Faith and Biodiversity: A Vaishnava Hindu Perspective
Hindu traditions vary greatly, yet they have many common themes and beliefs. One is this: The world is not ours to exploit or whimsically enjoy. The world is a gift. We should care for it with respect and love.
Human beings are not the owners, lords, or controllers of the Earth. Nor is the world ours to dominate, colonize, or subjugate. We are small, albeit significant, parts of a vast universe. Knowing this is true wisdom, and leads to happiness and liberation from suffering. Ignorance of this truth leads to degradation and pain.
The theistic Hindu traditions teach that the entire universe is God’s property, and God’s energy. Failing to understand this, we’re prone to commit violence against our planet and its abundance of life. And, we destine ourselves to suffer reactions for such harm. The karma for our abusiveness is all around us in the form of pollution, global warming, and loss of biodiversity.
Our tradition maintains that this perspective is more than good theology. It’s a path to peace. If we see the world as God’s property, then we minimize our competitive zeal to ‘win the world’ and instead treat nature with care and affection. Just as when we borrow the car of a friend, we don’t mistreat it. We care for it cautiously, remembering that our friend is the real owner. If we forget the actual owner, we become a thief.
Seeing the divine essence of nature has many scriptural sources. The Sri Isopanishad, an early Sanskrit text, puts it this way:
Everything animate and inanimate, that is within the universe, is controlled and owned by the Lord. One should therefore accept only those things necessary for oneself, which are set aside as one’s quota, and one should not accept other things, knowing well to whom they belong. (Sri Isopanishad, Mantra One)
The Bhagavad-gita, perhaps the best loved of all Hindu scriptures, explains the same principle in this verse:
“The sages, knowing me to be…the Supreme Lord of all planets and demigods, and the benefactor and well-wisher of all living entities, attains peace from the pangs of material miseries.” (Gita 5.29)
We’re all looking for peace. In that search, we prioritize the best interests of our family, community, nation, tribe, or species. The Vedic sages say this is narrow minded. Such limited vision ignores the reality of our interconnectedness with nature and each other, and leads to unnecessary rivalry, conflict, shortages, and suffering. As one commentator to the above quoted Isopanishad verse has written, without divine vision we are left simply “fighting for stolen bread.”
Inspired by this view, members of my Vaishnava Hindu tradition are strict vegetarians. ISKCON provides the world’s largest network of vegetarian food relief; in India alone, feeding more than one million hot lunches to school children daily. We’ve also developed eco-farms around the world where the land and animals are cherished and protected. When we see the universe as a gift of divine love, we can live, and promote, peace for all.
Written by Anuttama Dasa
Anuttama has been a member of the Gaudiya Vaishnava tradition since 1975. He is a Governing Body Commissioner of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON), and serves as its Global Minister of Communications. He is a Co-Founder of the ISKCON Environmental Initiative (iskconenvironment.org). He and his wife, Rukmini, live in suburban Washington, D.C
