1

Spirituality

Jewish Arbor Day

Tu b'Shevat: new year of the trees.

Elizabeth Applebaum
Special to the Jewish News

• What are the rules?
This year, Tu b'Shevat occurs on
Shabbat, so we do not recite the elegy, Av
Harachamim, that (in Ashkenazi liturgy)
partly concludes the Shacharit (morning)
service. Also at the end of the Mincha
(afternoon) service, do not recite the three
verses that begin Tzidkat-cha.

What does it mean?
Shevat is a month on the Jewish calendar.
In the Hebrew alphabet, each letter also
represents a numerical value; the number
15 is written as tet vav, which forms the
acronym Tu. The second part, b'Shevat,
means "in Shevat." Thus, Tu b'Shevat
means "15th of Shevat."

•When does it occur?
This year on Saturday (Shabbat), Jan. 30

• What do we observe?
Tu b'Shevat does not appear in the written
Torah, but is known from its reference in
the talmudic tractate Rosh Hashanah. In
Halachah (Jewish law), the 15th day of
Shevat is designated the cut-off date for
tithing fruits from trees. In ancient Israel's
agrarian economy, every Jewish farmer
gave a percentage of his produce to the
priests and Levites to maintain the Temple
in Jerusalem. In Hebrew, this is known as
teruma, a tithe.
Tree-borne fruit that came from blos-
soms formed before the 15th of Shevat
belonged to the current tithing year; fruit
from blossoms that formed after the 15th
were designated for the next year. (The
laws of Tu b'Shevat applied only in the
Land of Israel, so Jewish farmers in other
parts of the world did not set aside fruit.)
Tu b'Shevat often is called the "new year
of the trees:' The source of this designa-
tion is the Torah. In Leviticus 19:23-25,
the Torah teaches that we may not har-
vest fruit from a tree's first three years of
production. On Tu b'Shevat, every tree is
regarded as another year older, no matter
when in the previous year it was planted.
Thus, if a farmer planted a tree at any
time prior to the 15th of Shevat — even
on the 14th of Shevat — come Tu
b'Shevat, that tree is one year older.

• How do we observe?
Today, there is no tithing because there is
no Temple. For Jews in ancient times, Tu
b'Shevat was nothing more than a book-
keeping day. Through the generations,
however, the 15th took on mystical char-
acteristics and rabbis attached spiritual
significance to the day, seeing new fruit
as symbolic of new hope, new beginnings
and new opportunities.
Tu b'Shevat was especially embraced by
Sephardic Jews, in the 16th century by the

Jewish mystics of Tzefat in northern Israel
(often transliterated as Safad) and authors of
the Kabbalah. Mystics developed many cus-
toms for the day, including liturgical read-
ings and a ritual meal based on the Pesach
seder, complete with four cups of wine.
For most Sephardic Jews today, Tu
b'Shevat is a festive day. Among all Jews,
however, it is customary to eat fruit from
trees, especially fruits imported from
Israel or, that by tradition, are native to
Israel.
Based on Deuteronomy 8:8, these are:
wheat, barley, grapes, figs, pomegranates,
olives, dates. Wheat, barley and grapes do
not grow on trees, so in addition to figs,
pomegranates, olives, dates, it has become
the practice to enjoy any fruit produced
on trees, such as apples, pears, oranges
(all of the standard fruits and many exotic
fruits are grown in modern Israel).
In the early 1900s, the Jewish National
Fund, which was buying and developing
land in Palestine for Jewish settlement,
seized upon Tu b'Shevat's marketing
potential. Because the JNF improved land
by planting trees, it promoted Tu b'Shevat
as the ideal time to donate money for
the acquisition of land and the planting
of trees in the rocky soil of the ancient
Jewish homeland.

Even now, Tu b'Shevat is often known
as JNF day. Although these days the JNF
is most concerned with finding ways of
conserving Israel's limited natural water
resources, it still sponsors a day of tree
planting on Tu b'Shevat (although this
year it will be before or after Shabbat).
For environmentalists, Tu b'Shevat is an
excellent opportunity to teach the tremen-
dous economic and environmental values
of trees. Many of Earth's ecosystems and
the entire atmosphere depend on trees,
which provide us with food, fuel, fiber,
paper, housewares, building materials,
chemicals and many other useful products.
Trees planted in urban areas greatly
reduce summer heat that builds up in con-
crete-covered neighborhoods, and trees
put in the right places around your house
can keep your air-conditioning bills to a
minimum. Trees planted in windbreaks
help farmers conserve their crops and
topsoil, and trees along rivers, streams and
hillsides keep soil in place.
The beauty of natural woodlands is
unmatched, and natural forests are home
to countless species of animals and plants.
Humans and animals breathe in oxygen
and breathe out carbon dioxide. Trees
breathe in carbon dioxide and breathe out
oxygen. Without trees, life would disappear.

• What's to do?
Here are ideas for making your holiday
fun!
•Add green food coloring to pasta, rice
or bread dough to go green!
• Ask children to design a new tree
for the world. What fruits would it bear?
Where would it grow? What would it look
like?
• Challenge family members and friends
to come up with the worst possible puns
using nature words: "Leaf me alone — the
teen's lament" is pretty awful, as is, "Do
you know why trees aren't flighty? Because
they're so well-grounded."
• Try a new recipe using one of the
fruits of Israel. Allrecipes.com is a great
place to start. Here you can find recipes
for desert, jam and breakfast with figs.
Or try POMwonderful.com, filled with
recipes for duck with pomegranates and
pomegranate ice.
• Help the earth and have a great time!
Collect bits of scraps from around your
home (items that otherwise would have
gone right to the trash) and challenge chil-
dren to make up a game using every item.
•Make a Tu b'Shevat word scramble. Find
the names of 15 different trees or plants, mix
up the letters and have children unscramble.
• Use scissors to cut your child's lunch
sandwich into a leaf pattern.
• Make holiday ice by dropping fresh
herb leaves (mint and basil work well)
into water and freezing.
• Create a terrarium. You can find many
great and easy terrarium ideas at www.stor-
mthecastle.comiterrarium/index.htm.
• Invite friends to a tree party. Ask
everyone to bring a donation for the JNF
or for a favorite Earth-friendly program,
or swap clothing or items that might
otherwise just have been tossed. Drink
healthy tea. Bring tree seeds for everyone
to plant. Play nature games (see who
can name the most movies, books and
songs with "plant" "flower" and other
appropriate words in their titles). Make
tree-shaped cookies. Read The Giving
Tree. Make old-fashioned trees from
newspapers.

❑

January 28 • 2010

31