I am very excited to be finally writing my first blog about one of the 7 species. I feel that my whole introduction to my love of nature started with the 7 species and ten years later I am coming back to them to give them credit where credit is due. Ten years ago I started to study to be a guide at Neot Kedumim Biblical Nature Reserve, not really knowing much about either nature or the bible. The seven species, being the core of the Biblical plants, formed the main part of my initial studies. Once I conquered those seven I was hooked and the rest is history.
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| Seven Species |
The Seven species are the seven main agricultural products presented in the Bible to the children of Israel while they are in the desert. It is a promise of what to expect when they cross over into the land of Canaan. They are wheat, barley, grape, fig, pomegranate, olive and date. These seven species will provide the Israelites with a full balanced diet and importantly are a message to a predominantly shepherding community that will become farmers and will be staying in one place to work their own land. If you ever want to remember where these 7 species are mentioned then refer to Deuteronomy Chapter 8 Verse 8 and you will learn what the children of Israel ate.
If I was to stop any person on the street and ask them which of the seven species is the most beautiful, delicious and striking I would assume that most would answer that it is the pomegranate. As spring turns to summer we are starting to tire of looking down at the yellowing less inspiring flora on the ground and look up to that flash of red among the leaves on the pomegranate tree, a promise of things to come.
The pomegranate flower is blossoming now. (A little interesting aside: trees 'blossom' and flowers 'bloom'!). The flower is actually made of two parts, similar in color but contradictory in texture and sheen. The cup part is actually the starting of the fruit, with the crown already perfectly formed at the top. One can envision the adult fruit this will become. I actually think this looks a bit like an ice cream cone. Out of the shiny waxy cone come the delicate petals of the flower, thin and almost translucent. Inside the flower is a dense clump of yellow pollen, probably very attractive to passing pollinators. The petals actually fall off very quickly leaving the fruit to start to develop and swell.
We then just watch it grow and grow with anticipation until September or October when the fruit will be ready to eat. The pomegranate is traditionally given the blessing of the first fruit on Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. This provides a dilemma for me every year. Rosh Hashanah can fall any time between early September and mid October, depending on the Jewish Calendar of that year. When it falls in October it is very hard for me to see all those gleaming pomegranates in the supermarket and have to hold back buying them until Rosh Hashanah. We spend Rosh Hashanah on Kibbutz Alumim, and our first taste is the pomegranates from my brother in laws tree. Delicious and definitely worth the wait.
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| Autumn! |
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| Winter! |
After ten years of guiding tourists I can honestly say that there is nothing that impresses them more than when I pick a big red pomegranate, open it up exposing dozens of ruby like gems and share it out among them. Of course this is always followed by the all important question: How many seeds are inside a pomegranate? Most know the myth that it is 613 after the number of commandments in the bible. When my children were young we whiled away time on Rosh Hashanah counting them. We once counted 623, another time 684 and then the kids got bored.
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| Photo: Sara Oren, Neot Kedumim |
The pomegranate is so much a part of our history and culture. The spies came back to the children of Israel carrying giant bunches of grapes and pomegranates on their shoulders. I don’t understand why the pomegranates got such a raw deal by not being included in the Ministry of Tourism logo, if I was a pomegranate I would go out and demonstrate outside the Ministry. Its beauty is an inspiration to poetry and is mentioned many times in the greatest love poem of all time – The Song of Songs. “Your shoots are an orchard of pomegranates with all choicest fruits” 4:13. “Your temples behind your veil are like the halves of a pomegranate.” 4:3 “If their blossoms have opened, and if the pomegranates are in bloom— there I will give you my love” 7:12
The pomegranate is elevated in importance as the High priest wore robes decorated with bells and pomegranates. We know longer have the High Priest or the temple but every synagogue has silver decorations topped with a crown and bells which adorn the Torah Scrolls. These are called ‘rimonim’, the Hebrew word for pomegranate.
Ironically the rimon, for all its beauty, was the name also given to a hand grenade, and it is easy to understand why. The English word, grenade, is also derived from the ancient French word for the fruit ‘pomme-grenade’.
Pomegranate is so healthy it’s ridiculous. It has plenty of good antis in it: anti ageing, anti oxidant and no good uncles. (Groan). Pomegranate juice has been found to have three times the antioxidant activity of red wine and green tea!! So sucks to you wine connoisseurs and pompous tea drinkers.
I love buying a giant cup of seeds in shuk Machane Yehuda or Shuk HaCarmel. I know they are over priced but who can resist those cool juicy red pearls on a hot day. Any salad I make during the season is enriched by sprinkling it with the seeds.
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| Photo: Michele Levy |
Tomato and Pomegranate Salad:
https://ottolenghi.co.uk/recipes/tomato-and-pomegranate-salad
Photos courtesy of Yasmin Maissel
Editing courtesy of Elizabeth Kay From HaChamama Shel Elizabeth
PS: I started this blog a year ago this month so from now on you can start looking back at previous blogs to see what else is flowering this month:
Check out the wild carrot: https://flowerfuninisrael.blogspot.com/2019/05/
