A song for Spring, a love song for the land

This Shabbat/Yom Tov we recite Shir HaShirim, the Song of Songs. Here's a devar Torah by Rabbi Wein that focuses on this inspiring and, it turns out, seasonal ode to nature and to our reconnection with the land that God gave us.

Those of us who live in the northern hemisphere are excitedly awaiting springtime and the end of our winter weather woes. Here in Israel we had a fairly normal winter with a decent amount of rain and a few cold spells. it was an unremarkable winter, weather wise. Nevertheless, winter is winter and I for one am keenly looking forward to the arrival of the spring season, the blooming flowers, trees and the great holidays of Pesach and Shavuot that mark the book ends—the beginning and the end—of the spring season here in Israel. 

The great song of springtime is Shir HaShirim, written by King Solomon, and according to the custom of many synagogues, is read publicly on Shabbat Chol Hamoed or on acharon shel Pesach. There is no more lyrical description of the advent of springtime than that which appears in Shir HaShirim. It evokes not only the reawakening of nature and the change of weather but it also speaks the mood, the emotions and the spiritual quality that attaches itself to that season.

The Jewish people were freed from Egypt and from bondage in the springtime. The Torah explicitly commands us to commemorate that freedom with the holiday of Pesach and the Jewish calendar must always be adjusted so that this holiday falls when spring arrives. Springtime has come to symbolize not only a change of nature and mood but also our change of status: from slaves to free and independent people. It represents our ability to free ourselves from he whims of others so that we can fulfil our own potential as a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. 

When most human beings were occupied in agricultural tasks, we noticed the change of seasons and the arrival of spring more than now, in our urbanized and industrialized world, where spring has lost some of its luster. The city dweller today rarely visits farms or orchards. Indeed, industrialized and global farming has caused some folk to think that apples and bananas grow in bags and are raised in fruit stores and supermarkets. This disconnect between nature and humans is a troubling aspect of modern society. I am not suggesting that we return to horses and buggies and backbreaking farm labor. However, an appreciation of nature and its bounty, of the change of seasons and the weather patterns that accompany it, can only serve to strengthen our spirituality and the yearning for eternity that exists within all of us. 

The pagan world, terrorized by nature, worshiped various angry gods who had to be appeased, even by human sacrifice. Judaism however viewed nature as an instrument of God's will and as a blessing for humanity, with the ability to harness its bounty and turn it into a positive and manifold gift to the human race. The coming of spring brings a restatement of this belief and attitude. 

Part of the legacy of our long and bitter exile has been a disconnect between the appreciation of nature and our entire educational system. One of the six sections of the Mishnah concerns itself solely with matters of agriculture, botany and farming. This section of the Mishnah, Zeraim, was neglected in rabbinic scholarship for centuries. Rabbi Menachem HaMeiri, of early fourteenth century Provence, pointed out that that this section of Torah did not appear in the curriculum of the yeshivot of his time and place. This was true of all later generations of Jewish scholarship until the nineteenth century, which saw the beginning of Jewish immigration from the dark winter of Eastern Europe to the springtime of the Land of Israel. 

As Jews began to return to the Holy Land and reconnected themselves to the soil, the desert began to bloom and the desolate landscape turned green and verdant. All of the great prophets of Israel foresaw an agricultural and natural rebirth in the redemption of the Jewish people from exile and their return home to the Land of Israel. In fact, the prophets stated that the harbinger of the eventual redemption, in its totality, would be the rebirth of the natural produce and beauty of the land itself. 

Springtime reminds us of the great miracle that we have witnessed and are part of. It guarantees us hope for the full completion of the process of redemption in our time.