Happy Tu B'Shvat and snow…
Tu Bishvat, the holiday of trees, will be next Monday and this year comes with a forecast of snow in our area!
The last two years we were able to complete all of our tasks and deliver to all locations, although with frozen fingers, shuffling through the snow and mud and with reasonable damages in the garden… I hope it is the same this year 🙂
Tu Bishvat began as an important date for laws related to agriculture, as our ancestors were once all part of an agricultural based society. For example: This is the date from which to count the years of age of a tree, which is used for the maintenance of the Arlah- the prohibition to eat the fruit of a tree until it reaches a certain age. More on Tu Bishvat from previous newsletters, here.
The meaning of the month’s name "shvat" – "sabto" in Babylonian, is a stick or branch. This season, when the soil is soaked, the days are getting longer, the budding points on branches of the trees get bigger and begin to bloom with new leaves. Our ancestors during the Mishna, who were alert to the smallest changes in nature, saw the promise of rain and the conditions for fruit for the next year and decided upon this date to start the count of the crop for next year.
I write to you on a day that the rain is hitting us. This "stick" reminds me that it also signifies that the rain this season could give us a beating. Indeed, we are expecting a storm…
According to tradition, Noah's flood ended in the month of Shvat and a dove returned to him now, in her mouth a branch from a replenished young olive tree.
The olive tree was also a symbol of the Greek goddess Athena, the goddess protector of the city of Athens. Roman soldiers would surrender and cease to fight by raising olive branches. A white dove with an olive branch even in this century became a symbol of the nuclear abolishment movement.
Tu B'Shvat is a festival that is really related to our country. Here you can easily see the very subtle-to-the-eye changes that are so significant for the whole year precisely in this season. For example, the flowering of almond trees occurs now, while in other climates or regions it is still frozen or always tropical…
Nowadays, Tu B’shvat is celebrated as a World Environment Day, which increases the awareness of sustainability in all of us, even those who are not farmers. I encourage everyone in holiday meals (and always, of course) to eat organic fruits, fresh, clean and local, of our country, of which there is plenty :). We can do this now but when we were in exile, when Jews wanted to celebrate this Israeli holiday by eating fruit from the country, they imported them dried.
How nice that every culture has some kind of a day like this :).
So for the occasion of the start of the tree year, I hope that the rain will continue, for periods and with blessing, and will allow us to grow and enjoy more of the fruits, vegetables and herbs of the season. May we all be more aware of the environment and the ways in which we can be less harmful.
Happy New Year for Trees and all plants and good luck for us humans to live in peace and sustainability in this amazing world.
Good week!
To health!
Yours, Maggie
We expect in our organic vegetable baskets (draft only) :
Carrots
onions
pumpkin
lettuce
coriander
Cucumbers
Kale
Tomatoes
Zucchini
Fennel
In the larger organic vegetable baskets also :
Cherry tomatoes
Parsley
celery
dill
Organic fruit baskets ;
Clementines
Red Grapefruit
Oranges
In the larger organic fruit baskets , too :
Sweeties
And avocadoes
