www.towardtradition.org/article_Earthquake.htm
Equal Earthquakes with Unequal Results December 29, 2003 By Rabbi Daniel Lapin President, Toward Tradition Our television screens fail to convey the full horror of the recent earth quake in Iran that inflicted terrible deaths on over twenty thousand sou ls. America has once again led the international relief effort. It might seem callous to analyze this disaster even before all the victims have been buried, were it not for one timely parallel. Only a few days earlier, a small town on the California coast also endure d an earthquake. Even taking the logarithmic nature of the Richter scale into account, from an objective geological perspective, these two event s were almost identical, yet the California quake killed only two people . Dispassionately examined, the evidence suggests a spiritual rather tha n a seismic explanation for the disparity. One might leap to a seemingly obvious, although incorrect explanation for the difference in death toll between the two earthquakes: Bam is a very large city in Iran, while Paso Robles is but a seaside hamlet. However, calculating the discrepancy shows that the damage done in Bam was vastl y disproportionate to that suffered in Paso Robles. This is not the first time that similar meteorological phenomena in diffe rent parts of the world have caused immeasurably different consequences. For instance, China's Yellow River has repeatedly flooded, on one early twentieth century occasion, snuffing out the lives of millions of Chine se peasants. In a 1991 monsoon in Bangladesh, one hundred and thirty nin e thousand people drowned. However, hurricane Hugo, which battered our own east coast in 1997, was n ot significantly less severe a storm than the one that ended the lives o f those pathetic Bangladeshis. Sad to be sure, but nowhere near the scale of the Asian catastrophe s The dreadful San Francisco earthquake in 1989 did kill about fifty motori sts unfortunate enough to be in their cars beneath the stretch of East B ay highway that collapsed upon them. However, it is important to remembe r that San Francisco's high rise skyscrapers did not fall. In fact, othe r than the problematic highway, virtually all other buildings and bridge s survived the shaker. Less than one year earlier, a similar quake had k illed fifty five thousand victims in the eastern reaches of the old Sovi et Union. Contrast this with a massive earthquake in 1994 that rocked, w ith few fatalities, one of the world's great cities-Los Angeles. I have studied the world's twenty greatest natural disasters (measured by number of fatalities) of the past one hundred and three years. Of all t wenty, only three have taken place in nations where Christianity has had a profound influence. Two were volcanic eruptions in Sicily and Italy t hat killed tens of thousands of people; the other was the flooding of pa rt of Holland during a violent North Sea storm in 1953 drowning about tw o thousand people. Am I suggesting that God dispatches natural disasters to punish those who have not embraced Christianity? Yet the question does stand: Why are so many more people killed by comparable natural disasters in non-Christian countries? Natural disasters occur randomly around the world regardless of the parti cular faith that has shaped each nation. What dramatically changes the c onsequences of natural events such as earthquakes or storms is how a par ticular society is organized. And this is where the religious culture of the people seems to make a huge difference. When Holland was flooded by the North Sea breaking through its dikes, it was the last time it ever happened. By contrast, since 1953, Bangladesh alone has endured six major floods each drowning many thousands. But by 1958, the Dutch had embarked on the greatest flood control and land recl amation project in history. When they were done, the Zuider Zee and the rest of Dutch geography had changed for all time. Dutchmen invested thei r guilders together and built up the necessary war chest to defeat the N orth Sea. The Dutch government, acting on behalf of all the people, offered twenty-year bonds. The Dutch eagerly handed in their savings in exchange for a promise to repay the sum with interest after twenty years. It was Protestant faith that prompted the Dutch to hand over their precio us savings in order to build the biggest and strongest dike ever. Their faith muscle was strong and, like any other muscle, once you have streng thened your faith muscle in one area, it is strong for other purposes to o You may have developed your biceps in the gym, but when you need them to lift the kitchen table they won't let you down. Similarly, those of us who have developed our faith muscle within the religious observance o f Christianity or Judaism find that we can count on that faith muscle be ing ready and available whenever we require its services for more mundan e purposes like investment. This helps to explain why the Judeo-Christia n-based West is our epoch's epicenter of wealth creation. Western societies originally shaped by Judeo-Christian values enjoy an en ormous advantage in this area. Unlike most of the world's other religion s, many of which stress fatalism over faith, both Judaism and Christiani ty, each with its utterly distinctive theology, impart a framework of fa ith to its adherents. Other cultures believe they please their god by su bmissively accepting his wishes. But societies sculpted by Biblical idea s have faith that tomorrow can, and must be improved, and that it is mor ally worthy to bring about that improvement. That is why non-Christian c ountries endure repeated earthquakes and repeated storms yet do little t o reduce the successive impact while countries rooted in Christianity in vest massively in seawalls, dykes, and other protective infrastructures and preventive measures. In Bangladesh and Bam it is a forlorn hope to get millions of peasants to act in unison and entrust their gold to a capital market. Their religio n has produced a culture that encourages greater trust in mattresses tha n in banks. Theirs is also a culture of fatalism rather than of faith. T hus when the monsoon or earthquake strikes, it is each man alone against the forces of nature. In America, and other countries with Judeo-Christian roots, individu als entrust their resources to the group. They have faith that that thos e funds will help build defenses and, eventually, will be repaid with in terest. Judaism and Christianity teach that with faith and action we can change t omorrow. Furthermore, if doing so can save even one life, we are indeed obligated to denounce fatalism and act decisively. Uniquely, Biblical ci vilization teaches a distinctive emphasis on the value of even one human life. Ancient Jewish tradition teaches that all of humanity is descende d from only one man, Adam, in order to stress that saving even one life is equivalent to saving the entire world's population. Abraham's ill-fat ed attempt to save the city of Sodom by arguing with God is another exam ple of this oft-repeated sentiment exceedingly rare in other religions. Not surprisingly, suicide murderers are found more frequently in non-Bib lical civilizations that profess less value in human life. Not surprisin gly, the countries with embedded Judeo-Christian foundations cope more s uccessfully with natural disaster. Another reason we are not surprised to see such different fatality figure s is because both Judaism and Christianity, in spite of vastly different theologies, tend to unify people into collaborating entities. They are both community-building religions rather than merely tribe-building reli gions. However, other religions tend to stress tribal and family affilia tion as we see even today in the Saudi ruling classes. Judeo-Christian t eachings implant in Western countries not only the importance of family but the productive allegiances that can be formed by those who share com mon faith. This is why so many Jewish and Christian Americans regard the ir synagogue and church affiliations to be as enriching as their family relationships. Common agreement to abide by zoning laws and building standards, rare in most non-Ch...
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