Summary of the festival

Tu BiShvat (15 Shevat) is the New Year of the Trees, the day on which a new year begins for fruit trees with regard to tithes and fruit. It falls in the middle of winter, when the almond tree is already blossoming in the land of Israel. There is no prohibition of work and no special prayers, but it is customary to eat fruit and to omit the penitential prayers.

The mitzvot of the day

• Eating fruit, especially fruit of the land of Israel: the seven species (wheat, barley, grape, fig, pomegranate, olive and date honey), and others such as carob and raisins. We make the proper blessing on each fruit.
• The “Tu BiShvat seder”: following the kabbalists of Safed, it is customary to hold a “seder” with four cups of wine, from white to red, and with fruits of different kinds (with a shell, with a pit, and those that can be eaten whole). The book “Pri Etz Hadar” (printed in Venice in 1728) records this order.
• Planting trees: a custom that spread in the land of Israel from the early days of modern settlement.
• No supplicatory prayers (Tachanun) and no fasting, since it is a day of mild joy.

Origin in history

The Mishnah (Rosh Hashanah 1:1) teaches: “On the first of Shevat is the New Year for the tree, according to Beit Shammai; Beit Hillel say, on the fifteenth of it.” The law follows Beit Hillel. The reason: by 15 Shevat most of the rains have passed and the fruit begins to form. This new year determines when the tithes of fruit trees apply and when the years of orlah (three years in which fruit is forbidden) are counted, especially in a Sabbatical year. So the day is mainly agricultural and legal, and the kabbalistic tradition added a spiritual meaning to it.

The message for today

The Torah says “for man is the tree of the field” (Deuteronomy 20:19), so a person resembles a tree: roots, trunk, branches and fruit. The Talmud tells of Honi the Circle-Drawer, who saw a man planting a carob tree that he would not live to see bear fruit, and he answered: “As my ancestors planted for me, so I plant for my children” (Ta’anit 23a). And Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai said: “If you have a sapling in your hand and they say to you, the Messiah has come, go and plant the sapling first, and then go out to receive him” (Avot DeRabbi Natan). Tu BiShvat is a reminder of responsibility to the generations to come and of respect for the world in which we live.