Repurposing the Shehechianu
Josh Shupack
Ashland, Oregon
(place Hebrew pray here)
My God, our God, Universal Ruler, Life Giver, Our Continual Creator and Sustainer of This Moment, You are blessed.
The shehechianu blessing is one of the most popular and widely used blessings in Judaism. You can say it when buying new clothes, starting off a holiday, eating the first fruits of the season, and even on seeing a friend after not seeing them for 30 days. In this article we will focus on seasonal fruits and how we can use this blessing to reconnect us with the Earth, the cycles of life, and our local food scene.
Like all things Jewish, there are constraints on when we can use this blessing over food. The fruit or vegetable has to be both ripe and fresh. You can’t have eaten it in the last 30 days, and the fresh version has to be distinguishable from the stored or refrigerated one. These 3 rules ensure that the act of eating this fruit is a unique, seasonal experience.
Unfortunately, living in the developed world it is hard to meet these 3 requirements. Fruits and vegetable are routinely stored for long periods of time and shipped great distances in order for consumers to be able to eat almost any fresh fruit or vegetable almost year round. When is the last time you went 30 days without eating a “fresh” tomato or apple? In an extreme case, according to the Piskei Teshuvot, the Satmar Rebbe never recited the shehechianu on fruits because all fruits are imported to the United States and are thus available year round.
What this illustrates is the amount of disconnect we have with our food in the current system. The shehechianu blessing is designed to give us a moment to reflect and appreciate the cycles of the seasons. When we haven’t had cherries in 11 months and they are ripening on the trees and we taste our first cherry of the season, this is a time of celebration; we have the opportunity to stop, thank God and enjoy this special moment.
Last Friday night I went to visit some friends about an hour walk away. I ended up walking for 2 hours before realizing that I was lost. It ended up taking me 3 hours to get to their house. From this experience I learned 3 valuable lessons that are relevant to this discussion. The first is that it is very important to stop when something doesn’t seem right and reevaluate the situation. I just kept going without stopping to realize that something was wrong. The second lesson is to realize how our actions impact other people. If I had thought about how upset my friends must have been getting at my absence, I would have stopped and asked for help sooner and tried to contact them. And lastly, the most important lesson I learned is that we are never more lost than when we don’t realize we are lost. The first step towards being found is to admit to being lost.
Most people in America don’t know where their food comes or how it was grown. Through conscious use of the shehechianu, we can begin to improve this situation. Rabbi Nina Beth Cardin calls the shehechianu the essential blessing of awareness. It is an opportunity to bring awareness of the natural world into our lives and to reconnect to the Earth, the source of all our nourishment. The first step towards reconnection is to become aware of our disconnect.
I would like to present some opportunities for you, the reader, to begin your process of reconnection. I encourage you to pick one of the suggestions below and set aside time to try it out, or find a friend to share in the process with you.
- Go shopping at your local farmer’s market, or take a tour of a local orchard or farm
- Choose one fruit or vegetable and don’t eat it for 30 days before its available locally, then say the shehechianu before eating it
- Read the labels of food you buy and notice the country of origin
- Find or create a local food chart that shows what’s in season in your area
- Grow your favorite fruit or vegetable in your backyard, patio, or kitchen window
How does adding in this practice change your relationship to your food? How does seeing tiny, unripe grapes in a local vineyard make you feel when you see grapes in the market from Chile? Does restraining yourself to seasonal food change the taste of it, does it allow you to enjoy it differently? Can you taste the difference between an apple you picked from your neighbor’s tree and one that was stored all Winter or shipped from New Zealand? Consider adding one new reconnecting practice each year, maybe on Tu’Bshvat or Pesah.
Hopefully by consciously using the shehechianu and the reconnecting practices outlined above you will begin to reconnect to the cycles of life around you and embrace the ever-changing nowness that we find ourselves in.
