BIBLE AND SUSTAINABILITY: ECOLOGICAL CONSCIOUSNESS AS A PARADIGM OF A NEW BIBLICAL HERMENEUTIC

Abstract

Social, political and economic crises, extreme droughts and floods, and rising sea levels are all part of the contemporary environmental crisis. Therefore, this article sought to clarify some causes of this crisis, which are closely related to a type of relationship between human beings and nature, a relationship that arose from the anthropocentric turning point in modernity. It aims to show that a hermeneutics of the Sacred Scriptures based on an anthropocentric perspective is unable to correctly interpret biblical texts. Firstly, it argues that the accounts of creation do not imply the dominion of nature, and its excessive exploitation, by human beings. Then, the article clarifies that the Sabbath system in the Bible, many centuries before environmentalists, already proposed a form of sustainability, ensuring natural resources for future generations and care for the entire creation. Finally, the results of the research point to the need for a new hermeneutic paradigm capable of interpreting the Bible no longer from an anthropocentric perspective, but from a perspective rooted in ecological consciousness. Therefore, it is not simply a superficial hermeneutic change, but a real paradigm shift.

KEYWORDS: Consumer Culture. Environmental Crisis. Bible. Accounts of Creation. Sabbath.