I like to believe that I can tell when the Jewish holiday of Tu B’Shevat is about to arrive. I don’t need to look it up on a calendar; the several thousand trees abutting the back side of my property and the crisp scent of winter snow are my almanac. The craggy landscape, feathered by a stalwart army of pines, cedars and the occasional maple overlook a small, ambitious orchard of cherry, plum and apple trees.
They are the vestiges of pioneers who, like the early Israelites, relied on agriculture to survive, often by adapting to unpredictable weather conditions. Anticipating the start of spring was crucial in a perpetually changing climate.
For this hapless lover of nature, however, predicting the arrival of the first buds is simply a past time and a desire to understand the Israelites’ first experiences in their new homeland. Coming from the parched lands of Egypt, how did they determine when to plant and when to harvest? What sixth sense did they hone to be able to survive in their new climate? And even more curious, why do we now celebrate this innocuous date each year with a seder, pomp and reverence?
The Torah lays out a list of commandments, or mitzvot to guide the new Israelites (and the generations that will follow) in how they are to treat the produce they grow: When the fruits can be harvested, which must be reserved and offered as Temple sacrifices and which can be eaten. The rules are complex, but they are also rudimentary in purpose. And with the exception of the rules related to sacrifices, the mitzvahs pretty much reflect the customs that are used today around the world when it comes to figuring out the timing for planting and harvesting particular fruits.
So why a special holiday to recognize the sanctity of trees? And why a special dinner and prayers on par with those we say on Passover? And, equally importantly, I suppose, why did it take more than a thousand years for rabbis to create a holiday for the tree, one of the most prolific plants on earth?
The last couple of decades of rural living have taught me that weather and climate patterns are everything to a would-be orchardist, and they are rarely constant, even in the Promised Land. The Israelites would have arrived in Canaan during what is now called the Bronze Age, a time marked by increasing urbanization and a shifting climate.
Compared to indentured life in Egypt, ancient Israel was truly a land of milk and honey. But its moist, fertile pasture lands and wadis (perennial streams) were drying and transforming, a forecast of the desert climate we now see in modern Israel.
Social factors in Canaan may have also had a role to play in the worsening ecology, say researchers. Over-harvesting of resources like trees to support ship building and urbanized living contributed to vast tracks of deforestation across the Levant, largely due to the increasing demand in Egypt. Trees like acacia and white broom provided fuel for copper smelters; oak and terebinth (pistachio) were used for timber. The Levant’s abundant olive trees supplied the Egyptian hegemony’s insatiable appetite for oil.
For the new arrivals, determining when to plant their crops in an increasingly arid and shifting climate would take stubborn persistence. So it’s no surprise that the Torah puts constraints on how the Israelites were to treat those very first fruits they harvested from their gardens: with reverence as a Temple sacrifice to God.
By the first century BCE, when Hillel and Shammai formally recognized the 15th of Shevat as the New Year for Trees, the climate in the Lower Levant had begun to stabilize. It was hotter, drier and still progressing toward an even more arid environment. Rainfall was modest. Determining the precise date of spring, when the sap in trees would likely start flowing and buds would begin to flower, was essential to a successful and bountiful harvest. But it was also essential to the perpetuation of Jewish traditions and customs.
Without the common tree, there would be no bikkurim (“first fruits”) to offer at the Temple at Shavuot, no etrog or lulav (“palm fronds”) with which to celebrate at Sukkot. No wood with which to construct the Temple. I can’t help but wonder if the rabbis also wanted to remind future generations (as they were often wont to do) of the immeasurable importance that trees hold and will always hold, for the Jewish faith.
I’m reminded of that even here at my home in the Northwest, where the snow is still falling. The signs of spring seem a far way off. The cherry tree, though, seems to know we are coming up to a significant date. Its branches, encouraged by an unseasonable warming spell a month ago, hold the first evidence of tiny buds, waiting ever so patiently for spring. The first fruits of the season won’t be far behind.
