of collective responsibility?
- Take a moment to consider some of the most prominent elements of the natural world near you. If these beings could talk, what would they say?
Pairings
Our responses to life's big questions are meant to form a coherent whole—a vision of life worth living. A response to one question will fit well with certain responses to other questions, but it will be incompatible with others. We've provided the "Pairs Well With" and "Pairs Poorly With" sections for this article to help you consider these questions of coherence.
Context
- Alice Walker’s Living by the Word
- "How Should We Live?" in Life Worth Living: A Guide to What Matters Most
Pairs Well With
- Certain indigenous understandings of the Earth being enmeshed with humanity
- Mahayana Buddhism and its emphasis on the illusory nature of the self and the reality of collective suffering caused by attachment
- Forms of Animism
Pairs Poorly With
- Climate movements that emphasize the waste/harmful acts of individuals
- Certain christian stewardship arguments that believe humans hold dominion over the earth and its creatures and thus can do with them as they please
- A naturalist ontology/dualism that puts a firm divide between humans and the “natural world”
Keep browsing
Join the LWL Community
