The ecology of Israel's festivals

The unbreakable bonds that tie Jews to the Land of Israel despite millennia of physical separation still confound scholars. Yet the explanation lies not only in the collective historical memory preserved by the holidays of Israel but also in the agricultural cycles of the land of Israel that are imbedded in the three pilgrimage festivals, Passover, Shavuot, and Sukkot. When the Jewish nation was forced to leave its homeland and scatter in the Diaspora, it took with it its historical holidays that were firmly intertwined with the ecology of Israel: its agricultural problems, landscapes, and nature.

There are other holidays in the Jewish calendar that celebrate specific historical events such as Hanukkah, Purim, and the miracle of modern Israel 's rebirth on Independence Day. But those dates that were rooted solely in nature and agriculture, such as Tu B'Av and Tu B'Shvat, were forgotten in the Diaspora for many centuries and were meaningfully revived only when Jews returned to their land.