Biblical Tale Is Rooted in Ecology, Says Director of Noah

Scenes from Darren Aronofsky's telling of the tale of Noah.

For noted Hollywood director Darren Aronofsky, who describes himself as a not very religious Jew, the Biblical story of Noah has always been about humankind's relationship to ecology and the environment.

"To try to remove the ecological message from the story of Noah is harder than putting it in," Aronofsky, the director of the controversial spring hit movie Noah, says. "Noah is saving these animals."

Aronofsky, on the left, and co-writer Ari Handel

Aronofsky recently appeared on a panel program at the Center for American Progress (CAP) titled Noah and the Nexus of Faith and Environmentalism.

He was joined on the panel by:

• Ari Handel, the co-writer of the movie
• Danielle Baussan, the managing director of energy policy at CAP
• Michael Brunce, executive director of the Sierra Club and
• Jack Jenkins, a senior writer and researcher of faith and progressive policy at  CAP

Aronofsky said that he maintains a broad view of environmentalism. "I think violence of man against man is an environmental issue. War is an environmental issue. War destroys the planet," he said.

Responding to criticism that his film does not follow Scripture, Aronofsky pointed out that that wasn't the intention of the movie. 

"The mythical power of these early chapters is really inspiring," he said. "It's a question of what can we learn from them."

The director said he wanted to create a film that combined "the poetry of Genesis with the visuals of the movie screen."

"They are equally inspiring," he added. "They are not mutually exclusive. It makes for an incredibly beautiful way to look at what happened. We never questioned the text. We showed full respect for the text."

Aronofsky said he and his co-writer Handel faced many difficult choices in bringing the story to life. "Lots of questions came up. People have been wrestling with these questions for centuries.  For example, there is stewardship - does man have a moral responsibility to take care of the environment?" 

Brunce said the film, although set in early Biblical times, captured "the exact emotions and challenges" that environmental movement is facing today. "It (the destruction of the natural world) is a cause of great despair, but we have a greater awareness and a greater ability than ever to do something about it," he noted.

Baussan said the exposure of the issues raised in the film is a great way to focus more on the relationship between modern man and the environment. "Conversations around art can be a great way to do this," she said.

Aronofsky said that one of his goals was to restore the Noah tale to its original intent. "For a very long time, it has been turned into a children's story. But it was the first Apocalypse story. God had a question in his mind - does man have the right to continue. God is judging man," he said.

"I think I always related to the fact that I wouldn't have been good enough to get on the boat. For me, it was scary and traumatic," he added.

The Question of Race in the 21st Century

Ever since our founding as a nation, race has played a key role in the American experience. That is still true today, but as we head through a rapidly changing 21st Century, the question of race takes on a new urgency.

"It's not a question of numbers, it's a question of status," says Roderick Harrison, a senior research fellow at the Civic Engagement and Governance Institute's Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies.

Harrison was one member of a Center for American Progress panel which recently examined the changing meaning of race in the 21st Century. He was joined by:

• Rinku Send, the president and executive director of Race Forward: The Center for Racial Justice Innovation
• Julie Downing, an associate professor in the Department of Latina/Latino Studies at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign and
• Hillary O. Shelton, the Washington bureau director and senior vice president for advocacy of the NAACP

Much of the discussion focused on the best ways to get an accurate census counting of American minority citizens. In 1960, census takers simply checked the box of the race they thought their interview subjects belonged to. Now, census respondents choose their own racial identity, which obviously is more accurate. 

But problems still remain."We have Latinos not wanting to be recognized so there is an under-reporting of Latinos," Downing said. They say 'I am an American citizen and I want my citizenship to be recognized. I don't want to be discriminated against."

Then there is the growing number of Americans who come from mixed races. They may view themselves as white, but not all Americans will do so. "When many people see Barack Obama, who is racially mixed, they see black. Or when they see Tiger Woods, they don't see Thai. They ask is he going to be eating fried chicken at the Master's," Harrison said.

But why is accurate reporting of minorities so crucial? The answer, the panel concluded, is quite simple - to solve a problem you must first be able to accurately measure it.

"We need that information to see how close we are coming to full inclusion and full parity," Harrison explained.

The panel members agreed that while race relations may be better than they once were, there is still much room for improvement.

"I am afraid we're going to just stop at accepting diversity and not move forward in terms of equity and justice," Send said. "We can't just date our way out of inequity. People say it will all even out over time and that is just not going to happen. The problems we're dealing with are institutionalized and systemic. We need to change the rules to take apart the hierarchy."

Harrison said fear is also exacerbating whites negative fears toward non-whites. Much of that is fueled by projections that by the mid-21st Century, there will be more non-whites in America than whites.

"They (many whites) see this change as destroying their America. They say these people are taking over. They see growing diversity as a threat to their privilege. It is a this is mine, this is not yours attitude," Harrison said.

The current hard economic times in America is also factoring into widening of racial divisions. "Under the pressures of economic distress, there is a search for scapegoats which always ends in the finding of minority populations who are either the cause of the problem or a barrier to the solution," Harrison said.