There is something quietly radical about a people in exile celebrating the New Year of Trees. The Mishnah (Rosh Hashanah 1:1) lists four new years in the Jewish calendar, and the fifteenth of Shevat — Tu B’Shvat — marks the new year for the purpose of tithing fruit trees. It was, at its origin, an agricultural and legal date. But across the centuries of diaspora, it became something more: a declaration of connection to a land many Jews had never seen, and a reminder that even in the depths of winter, sap begins to rise.
Tu B’Shvat falls in late January or February. In Israel, the almond trees are beginning to blossom — white and pink flowers appearing on bare branches, the first tangible sign that spring is approaching. In the diaspora, it is often still the coldest part of winter. The holiday asks us to trust what we cannot yet see. Beneath frozen ground, roots are at work. Growth is happening in the dark.
The Talmud (Ta’anit 5b-6a) records a teaching of Rabbi Yochanan in the name of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai: “One who studies Torah and teaches it in a place where there is no Torah scholar is like a spring flowing from the ground and a tree planted by streams of water.” The metaphor of the tree appears again and again in Jewish thought — in Psalms, in Proverbs, in the Torah itself, where the Tree of Life stands at the center of the Garden. To be rooted, to grow slowly, to bear fruit in season — this is the Jewish ideal of a life well-lived.
In the 16th century, the Kabbalists of Safed, in the hills of the Galilee, transformed Tu B’Shvat from a minor calendrical marker into a mystical celebration. They created the Tu B’Shvat Seder — modeled on the Passover Seder — structured around four cups of wine and the eating of specific fruits and nuts corresponding to the four Kabbalistic worlds:
Assiyah (the world of action): Fruits with hard outer shells and soft insides — walnuts, almonds, pomegranates. We eat the inside. The shell represents the barriers we must break through to access holiness.
Yetzirah (the world of formation): Fruits with soft outsides and hard pits — olives, dates, cherries. The pit at the center represents the hidden core of being, the part of ourselves that remains protected.
Beriah (the world of creation): Fruits that are entirely edible — figs, grapes, berries. Nothing is discarded. This world represents wholeness and integration.
Atzilut (the world of emanation): This highest world is represented by fragrance alone — the scent of spices or etrog. It is beyond the physical, beyond consumption. It is pure spiritual essence.
The four cups of wine progress from white (representing winter’s dormancy) through increasingly red blends, ending with deep red wine (representing the fullness of summer and spiritual awakening). The Seder is accompanied by readings, songs, meditations, and teachings drawn from the Torah, Talmud, and Zohar.
In Sephardic communities, Tu B’Shvat has long been celebrated with particular warmth. Moroccan and Turkish Jews traditionally set elaborate tables with dozens of different fruits and nuts — the more varieties, the better. Some families aim for the symbolic number of fifteen, matching the date. Special blessings are recited over fruits one has not yet eaten that season, including the Shehecheyanu, thanking God for sustaining us to this moment.
In recent decades, Tu B’Shvat has become a focal point for Jewish environmentalism. The connection is natural and ancient: the Torah itself commands that even during wartime, fruit trees must not be destroyed (bal tashchit, Deuteronomy 20:19-20). The rabbis expanded this principle into a broad ethic of conservation — do not waste, do not destroy needlessly, respect the natural world that sustains you. Tu B’Shvat gives this ethic a holiday, a date on the calendar, a seat at the table.
I find deep comfort in the symbolism of this day. A tree does not grow quickly. It does not announce its progress. Year after year, it sends roots deeper and branches wider, silently accumulating the rings that tell its story. Jewish life is like this. We plant seeds whose fruit we may never taste. We study texts whose meaning unfolds across generations. We raise children and teach students and build communities, trusting that the roots will hold even when we cannot see them.
On Tu B’Shvat, we celebrate the patience of trees and the faith of those who plant them. The Talmud (Ta’anit 23a) tells the famous story of Choni HaMe’agel, who encountered an old man planting a carob tree. “How long until this tree bears fruit?” Choni asked. “Seventy years,” the man replied. “And do you expect to live seventy more years?” “I found this world with carob trees,” the man answered. “As my ancestors planted for me, so I plant for my children.”
Plant something this Tu B’Shvat. A tree, a seed, a new practice, a conversation with someone you have been meaning to reach. Trust the roots.
Chag Tu B’Shvat Sameach!
— Rabbi Tsipi Gabai