The Fruit of the Tree is Wheat?
This week, I want to focus on a bracha; specifically the bracha that is spelled out in the first 11 pesukim of Parshat Bechukotai. It’s a beautiful bracha which starts by blessing us with rain that comes at the right time and produces bountiful crops. It includes peace and serenity, protection from wild animals and the ability to vanquish our enemies. It closes with the promise of Hashem dwelling among us. This section naturally comes out each year just before Shavout, and was also decreed by Ezra HaSofer to be read at this time. There is something meaningful here for Shavout.
This bracha describes a world which is so idyllic, so spiritual, that Ramban tells us that it has never been actualized fully. For example, when Hashem promises us, “I will quiet the wild animals from your land (Vayikra 26:6),” Ramban explains that this describes a complete change in nature. When the world was created all animals ate only plants (see Bereisheit 1:30). This was their original nature. It was only after Adam sinned that some animals began to prey on each other and become dangerous. In the future, when we are unified nationally, living together in Eretz Yisrael and following Hashem’s Will, the entire world, and the animals along with it, will return to its original state. Wild animals will no longer be dangerous.
Similarly, the Rama MiPano tells us that when the Torah promises (Vayikra 26:4) that the “tree of the field will give fruit,” the promise is not just that apple trees will produce apples. The promise is that all trees, even trees that today do not produce fruit, will become fruit bearing. The fruit they will bear will not be like the fruit of today. Today, we are only able to eat bread after we have put in a lot of effort to plow, plant, harvest, grind and form the grain into bread. This is a result of Adam’s sin, as Hashem told us, “by the sweat of your brow, you shall eat bread (Bereisheit 3:19).” But there was a time when things were different, and they will be different again. According to Rebbe Yehudah the fruit of the tree of knowledge was wheat (Sanhedrin 70b), because in Gan Eden wheat grew just like the fruit of a tree. Additionally, according to Rabban Gamliel, in the future the soil of Eretz Yisrael will produce fully formed bread (Shabbat 30b).
Even though wheat clearly does not still grow on trees, we retain a connection to this ideal, even today. Shavout is the new year of the fruit of the tree (see Megilla 31b). The Korban we bring, for the purpose of bringing bracha to the fruit of the trees, consists not of fruit but of two loaves of bread. There is still a connection between wheat and the fruit of the tree, even if we don’t experience that connection in our fields today.
The bracha at the beginning of our parsha is an ideal. But it is an ideal that we retain a connection to. The Midrash points out that our bracha follows the order of the aleph-bet. It begins with the letter aleph and ends with the letter tav. The aleph-bet is the order of creation. When the Midrash tells us that the bracha follows the order of the aleph-bet, it is making an important point about the nature of our world. This bracha is the original, intended, nature of the world. Bracha is not a chidush in the world; it is the essence of what this world is meant to be.
When we read through the parsha, what often strikes us is that the brachot are followed by a very long list of klalot, that seem to go on forever. But the Midrash points out that the klalot begin with the letter vav and end with the letter hey. They are exactly backward, the inverse of the purpose of creation. We have the ability to flip them around and turn them to good. Our world was created with the letter “bet,” the letter of expansion and bracha. Our natural state is to live in a world of bracha.
Why do we read this message just before Shavout? Because when we talk about Shavout being the new year for the trees, we mean this on two levels simultaneously. On the one hand, the yield of the trees is being determined for the next year. On the other hand, when we speak of a tree, we are also speaking of ourselves. As we read in Devarim 20:19 “for man is like the tree of the field.” Shavout is a new beginning for us as well. It is a beginning when we return to our roots, and to our true self.
We live physically by bread, but spiritually through the Torah: “man does not live by bread alone, but rather by whatever comes forth from the mouth of Hashem does man live (Devarim 8:3).” Once, both Torah and bread were easily available to us. Now, outside of Gan Eden, we have to work to attain these things. But we are meant to do this work in a specific way.
The nature of a tree is very different from the nature of a field. Each year, in the field, we begin again, plowing, sowing, planting. We have to tear down in order to grow. In contrast, the tree stands tall, year after year, and produces fruit from within itself. Yes, it needs to be tended to, and cultivated. But it never needs to be torn down in order to grow. The new year of Shavout is the new year of the tree. It is when we reconnect to our source of life, the Torah. It is the time when we reconnect to our original nature. We have no need to recreate ourselves in order to grow. We already have tremendous spiritual strength within. Our avodah is only to refine ourselves, for the purpose of allowing our inner strength to reveal inself naturally.
May we be blessed to succeed in finding the joy and tranquility of connecting to the Torah, and to our own inner strengths.