Page 38 - HaMizrachi #6 TuBishvat 5779

Rabbanit Rachelle Fraenkel

What does Nature

Want of Me?

f you were a Jew in the time of the something to do with their spiritual astray like Germany did – is to heed
Mishna, Tu BiShvat would mean superiority. the Rambam’s wisdom:
I the beginning of a new calendar
year and identifying the previous But this is where Rabbi Hirsch makes “How may one discover the way
year’s fruit. his major leap: “Joy in the beauty of to love and fear Him? When man
nature and growing plants, brings us to reflects on G-d's deeds and His great
If you were a kabbalistic Jew in Tzfat enjoyment of ethical beauty as well. If a and wonderful creatures and will
in the 16th century, Tu BiShvat would society doesn’t care for what is beautiful, behold through them His wonderful,
be an opportunity to connect to the a person in that society will also grow matchless and infinite wisdom, he
mystical worlds symbolized by the up wild. Man’s joy in aesthetic harmony will spontaneously be filled with love,
different parts and fruits of the trees. is closely related to his joy in ethical praise, and exaltation and become
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harmony.” possessed of a great longing to know the
And if you were a Jew in the renewed Great Name… as some sages said on
Zionist movement, a pioneer, or a We can understand that disregard the subject of love: “Out of it you will
child lucky enough to grow up in a for what is beautiful and delicate, recognize the One who spoke, and the
sovereign state of Israel, Tu BiShvat is like stomping on a bed of flowers, universe was called into existence.”
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the time for planting. is lowly and bestial. But does the
appreciation of beauty and aesthetics The call is to see natural beauty not
It’s the time you get to play G-d. To actually encourage a society to be as “still life with flowers” but to open
walk in his ways. Because the first moral? One cannot help but think of up to its vibrant riches and divine
thing He does after the completion of Rabbi Hirsch’s 19th century Germany, soul, and then, with a heart full of awe
Creation is to plant a garden of trees in and where it ended up. The words and love, take one step further, and
Eden. ask what does this mean to me. More
that come to mind are from Natan precisely, what does it require me to
Let us walk through that garden and Alterman’s “Of All the Nations”: do?
take a closer look at those trees. Here Great is the worry for sculptures
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in the center is the Tree of Life, and and art / Lest artistic treasures be The famous mishna that berates
over there is the Tree of Knowledge... destroyed in the blast. a person who stops his learning to
everything is so gorgeous. As it says, appreciate the beauty of a tree, is
G-d grew every tree “pleasing to the But the artful treasures of infant-heads describing someone for whom these
sight and good for food.” 1 / On the walls and the roads to be are really separate experiences. Torah
bashed. doesn’t integrate into the everyday
The Torah gives precedence to the journey, and beauty stands alone,
aesthetic satisfaction of beauty (sight) Rabbi Hirsch’s idea sounds like sterile, detached. The Rambam, Rabbi
over the physical satisfaction and wishful thinking. Yet we do often Hirsch and Tu BiShvat itself all call us
benefits of nutrition. Rabbi Samson sense, especially when faced with to integrate our worlds and let them
Raphael Hirsch sees this as justifying a stunning sunset for example, that grow and fertilize each other.
and sanctifying the sense of beauty. In there is something grand here, far
this context too, Man’s preeminence deeper than meets the eye. Something
over all other species is revealed. divine, a reflection of G-d, that if truly 1 Genesis, 2:9.
Humans are the only creatures able to appreciated, could indeed advance 2 On Genesis 2:9.3.
enjoy beauty. one’s spirituality, and maybe even 3 Hilchot Yesodei HaTorah 2:1-2.
one’s morality. 4 Avot 3:7.
The precedence of beauty means it
has spiritual value, and the fact that Perhaps the way to realize the divine Rabbanit Rachelle Fraenkel is a Torah
only humans can appreciate it has aesthetic experience – yet not go educator at Nishmat and Matan

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