It’s a minor holiday on the Jewish calendar. But with each passing year, Tu B’Shevat grows more important and urgent.
Known as New Year of the Trees, Tu B’Shevat this year begins at sundown on Tuesday, Feb. 3. The holiday is often celebrated by planting trees, tasting new fruits and holding a special seder.
This year something is different. Anyone with a rain gauge has noticed how much has fallen in the Bay Area this month: zero. Not a drop. We may plant new trees, but how will we water them?
On Tu B’Shevat, we acknowledge our connection to the land. The Torah instructs us to be “stewards” for the Earth and its flora and fauna, making Jews the original environmentalists. As such, we have an obligation to advocate on behalf of our planet, and not just on this holiday.
Skeptics may continue to wag their fingers, but California’s historic drought, now in its third year, is one more ominous sign that anthropogenic climate change is undeniably upon us.
The headlines stream by: 2014 on the books as the hottest year on record; mass die-offs of sea birds along the west coast of the Americas; mega-blizzards like the one this week in New England, fueled by alarmingly warm Atlantic Ocean temperatures; glaciers melting away, from Greenland to the Andes.
Humankind’s 200-year reliance on fossil fuels has caught up with us. The oceans, which trap excess carbon and atmospheric heat, are tapped out. That heat is now being spit back at us in the form of destructive superstorms and methane plumes.
Meanwhile, the world dithers. Here at home, congressional committees in charge of the environment are now chaired by politicians who deny the indisputable truth of climate change. With such misguided leaders running the show, we can barely get to square one in this all-important fight.
It’s easy to despair. But there are glimmers of hope. A new British study concludes that civilization can “cut carbon emissions and live well” as long as we limit global temperature rises to 2 degrees Celsius. We can do that by increasing crop yields, ramping up renewable energy capacity and reducing our dependence on gasoline-fueled vehicles, for a start.
Oh, and one more thing on that checklist: expanding the world’s forests by up to 15 percent. In other words, plant trees, just as we do on Tu B’Shevat. The Jews are on it, and have been since the giving of the Torah.
The solutions to climate change are right there before us. We must act, without delay.