THE SYMBOL OF LIFE

May 13, 2010 - The Indian chief Raoni came in France for meeting the President in order he supports his fight against a brazilian giant dam which is going to be erected in Amazonia and which is going to destroy a large part of the amazonia forest where dozens of indian tribes are living. Raoni has been famous since 1989 when he received the support of the singer Sting for the protection of the Amazon forest. Raoni came in Europe with the mission of finding supports and funds to protect the forest.

Since always, the tree has keeping a main place in men life because it is associated to the origins of humanity. It was the place of safety where took refuge our primitive ancestors for protection from the wild world which surrounded them. They slept in the tree at night, make huts with its leaves, ate its fruits and took refuge in its shade to find freshness and protection against the natural elements. Struck by the lightning of the storm, they are also the trees which initiated men to the fire, before the flint and which learned to men how to sail on rivers thanks to their bark… Trees are linked to the evolution of men. Still today, even if trees have lost much of their blessed nature, we have to keep in mind that each tree is an universe. Roots, trunk cavities, bark cracks, branches and foliage go on attracting numerous living beings and misc. species which find food, refuge and support in them.

Man did not wait for ecology to think the tree as a symbol of life and to consider it as a faithfull companion till the grave.

It is natural if the tree has been venerated by men as being the center of Universe connected to several worlds/plans: its branches support the celestial world, its trunk stays into the terrestrial world and its roots go down to the Hells.

It is the case for Yggdrasil, the Scandinavian ash . Also, the large sycamore of the Egyptians stood at the border of life and death. Banyan is the blessed tree of the hindouist religion. Yaxche is the blessed tree of the Mayas whose branches supported the Sky. In China, it exists a tree which takes its roots in the center of the world and also, the mulberry tree symbolizes the cycles of life. The american native teach about a powerfull tree blessed and protective. In Amazonia, Behehué is a tree which contains all the possible forms of life. In Siberia, one believes in a tree of eight branches which grows at the center of the world and which raises towards the paradise. Coran speaks about the tree of Tourba which stands up in the middle of the paradise. Bible teachs about an apple tree linked to Adam and Eve’s fall of paradise. The Christmas tree that we go on decorating at the end of each year, finds its origin in the Roman feast of Saturnales when evergreen trees were the sign of rebirth and whose branches were used to celebrate the New Year’s Day.

The oak was the tree of Zeus for the antic Greeks, the tree of Jupiter for the Romans and a druidic altar for the Celts.

The yew was considered as immortal by the Celtic druids and decorated for this reason the old blessed sites and graveyards. Symbol of immortality, tree of paradise for the Persians, used for manufacturing sarcophagi by the Egyptians, its durable wood was regarded as protective for the bodies for eternity and its green flame linked the Sky and the World. Still today this old tree goes on to be the faithfull and dark guard of the deads in the western graveyards.

The symbol of the reversed tree is described in the kabbalah and the Hindu Bhagavad-Gita. This tree of life takes root in the Sky and its branches spread at the bottom. It represents God into the paradise as the origin of all things.

It is also from the tree that the wizard takes the symbol of his power through the medium of his stick made in almond , either hazel or willow tree. This wooden stick is the alchemical concentration which attracts and collects energies by creating vortices in ether and by joining together true swirls of forces.

The tree is closely associated to men and remains still today a footbridge between the human microcosm and the macrocosm of the Universe.