Seven Weeks for Water 2026 | Week 4 - Women and Water: Etsutchukha! When a perennial lake runs out of life

The fourth reflection of the Seven Weeks for Water 2026,  coinciding with International Women’s Day, is authored by theologian Renemsongla Ozukum from Nagaland, India. She currently serves as a member of World Council of Churches Commission on Climate Justice and Sustainable Development. She actively engages in grassroots women’s movements in eco-justice issues with Indigenous communities as well as church healing and transformative programs in the northeast region of India. Her reflection explores etsutchukha and the temporality of water sources while also drawing connections with water and women from the Bible. 09 March 2026 Women carry water to their homes on April 12, 2017, in Dong Boma, a Dinka village in South Sudan's Jonglei State. Most of the villagers recently returned home after being displaced by rebel soldiers in December, 2013. The women obtained water from a well drilled by the Lutheran World Federation, a member of the ACT Alliance, which is helping villagers restart their lives with support for housing, livelihood, and food security. Photo: Paul Jeffrey/Life on Earth Pictures Texts:  Exodus 17:1-7; Numbers 20:1-13 Reflection The opening weeks of 2026 in Nagaland were greeted by a jolting story of a “dried up” etsutchukha - a Lotha Naga word attributed to a perennial lake in Wokha town, Nagaland. Since the lake was the most dependable water source during winter season, it pushed the locals to probe the cause of its death. The lake was presumably dug up by the British colonial administration in the late 19th century. According to locals, sustained pressure on the fragile hydrological system, including the proliferation of private bore wells that stress underground aquifers, resulted in this catastrophe. Etsutchukha provokes community conscience beyond what nature has to offer. The Bible is replete with narratives and miracles related to the life-sustaining and sanctifying role of water. “Water from the rock” is an eyebrow-raising Sunday school story, and song that children are fond of hearing. The migrant nation Israel ran out of healthy water sources, demanding that Moses and Aaron provide water for them. The Israelites experienced a moment of etsutchukha, just like Wokha town today, causing Moses to strike the rock that brought forth water (Exodus 17:1-7; Numbers 20:1-13).  The Book of Exodus shows a continuous connection between water and Moses, a name given by Pharaoh’s daughter to mean “taken out of water” (Exodus 2:10). This connection is shown with Mariam, Moses’ sister, a young girl who skillfully negotiated her brother’s life with Pharaoh’s daughter on the banks of River Nile. Miriam is recognized as the first female prophetess in the Bible wherein she saves her community from slavery, crossing the Sea of Reeds, singing victorious songs (Exodus 15:20-21) along with her brothers, Aaron and Moses. The Book of Numbers 20 associates Miriam symbolically with water, through its account of a water emergency at Kadesh. The passage begins with the death and burial of Miriam, a prominent woman, underscoring a profound communal vulnerability in the face of death. Following her death, the community faces a severe water shortage, and their murmuring prompts the miracle of water gushing from the rock. Biblical scholars postulate that the water source which follows the migrants through the desert is Miriam’s symbolic wellspring. Miriam represents perennial water from the ground, a pivotal mediator of divine grace whose absence precipitates a crisis of both thirst and identity (Cocco, 2025). From ancient biblical times until today, infectious diseases, ulcers, conflicts, migration into urban areas, are often caused by lack of access to clean water and aggravated by human activities that cause droughts and floods. As seen with Etsutchukha, these realities are being intensified as climate crises deepen across the world.  Young girls and women in rural India and the Global South, struggle to negotiate their practical wisdom with local communities for livelihood and sustenance. They spend time and energy managing domestic needs such as fetching water, cooking, cleaning, washing, watering plants and tending to animals. Unfortunately, most decision-making processes are led by men. Lack of access to decision making and deprivation on many fronts perpetuated by the social structures of patriarchy, castes, classism, and ethnocentrism, severely impede the agency of women in both urban and rural India. Burdened by these structural inequalities, rural Indian women in particular may not effectively realize the UN Sustainable Development Goals: 3. Good Health and Well Being, 5. Gender Equality, and 6. Clean Water and Sanitation by the year 2030. Traditionally, during dry cold seasons, which last up to six months in northern India, rain harvesting as well as perennial reservoirs, community ponds, and natural lakes, enable the community to meet their needs. In places like Nagaland where I live, community-driven integrated approach is presented as one of the most effective strategies for water conservation.  In such a process, every citizen and group become stakeholders, making water a shared primary source of living. Dialogue with mothers, women in self-help groups, and the knowledge of community workers is crucial in shaping regenerative water policies.   Women stand at the center of water spirituality and politics, whether in the association with Miriam with life-giving water or in the realities of water scarcity in rural India. Though often denied formal recognition, many Indigenous traditions link water with “woman wisdom,” seen in the rhythms of tides, creeks, such as in Jog Falls. Women’s embodied experiences through blood, milk, sweat, and tears, mirror water’s life-nurturing and resilient flow. This connection reveals a life-sustaining spirituality forged amid hardship.  Water, too, is a political tool as its scarcity disproportionately burdens women and girls, especially in rural areas, excluding them from decisions about access and control. Water justice occurs when communities respect the voices of women, and work collectively to build water-resilient families, churches, and local communities. Etsutchukha reminds us to cultivate spirituality and politics of collective responsibility for water. Questions 1.    Are there stories of etsutchuka, Miriam, and “water from the rock” in your cultural traditions? How can your community advocate for a sustainable, shared water heritage? 2.    Etsutchuka signals a fragile ecosystem that resists private extraction. How can faith communities empower young people to challenge extractivism through conservation? Practical idea  Research and advocate for fair policies for digging bore wells and rainwater harvesting in your locality. Collaborate with the local authorities in managing community water assets for corporal wellbeing. References for further reading Francesco Cocco, “When Miriam’s Well Run Dry: Death, Thirst, and the Bitterness of Israel in Numbers 20:1-2.” In Religions, 2025, 16, 350: 20-21. DOI: 10.3390/rel16030350 Morung Express, “From Rain to Rivers, Nagaland’s Water Woes need multiple remedies.” Morung Express, https://morungexpress.com/from rain to rivers. Nagaland’s Water Woes need multiple remedies (accessed 26 January, 2025). N. Janbemo Humtsoe, “Etsutchukha - When a Perennial Lake Runs Dry,” Morung Express, https://morungexpress.com/etsutchukha-when-a-perennial-lake-runs-dry (Accessed 8 January, 2025). Miriam Therese Winter, Woman Wisdom: A Feminist Lectionary and Psalter Women of the Hebrew Scripture: Part One. New York: Cross Road, 1995. Mery Kolimon, Women, Drought, and Migration: Reading the Book of Ruth from a Feminist Perspective in East Nusa Tenggara, Indonesia (Paper presented at the Dom Helder Camara Lecture, 25 November, 2019) Ma. Maricel S. Ibita, “The LORD, the Waters, and Miriam: An Ecolonial-Sustainability Reading,” in Biblical Theology Bulletin, Volume 54, Number 4: 221-232. DOI: 10.1177/01461079241296531  Theologian Renemsongla Ozukum from Nagaland, India, currently serves as a member of World Council of Churches Commission on Climate Justice and Sustainable Development. She actively engages in grassroots women’s movements in eco-justice issues with Indigenous communities as well as church healing and transformative programs in the northeast region of India See more

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