Keeping the balance

However short-sighted mankind’s treatment of the planet may be, the beauty of nature will reassert itself. Bahá’u’lláh proclaimed this truth in the nineteenth century, when He said:
“All praise be to God Who hath adorned the world with an ornament, and arrayed it with a vesture, of which it can be despoiled by no earthly power, however mighty its battalions, however vast its wealth, however profound its influence.” I have always found this very reassuring. We can never totally destroy life on this planet, but if we don’t keep within a natural balance, the planet could change drastically, with much of it becoming unfit for human habitation. Unfortunately, there are some political leaders who consider our natural environment to be of little consequence, not understanding our total dependence on our environment to support human life.

The forests of the world are its green lungs. Trees take in carbon dioxide, of which we currently have too much in the atmosphere, and give out oxygen, which humans most definitely need. Ever since Europeans first landed in South America, its forests have been cut back. The largest of these forests are in Brazil, where there are still nearly a million indigenous people living in the forest. Brazilian law gives them rights in theory, but these are not always carried into practice. The recent election of a new Brazilian president, who gives precedence to the perceived short-term needs of business interests, has accelerated the rate at which the forest is being destroyed. This is of course at the same time as the Paris Agreement of 2016 has inaugurated massive programmes of tree-planting world-wide, and some researchers are saying that restoring this natural vesture of the world is the single most important move that can be made to help protect us from more severe climate change. Of course, this will be nowhere near enough on its own, we need to reduce harmful emissions drastically too, but it is an essential part of the solution. Over the last few thousand years, humanity has been gradually removing forest in many parts of the world, to make way for agriculture, houses and so on, but it is becoming clear that rapid action is necessary to restore the balance. A “Great Green Wall” of trees is being planted across Africa, from Senegal in the west to Djibouti in the East. Pakistan has planted a billion trees already, and has adopted a new target of ten billion trees in the next five years. In one state in India, sixty-six million trees were planted in a single day, by well over a million volunteers. But however wonderful these results of the Paris Accord will be for the future of the planet, the trees will take perhaps thirty years to reach a size at which they will make a big difference to the balance of gases in the Earth’s atmosphere.

Each forest is a great resource for humanity. It provides wood for fuel, for homes, for furniture and other purposes. It provides nuts and fruits for us to eat. It provides thousands of species of plants, including potentially medicinal plants. It was when malaria was accidentally transplanted into South America that a cure was discovered. Quinine occurs naturally in a south American plant, and the cure was discovered by Native Americans. But what we take from the forest has to be subject to the law of moderation. Bahá’u’lláh advised: “It is incumbent upon them who are in authority to exercise moderation in all things. Whatsoever passeth beyond the limits of moderation will cease to exert a beneficial influence.” At present, humans tend to think that economic growth should be never-ending, whereas what is most needed is for the lives of the poorest to be made more comfortable.

A Bahá’í sees nature as part of God’s plan for our care and well-being. As Bahá’u’lláh puts it: “Nature in its essence is the embodiment of My Name, the Maker, the Creator… Nature is God's Will and is its expression in and through the contingent world.” The planet itself is part of the natural world, and nature is part of our planetary home. Some years ago, the Universal House of Justice, which is the elected body of the Bahá’ís, called upon the world at large to add World Citizenship into the school curriculum, as a response to Bahá’u’lláh’s statement that “The earth is but one country, and mankind its citizens.” This subject would teach our young people to regard themselves as citizens of the world, with all which that entails. Such an education would, for instance, help the people who live near forests to understand how they are keeping them on behalf of the whole of humanity, not to mention the planet’s wildlife. The fact that many people who live in countries with rainforests have no idea how special these forests and their wildlife are, was brought home to me very forcefully recently. My brother teaches educated people from Nigeria who come to Britain for various purposes. He finds that they are simply not aware of the importance of what their country holds. On one occasion, he was speaking to a group about the remaining forests in Nigeria, and the demise of the African elephant. One of these highly educated professional people said, “Why do we always have to hear about the African elephant? Why can’t we hear about how you treat your elephants?” My brother, who was totally taken aback, managed to respond with: “I am very sorry. We managed to kill all our elephants about thirty-seven thousand years ago!” His audience was amazed - they did not regard elephants as special at all!

In the same way, most of us in the UK do not realise that we use far more than our fair share of the world’s resources and that we need to reduce this drastically. Bahá’u’lláh said: “Take from this world only to the measure of your needs, and forgo that which exceedeth them.” Unfortunately, we cut down most of our forests in the UK many years ago, so, in this respect, our contribution must be to plant as many trees in our country as is practically possible.

An important part of World Citizenship is surely highlighting the different responsibilities of different countries as part of the coherent whole. Each nation needs to understand the importance of what it has, and what they are keeping in trust for all of mankind. This would be a big part of achieving a sense of balance in the life of the world. Bahá’u’lláh, speaking about the common desire to put one’s nation above all others, stated: “Let not a man glory in this, that he loves his country; let him rather glory in this, that he loves his kind.”

There is currently a strange situation. People in some countries who have forests nearby wish to destroy them, to create more grazing land or more arable crops; while people in other countries which are suffering from droughts and flooding are rushing to plant saplings which will take years to grow. This problem will not be solved unless all mankind is in unity, with some form of global co-operation and co-ordination established. The good of the part should be seen in the good of the whole. Bahá’u’lláh puts it like this: “The well-being of mankind, its peace and security, are unattainable unless and until its unity is firmly established.” If we work together we can combat climate change, and one aspect of this is protecting and increasing our forest cover.

The well-being of mankind demands that the rate of deforestation should be drastically reduced, and the natural balance should be restored.