Women, the Earth, the Divine
by Eleanor Rae
Ecology and Justice Series
Orbis Books, 1994
160 pages
ISBN 0-88344-952-8

Eleanor Rae's "Women, the Earth, the Divine" is a succinct, well written, and highly readable overview of the relationship between, like the title says, interlinking cultural attitudes towards women, the earth, and conceptions of the Divine. If you are looking for a book for the secondary classroom to discuss these relationships, this book certainly should be an option.

In her lucid introduction, Eleanor Rae lays out social attitudes towards the feminine and how this directly relates to current attitudes towards women, the environment, and how all of these are at their core religious issues. The book is then divided into the three areas of the title (Women, the Earth, the Divine) with a more in-depth look at the problems and suggestions for solutions.

The section on "Women" is divided into two chapters, "The Present Situation of Women," and "Ecofeminism." The first chapter is a quick overview of the rise of patriarchy and suggestions for how women might respond to this historical situation in general. Using historical examples from U.S. history, Ms. Rae weaves together a highly coherent picture of how solutions can be found in a wide variety of diverse female voices. Once she honors the diverse qualities of women that can be forged together to seek solutions she turns her attention to what all women have in common and how this powerful source of unity can be harnessed to create social change.

Her chapter on "Ecofeminism" clearly outlines the historical development of ecofeminism as well as delineating core ideas and concepts. Ms. Rae discusses the basic connection between women/nature, the constructs of instrumentalism, and cosmic dualism. She then suggests a potential reworking of these ideas in the concepts of complementarity and the relationship between the one and the many.

The section on "The Earth" is also divided into two chapters. The first, "Living the Earth-Centered Future Today," begins by looking at the earth as the prime teacher of values through notions of sustainability and moves from there to exciting feminist notions of "an ethic of care." Carefully and thoughtfully Ms. Rae shows how this new field of ethics, "ethics of care," can be applied to environmental concerns. She moves then to a discussion of how and why transformation of human consciousness in relation to the environment must take place. This is followed by example solutions of bioregionalism and the Green Movement. This approach of clearly delineating problems and then offering positive and active solutions to those problems in each chapter is part of what makes this book so useful and helpful.

The second chapter in "The Earth" section is entitled "Towards a Contemporary Cosmology." Here the author deals with the nature of myth, mysticism, and the cosmological mythos of modern science. Other materials touched upon in this chapter are those of modern, scientific cosmology, with an excellent overview of current views on the creation of the universe, and then linking those theories to a new theology of immanence. She deftly points out that for the first time in history, "the whole Earth community has a single origin story"(73). With this in mind Eleanor Rae, following Thomas Berry and Brian Swimme, posits a theological cosmology. "It is the Universe itself which is the 'primary religious reality, the primary sacred community, the primary revelation of the divine, the primary subject of incarnation, the primary unit of redemption, the primary referent in any discussion of reality or of value. The Universe itself is the context in which divine reality found in the diverse religions is revealed to itself. The Universe is both a psychic-spiritual as well as material-physical reality" (74).

The third and final section of the book is "The Divine." The first chapter then takes these understandings of the feminine and cosmological immanence and looks at what that might mean within Christianity. Ms. Rae focus her thoughts on the "Holy Spirit as the Feminine Divine." Discussion centers on the necessity for a feminine component to the Divine, the function of the Holy Spirit, the relationship between the Holy Spirit and the Word, the Holy Spirit and the Trinity, and the person of the Holy Spirit. Here she suggests that in the person of Mary, mother of Jesus, the "Wisdom Woman" of the biblical wisdom literature, and in that of the feminine as sister, daughter, mother, and friend we might find the most applicable feminine images of the Holy Spirit.

The last chapter, "The Feminine and the Major World Religions," looks at the Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism, and Islam and their relationship to the "Feminine Ultimate and the light this relationship sheds on women's and the Earth's issues" (95). These short sections thoughtfully outline both the problems and the promises each of these religious traditions offers towards issues of the connection between women, the earth, and the Divine.

Well written and clearly articulated "Women, the Earth, and the Divine" is a wonderful addition to the growing literature on eco-feminism and religion. I highly recommend it.

review © 2000 by Tom Collins and RSiSS

Seabury Hall
Makawao, Hawaii

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