These days we are facing, with increasing alarm, the consequences of our own self-centeredness. Our plunder of the earth’s resources has led to climate change – record-breaking temperatures; floods, wildfires, and hurricanes. It is as if the world is warning us to change our ways before it is too late. Torah tells us, when the world first came into being, God told humanity it could master the natural world, use it for its survival, as long as it remembered the air, food, and water all came from God. But humanity eventually forgot, and became greedy and irresponsible. God sent a flood to wipe away creation, and start over again.