10 myths
Myths, legends, and mystical writings about Trees from across Jewish tradition.
10 myths on JewishMythology.com retell how Jewish tradition imagines trees, drawn from the Hebrew Bible, Midrash, Talmud, Kabbalah, and later Jewish literature. Each story below synthesizes primary sources into a single narrative; follow any myth to read it, and from there into the source passages behind it.
Before Haman drove a single nail, God called a council and asked the trees of creation which one would volunteer as the instrument of Haman's destruction.
A builder on a beam answers how the world was made, and the waters revolt, the trees grow proud, and God tears the deep apart with one finger.
God pushes Adam past Eden's gate to work the dust he came from. Sages later fight over whether he also lost the World to Come.
On the fifteenth of Shevat the sap pushed upward, the orchard held its breath, and a prayer named Malachi drove the devourer from the fruit.
Three kings ran out of water and found Elisha. He promised a dry valley full of pools, then told them to fell every good tree in Moab without mercy.
On Tu Bishvat the table fills with fruit and praise. A man saved gleanings so he would not answer for what he never tasted.
At seventy Abraham cut the pieces and heard exile timed. Later Israel planted trees that waited three years for free fruit.
When Canaan heard Israel was coming, axes rose against every orchard. God turned the people into the desert and let the land relearn how to grow.
The forests had been standing for a few hours when iron came up out of the same ground. Every tree in the world started to shake at once.
A king finds his orchard choked with thorns and lifts the axe, then smells one rose. For Israel's pledge at Sinai the whole ruined world is left standing.
