Be Fruitful

Life Lessons from Fruit, in Honor of Tu B’shvat

There is what to be learned from everything in Hashem’s magnificent creation, including fruit, especially the shivas haminim. Would you imagine that the delicious fruit we eat can also be inspiring? Here are some lessons we can learn when we take a deeper look at fruit. 

Appreciating Hashem’s Chessed 

Fruit stands out as one of the most beautiful and sweet sources of sustenance we have. Rav Avigdor Miller ztl called fruit “Hashem’s candy.” In fact, noted author Bracha Goetz has an adorable children’s book called “Hashem’s Candy Store” that reflects this theme. Hashem created the world with the reality that human beings need to eat to survive. He could have built into the world some sort of gray glob that contained all of the nutrients we need for survival. Every day we would ingest that substance and be sated for the day. But Hashem in His great chesed bestowed upon us an array of delicious, refreshing, colorful foods so that we can actually enjoy what we eat. This is no dispensation of His obligation so to speak to keep us alive. This is pure love. And nowhere is this more apparent than in the vast array of fruits available in our world. Aside for the brilliant colors that make them so palatable and the sweet taste that you can’t get enough of, there is the sheer variety. He created so many different kinds of fruit, each more delectable than the next. 

If you ever find yourself wondering if Hashem really loves you, just look at the fruit in your fridge. Your answer is right there.  

Lessons from the Beauty of Fruit

Hashem made fruit, which are so beneficial for us, so appealing and vibrant. This is no accident. Many fruits also start out a dull green until they ripen, and only then do they turn their vibrant shades, tantalizing us. And finally, fruit doesn’t begin to fall from the tree until it is fully ripe, becoming most accessible to us only when it is healthy for us to eat it. Hashem put so much into making it easier and more pleasant for us to consume that which is healthy and good for us. This is an important yesod in chinuch. We want our children to follow certain behaviors and retain certain values, but we need to make those behaviors and values tempting! We are struck with obstacles in the increasing allure of the world that is against our values. There are things in foreign cultures that seem so exciting, and we need to battle those influences by making Yiddeshkeit and Torah vibrant and exciting so our children aren’t compelled to look elsewhere (this is also a great lesson as we lead into Purim). We need to bring the fruit to them, and we need to paint that fruit in the brightest colors possible, infused with the juiciest juices possible. Experiencing Shabbos needs to be as geshmak as biting into a ripe, luscious watermelon with the juice dripping down our chin.

A life of emes and yiras shamayim needs to be as tantalizing as a bunch of plump purple grapes and a fuzzy, dripping peach. 

Lessons from the Olive: Squeezing the Oil 

Olives are a wonderful fruit. They have much nutritional value and are a great addition to a Greek salad. But the real potential in olives lies in the oil they produce. It’s the oil that served as the catalyst for nes Chanukah, that we light our Shabbos neiros with, the oil that is used for frying and dressing and so much more. 

But the only way you can get to the oil is by pressing those olives. The more you squeeze them, the more precious oil you procure. 

Sometimes life is tough and we feel like we are being squeezed from all ends. We wonder what the point of all of these challenges are, and why we couldn’t just sit in peace in our Greek salad or on a fancy meat board. But our challenges are Hashem’s way of showing us our potential, of allowing us to see what has been inside of us all along and helping us bring that potential to fruition. 

This is true of am yisrael as a whole. Our beauty shines forth in our adversity. When we suffer global losses, we come together, we grow, we build our faith and we produce an oil so breathtakingly beautiful no other nation can ever come close. 

And it is true of an individual as well. Our challenges have a way of bringing out our inner core, of showing ourselves how resilient we can be, how much faith and hope and love we have been harboring all along. It sat there until we were tested, and only now that we have been pressed can our true beauty flow.   

The same is true of another one of the shivas haminim: the grape. Grapes are delicious in their own right, but their true value is in the wine they produce. And only when they are stomped upon and squeezed to their last breath, does the wine truly flow. Our tribulations squeeze us, but they also bring out the best in us. This can also teach us the value of humility. That only when we learn how to truly humble ourselves, to crush any vestige of ego that we harbor, can our greatness flow. 

Lessons from the Outer Layer: Peel the Layers

Most fruits contain the meat on the outside and the pit on the outside. Some have a soft skin surrounding the meat, but that skin is just as edible, and in fact contains many of the nutrients of the fruit. But then you have the pomegranate. The rimon’s tastiness is buried within a hard outer shell. Imagine someone biting into a pomegranate as they would an apple. They would immediately wrinkle their nose and discard the bitter fruit. They might even lose a few teeth in the process. But that is only because they assumed that what they could see is what there is. They didn’t bother to peel the layers, to get past the tough facade and find the thousands of seeds inside bursting with the sweetest, juiciest flavor. 

The gemara in Sanhedrin (37.) quotes Reish Lakis as saying of Kllal Yisroel, “Afilu reikanin shebichah milein mitzvos k’rimon.” Every one of us has so much to offer, but if we get turned off by the shell of every person we encounter, we won’t ever get to experience the deep goodness they all harbor within. 

Take a moment to peel through the layers and find the seeds where the true sweetness lies. 

Lessons from an Apple: See the Potential 

Another famous thought from Rav Avigdor Miller as it relates to fruits is seeing the niflaos haborei in an apple. Every apple contains seeds bearing the potential for thousands more apples. One seed grows a tree, and every tree can grow innumerable apples in its lifetime. We can draw an analogy to human potential. When you look at a person, you see their facade, you see the apple. If you are more perceptive, you can see the seeds within. But can we begin to fathom the vast potential contained in those seeds? Can we begin to fathom what every human being is capable of, if we give them the chance to thrive, if we take the time to carefully plant and water and nurture the seeds they carry within them?

As the saying goes, “Anyone can count the seeds in an apple, but only Hashem can count the apples in a seed.” In the spirit of v’halachta b’drachav, it is up to us to find the potential in every human being we encounter. The most impactful teachers you remember are the ones who saw your potential and helped you bring it out. It’s not only teachers who have that power. Any human being can touch another by finding their potential and helping them bring it out. When we can look at a person and see not only what they present but also all they can be, we can change their lives. 

Lesson from a Grape: Make Sure You’re Supported

One of the most important things you need to consider when trying to grow grapes is what kind of support you will give your vines. Vines need a trellis of sorts to ensure that they grow upward instead of staying on the ground. Human beings are no different. We were placed in this world with a mission, a purpose. Our life is one of growth and upward movement. And much like the grape vine, we need to be backed by support if we want to grow upward. Otherwise, we flop to the floor. Our greatest backbone is the Torah. When we attach ourselves to the Torah, we flourish and we grow upward, bearing remarkable fruit. Our support system needs to be daas Torah, connecting to a Rov who can guide us as we grow, who can help us make sure we are constantly upward bound. The trellis of daas Torah is vital for every ben Torah, every eved Hashem. Otherwise, his life will be linear and his grapes just won’t grow. 

And we can extend this to other kinds of support as well, each according to her needs. 

Our extraordinary cadre of superwomen sometimes operate under the misconception that we need to do everything ourselves in order to prove our worth. To lean on others is weak. We need to be the ones others lean on. But let’s remember that the strongest vines are the ones with the strongest support. Making sure we have those stakes of support built from the get-go is the biggest act of strength and courage we can do for ourselves. 

Lessons from a Date: Never Give Up

Date palm seeds can go dormant for decades until the right light and water conditions present themselves. They lie beneath the surface of the ground, seemingly dead. No one would expect to see any sign of life from them, ever. And yet, when all hope has been lost and all expectation given up, they suddenly spring to life and blossom into a beautiful, lucious, fruit bearing tree. 

Yeshuas Hashem k’heref ayin. We can sometimes plant seeds and then build our hopes around them, only for those hopes to be dashed. And yet, one never knows when Hashem will decide the time has come for those seeds to bear fruit. We must never lose hope, and always place our faith in Him that our yeshuah will come just as the right conditions present themselves. As in, just when the moment He has determined it to arrive. 

This Is Precisely Message of Tu B’shvat

We celebrate the birthday of the trees at a time when the trees are seemingly dead. We are deep into the winter, surrounded by bare branches and barren trees. It seems to be a strange time to celebrate the life of a tree! And yet, it is precisely at this time that we celebrate. For we may not see it, but the trees are not entirely dormant. This is the time when the saps within the tree begins to rise, preparing for the renewal of spring. 

Galus is long and hard, and it seems as if there is no end in sight. This is both the communal galus klal yisroel has experienced for so many years already, and every individual’s personal galus, whatever hardships they may be enduring. We think there is no end in sight. We look around and all we see are dead branches and barren landscapes. But unbeknownst to us, beneath the ground, the sap is rising. The yeshuah is materializing. And just when Hashem deems it right, our yeshuah will burst furth, blossoming and thriving with the breathtaking fruits of spring. 

May we see that day very, very soon!