NEWS
What is Tu B’Shevat?
Rabbi Jay Heyman
Each year on the 15th of Shevat we celebrate the New Year of the Trees. There is a little known practice, developed by the Kabbalists of Safed in the 16th century of having a Tu B’shevat seder. During the seder, aspects of the four elements of the universe, as understood by the medieval mind, were taken and compared to the various kabbalistic understandings of reality.
During the seder, the fruits and nuts of the “Holy Land” would be eaten and cups of various wines would be tasted. In modern practice, participants begin with a cup of white wine and gradually increase the amount of red, until there is only a drop of white. The fruits of three types of fruits grown in Israel would be eaten: those that we cannot eat the seeds thereof, those that we cannot eat the skins thereof, and those that we can eat in their entirety.
Often the story of Honi, the Circle Drawer, from the Talmud is also included in celebrating Tu B’shevat: One day, Honi saw an old man planting a carob tree, assisted by his grandchild. Honi laughed, “Foolish man,’’ he said, “do you think you will still be alive to eat the fruit of this tree?’’ The old man replied, “My grandparents planted for me, now I plant for my grandchildren.’’ Weary from the heat of the day, Honi later found a shady spot for a nap. But the short nap became a sleep of many years, and when he awakened he did not know that his hair had turned as white as snow. He looked at the spot where the old man planted the sapling. He was surprised to see a full grown carob tree, and an elderly woman giving its fruit to the great grandchild of the man who first planted the tree. Honi then realized that one must plant not only for oneself, but for future generations as well.
On this theme, the early Russian- Jewish Zionist, A.D. Gordon, has written the following:
And when, O Man [sic], you will return to Nature—on that day your eyes will be open, you will gaze straight into the eyes of Nature, and in its mirror you will see you own image. You will know that you have returned to yourself, that when you hid from Nature, you hid from yourself. When you return you will see that from you, from your hands and from your feet, from your body and from your soul, heavy, hard, oppressive fragments will fall and you will begin to stand erect. You will understand that these were fragments of the shell into which you had shrunk in the bewilderment of your heart and out of which you had finally emerged. On that day you will know that your former life did not befit you, that you must renew all things: your food and your drink, your dress and your home, your manner of work and your mode of study—everything!
Tu B’Shevat marks the beginning of spring in Israel. The sap begins to flow in the fruit trees once again. The fields sprout, flowers bloom, the almond trees burst into white blossoms and leaves begin to appear on the fig and mulberry trees as the earth awakens from its sleep.
The Tu B’Shevat seder also speaks to the notion of “tikkun olam,’’ the Jewish obligation to repair the world. We live in a time when the natural world needs repair as never before. There is a story about the famous Israeli Chief-Rabbi, Rav Abraham Isaac Kook, which illustrates this point. Once he was walking in the woods when one of the students with him inadvertently plucked a leaf off a branch of a tree. Rav Kook said to his student: “I’d never pluck a leaf off a tree or even a blade of grass or any other living thing unless I have to. Every part of the vegetable world is singing the song and breathing forth the secret of the divine mystery of creation.’’ For the first time, the Rav Kook’s young disciple reported that he understood the meaning of showing compassion to all creatures.