Tu B’shvat at BCC!
On Friday, January 30 at 8pm, we will mark Tu B’Shvat with Ruach Chayim Shabbat Shirah & Tu B’Shevat Services with Rabbi Lisa Edwards and Cantor Juval Porat.
Please join the whole BCC mischpucha for our once-a-month musical Shabbat Service and birthday of the trees celebration. Guest musicians are violinist Janice Markham, percussionist TJ Troy and pianist Matthew L. Cohen. Stay after for a Tu B’shevat oneg
Tu B’Shvat
Tu B’Shevat, the 15th of Shevat on the Jewish calendar, is the day that marks the beginning of a “new year” for trees. This is the season in which the earliest-blooming trees in the Land of Israel emerge from their winter sleep and begin a new fruit-bearing cycle.
Legally, the “new year” for trees relates to the various tithes that are separated from produce grown in the Holy Land. These tithes differ from year to year in the seven-year shemittah cycle; the point at which a budding fruit is considered to belong to the next year of the cycle is the 15th of Shevat.
We mark the day of Tu B’Shevat by eating fruit, particularly from the kinds that are singled out by the Torah in its praise of the bounty of the Holy Land: grapes, figs, pomegranates, olives and dates. On this day we remember that “man is a tree of the field” (Deuteronomy 20:19), and reflect on the lessons we can derive from our botanical analogue.
RELATED: Take the Tu B’Shvat Quiz!
What Do Our Clergy Say About Tu B’Shvat? Related Sermons
“Isn’t it amazing that sometimes the things that we plant today will be around long after we are.” – Rabbi Heather Miller, 2014 Read the full drash
“Torah often reminds us our relationship to trees. It teaches that even in war we are not permitted to cut down trees that yield food [Deuteronomy 20:19-20]; and our tradition refers over and over again to Torah itself as eitz chayim – the tree of life.” – Rabbi Lisa Edwards, 2007 Read the full drash
