התאנה חנטה פגיהThe Fig That Fruited Early

ha-te'enah ḥantah fagehaIn Gamatria ↗

The fig kept the poet's secret and told it early.

'When I take the appointed time, I judge with uprightness.' The nations keep their feasts in taverns and dances. Israel eats and rejoices too, but spends half the day in prayer and poems and then learns Torah. Kaidanover reads this in the letters of 'uprightness' (meisharim). So the festival poems are no burden. Their authors were great and holy, Kallir arranged his by the counsel of angels, and whoever makes light of them shortens his days. He tells of R. Shlomo ibn Gabirol, master of kabbalah and grammar, whom a jealous Ishmaelite killed and buried under a fig tree in his garden. The tree ripened huge figs before their season. The king, amazed, questioned the man until he confessed, and had him hanged on that fig. Say each poem intending its author's merit, and remember the dead on festivals.

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