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From the Rabbi:
Spring is coming! Can’t you tell? Well, maybe it’s a little harder to tell around here, but in Israel, the first spring flowers start to appear on the ground and almond trees begin to bloom right at this time of year. Perhaps you know the song:
🎵𝅘𝅥𝅮Hashkedia Porachat, Hashemesh m’al Zorachat, Tipporim m’rosh kol gag machrizim ki bo hachag. Tu B’Shvat higiyah, chag ha ilanot, Tu B'Shvat higiyah chag ha ilanot. Almond trees are blossoming, the sun shines from above, birds from every rooftop announce that the holiday has come. Tu B'Shvat has arrived, the holiday of the trees.🎵
Yet we all know spring is not fully at hand, neither here in Buffalo nor even in Eretz Yisrael. Shvat is not the “Month of Spring” we heard about last week, (Ex 13:4) “Today you are leaving in the month of Spring”. That’s in Nissan when we celebrate Pesach, when we actually left Egypt and we re-experience that Exodus every year at the Seder. That’s actually Springtime. This is still winter.
Yet, every year we READ that verse, along with the entire narrative of the Exodus, the Splitting of the Sea and the Giving of the Torah in the month of Shvat. Meanwhile, Shvat is best known for the holiday of Tu B'Shvat, (Mishna RH 1:1) “The New Year of the Tree” when the sap begins to rise in the roots of the trees and the process of spring begins underground. In this week's Parsha, when the waters were bitter, (15:25) "Hashem taught [Moshe] a Tree and the waters were sweetened". So we're definitely on schedule for Tu B'Shvat in that we're reading about a Tree. But there's gotta be more to it. You betchya!
Did you notice how the Mishna calls Tu B'Shva not the “New Year of Trees” but rather of “The Tree”, singular. As we all know, the Torah is called the Etz Chayim - ‘Tree of Life’, or perhaps ‘Living Tree’. So, perhaps Chazal were telling us that Tu B'Shvat is not only about the renewal of Nature, but also the renewal of the Torah. Or that Torah and the natural cycle are inherently connected.
Tu B'Shvat usually falls (as it does this year) in Parshat Yitro, in which we READ about the giving of the Torah - The Tree. However, we all know that the Revelation actually happened on Shavuot. Speaking of Shavuot, the very next Mishna in Rosh Hashanah tells us that Shavuot is the time every year when we are (RH 1:2) ‘judged for the fruits of The Tree’. Notice that again it’s a singular Tree and that Shavuot is when we bring the first fruits of our orchards to the Temple. So clearly there's a strong connection between 'The Tree', Tu B'Shvat and Shavuot. The Parsha cycle is such that every year we read about the events of Shavuot around Tu B'Shvat, when the process of making the fruits we will offer on Shavuot begins with the rising of the sap in The Tree.
From all this we can clearly see that there’s two cycles going on. The Holiday cycle marks when things actually happen in fully manifest form, both in nature and history. The day we actually left Egypt is Pesach when it’s actually spring and fruit trees are in bloom. Then we count the Omer and we actually receive the Torah on Shavuot when we offer our ripe fruits. But there’s also an inner cycle of Torah in which new potential arises. We READ about these events now, in the heart of winter, just as those processes are beginning underground.
It's not just that we read about them when it so happens that the sap begins to rise. It's not a well timed coincidence. Rather, the Parsha cycle causes the sap to rise! (See Deut. 1:3 where Moshe begins the upwelling of the Torah in the month of Shvat). With our Torah Reading we are summoning forth spring, redemption and revelation. We set the process in motion by calling it into being through the Torah. Torah arouses a vision of what the world could be, activates the potential that lies within us and calls it to manifest. Through the Torah we realize we can actually experience personal, national and global redemption. It inspires us to aspire, to yearn and to put in the effort to bring our potential to fruition. Tu B'Shvat becomes Pesach and Shavuot. The rising sap itself turns into ripe fruit.
As we approach Tu B'Shvat I encourage us all to look anew to the Torah for a new sense of who and what we could become. To raise the sap upwards with the energy we invest in our learning. To feel our potential rising inside of us and embrace the possibility of the glorious spring which now stirs within us all.
Please join me on Wednesday at 7 pm for Maariv and 7:15 for a Tu B'Shvat Seder in which we’ll explore deeper the imagery of ‘The Tree’ and its significance to our individual, national and global evolution.
Shabbat Shalom,
Shlomo
Tu B'Shvat Seder, Wednesday 2/12, 7:15 pm
Purim is coming, March 13 &14. Being a Friday, expect a Purim experience that will flow into Shabbat. Stay tuned for megillah reading times, KOT Mishloach-Manot and Purim Seudah information.
Classes This Week
- Shabbat 4:45 pm before Mincha - Football in the Bible?
- Sunday at 7:00 PM - KOT Beit Midrash
- Tuesday at 12:30 PM - Parsha Conversations at Cheryl's office
- Wednesday 7:15 PM Tu B'Shvat Seder
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