c. 2005 Religion News Service

(UNDATED) Religious festivals usually celebrate the achievements of important spiritual leaders or significant past events including exodus, revelation, birth, death, deliverance, destruction or creation.

But beginning on the evening of Jan. 24 and continuing until nightfall the next day, the Jewish people will mark a holiday that is surprisingly not centered on the lives of individual human beings or a specific moment in human history.

The unique holiday is the New Year of the trees or Arbor Day, called in Hebrew Tu b’Shevat, the 15th day of the month of Shevat. The “Tu” represents the number 15, and a comparison would be to call American Independence Day, “IV in July.”

The Hebrew Bible mentions 37 different kinds of trees, starting with the famous Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil in Genesis. Indeed, when the former Israelite slaves of Egypt were poised to return to the land of their patriarchs and matriarchs following 40 years in the Sinai wilderness, God commanded them: “And when you shall come into the land, you shall plant all manner of trees for food …” (Leviticus 19:23).

In Jewish liturgy the sacred Torah is symbolically called “Aytz Hayim” (Tree of Life), and a famous Midrash or biblical commentary declares: “If it were not for trees, human life could not exist.”

Trees, in case we forgot, provide us with food, books, paper, furniture, houses, shade, aesthetic beauty, and, of course, trees play an integral part in supplying us with oxygen.

The Talmud recounts the story of a sage, Honi, who lived while the second Holy Temple stood in Jerusalem. Honi saw an elderly man planting a carob tree. Since the carob takes 70 years to ripen and offer its fruit, the sage was puzzled and asked the man: “Why are you planting a tree whose fruit you will surely never live to see?”

The old man replied: “When I came into the world, I found a world of carob trees. Just as my ancestors planted for my benefit, I am now planting for my descendants.” Placing a young tree in the earth is a tangible commitment to the future, even if we shall not live long enough to enjoy the full fruits of our planting.

Although the holiday is not mentioned in the Bible, Jewish Cabbalists living in 17th-century Israel created a Tu B’shevat Seder loosely based on the well-known Passover meal. On Tu B’shevat special fruits and nuts are eaten and four cups of wine are consumed … all food and drink not requiring the destruction of trees, vines or animals.

In modern Israel Tu B’shevat is a time to plant young saplings that will mature in the decades to come. Indeed, the millions of trees planted by Jews in the once barren land during the past 100 years frequently impress first-time visitors to Israel.

I vividly recall leading a clergy study mission to Israel a few years ago composed of black Christian leaders from the United States. A highlight was a stop at the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. forest. Members of the visiting group tenderly planted “their” young trees in the ground as a loving tribute to the assassinated civil rights leader whose 76th birthday we observe this month.

But Tu B’shevat represents more than simply planting trees in Israel. It is a yearly critique of the reckless abuse we humans are constantly inflicting upon our fragile planet. We blithely press on, ignoring the destructive results of stripping forests bare, making thin the ozone protective layer above us, and rapidly consuming finite natural resources.

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, who died in 1972, clearly recognized what we were doing to our natural resources. He believed we have misused Earth’s gifts and created “ … a gigantic tool box for the satisfaction of our needs.”

My wife and I live on a small island in Florida that lost thousands of its trees during last summer’s Hurricane Charley. In the five months since then, many new trees _ palm, grapefruit, key lime, gumbo limbo and other varieties _ have been planted as a commitment to the future.

In recent weeks, the world has suffered a horrific catastrophe dwarfing what the United States recently experienced. Just as Honi’s elderly friend planted new trees, there are millions of people today in Asia and Africa who are already planting new trees to replace those destroyed by the tsunami.

But unlike Honi of ancient times, we moderns do not have to ask why. The answer: our lives depend on it.

MO/JL RNS END

(Rabbi Rudin, the American Jewish Committee’s senior interreligious adviser, is Distinguished Visiting Professor at Saint Leo University.)