Talk:Tu Bishvat

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[edit] Spelling of Tu Bishvat

The vowel under the bet is a chirik, and the vowel under the shin is a sh'va na, so "Tu B'shevat" is not an accurate transliteration. Dreyfus 23:59, 1 Dec 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Tu BiShvat

The article states that Tu BiShvat is the time to bring tithes of fruits. I believe it is more accurate to say that this day is the day of division between "last year" and "this year" as far as tithing goes. Tithes for one year may only be separated from produce of that year; you can't separate tithes from this year's produce for last year's crop, or vice versa. Therefore fruit that ripened a certain amount by Tu BiShvat had to be tithed separately from fruit that only ripened by that minimum amount after Tu BiShvat.

Why don't you go ahead and correct that, then? Jayjg | (Talk) 22:08, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

[edit] types of fruits

I added the material on the traditional types of fruits. I don't have a formal reference for this, but I'm pretty certain I have it right. I based it on a combination of my own recollection and a recent email sent by Brit Tzedek v'Shalom. If someone has an authoritative reference, please add that and make any corrections. -- Jmabel | Talk 18:32, Feb 2, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Copyvio?

Text in this article is awfully similar to the knesset.gov.il page linked. Sorry, no time to check into it thoroughly. Suitov 17:15, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Yes, at this moment the paragraph "The earliest scholars" and the sections "Trees in Jewish sources" and "Modern Zionism" consist entirely of text plagiarized word-for-word (yes, in English) from [1], an article which includes the claim "© Copyright 2001, The State of Israel. All Rights Reserved." --Hoziron 04:47, 29 January 2006 (UTC)
OK, I removed that text from the article. You can easily look it up, either in the page history or at the site [2]. --Hoziron 04:57, 29 January 2006 (UTC)
Good going, thanks. --Suitov 13:41, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Seder

I read some great stuff about the Tu Bishvat seder at the kolel site, and I synthesized some of the info here. It's just a start, but it's something :) Tu Bishvat Higiah! --Bennyp 22:57, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Planting trees?

My memory of this from when I knew something about it, almost thirty years ago, says it's common (maybe among Reform Jews) to plant trees or buy trees to plant in Israel on Tu BiShvat. Is that or was that true? —JerryFriedman 23:25, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

perhaps as true as anything else in this "holiday". There are really no laws relating to to Tu Beshvat and most have been made up very recently. Jon513 16:11, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
Planting trees IS the main activity in Israel (ALL schools) and is the primary thing done in this holiday. Amoruso 06:04, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
There is a law that we do not recite tachanun. There are customs to eat fruit. Planting trees was invented by heretical zionists. Bobover1 05:26, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] This article lacks important clarifications

I noticed reading this article that it incorporates a lot of information that is only true according to one branch of Judaism or another. For example the article never specifies that there is no actual Tu B'Shvat Seder today (at least in Orthodox Judaism and I don't think so either in Conservative Judaism although I can't say for sure) and that there was certainly never any Tu B'Shvat seder in the same sense as the Passover seder (which is highly central to Jewish religious practice). In addition religious Jews will take severe offense to the description of the modern Tu B'Shvat seder involving issues of current events in ecology and the like (which I think might be Reform, but it is outside of my area of expertise to say) since it describes Judaism as changing with the times. In fact, one of the big issues of dispute - perhaps THE issue - between branches of Judaism is whether practices should be traditional - reflecting the notion of Judaism as a timeless connection to God, or revisionist - reflecting the Jew's evolution in conjunction with the rest of humanity as just one cultural group belonging to the greater human culture. This difference tends to create a separate set of revisionist definitions and practices as distinctly different from tradition in support of the latter view. The traditional (aka Orthodox) view will always reflect the notion that Judaism as practiced at Sinai is fundamentally the same as the practice of today (despite the introduction of additional customs along the way). Conversely, Conservative, Reform and other branches of Judaism each formed for the purpose of changing that. Various people along the way apparently felt the need to introduce a fundamental change of one sort or another in the meaning of Judaism and formed the other branches for that purpose. This is reflected, for example, in the subsuming of the Jewish practice of Tu BShvit into the secular practice of conservationism - a wildly unacceptable deviation in the mindset of traditional, old-school Judaism, but apparently a necessary one in the mindset of the various new-school branches. There are no bases for these changes in traditional Judaism. Rather, they are innovations.

I have noticed a number of Wikipedia articles, such as this one mix and match traditional and non-traditional practices without specifying that the non-traditional practices are non-traditional. In order for Wikipedia articles such as this one to correctly represent the facts, practices which belong to non-traditional Judaism must be marked as such according to the specific branch of Judaism that practices it. Conversely, any area where no such note is given must be assumed to be talking about traditional (i.e. 'original', 'timeless', ) Judaism as defined in legitimate timeless Jewish sources such as the Talmud and the Shulchan Aruch (all many centuries old). Therefore, this article, which states a number of non-traditional practices without attribution to the correct party must be seen as highly misrepresentative of the facts. To clarify, I am not saying that Wikipedia should be biased in favor of traditional Judaism against newer branches. Wikipedia should be religion-neutral. What I am saying is that there is a clear distinction between traditional and non-traditional Judaism which must be respected. One set of practices goes way back and is universally Jewish. Therefore it is not subject to dispute and does not necessarily require a clarifying statement as to source (although it is never a bad idea to do so). Conversely, non-traditional Judaism (conservative, reform, etc) needs to be specified as such, since it inherently exists as a divergence from traditional practice. Therefore it is intellectually and religiously dishonest to mix and match traditional with non-traditional without flagging the source/ownership of the latter and/or clarifying that this is not what is traditionally accepted. Moisheweiss (talk) 20:36, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

There is an actual Tu Beshvat in Orthodox Judaism. I agree this article is representing a POV by not mentioning Orthodox Judaism at all and overplaying what may be a tiny minority practice. Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 21:43, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Rewrite

I've significantly rewritten the article including (a) moving the details of the Seder to a separate Tu Bishvat seder article (b) adding contemporary use as a cutoff date for purposes of Orlah, and {c) changing the article approach from a "history" approach implying leading from "ancient" practices to modern ones (and implying that past views are obsolete) to a viewpoint approach listing the major viewpoints, keeping the existing details on each viewpoint. I believe this better represents WP:NPOV. Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 23:42, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Orlah

Orlah has some fine points. I'm not an expert on this subject. While I think it greatly improves the article to point out the continued existence of the concept and the continued use of Tu Bishvat for dating, my attempt at a brief explanation doubtless mangles things and could be better put. I'd appreciate an expert willing to improve this description. I'm going to try to start an Orlah article on the contemporary use of the concept (as distinct from the Talmud tractate) and I'll do just a stub which I hope experts with a solid grounding in the various halakhic disputes and fine points will be able to improve. Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 23:42, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

The subject of the article is not Orlah, but Tu Bishvat. Any lengthy discussion of orlah laws should be on the Orlah page. Since it is linked in blue, anyone who is interested can click on it for more information. The Tu Bishvat seder deserves more detail, as it has been a long-standing tradition among religious Mizrahi Jews. In Iraq, for example, it was a really big deal, with all kinds of symbolic items set out on the table, with special brachot for each dish. Tu Bishvat seders are a new trend in Israel, also among kipa sruga. I don't have time to search for info at the moment, but if anyone can come up with sources, that would be good.--Gilabrand (talk) 06:48, 21 January 2008 (UTC) Now I see that the whole discussion of the Tu Bishvat seder was removed to a separate article. I don't think this was a good move. This information should be incorporated on the Tu Bishvat page, with proper editing, as some of it is needless.--Gilabrand (talk) 07:29, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
As orlah is the only halachicly mandated aspect of Tu Bishvat it definitely deserves more than one sentence. Three or four sentences seems right to me. Jon513 (talk) 09:11, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
The reason I moved the Tu Bishvat seder content to a separate article is because it requires a lot of detail to discuss but only a minority of people do this on Tu Bishvat, so that leaving it in the Tu Bishvat article could be construed as resulting in overwhelming the main article with detail about this practice. No-one disputes that it's a notable practice. Separate articles avoid any issue of Undue weight. Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 11:37, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
I disagree. The "seder" does not require a lot of detail to discuss. There is a lot of trivia in the article that could be pared away, such as lists of what fruit is appropriate. All customs relating to Tu Bishvat should be on the page, which is very short as is. You say it is not widely practiced. If so, then you are not aware of the trends in Israel, where it is becoming more and more widespread, or the customs of Mizrahi Jews. The fact that some black-hatter in America doesn't like the current customs of tree-planting or the revival of kabbalistic rituals is not a reason to remove them from the page. --Gilabrand (talk) 12:03, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
The fact that some editor does not like the practice of Orlah is no reason to remove remove all mention of its contemporary existence or the role Tu BiShvat plays in it, leaving a single sentence characterized as "Ancient Jewish Sources". Whether you like the POV or not, its the way the majority of people who observe the holiday use it; Iraqui Jews are a notable but very small minority. It was you, not I, who removed content from the page here. The reason I reverted is that the removal slants the article in a way that violates WP:NPOV. The article needs to include the religious (Orthodox and Conservative here) viewpoint, including an explanation of what religous Jews regard as law and and what they regard as custom. I would urge you not to repeat your complete removal of that point of view. Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 12:18, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
Since I'm an editor of this article, I'm bringing in a third-party administrator to take a look at this. I want to make it clear that my difficulty here isn't with the content you added, it's with the content you removed. As I see it, by removing all mention of the contemporary role of Tu Bishvat as a cutoff date for purposes of Orlah you (a) completely removed all content on, including mention of the very existence of, a very significat viewpoint that you happen to disagree with (this is my primary concern). In addition, you (b) rewrite the article from your own point of view when there are muliple points of view which qualify for representation under Wikipedia policies. The 1906 Jewish Encyclopedia explained why it called Orthodox Judaism "ancient Judaism" (because it regarded it as a viewpoint with no contemporary relevance which would soon disappear); contemporary Orthodox Jews don't take very well to having their contemporary practices mischaracterized as being only ancient history. P.S. This is also the first time anyone's called me a "black-hatter". Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 12:25, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
Sorry if you don't like my editing of the article. You are welcome to add sections that you think are relevant, but on the whole, it was badly written and organized, and overly verbose. I did not call YOU a black-hatter. The comment about Tu Bishvat customs being an inventions of Zionist heretics spurred that response. It seemed to me that you made all the revisions in response to this one person's inane comment. Respecting sensibilities of anti-Zionists is fine, but not if it turns an article about a holiday into a mishmash that nobody else but yeshiva-educated people can understand (which happens to be incredibly widespread on Wikipedia)--Gilabrand (talk) 12:43, 21 January 2008 (UTC).

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Gilabrand" —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gilabrand (talk • contribs) 12:47, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

By the way, you have totally misunderstood the heading "ancient sources" - I meant the "mekorot," or Mishnaic sources, not some outdated custom from antiquity. --Gilabrand (talk) 12:52, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
Ok, first of all Gila, "black-hatter" could be construed construed as a personal attack (I will note incidentally that Shira isn't in that category anyways). Try to remain civil. That said, Now, while obviously the modern Israeli treatments are relevant, the historic and modern day Orthodox clearly matter. As Jon observed above, if something is the single halachic element of a holiday it should get a decent amount of coverage. Chanukah may be a good guideline for how to break this sort of thing down. JoshuaZ (talk) 18:23, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
Joshua, I have edited your comment (John-->Jon). Jon513 (talk) 19:03, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
It would be nice if you read what I wrote before responding. I did not call Shira a black hatter (the color of her hat, if any, makes no difference to me). The trouble with many articles on Wikipedia is that they engage in endless Talmudic hairsplitting that makes no sense to the majority of people who seek information on Wikipedia. I doubt very much that Orthodox Jews and yeshiva students are the target population of an article such as this. If they want information, they will go to halachic and rabbinic sources. The kind of person who will read this article is a person who wants to know tachlis - how to celebrate it, or what on earth it is. What I am trying to do is improve the accessibility of Jewish topics for those who are not "in the know," and in the process, to present Judaism in a respectable way, that will not elicit bellylaughs and mockery from "outsiders." Maybe that is an ambitious project, but I think it is a worthy one.--Gilabrand (talk) 19:36, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
I'm a statistician in my other life. Statistics, like many other fields, has an often-dense jargon that can be difficult for outsiders to understand. I imagine some people might disrespect or even laugh at my professional field because of that. An editor who tries to explain statistical jargon in a way that makes it clear to outsiders while being true to the underlying concepts is providing a valuable service. But an editor who claimed that statistics articles should avoid all use of standard professional terminology because statistics jargon is not "respectable" and "elicit[s] bellylaughs and mockery from 'outsiders'" would very quickly get his or her edits reverted, and I imagine that would be true in almost any article on any academic or professional subject in this encyclopedia. Same here We expect people who read our encyclopedia to have an interest in understanding the relevant subjects and to have some respect for them, including the jargon that specialists in the resepective fields use. Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 21:43, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
The latest additions to the article are so badly worded as to be incomprehensible. The English is substandard, to say the least. --Gilabrand (talk) 05:26, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
The relationship between Tu Bishvat and Orlah is rather complex, and I'm not sure how to articulate the relationship in a straightforward way. There seem to be three main cases: (1) all authorities seem to agree that if a tree is planted between Tu Bishvat and 30 days before Rosh Hashanah), then Tu Bishvat is the cut-off as stated. This is the usual case. (2) If a tree is planted in the 30 days before Rosh Hashanah, there seems to be two main streams of opinion. One makes the following Tu Bishvat the cutoff (so Orlah lasts a year longer but involves Tu Bishvat in the usual way), and the other makes Rosh Hashanah the cutoff (and in this case they say Tu Bishvat isn't involved at all). (3) I'm not sure I understand what happens if a tree is planted between Rosh Hashanah and Tu Bishvat. The Schottenstein edition of the Talmud has a diagram of the Orlah period and cutoff dates for cases (1) and (2) above under the two streams of opinion at p. 8a of tractate Rosh Hashanah. Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 02:13, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Tu Bishvat seder as separate article

The reason I created a separate article is that the topic is very detailed. There are a lot of different detailed rituals, practices, and symbolic interpretations, many of which, while notable, represent distinctively minority practices and interpretations. I was concerned that this content would overwhelm other points of view about Tu Bishvat, which generally involve less detail and for which there is less to say. A separate article permits giving the major approaches roughly similar weight in the Tu Bishvat article without requiring removal of detail, and permits expansion of the sedar topic with a greater ability to present multiple approaches to arranging and interpreting a seder. Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 13:23, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] When occurs?

"Tu Bishvat (or Tu B'Shvat) (Hebrew: ט"ו בשבט) is a minor Jewish holiday in the Hebrew month of Shvat, usually sometime in late January or early February" -- So, is it ever at any other time? When? Why? (Obviously, asking this as a person with little knowledge of the Hebrew calendar, and for the benefit of such people.) -- 201.37.229.117 (talk) 13:29, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

The secular date differs from year to year because Jewish holidays are celebrated according to the Hebrew calendar. The month of Shvat usually comes out in January-February. This year, Tu Bishvat is TODAY. Happy birthday to the trees!--Gilabrand (talk) 13:44, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
In the years 2000-2050 the latest Tu Bishvat is on February 13 and the earliest is on January 15. Jon513 (talk) 14:08, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
Thanks. -- 201.37.229.117 (talk) 21:05, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Factually incorrect information - Orlah

I'm no expert on Halacha, but I'm pretty certain that the entire first paragraph in the section "In contemporary Jewish law" is factually incorrect. Orlah is actually determined based on the first of Tishrei, not on Tu Bishvat. See the first Mishneh of Rosh Hashanah and רמב"ם הלכות מעשר שני פרק ט. And Maaser Ani is NOT redeemed onto a coin as Maaser Sheini is. It is given to poor people, and is not redeemable. There is most definitely a large Halachic application of the year of Maaser for fruits. Other examples are that one cannot Maaser fruits from one year with fruits of another year. This is all applicable 100% in Israel nowadays. I'm too lazy to rewrite this section myself, but I'm pretty certain that the information is inaccurate and should be changed. -Clum (talk) 12:34, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

I see now that some of the references also contain these mistakes, which is quite surprising. They are probably confused with the 16th of Av, which is the latest day to plant a tree before Rosh Hashanah, so that it can be counted as a full year when Rosh Hashanah passes (because it takes 44 days for the tree to take root). I've checked this up in more than one Sefer, including קיצור שולחן ערוך סי' קע"ג which is intended to contain practical Halacha, and I'm absolutely certain that Orlah has nothing to do with Tu Bishvat, and that it has considerable Halachic application even nowadays. -Clum (talk) 12:48, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

According to a table listing opinions and the authorities supporting them listed in the Schottenstein Edition of the Talmud, Rosh Hashanah, 8a, the Orlah period has a beginning and an endpoint. The beginning is determined from the planting of the tree, and the end is determined from the fruit. According to this table, Rosh Hashana is used to determine the year of the planting of the tree, but Tu Bishvat is used to determine the year of the fruit. It also says there are various opinions as to the number of days prior to Rosh Hashana a tree needs to have been planted to have taken root by then. It seems to prefer a 30-day cutoff, but that may be its own editorial preference. Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 15:00, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
The article is supported by references. Given that there appear to be multiple opinions on the various issues, it would not be appropriate it say that the references are incorrect, when they happen to disagree with ones own preferred sources. You're welcome to add disagreeing opinions cited and attributed to particular sources. It should be noted that Tu Bishvat is definitely mentioned in the Talmud in connection with Orlah in tractate Rosh Hashanah 8a, so it is not clear to me that the cited references are all as mistaken as claimed. Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 15:08, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
Note: It's not the intention of this article to give a lot of detail on the subject, that should be done in an Orlah article. I'm not an expert on Halachah and certainly not Orlah, I don't live in Israel. Like you, I simply looked the subject up in various references. Coverage of this subject could definitely benefit from the attention of an expert on Orlah familiar with the different opinions and contemporary practice in Israel. Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 15:11, 22 February 2008 (UTC)