Congregation Beth Elohim

Per the advice of Hillel, the festival of Tu B'shevat was fixed as the day of the full moon of Shevat, the fifteenth day of the month. It was celebrated in the time of Hillel, almost two thousand years ago, but then ignored for many centuries. The holiday was revived in Israel in the early 1900s when Jews began repopulating the land. Deuteronomy 8:7-8 emphasizes the connection with the land when Moses speaks of "a land with streams and springs and fountains issuing from plain and hill; a land of wheat and barley, of vines, figs, and pomegranates, a land of olive trees and honey...".  These are the seven species, all were found in Israel more than three thousand years ago. Corn, lemon trees, apples, and tomatoes may grow there today but do not have the distinction of being mentioned in the "seven species" passage of Deuteronomy. There is a growing tradition of a Tu B'shevat seder, where the table is set with these diverse agricultural products of Israel. Incidentally, both corn (maize) and tomatoes are New World plants, although the term "corn" was commonly applied to the principal grain of a country in the centuries before the discovery of the Americas. Thus Biblical references to corn actually refer to barley.

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