The present ecological crisis urges us to rethink the meaning of being human and the rights of the human being. Most works on our ecological crisis agree that anthropocentrism is the major cause of the crisis. Anthropocentrism has prevailed in the industrial age and deeply influenced our perceptions, values, and activities. Anthropocentrism is an understanding of humanity as the supreme reality and value of the earth, and of all other species as having value only in their utility to humanity.

We sense that we need a paradigm shift from anthropocentrism to something else to respond successfully to the ecological crisis of today and to create a new age. It will help the earth community to undergo the transition from the industrial age to the ecological age. Many suggest that ecocentrism is that something. Ecocentrism emphasizes ecological wholeness and reciprocity without victimizing the autonomy and plurality of beings of the earth.

In this vein, a concern for human rights in the ecological context is expected to re-examine anthropocentric tenets in the traditional concept of human rights and to search for ecocentric understandings of human rights. This task also requires an evaluation of anthropocentrism and/or ecocentrism in religions and contemporary thought.

Human rights and anthropocentrism

The scope of human rights

As we trace the history of the human rights movement in the world, we notice that it has expanded the scope of its concerns. In the early stage, human rights usually meant individual political liberties. Particularly in the West, the freedoms of the individual over against the state were emphasized. Then in the next stage, the economic, social and cultural rights of social classes were added to human rights. Particularly in the struggle against capitalism and class domination, the rights of social classes were emphasized. In the following stage, however, not only individuals and social classes, but also human communities began to be entitled to human rights. As the world came together closer, the rights of weaker national, ethnic, and regional communities for survival or life became important in the human rights discussions, and racism, colonialism, and regionalism were charged as violations of human rights.

Now as the ecological crisis has deepened, the survival rights of the whole of humanity, including future generations, and of the entire biosphere are being added to the range of human rights. We have discovered that the history of humans is a part of the history of the universe, together forming the history of life. As the history of life has never been a given, humanity and nature together participate in the making of the future of their life.

The foundation of human rights

The traditional understanding is that human rights are grounded in human dignity. Human dignity consists in the inviolability of the person, personal freedom, and the right to responsible participation in social and economic processes. This understanding is based on human nature, with such innate qualities as sentience, reason, virtues, talents, interests and dispositions, and on human achievements. This understanding imagines an unbound individual responsible only to himself. It is androcentric (male-centred) and it disregards the physical requirements of the human being and its relation with other life.

Christian understandings of human rights are grounded in the status God has granted to humans: God's claim upon or God's right to humans. The same can be said for nature. Humans and nature are the creation, property, and temple of God, and they are in a covenant relationship with God. They are God's partners as well as God's creatures. The partnership between the creator and the creature is based on reciprocity. Thus nothing but God alone can make a claim upon human beings and nature, and interfere with their relationships. It is this reciprocity that confers rights upon humans and nature.

Christian understandings of human rights are also grounded in the nature of creation itself. The creation is the glory, reflection, emanation, part, and body of God. Because of this nature of the creation, the authentic state of the creation was, is, and always will be wholeness.

Christian understandings of human rights, therefore, are reflective of both the relational (or functional) and the ontological (or substantive) status of humans and nature.

Anthropocentrism in the concept of human rights

In the ecological age, we now ask whether the concept of human rights that has been formulated in the modern age is still viable. Modernity has evolved a social philosophy peculiar to itself that centres on the intrinsic value, autonomy, and dignity of individual human beings. It places the rights and welfare of humans over against the rights of other beings, and confuses human rights with human property rights. Other beings are simply the property of human beings, whether as individuals or as collectives. Facing ecological crisis, human rights are still concerned with human welfare first - clean air, water, soil, etc. This manifests a decidedly modern bias in its strident anthropocentrism.

Ecology has recently discovered that each of us is a member of a local biotic community as well as of various human communities. To preserve the integrity, stability and beauty of the biotic community, we need to transform the anthropocentric concept of human rights into an ecocentric one. Human dignity does not just lift humanity above all other forms of life. It also binds humanity to the dignity of all life.

This leads us to question the view of nature as the human environment. Nature must be preserved for the sake of its own dignity. Nature cannot be valued only for its utility of nature for humanity. We cannot be satisfied with our own well-to-do, protecting, condescending, patriarchal attitude to nature, any more than with similar but now discredited attitudes towards the "weaker sex", or the subordinated class, race, or ethnic group. If nature has an intrinsic value and dignity, we must learn to recognize and respect it.

If the traditional demands for human rights arose in the struggles of human beings to liberate themselves from the oppression of the state, tyranny, or superpower, now nature must be liberated from human oppression. As we have believed that if one part of humanity is not free, the whole of humanity is not free, now we have to say the same for nature: if nature is not free, the whole of life, including human beings, is not free. As oppressors of nature, humans must stop the manipulation, exploitation, and destruction of nature. And we must recognize that nature's struggle for liberation is manifested in natural phenomena. We may call it "natural disaster", but from the standpoint of nature, it is a sign of her struggle for liberation.

Traditional theology and anthropocentrism

Since Lynn White wrote "The Historical Roots of Our Ecological Crisis" in 1967,¹ it has been widely debated whether Christianity fostered the anthropocentrism that is responsible for our ecological crisis.

Traditional theology is ambiguous about the relationship between humans and nature. First, it recognizes that nature has the same intrinsic value as the human does. As mentioned above, nature's rights are affirmed by God's claim upon it, and by its own intrinsic value. At the end of the creation narrative, it is the whole creation, not humans alone, that God declares "very good".

Traditional theology understands that nature is a gift of God given for humans to use and care. Gen 1.26 says that humans are to have "dominion" over the earth. Scholars disagree on how this dominion is to be interpreted. Is it domination, beneficent governance, or stewardship? In any case, each can be an anthropocentric interpretation. The very idea of stewardship easily lends itself to attitudes of separation from the rest of creation.

To prevent this, emphasis must be placed on the fact that the stewards themselves are mere creatures among creatures, human nodes in the broader web of life. Stewardship should be undergirded by respect for nature. As the image of God, humans have the unique potential to care for creation with a stewardly compassion that mirrors God's own. We must always remember that humans and nature were created with their own boundaries and proportions, and humans are not supposed to trespass beyond their own boundaries and proportions or those of the entire creation.

In spite of its ambiguity toward the relationship between humans and nature, traditional theology as a whole cannot escape the criticism of anthropocentrism. By picturing God as singular, male, and separate from creation, and somewhere above and beyond the earth, traditional theology accordingly assumes that the proper human, as the image of God, is supposed to be independent, male and separate from nature. This image of God and the human weakens the human sense of the sacred in the natural world and justifies anthropocentrism in the use and abuse of the planet.

Traditional theology is also to be criticized for its lack of concern for nature. In the modern age when natural science has prevailed and the persuasive power of the previous metaphysics and teleological worldviews has declined, traditional theology has given up its concern for nature and instead turned its attention to the human alone.

Traditional theology needs to correct its dichotomizing of creator/creature and human/nature and to allow supreme values such as the sanctity of nature, the continuity or wholeness of beings, and the reciprocity between humans and nature to be restored in theology. All this reminds us that our ecological crisis is directly related to our theological crisis.

Anthropocentrism and ecocentrism in religions

Our ecological crisis has been created not only by our economic systems but by our worldviews which have fostered anthropocentrism in the life on earth. Although traditional religions may not deal directly with the ecological problems that we have to face now, we cannot face them without the traditions. The examination of different religious views on the relationship between humans and nature is critical in the task of proposing solutions to the ecological crisis. In the space available here we cannot deal with the ecological perspective of every religion in the world. For convenience, we will cluster them into three categories - cosmic religion, historic religion, and mysticism - and search for the clues for ecocentrism that can contribute to the solution of anthropocentrism.

Cosmic religion

We assume that cosmic religion is the religion of our earliest ancestors and that of the indigenous peoples of today, in spite of the qualitative differences between the two.

The people of cosmic religion live in proximity to the natural world.

Their identity, way of life, and spirituality are embedded in concrete places. Nature symbolizes for them a way of perceiving, a mode of thinking, a way of living, an attitude. and a worldview. A natural outcome of their embeddedness in concrete locality is their intimate and detailed knowledge of their natural world, and the demarcations between their human habitat and nature are blurred. Implicit in this model of existence is the realization that the wholeness and reciprocity between the human world and nature is both necessary and desirable. This life exemplifies human participation in, empathy with, respect for, and fulfilment of nature rather than human control of, objective observation of, domination over, and alienation from nature. Cosmic religion fits the ecocentric mould.

In cosmic religion, the divine is perceived as manifested throughout the world, throughout the total range of natural phenomena. There is a spatial experience of the divine manifestation in the natural world. This cosmic element is found not only in primitive and indigenous religions. It is also found in Christianity. In Christianity, nature is believed to be God's creation, endowed with life, and witnesses to the wisdom and glory of God. Humans feel the presence of God in nature.

Historic religion

In cosmic religion, nature changes in unending, seasonal cycles. It is eternal. It exists as it always was and always will be, in ever-renewing cycles. Human beings cannot really interfere with that or change it. They cannot begin it, nor can they end it.

In the world of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, however, a new sense of history emerges, an awareness that the universe came into being at a definite moment and continues to develop. Now the divine presence is felt more acutely in the human world, human time, and human history, than in nature. God revealed Himself in the history of Israel. Here we see the germination of anthropocentrism.

Christianity has focused on the life and death of the person of Jesus who is believed to be God incarnate and the Son of God. Although Jesus noticed the providence of God in the natural phenomena, his followers were concerned mainly with his person and attributes. Paul wrote that "the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and obtain the glorious liberty of the children of God." (Rom 8.21) It is good to have nature redeemed together with humans, but this image of nature betrays its image as the aura of God.

In the modern age, not only nature but also history itself became desacralized. Nature became a dead entity waiting to be controlled, manipulated, exploited by humans. History became the enclosed space of humans alone, and even God was not allowed to penetrate into history. This modern anthropocentrism has, however, presented a new crisis in human life. Modern people experienced in history deep contradictions and tragedies, and they felt futility and despair more than the providence of God in history.

As the outer natural world became void of life, and history "disillusioned", the human sense of the divine has been degraded in a corresponding manner. As nature deteriorates and a sense of history diminishes, the human inner world becomes desolate, because the human is a part of nature and nature a part of the human.

Mysticism

Lost in the world of the desacralized nature and history, humans try to meet the divine in the human soul. We call this mysticism. Of course, mysticism did not come into being in modern times. But its concern for the human soul has an affinity with the contemporary search for the divine in the individual soul Mysticism has also fostered both anthropocentrism and ecocentrism.

Chinese mysticism is natural mysticism. It contemplates nature and seeks the union with nature. For the Chinese, nature is divine. Taoism cherishes the ecological living in accordance with the Tao of nature. For Taoists, human beings are part of nature and must conform their ways of living to natural processes and cycles. Taoists try to naturalize the human. A good human life is understood to be one in harmony with nature. Confucianists believe that the human ethic is in accordance with natural order. Confucianists try to humanize nature. Mysticism in Taoism and Confucianism is ecocentric and tries to base the union between humans and nature on wholeness and reciprocity.

Indian mysticism in its later stage turned into the internal world of the human. Indian mystics find absolute peace and joy amidst the pure and eternal light beaming from the inner world of the human. This light is indicative of a supernatural and superhistorical reality. The individual atman's union with the universal Brahman is the final goal of Indian mysticism. This union is inward and beyond the ever-changing bodily and natural phenomena. This is a very anthropocentric concept of salvation. Fortunately, however, Indian mysticism sees nature as the incarnation (parinama) of Brahman. Like Tao, Brahman is the womb of the universe from which life comes out and to which it returns. Everything is in Brahman and Brahman is in everything. In this way, nature and the divine form ecological wholeness and reciprocity. The oneness of all life is envisioned together with an attitude of ahimsa in respect to all living things.

Although Buddhism's non-self theory (anatman) does not recognize the existence of the inner self, it is more interested in the inner state of the human than in nature. Salvation requires complete detachment from the love for nature, because human suffering comes from attachment. This is very anthropocentric. Yet the Buddhist compassion for the world and its life of non-desire can be conducive to the care and preservation of nature. Its emphasis on the discovery of truth within natural phenomena can be interpreted as in an ecocentric mould of wholeness and reciprocity.

Mysticism in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam tends to see the human body and sensuality as sinful. It places the highest value upon the union between the individual human soul and God. This is very anthropocentric. Yet monotheistic mysticism tries to see continuity rather than discontinuity between the creator God and the creature world. Many Christian mystics look at nature in awe and find familial solidarity among creatures.

In mysticism we find both anthropocentric and ecocentric attitudes toward nature. Mysticism contrasts sharply with modernism, however. Unlike modernism, mysticism tries to liquidate human subjectivity instead of strengthening it; it emphasizes an attitude of the receptive contemplation of nature, instead of an aggressive attitude toward an objectified world; it never justifies the violent domination of nature by force, even if it does not actively find religious meaning in nature. The mystics' commitment to liberation from desire and wilful action and their dedication to poverty can reduce the burden and violence that humans have inflicted upon nature. Mysticism also can help the cultivation of contemplative and meditative attitudes and overcome aggressive anthropocentric activism. Mystics become one with nature by participating in it and uniting with it. This attitude can be corrective of the modern anthropocentric attitude that justifies the violation and alienation of nature.

More ecocentrism in religions

Cosmic religion sacralizes nature and is definitely ecocentric. Historic religion and mysticism desacralize nature to some degree, but they still contain ecocentric elements. We may conclude that it is not religion alone that is to be blamed for today's ecological crisis. Yet in the future, without the recovery of the religious meaning of nature, the existence of religion itself will be in danger. The entire civilization will become more anthropocentric, negating the respect for nature and God. The end result of this will be the entire alienation of God, the human, and nature, with no turning back to union. There is no God without creation and there is no creation without God.

Nevertheless, the question for historic religion and mysticism will be now how the human appreciation for nature can be more fully integrated into a religious context, while for cosmic religion, where nature is the central religious context, the question will be how to articulate that understanding in relation to today's world. It is our task to undo the disjunction between ideals and reality.

Contemporary ecological perspectives

If anthropocentrism is related to the obsolete mechanical worldview of modernism, we also need to find alternative ecological worldviews from non-religious sources. Recent developments in science and feminism offer some alternatives.

A new scientific worldview

Unlike the people of cosmic religion who see the universe as simply given, modern people look at the natural world in terms of empirical science. Gradually, we have come to understand that the universe has a beginning in time and has evolved in the past fifteen billion years through a sequence of differentiating transformations leading from lesser to greater complexity and greater modes of consciousness. Many argue that the ascending consciousness of the universe and the rise of spiritual community need to be related. The universe itself is the most basic experience of community, that is, the ultimate sacred community.

In this way, science and technology have enhanced humanity's ability to conceive of the earth as a whole, literally, to see globally, as well as think globally. This may enable us to generate a new spirit of wholeness and reciprocity.

Some believe that our modern scientific view of the universe coincides with the biblical sense of an emergent universe which began at a definite historical moment and has continued to evolve, yearning for the consummation in the end time.

The understanding of a time-developmental universe also helps human beings to see themselves as descendants of and siblings to every other being in the universe. This time-developmental universe also teaches us that our universe has moved from being to becoming. According to this, we were destined to be here at this time in the sense that the time of our lives was determined for us by previous generations of humans and nature. Likewise, the future generations of the universe are destined to be there by our being and becoming. A new understanding of the universe directs us toward a new understanding of our role in this dynamic, unfolding process of the universe. This will lead us to be ecocentric, conscious of cosmic wholeness and reciprocity.

Ecofeminism

The central insight of ecofeminism is that a historical, symbolic, and political relationship exists between the denigration of nature and the denigration of the female in Western cultures. Ecofeminists challenge the western concepts of "rights" that have been established, based on the relative values of various parts of nature via such criteria as sentience, consciousness, rationality, self-determination, and interests. A being possessing one of these characteristics is said to have intrinsic value and hence the right to human consideration. Ecofeminists generally regard this approach as static, arbitrary, and lacking a holistic apprehension of the natural world, including humans: its wholeness and reciprocity. Another objection of ecofeminists to the above use of rights theory is that it requires a strong separation of individual rights-holders and is set in a framework of human community and legality. Ecofeminists feel that a more promising approach to the ecological crisis would be to remove the concept of rights from the central position it currently holds and focus instead on less dualistic concepts such as respect, sympathy, care, compassion, gratitude, friendship, and responsibility.

At the same time, however, ecofeminists argue that the male ecologists' criticism of anthropocentrism is based on gender-blind assumptions, without taking seriously the formative dynamics of androcentrism or male dominance. For example, the emphasis on the ecological self which refers to the aspect of one's being that is continuous with the larger Self (that is, the unitive dimension of being) rather than the individual self may result in obliterating all particularities. This worries women, who have been socialized in patriarchal culture to sacrifice their own self-definition to the needs of the family. This notion may also obstruct the attempt of social and cultural minorities to assert their own particularities.

Ecofeminism as a whole emphasizes the ecocentric mould of wholeness and reciprocity, while pointing to the significance of the particularities of minorities. This will help us monitor the totalitarian use of ecology in environmental politics.

Conclusion

The emergence of a new understanding of human rights is based on the combination of the new discoveries of religion, new science and feminism. They share a common concern for ecological wholeness and reciprocity between humans and nature. Their concern is really global in scope as well as focus. Thus we may have a single, integrated understanding of human rights, corresponding to the contemporary reality that humans and nature inhabit one common planet and that we share a common future.

Yet single does not mean simple or undifferentiated. We realize that we have a plurality of received and renewed views of human rights corresponding to the diverse realities of many peoples who are inhabiting diverse bioregions and looking through diverse cultural and religious lenses. A unified but multifaceted global concept of human rights, based on ecocentric wholeness and reciprocity, is emerging, and we are welcoming it.

The late Sun Soon-Hwa of the Presbyterian Church of Korea taught Feminist Theology and Theology and Culture in Hanil University and Theological Seminary, where she also served as Dean of the Asia Pacific School of Graduate Studies.

Notes

1. Lynn White Jr., "The Historical Roots of our Ecological Crisis", Science (1967), pp.1203-7.

References

Mircea Eliade, Patterns in Comparative Religion (New York: New American Library, 1974).
May Evelyn Tucker, and John A. Grim, eds., Worldviews and Ecology: Religion, Philosophy, and the Environment (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1994).
Lukas Vischer, ed., Rights of Future Generations, Rights of Nature: Proposal for Enlarging the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Geneva: World Alliance of Reformed Churches, 1990).