Three stories for Tu B’Shvat

Growing up in northern California and having a birthday that falls around Tu B’Shvat, on more than one occasion I got a very specific birthday card. The front featured a cartoon of an Israeli boy wearing a kova tembel (bucket hat), standing next to a small sapling. Above the picture, it read: “In honor of your birthday, a tree has been planted in your name in Israel ..” And then I’d open the card, and on the inside it said: “…”Your day to water it is Tuesday.”

Jewish holidays, even the minor ones, are all about “doing” something. I am reminded of Nike’s trademark slogan, “Just do it.” But what does one “do” on Tu B’Shvat? The most common answers are, plant trees and eat Israeli dried fruits. I suppose many of us will sample some kind of dried fruit this Thursday in honor of Tu B’Shvat, but for most of us, our tree-planting days stopped once we got out of elementary school. Or so I thought.

The Reluctant Planter

My first job after making aliyah was at the Isracard credit card company in Tel Aviv. One January day, our supervisor announced that the following day there was going to be a tree-planting event in honor of Tu B’Shvat, organized by the HR department. She needed three volunteers from our department to go on the trip.

I looked around and saw that nobody was volunteering, so neither did I. One of the first rules you learn in Israel, mainly from the army, is never to volunteer for anything. So the boss picked three other people to represent our division, and we all went back to work. As luck would have it, it rained the next day and the tree-planting trip was postponed indefinitely. Nobody was too disappointed. But one day, about two months later, I walked into work a bit late one morning.

“You’re going tree-planting today!” my co-workers informed me.

“What?” I asked in disbelief.

“Tree-planting. It’s happening today. Since you came late, we volunteered you.” 

The next thing I knew I was boarding a bus along with dozens of employees from other departments. I wondered if they too had been “volunteered.”

The tree-planting itself was fun (as was the barbecue they made for us afterward), but one particular memory sticks with me. After the Jewish National Fund (JNF) representative unveiled the sign that dubbed our section “The Isracard Forest,” he approached me, perhaps because I was the only one in the group wearing a kippah, and handed me a card. He requested that I read “The Tree Planter’s Prayer for Planting Trees in Israel.” I agreed and stood behind the JNF podium as the Isracard company photographer snapped pictures of me. 

And I read the prayer in a solemn voice (in my slightly accented Hebrew): “Heavenly Father… give dew for a blessing and cause beneficent rains to fall in their season…. And these saplings which we plant before thee this day, make deep their roots and wide their crown that they may blossom forth in grace amongst all the trees in Israel, for good and for beauty…. And bless this land that it may flow again with milk and honey.”

The next day, those photos appeared on the walls of the company (and in the company newsletter), causing me some embarrassment, but also a lot of pride among my coworkers who had not been “volunteered” to participate.

Getting Your Hands Dirty

An emotional story about tree-planting is told about Rabbi Avraham Yitzhak Hacohen Kook, the first Ashkenazi chief rabbi of pre-state Israel. When the settlement of Magdiel celebrated its establishment, Rav Kook was invited to participate in the festivities. The ceremony included planting trees, and he was given the honor of placing the first sapling in the ground. The organizers handed the rabbi a shovel, but he declined and began digging the hole with his bare hands. 

Those present noticed that he suddenly became impassioned. His entire body seemed to quiver and shake, and his face was aflame as he placed the sapling in the ground. Afterwards he was asked why he had become so emotional. Rav Kook answered that the planting of a tree in the Land of Israel was no ordinary agricultural action, but an act of clinging to the traits of God. For God, when he created the world, also engaged in planting first, as it says, “The Lord God planted a garden in Eden” (Genesis 2:8). Similarly God exhorted the Israelites to engage in planting first when they entered the Land of Israel, as it is written, “When you shall come into the Land, and you shall plant all types of fruit trees” (Leviticus 19:23).“When I was about to put the sapling in the ground,” Rav Kook explained, “I remembered these words and felt as if I was clinging to the Shechina [the divine presence].Thus, I was overcome by fear and trembling. And how could I use a shovel or any or other object to perform this great mitzvah, as there should be nothing which separates the person and the holy land they are planting on.”

Step Outside

As wonderful  as planting trees in Israel is, there is a simpler way to observe Tu B’Shvat. It’s even simpler than eating fruits of the land of Israel.

A story about Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Kotzk (a town in Poland) recounts that he asked his student Rabbi Yitzhak Meir to speak at their festive Tu B’Shvat meal. Rabbi Yitzhak Meir chose to discuss the section of Talmud which teaches that Tu B’Shvat (the 15th of the Jewish month of Shvat) is the New Year for the tree, and gave a lengthy and complicated discourse on the subject. When he finally finished, the Rebbe of Kotzk replied, “If we were in the Land of Israel, we could just go out to the fields and look at the trees. We would then understand what ‘the New Year for the tree’ really means, and we would not need scholarly learning on the subject! For there, in the land of Israel, Tu B’Shvat does not say ‘darshuni’ [expound upon me], but ‘asuni’ [do it].”

Want to really experience Tu B’Shvat? If you are lucky enough to live in Israel, you don’t necessarily need to get your hands dirty, just step outside.