by Padre Art

Created on: February 07, 2009

The Tu Bishvat seder is a purification and fertility ceremony, first practiced by the Kabbalist segment of the Jewish religion in the mid-1500s. Kabbalists practiced openly c.900 BC but were driven underground by foreign invaders.

These Kabbalists believed that knowledge in their holy book the Torah was written on several levels and that by the guided contemplation of nature they would be able to de-code the deeper meanings. A number of attempts to revive the movement existed as early as 1 BC but did not come to fruition until a group of believers settled in the Galilee area of Israel in the town of Tzfat (Safed). Under the leadership of Ytzahk Luria a special celebration was instituted for the New Year holiday of "Tu Bishvat" (there are four New Years in the Hebrew calendar).

Until this time the festival of Tu Bishvat (Tu B'shvat translates as "day 15 of the month of Shvat") was celebrated with a feast of dried fruit, a sort of "Almond Blossom" festival since the wild almond trees are in full bloom throughout Israel at this time (late January to early February). The new ceremony was codified and first described in a text called the "Peri Eitz Hadar" or "The Fruit of the Beautiful Tree".

Authorship of the P'ri Eitz Hadar is attributed to "Nathan of Gaza", a follower of the messianic figure Shabbetai Tzvi who later converted to Islam. Do to this conversion the work of his disciple Nathan became a heretical text for the Ashkenazi (Eastern European Jewish population) while it was whole heartedly embraced by the Sephardic tribes of Spain and the African coast of the Mediterranean with the enthusiastic help of Luria and his followers in Israel.

The Tu B'shvat seder, P'ri Eitz Hadar, is divided into four sections, the introduction and historical basis of the seder being the first. The second part is a prayer, blessing the fruit (to be said before the seder actually begins) and next is a description of the ten fruits and the order in which they are to be consumed as well as instruction on the wine (white and red) and how it is to be blended in each of four cups. Last, but not least, are texts from the Torah, some rabbinical works and the Kabbalist literature, all verses to be recited during the ceremony (tikkun).

The reader is expected to have a grasp of centuries-old Kabbalist texts like the, "Sefar ha-Zohar" to which allusions are made. These inveterate code writers filled their work with symbolic language and used other obfuscations that open the text up to interpretation, but the inescapable use of the tree as a metaphor for the Tree of Life while working the cosmology of the Kabbalists into the tikkun shows their intent to get the message across clearly.

Kabbalists believe that the "day 15 of shvat" ceremony, the Tu B'Shvat seder, creates a connection with the Tree of Life that strengthens and re-balances the energy of this tree with roots in heaven and a bountiful fruitfulness on the material plane. Purifying and increasing the fertility of this cosmic tree increases the fertility of the of the earthly realm.

Closing this definition of a Tu Bishvat seder is a small portion of its own closing prayer. "May all the sparks scattered by our hands or by the hands of our ancestors or by the sin of the first human against the fruit of the Tree, be returned and included in the majestic might of the Tree of Life."

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