Holiday Traditions, History & Celebrations
5 Things to Know About Tu B’Shevat
1. What is Tu B’Shevat?
A new Gregorian year is upon us, and it’s a new year for the trees as well. Sometimes called “Jewish Earth Day,” the celebration of Tu B’Shvat generally falls in late winter—and is a celebration of the Earth, the trees and the abundance of spring. Originally, the day was an important marker in a Jewish farmer’s year based on the rules of the Torah, which state that farmers could not eat fruit from their trees until the 5th year after the tree began to bear fruit. Because tracking the exact anniversary of the flowering of every individual tree was impractical, farmers had to decide how to determine the 5-year mark. Their solution: a birthday for the trees!
2. What is the origin of Tu B’Shevat?
Unlike Passover and Purim, Tu B’Shevat is not rooted in a biblical narrative. But while the first mention of Tu B’Shvat comes from the Mishnah, scholars and rabbis agree that the traditions at the heart of the holiday date to biblical times. Since then, Tu B’Shvat—literally meaning the 15th of the month of Shvat— has become a widely celebrated holiday and is often associated with Zionism and a love for the land. In the Talmud, the day is called Rosh Hashanah Ha’Ilan, or New Year for the Tree, and marks the beginning of the agricultural cycle for trees as well as a deadline for Israelites to calculate the year’s tithes (or offerings) of fruit they were required to bring to the Temple in Jerusalem.
3. When is Tu B’Shevat?
In 2025, Tu B’Shevat will begin on the evening of Wednesday, 12 and ends in the evening of Thursday, February 13.
4. How Do Jews Celebrate Tu B’Shevat?
A significant Tu B’Shevat celebration beginning around the 16th century is the Tu B’Shvat seder, which honors the “Seven Species” of Israel as well as other fruits, nuts and wines. The Seven Species (wheat, barley, grapes, figs, pomegranates, olives, and dates) were first mentioned in Deuteronomy, and refer to the foods that Israelis in biblical times attached significant meaning to.
Many people also celebrate Tu B’Shevat by planting trees or by donating to organizations that focus on Israel’s ecology and environment.
5. What is the Tu B’Shevat seder?
Tu B’Shevat found a second life some thousand years later with a new ritual: a seder. Conceived by the Kabbalists of 16th-century Safed, the Tu B’Shevat seder was viewed as a tikkun (repair) to bring human beings closer to spiritual perfection. The seder is structured around four cups of wine and has a prescribed order to the meal, which consists of fruits and nuts found in the Land of Israel. It’s interspersed with readings and kavanot (spiritual meditations) from biblical, rabbinic and Kabbalistic texts that are designed to draw symbolic parallels between the gift of the physical fruits of trees and the gift of the spiritual Tree of Life—the Kabbalists’ mystical conceptualization of the presence of God in the world.
