The Sacred Tree: Or the Tree in Religion and Myth

by J.H. Philpot

This Is A New Release Of The Original 1897 Edition.

Genres: Nonfiction, Mythology

194 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1897

Reviews

[AvianBuddha · Rating 5 out of 5]

The origin of philosophy and world traditions can be traced back to the worship of trees and the belief in a tree-inhabited god. The book covers much wider breadth, but I simply want to highlight a few key points. To emphasize this book's point that "the tree is at the root of all philosophy", I am glossing over a lot.

There can be no doubt, however, that originally the mystical tree was the essential feature of paradise, and the garden was merely its precinct or setting—one of the many conceptions which grew up around the central idea of the cosmic tree. Each nation, according to its stage of culture or its prevailing habit of thought, emphasised one feature of it. The monster tree which, according to primitive cosmogony, was believed to support the universe by material branches, became in the minds of more cultivated races the central tree of a dimly-realised paradise, and eventually the symbol of an abstract idea. The intellectual Buddhist saw in it the emblem of knowledge; the Persian thought of it as the tree of immortality; the Hebrew, filled with the idea of man’s frailty and with the longing to explain it, made it the tree of temptation.

But in all these various conceptions we find a central idea, derived no doubt from an antecedent and universal tree-worship, an idea which places a tree at the root of all philosophy, refers all phenomena to the existence of a central tree, serviceable to man here or hereafter, and concentrating upon itself the reverent devotion which had outgrown its earthly counterpart.

The Indians, Arabs, Persians, Akkadians, Canaanites, Assyrians, Greeks, Scandinavians, and many others all worshipped trees as dwelling places for gods and spirits like nymphs, jinni, yazata, etc. In addition, they believed that spirits like nymphs were bound by trees, and that "blood would flow when the tree was injured" or "punishment incurred for destroying a tree that contains spirits". For example, take a look at this painting of the Hamadryadad by Émile Bin:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...

It is also interesting to note that certain types of trees were associated with certain gods. Zeus, for example, is associated with the mighty oak (like Dagda), Aphrodite with the myrtle & apple tree, Apollo with the laurel, and Athena with the olive tree. "Indeed, the solitary tree standing in Attic fields and worshipped as the sacred habitation of a god was in all probability the earliest Greek temple, the forerunner of those marvelous edifices which have aroused the admiration of every subsequent age". In Brahaminical worship, the deity's essence is believed to descend into the tree, and the Sycamore tree was associated with Osiris in Ancient Egypt. Even the Arabs revered the "sacred acacia of Nakhla, the dwelling place of Al-'Ozza". As a way of further deifying trees, votive offerings were often given to trees, engraved with faces or adorned with clothes. Originally, the tree was the "home of the great gods" and later became "the embodiment of the all-powerful patron of universal fertility".

A few trees were believed to possess oracular powers by the Greeks, including the famous oak of Dodona. They even used certain branches and shoots for divination and auguries (e.g. the laurel for prophecy).

It was the god dwelling in them who produced the mysterious rustlings and movements of the branches, from which the responses were interpreted by the attendant priests. But according to the ancient view the tree derived a further title to its oracular prestige from its connection by means of its roots with the under-world, the mysterious abode of departed spirits, in whom wisdom and knowledge of the future were supposed to be vested. Thus the special prophetic power attributed to the variety of oak (probably the Quercus esculus) which grew at Dodona was ascribed by later writers to the fact that its roots 94 pierced the earth more deeply than those of other trees, reaching down even to Tartarus.

Trees and the gods that dwell within them were celebrated by the Greeks in many ways:

At the Pyanepsia and the Thargelia, two important Athenian festivals, the Eiresione, a harvest wreath of olive or laurel bound round with red and white wool, and hung with the choicest first-fruits, was borne about by singing boys, while offerings were made to the gods. A vine branch with the grapes upon it gave its name to another Athenian festival, the Oschophoria, or grape carrying, held in honour of Dionysus. A race between chosen youths formed one of the events of the festival, the competitors running from the temple of Dionysus to that of Athena, with boughs in their hands.

There are many mythologies in Greek and other world mythologies that tell of mortals being transformed into trees or humans and man-like spirits originating from trees. In the old world "tree and man, and indeed all living things, were held to be so near akin". In some stories, flowers arose from blood or teardrops, which served as seeds for miracles. Furthermore, "it was usual amongst the Romans to plant a tree at the birth of a son, and from its vigour to forecast the prosperity of the child... But more important than the family tree is the community tree. In many an old German village there stood a tree, often a May-tree, which the villagers guarded as the apple of their eye. It was looked upon as the life-tree, the tutelary genius, the second 'I' of the whole community. Devotions were paid to it and gifts offered as to a deity."

Pagan Scandinavians viewed Yggdrasil as the supporter of the universe, and Indians and Persians saw a sacred tree of life as offering immortal ambrosia, soma, and haoma to the gods. "In the Rig-Veda Brahma himself is described as the vast over-spreading tree of the universe, of which the gods are the branches". "In Chinese mythology seven miraculous trees once flourished on the Kuen Lün Mountains. One of whem which was of jade, bore fruit that conferred immortality; another named Tong, grew on the highest peak, 'hard by the closed gate of heaven'". In both East and West, the "universe-tree was venerated as something more than a mere material supporter of the world, being sometimes the giver of wisdom and sometimes the conveyer of immortality". Furthermore, mythologies are full of mystical-life-giving trees.

The corresponding legend amongst the neighbouring Esthonians, as told in their epic, the Kalevipoeg, contains a quaint medley of the practical and the poetic. Here, too, the monstrous oak is felled by a giant who grows from a dwarf; in falling it covers the sea with its branches and is quickly turned to use by the people. From the trunk is fashioned a bridge with two arms, one stretching to Finland, the other to an adjoining island. Ships are built from the crown, and towns from the roots, and toy-boats from the chips. What is left over is used to build shelters for old men, widows, and orphans, and the last remainder to provide a hut for the minstrel. Therewith he gains “the master-magic,” for the strangers who cross the bridge now and again, and stop at his door to ask what city and what splendid palace stand before them, receive for answer that the palace is his poor hut, and all the splendour around is the light of his songs reflected from heaven.

As well as trees, heavenly paradise is associated with walls and gardens (derived from the Avestan term pairi daeza, meaning "walled garden").

Paradise was sometimes represented (1) as the seat of the gods; sometimes (2) as the first home of the parents of mankind; and in other cases as (3) the abode of the spirits of the blessed. Occasionally the different conceptions are combined; but the earlier traditions all concur in connecting paradise with a miraculous tree or trees, or with a more or less legendary mountain, from which it may be plausibly inferred that they date back to the days of that primitive cosmogony when the heavens were supposed to be upheld by a material support. Thus in one, at least, of its aspects the tradition of paradise must be regarded as an offshoot of the sacred tree.

It is not difficult to understand how the various conceptions arose. In the first place, as the idea of a life or spirit more or less bound to the tree became expanded into that of a powerful and wide-ranging god, the idealising process demanded for him some home in heaven corresponding to the tree which was his favourite habitat or embodiment on earth. The sacred god-haunted tree, to which worship and gifts were accorded below, suggested a mystical counterpart above, and the proper home of deity was assumed to be that marvellous tree whose branches were the sky and its fruit the sun and stars, or that lofty mountain whose summit touched and supported the heavens.

In the second place, the belief, common in primitive mythology, that the first parents were born from trees, presumably led to the idea that these honoured ancestors, whose innocence was a part of their idealisation, lived amongst trees and in a garden equally idealised.

The third conception of paradise naturally grew out of the earlier conceptions, when there arose the belief in a future life of reward or punishment; though it has been pointed out that the conception of heaven under the form of a garden prevailed, par excellence, amongst settled nations, living under kings of whose state a luxurious garden or pleasaunce formed an essential part.

A paradise associated with trees and gardens was even believed by the Greeks!

Homer placed the seat of the gods and the court of Zeus upon the summit of Olympus, which was supposed to touch heaven, and piercing through the region of rain and cloud to reach into the calm ether, where reigned eternal spring. By later writers, however, Olympus was represented as an unsubstantial region overhead, with the palace of Zeus in its midst. The earlier view of Olympus exactly corresponds with the Chaldaean “mount of the world,” the mountain of Arallu or Hades, where the gods had their seat, and beneath which was the world of ghosts; also with the Mount of the Assembly spoken of by Isaiah, and with 135 the Scandinavian Asgard. But there is a clearer reminiscence of the elevated paradise of Oriental legend in the beautiful gardens of the world-supporting Atlas, with their delicious fruits, their golden apples, and their protecting dragon. The third conception of paradise, as the abode of the blessed, is also met with in Greek mythology in the Elysian fields, or islands of the blessed, also placed by some authorities in the neighbourhood of Mount Atlas. Here the souls of the virtuous enjoyed perfect happiness, in bowers for ever green, and amongst meadows watered by pleasant streams and bestarred with asphodel. The air was pure and serene, the birds warbled in the groves, and the inhabitants carried on such avocations as they had delighted in when on earth
... ... ...
It contained the fountain of immortality, from which sprang the four rivers that flowed to the four quarters of the earth. Purling brooks ran with the far-famed ambrosia. The dwellers therein reposed on flowery lawns, lulled by the melodious warblings of birds and feasting on delicious fruits. Whatever there was of beautiful or sublime in nature there found its more perfect counterpart. Absolute contentment and serenity and the delight that never dies were the boons it offered. There man could cease from toil, for nature, unassisted, produced all that was necessary for his sustenance. This garden of delight was often sought after but seldom found, except by semi-divine heroes divinely led. Hercules, directed by Nereus, the sea-god, succeeded in attaining the gardens of the Hesperides on the world-supporting Mount Atlas, the Pillar of Heaven, as Herodotus calls it. He conquered the protecting dragon and secured the golden sun-fruit from the central tree.

According to the Japanese and Persians, paradise has an endless spring, unclouded skies, unfading flowers, birds that sing of love and joy, and trees that carry a secret of immortality in their celestial dews. There is no sorrow, pain, or death in that delightful place, and the elect of the gods, who live there, fill their days with music, laughter, and song without knowing about time's passing.

As a matter of fact, the primitive man, who saw the oak trees as God's dwelling place, was superior to the modernized, mechanized, industrious man with his lifeless gaze.

[Perry Whitford · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hippies were far from being the first tree-huggers in history, as this condensed yet comprehensive study from 1897 well illustrates.

In fact, joking aside, tree-worship is as ancient and pervasive as any kind of worship.
Certainly from the earliest records of recorded history, such as those found in Assyrian or Chaldaean sources, the scared tree seemed to hold a central position.

Trees could either represent or house gods, such as the oak tree for the earliest incarnation of Zeus at Dodona; could do the same for spirits, such as the jinni of Arabia and hamadryads of Greece.

Trees have also played a significant role in myths about the creation of the human race, such as the story of Mashya and Mashyana in Zoroastrian cosmogony, and Ask and Embla in Norse myth - where the first man and woman in both instances were born out of trees.

Then there are the examples of the universal-tree, which supports and nourishes the world, a common concept held by diverse cultures, from East to West, of which the most renowned version is the Norse tree, Yggdrasil.

Gardens filled with trees are the usual settings for paradise, such as the Elysian Fields, Eden, the Islamic Jannah and Avalon. Originally gods resided there, then later the deserving dead.

Trees were also associated with oracles, which originated in the oldest idea that gods dwelt in certain trees. As Philpot notes, with some contempt of the practice, the 'divining-rod is the meagre survival of the once renowned tree-oracle.'

She finishes off her study with a quick look at two of the more modern forms of tree-worship, the May-day and Christmas celebrations, both pagan in origin, one suppressed by Christianity, the other adopted.

Very informative on its subject but, the above zinger at the expense of water-divining aside, short on enlivening commentary.