The trees’ hidden hope: A 2026 reflection on Tu Bishvat - opinion

In many ways, the Jewish calendar is a direct manifestation of the very ebbs and flows of the land.

At their core, our holidays are agricultural milestones. We celebrate the harvest of Shavuot (Feast of Weeks) as the wheat turns to gold in the fields, and Sukkot (Feast of Tabernacles) when the stocks of grains are overflowing with the year’s bounty. These are moments of “revealed abundance” – moments where farming achievements are recognized and celebrated.

It is called the “New Year for the Trees,” but take a look outside and you will see a reality that is anything but festive.

The ground is muddy, the skies are often still grey, and the trees stand stark and barren.

So why then did our Sages establish this festival at the very height of the winter freeze?

The answer lies in the observation that this is the moment when “the sap rises within the tree.” For if we were to take a microscope beneath the rough, cold bark to view the tiny capillaries that hide within the wood, life has begun to flow anew.

The philosopher Emmanuel Levinas wrote that time is not merely a succession of moments, but an encounter with “the Other” and with that which is yet to come.

For Levinas, future is what gives meaning to the present – not because we can control what lies ahead, but because every moment is awaiting what might come next.

Although not apparent to the naked eye, a tree in the depths of winter is not static. Rather, it is in a perpetual state of “tense preparation.”

The vine, for instance, requires periods of biting cold – to ensure the quality of the fruit to come.

Through the lens of Levinas and Manitou, this is the process where the hidden prepares the ground for the revealed. What looks to the casual observer like a plant retreating into darkness is, in truth, the very moments where it is accumulating the strength for the growth and vitality that will come alive several weeks later.

This is a teaching that has critical importance when it comes to our faith as a people and as believers.  As difficult as it might sometimes be, we have a deep responsibility toward that which is not yet born – the ability to nurture the seed buried in the earth, knowing that while yet unseen, birth, redemption, and growth are already stirring beneath the surface.

For Rav Kook, the faith of Tu Bishvat is faith in the process of rebirth. Even when our personal or national reality seems as dry as a withered tree, the divine “power of growth” never ceases.

I have long believed that true faith is the ability to hear the music of the future, and hope is the courage to dance to it in the present.

At a time in Jewish history that might feel like an era of darkness or pain, it is well worth remembering that true redemption doesn’t actually begin when the beautiful and sweet produce is picked and eaten. Rather it begins when the sap begins rising deep within the roots and the trunk. That is the moment where we can begin to believe in the joy, promise, and blessing that is destined to come.

As we recognize this and commit to watering and investing in our roots, we are reminded that even when all might look bare, cold and dark, the light of life is only beginning to break its path through the earth.

So, this year, wherever in the world you find yourself as you gaze outside on Tu Bishvat, look not only at the trees themselves, but rather at the hope and promise that lie within.