GEN282 Man the yetzirah-creator, according to the teaching of Halakhic Judaism, is responsible to God the beriah-Creator not only for the raw material of the natural world into which he was placed, but is responsible as well for protecting and enhancing the civilizations which he himself created.  “Subdue it” is not only not an invitation to ecological irresponsibility; it is a charge to assume additional moral responsibility not only for the nature world as such but even for the man-made culture and civilization which we found when we were born into this world.  Perhaps the most succinct summary of the role of man and nature is given early in the Biblical narrative of God’s placing Adam in the Garden of Eden—which, from its description in Scripture, was a model of ecological well-being.  [this verse].  The undefiled world was given over to man “to work it,” to apply to it his creative resources in order that it yield up to him its riches.  But alongside the mandate to work and subdue it, he was appointed its watchman; to guard over it, to keep it safe, to protect it even from his own rapaciousness and greed.  Man is not only an oved, a worker and fabricator; his is also a shomer, a trustee who, according to Halakhah, is obligated to keep the world whole for its true Owner.  GOODSOC 221-2