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The Earth as a Gift
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 February 2024
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It is often said that the earth and its creatures are God’s gifts to humankind. Animals and plants are understood to have been ‘sent’ for us, so that we may, by and large, do with them as we will. What we must do in return is express our thanks to the Creator for His generosity. We must say Grace over our meals. So John Locke wrote:
The earth and all that is therein is given to men for the support and comfort of their being. . .all the fruits it produces, the beasts it feeds, belong to mankind in common, as they are produced by the spontaneous hand of nature.
In the Christian tradition, discussions on the rights of ownership typically propose definite limitations on the private use of the earth: we may not supply ourselves with luxuries while other persons still lack basic necessities. But no limits are explicitly set on the common human use of the earth. The gazelle, then, would seem to have no right to the land on which she grazes; the lion no right to her prey. Only humans have rights of ownership, even over their own bodies. That anything non-human enjoys food, habitat or life itself is only by the mercy of homo sapiens.
A popular belief drawn from this is that certain animals are simply ‘made to be eaten’. A sheep is walking mutton. Within the Christian tradition this belief tends to be justified by an appeal to revelation.
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- Copyright © 1993 Provincial Council of the English Province of the Order of Preachers
References
1 Locke, John: The Second Treatise of Government, (3rd edition. J. W. Gough ed), (Blackwell 1966.)Google Scholar
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7 See, for example, Dante: Divina Commedia, L'Inferno XI, 40f; Vatican II: Gaudium et Spes 71.
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