The Great Work

I somehow missed this visionary book when it first came out, and I am writing this review rather tardily in case other readers are in a similar situation. Put simply, The Great Work is a great work that should be read and digested by any thinking person. The book begins by defining the general notion of Great Work, with an indication of its nature in other epochs such as classical Greece and China. The corresponding Great Work of our own time is 'to create a mutually enhancing mode of human dwelling on the planet Earth.' This entails 'moving the human project from its devastating exploitation to benign presence.' We may have human rights, but 'we have no rights to disturb the basic functioning of the biosystems of the planet.' In a felicitous turn of phrase, Berry characterises the universe as 'a communion of subjects, rather than a collection of objects.'

The core issue is our modern way of relating to and understanding the natural world. Our attitude is one of domination, exploitation and control, corresponding to a masculine or patriarchal mode of functioning. Human beings are superior to and apart from nature. Berry traces this attitude partly to the time of the Black Death when there was a sudden dramatic reversal of more benign views of nature. Another factor is a religion of the book that does not naturally perceive nature as a numinous presence. The development of science with its objective approach and mechanistic metaphor adds a further development, as does the exploitative mentality inherent in modern economics. The human is prized above the natural, while the natural is viewed as a resource for human use. Linear progress replaces an understanding of limits and natural cycles, the economy is elevated above its ecological context. All of this is upside-down thinking and is eloquently described by Berry. We no longer live in a Cosmos in the sense of understanding the place of the human in the universe and a harmonious way of being within it.

It is interesting to read by way of illustration a passage quoted from William Strickland about his journey up the Hudson River in 1795. Speaking about the settlers in this area, he writes that: 'in the first place he drives away or destroys the more humanised Savage the rightful proprietor of the soil; in the next place he thoughtlessly, and rapaciously exterminates all living animals, that can afford profit, or maintenance to man, he then extirpates the woods that cloath and ornament the country, and that to any but himself would be of greatest value, and finally he exhausts and wears out the soil, and with the devastation he has thus committed usually meets with his own ruin…it is then left to him only to sally forth and seek frontiers, a new country which he may again devour.' It is a chillingly prophetic passage which is now coming about on a worldwide scale.

How then can we move towards the mutually enhancing human presence to which the author refers? How can we inaugurate what he calls an Ecozoic era? Needless to say, we need a drastic course correction towards the kind of reverential ecological attitudes that are part of the emerging alternative thinking characterised by such magazines as Resurgence. There are in fact many precursors for this, dating back to the thinking of Walt Whitman, Thoreau, Emerson, John Muir and the founding of the Sierra Club in 1892. But the mainstream has prioritised extractive economic growth over ecological sustainability; the GNP has increased, while the Gross Earth Product is falling every year. In addition, our political, economic, spiritual and educational institutions have failed to raise fundamental questions. Berry singles out the University as a place where new thinking can be grounded. Ecology as a functional cosmology, he argues, must be a foundation for all courses. Students need to understand the earth and its resources as the backdrop to all human activity.

A further step is the cultivation of our inherent capacity to commune with nature and move with the rhythm of life. On a practical level, nature must be accorded legal rights. A number of central concepts such as progress and profit need to be redefined. Archetypally, we need to reconnect with the earth as Mother and with other symbols such as the Journey, the Cosmic Tree and the symbol of death and rebirth. We also need to draw on the multiple wisdom of women, indigenous people, classical traditions and science. In other words, this Great Work is required on a number of levels. It is same work referred to by Brian Goodwin in his book reviewed elsewhere in this issue and corresponds to the practical vision of the Prince of Wales. Nothing short of cultural renewal will accomplish the task, so we need to develop new ways of communicating these vital messages for our time. This book is a major signpost on the way.