The New Year of the Trees of the Nature

My friend in Jerusalem sent  to me a book  Hagadah  Seder TU BeShwat. In that book of Joel Raphal is told about  the different New Years of the Israelian people. First  the New Year the  1st Nisan, ( The New Year of the Kings and the Rulers) and after that  they have the feast of Pesah ( Seder Pesah etc) . Another New Year is the 1st Elul- it must be from the time of the Temples( The tiths  from the cattle was then  taken). Another New Year is also the 1st of Tishrey, when  they count  the name and number  of the year ( as now 5772) ,every 7th year ( Shimtin),  every 50th year ( Jovelot,  etc.) , the new beginning for an new  agricultural year for mankind.

And then the New Year of the trees. Rosh Hashana LeIlan. According Shammai it is  the 1st of Shewat, but according Hillel the 15th Shewat,  TU be-Shwat). That means, one day  during  the time range  of our January- February.

This Feast of the relevant new year of the Israelian  trees is not direct from the Bible, but it has been developed among the  righteous religious Jewish people, teachers and rabbis after  the people of Israel  was scattered towards all corners of the world from their own land and native country- when they recalled  and remembered their native country.  The feast  was crystallized to a seder  little by little among  the religious teachers who had  retourned to The Holy Land  about 16th century from Spain and Portugal and , especially among   the  rabbins  of Kabbalistic Safed: They   formed the Haggadah to a practical  seder which then was practized in ISRAEL and in the countries of neighbourhood. Even  nowadays the seder is rich, beautiful,  valuable,  and suitable for   a delicious family feast.  In the Hagadah Seder Tu Beshwat , people learn to  think the  good fruits of the Promised Land and praise  the Lord for His good  promises to Israel. In this feast  people try to have 30  different kind of fruits to look. to taste and enjoy and eat  and learn about them. These  fruits represent symbolically  also three spaces and levels of  existence and they are presented in three kind of bowls, one low bowl , one high bowl  and one  bowl    between these levels.

From the low bowl you can eat  fruit  so that you cast a way the scale but eat the core parts.

(OOLAM HA-ASIAH),  the world which is made

From the median bowl you can eat the scale part but you cannot eat the core (seed, stone) , but you can plant  the seed and it can live next year and produce  a new tree.

(OOLAM HA-JEZIRAH), the world designed

But if you eat   fruit from the highest bowl, you see, that  those fruits are totally edible, you can eat the scale  and the core parts, everything is good to eat.

(OOLAM HA-BRIAH),  the world created

These levels have hebrew names and even symbolic explanations. Every  verb ( OSEE,  JOZER, BAARAA)  exist in the  Book of Genesis  in the first chapter. They are, all of them  creative, innovative  words: created ( BAARAA), made ( ASAH) , designed ( JAZAR), the aroms of the verbs are dissimilar but the product(tree etc)   is something existing,  but only  the fruit of the tree   reveals the quality of the tree.