From David to David

A legend, then and now

Today is the one hundredth birthday of a very special person: Sir David Attenborough. You might not have heard of him; you might be more familiar with his late younger brother Sir Richard, who played a prominent movie role in Jurassic Park. But for anyone from the UK, and for anyone who loves animals and the natural world, he is a legend.

My late father grew up watching his natural history documentaries. I grew up watching them. My youngest son grew up watching them. Three generations, all educated and inspired about the natural world by the same person!

What is the magic of Sir David? It’s something that I try to do myself, and which I teach all the guides at the Biblical Museum of Natural History is the most important part of their role as guide. Sir David imparts passion and enthusiasm.

But his main goal is to encourage people to have concern for the natural world. In this, I think, he is reminiscent of his namesake. The original David was a shepherd, and the Midrash (Shemot Rabbah 2:2) states that it was precisely for this reason that he was chosen by God to be leader, just as with Moses. As the Midrash says: “The Holy One said: You have compassion in leading sheep in this way – By your life! You shall shepherd My flock, Israel.”

Caring about the natural world is unfortunately not so fashionable in most of Orthodox Jewish society today. The reasons for this are obvious. One is that many Jews, especially if they live in Israel, have much more pressing concerns. The other is that people at the forefront of the animal welfare and environmental movements are often very hostile to Jews; Britain’s “Green Party,” which was originally all about the environment, is now primarily all about being anti-Israel.

Yet of course there are many statements in the Torah and Jewish tradition about both compassion to animals, and about the importance of respecting and caring for the natural world. At the Biblical Museum of Natural History we have signs explaining the 18 mitzvot that related to compassion and senstivity to animal life, along with posters displaying statements from Chazal about this.

It’s perhaps fitting that Sir David is such a prominent advocate on behalf of endangered species, since he’s somewhat of an endangered species himself: a good Englishman who isn’t antisemitic or Israelopathic. (And this despite working for the BBC!) His family took in two Jewish children from the Kindertransport and fostered them for seven years - Sir David refers to them as his “sisters” - and he has never joined the vogue of bashing Israel. Indeed, when he met Naftali Bennett a few years ago, his esteem for Israel was clear:

Happy 100th birthday, Sir David. And thank you.