Avatar the Last Airbender and Ecology & Religion

 

    For those unfortunate souls not familiar, Avatar the Last Airbender is a TV show the ran in the early 2000s (during my childhood) featuring a world wherein there were four nations whose culture centered around the elements which they could 'bend' (i.e., control). The four nations included Fire, Water, Earth, and Air. Though not all members of a given nation could actually bend their respective elements, the cultures were thoroughly shaped by those who could. Since the ancient times in this universe, there was an 'Avatar' who could master all four elements, whose job was to keep balance between the nations. Everything changed when the Fire Nation attacked. Leveraging the increased power from a nearby comet, the Fire Nation suddenly and decisively attacked the Air Nomads, in an attempt to kill the next Avatar (who came about in a reliable sequence after they died in a new nation). Ultimately the avatar escapes, and is the last surviving Airbender. There's a lot to unpack in this series about ecology, and a good deal about religion as well; I'll begin with the former and reflect more briefly on the latter. 

    In this series, there is a strong emphasis on balance and parallels. Every nation has some kind of counterpart: Fire and Water, Earth and Air, as well as a rich and dynamic 'Spirit World' which at times overlaps intervenes on the material world. The Fire Nation is made strong by the sun, while the Water Tribes are made strong by the Moon (just to name a few). So important is this balance that, in an early episode, a young princess from the Water Tribe sacrifices her mortal life to become the moon spirit when it is slain in a Fire Nation attack. Themes of self-sacrifice, balance, and transformation are abundant. 

    The connection I see to ecology (one of the connections, that is) is in the story of the exiled Fire Nation prince, named Zuko. His personal mission is to hunt down the avatar who had escaped his Nation's surprise attack. As his story unfolds, his character reveals a tender heart which had come to be dominated by the pain and anger which his father (the 'Fire Lord') had inflicted on him. Zuko learned to depend on anger to focus his Firebending, but as he turns away from the Fire Nation and its conquest, he loses his ability to bend this element with the skill he once did. His wise Uncle Iroh leads him on a quest to discover true Firebending (which includes lessons taken from the Water Tribes) and culminates in a journey to a lost civilization where ancient dragons teach him a lost Firebending technique based on dance (how cool is that?!). Zuko learns that Fire is life, not destruction. 

    Now for the ecology I promised. I think Firebending is an excellent analogy for modern technology. The Fire Nation in this series had become obsessed with machines and warfare, blending their innate abilities with hard steel and mechanization to bend the whole world to their will and into their likeness. Yet this driving, force, this fire they possessed, was not necessarily a tool that had to be used for destruction. The rapidly transformative power of fire need not be used to ruin and destroy. At least, that's what Zuko learned. What if we too, could learn to leverage our inner-fire, our desire to grow, expand, and transform, toward life-giving goals? The deeper lesson here is that there is no element of the material world which is inherently bad. Only when we bend it to evil purposes does a 'thing' become an 'evil thing.' Good and evil, however, are not in the domain of ecology. Enter religion. 

    The spiritual world of Avatar the Last Airbender is a complex one. Originally, in this universe, the spirits walked in the material world as well as in the spirit world, and there passage between the two was easy. Once humans gained the ability to bend the elements, however, the spirits were driven out and the connection was severed. Sounds familiar! To me, this closely mirrors how humans, across history, have driven the spiritual realm into hiding as we have gained an ability to manipulate and control the world around us. Is this not so? So what's the solution? 

    Tying things up, I think the vision we must seek (no matter how blurry it appears now) is one where human fire (i.e., the desire to spread and transform the world) is not at odds with the spiritual world. Notice, I did not say the material world. For how can fire (which is material) be at odds with material? I am invoking the earlier mentioned duality in the Avatar universe. How can there be balance if there is only one kind of thing? What would the balance be between? Indeed, if the world is all material, is not arbitrary to prefer material in one form over another? Material, in and of itself, has no value. The spirit world is the value crouching behind the concrete, material world. Never was it supposed to be the state of affairs that these two worlds were at odds, nor that one should be said to exist and the other not to. 

    I believe the struggle for a beautiful ecological reality starts with an ugly inner struggle. We will someday have to reckon with the immense, profound, and all-pervasive liberty which our 'development' has endowed us with. It has been long since we were able to produce enough food for everyone, but we did not stop. Long since each and every American could flood their life with entertainment, yet we have not gotten enough. Our time is limited and our souls, on the day of our death will demand an account from us for the lives we lead; was it all worth it? Did you spend your days well, soaking up the fruits of this bastion of life we call Earth, that is, our beloved home? Or did we spend it trying to get one more thing, one more bit of entertainment, one more product.