Community Magazine January 2019

24 COMMUNITY MAGAZINE Look at the Apple Furthermore, have you ever considered the stem of an apple? It looks like a simple stub ready to be discarded. But if you truly understood what it was, you would probably give it a kiss and keep it in your wallet as a kammea (amulet). The stem, of course, functions as an umbilical cord, connecting the fruit to the tree, just like an embryo. This is how the tree sustains the fruit till maturity. But there is something even more amazing. You probably heard the legend of Isaac Newton, who was sitting under an apple tree, when an apple fell off and hit him on the head, inspiring his discovery of gravity. In my opinion, he missed the real lesson. Gravity can be observed by anything that falls downward. Instead, he should have asked himself, “Hold it. Why did the apple fall off the tree at this moment?” Up till now, the stem held the apple tightly connected, bearing the brunt of wind and rain. How did the stem “know” to release the fruit at the perfect moment when the fruit becomes ripe? Once you see Gd in nature, you can never look at a stem the same way. The biotech industry only fantasizes about a digital sensor that can achieve this. If we’re already talking about an apple, think about the color and aroma which are divinely designed to already activate our salivary glands to help us digest. It’s getting us ready even before the first bite. Once you bite in, what do you see? A free coupon! Buy one get one free. It’s the seed. You don’t just get another apple; you get an entire tree of a hundred apples from each seed, for free. Look at the valuable bounty that Gd instilled in each piece of fruit. Tu B’Shvat’s Take-Home Message Thus, the take-away from Tu B’Shvat is to reveal the Gd in nature. Doing this, accomplishes the kabbalistic tikkun of hamtakat hadinim - sweetening the harsh judgments and decrees. When people separate nature for Gd, on the contrary, they arouse harsh judgments. You should run the other way when you hear people saying the world and life just happened by chance. We don’t just say, “What a beautiful world”; we pay attention to Hashem’s signature signed all over it. The best way to accomplish this is reciting berachot. Each time we say a beracha on food or nature, we are revealing Hashem’s hidden name behind the veil of nature. Tu B’Shvat is the perfect time to strengthen our commitment to saying berachot. If we do this, then we will merit not only tasting the sweetness of the fruit, but also sweetening any harsh judgments, and feeling the sweetness of being close to Gd in our daily lives. לעילוי נשמתם של משה בן עליזה, יצחק הלל בן עליזה, והנרייט לאה בת עליזה, דוד בן גילה, רבקה בת גילה, יהושע בן גילה, משה בן גילה, שרה בת גילה, יעקב בן גילה, ואליאנה בת גילה. ולרפואה שלמה ליוסף בן אהובה מסעודה, שילת אהובה בת עליזה, ודניאל בן עליזה. lou@louconstruction.com | 732-245-1322 | Louconstruction.com