When you plant a seed, it is with the expectation that it will eventually grow. It doesn’t matter if you are trying to grow a small houseplant or a large tree, it’s amazing to watch it happen.
It is even more amazing when it is a seed from the ancient fortress of Masada that dates back to the time that Jesus was on the earth. They were able to plant one of those seeds and it bore fruit.
A botanist from the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies at Kibbutz Ketura, Elaine Solowey, was in charge of the process of regrowing the seed. A variety of date palms were involved, and you will not find them anyplace else on the planet.
This wasn’t an easy process, a report by BBC showed how they had quite a difficulty getting the seeds. When they told them what they wanted them for, they were told they were crazy!
Although they had some rough spots, they were able to successfully grow the first tree in 2005. They named it Methuselah. Considering the fact that the type of tree that was grown was extinct for about 1500 years, it really was amazing.
Eventually, they would like to bring the tree back into cultivation and give it back to the world again. Plantations of those Judean dates would certainly be an interesting thing to have around.
Methuselah is getting larger but it will not bear fruit because the tree is male. Only female date palms will grow fruit.
What an incredible story! The resurrection of the Judean date palm after 2000 years (!!) thanks to its two "mothers" Dr Sarah Sallon & Dr Elaine Soloway 🙏🙏 #Israel #Methuselah 🌴https://t.co/n2fkb2ymle
— Annu Jalais, PhD অণু জালে 🌊🐅🌴 (@AnnuJal) June 27, 2021
Six additional saplings have been created, named Adam, Jonah, Uriel, Boaz, Judith and Hannah. Hannah was able to successfully be fertilized with Methuselah’s pollen last year and 111 dates were produced.
This year, the date harvest was increased to 700!
Yesterday, we held a ceremonial harvest of the fruit from our ancient date palms, which were grown from 2,000-year-old seeds. This year, we plan to offer some dates for sale at the Kibbutz Ketura guesthouse! pic.twitter.com/C4IgURzpay
— The Arava Institute (@AravaInstitute) August 24, 2021
They’re the size of the Medjool, but they’re dry and have a lovely honey after-taste,” Solowey said, adding, “If they’d tasted terrible, I don’t know what I would have done.
They used carbon dating to determine that the seed used to produce Hannah was 175 years older than the seed used for Methuselah.
We think [the seed] dates to between 30 and 65, and that her heritage is from a date brought back by the Jews who returned from the Babylonian Exile [in 539]