We Plant Trees

If you've ever seen the movie Keeping the Faith, you know it's about a priest and a rabbi who were best friends growing up (and remained best friends as adults in their respective religious leadership positions).

Today, I found out that an elderly relative passed away.  I thought of this exchange between the priest and the rabbi:

• Priest:     What do you want me to do, flagellate myself?
  Rabbi:    Jews don't do that. We-- We plant trees.

Planting trees have a lot of symbolism in Judaism, from the Tree of Knowledge in the Garden of Eden to the "Tree of Life" found in many synagogues with commemorative and memorial leaves honoring significant life events or lives as a whole.  Jews often symbolically plant trees in Israel to commemorate births, b'nai mitzvoht, and to honor our loved ones, as planting a tree to benefits the future generations the way we have benefitted from past generations' tree planting.

As the rabbi in the movie says, when Jewish people experience a significant life cycle event (including a death), planting a tree can also help bring peace to the family dealing with the death.  Family members participate in the planting itself - a distraction - and their act provides future generations both a living memorial of the past and the benefits of having a tree - be it fruit, shade, or the wood of which it is composed.
 
Here's to you, Uncle Archie - rest in peace.