Sacred Places: Tree Of Knowledge Can Liberate You

Sacred Places: Tree Of Knowledge Can Liberate You

Siddhartha Gautam roamed in search of the secret of sorrow and suffering. At Gaya, a village on the banks of the river Niranjana in Bihar, he sat in silent contemplation under a banyan tree.

He attained enlightenment there, and became known as the Buddha. The spot began to be referred to as the Throne of Wisdom, and the banyan tree is now known as the Eternal Wisdom Tree, the Akshaya Bodhibriksha .

The tree stands for inexhaustible life, and is therefore a symbol of immortality. With its roots underground and branches rising to the sky it symbolises heavenward ascension.

The branches that hang down to take root in the ground symbolise the continuing support of merit through earnest devotion.

In ancient India the acharya and his disciples would sit together under a tree, mostly a banyan tree, and endlessly discuss the mysteries of the universe.

The Upanishads emerged from such disputations. In Shankaracharya's Hymn to Dakshinamurti , the following verse describes this tradition: "I bow down to Dakshinamurti, the Teacher of the three worlds, who, seated on the ground under the banyan tree, grants knowledge to all the learned sages who have assembled around him. How strange! The assembled disciples were all aged, and the guru was young. The Guru's sermon was conveyed through his silence, and all doubts of the disciples were cleared up."

Ultimate wisdom is be-yond the reach of mind and speech. Yamaraj explains to Nachiketa in the Kathopanishad: "This atma is not realised through long lectures nor through intellectual effort nor through listening to many sermons."

The Buddha experienced the truth of this saying in his own experiments. The Truth dawned upon him in silent contemplation on the Throne of Wisdom under the eternal Tree of Wisdom.

To western travellers, however, the banyan appeared as a tree shrouded in dark mystery. Pliny, Raleigh and others have commented on the evil nature of the tree. Thus, for them, "the proliferating tree is a tree of error... As this tree, so did man grow straight and upright towards God until such time as he had transgressed and broken the Commandment of his Creator. And like unto the boughs of this tree, he began to bend downwards, and toward the earth, which all the rest of Adam's posterity have done, rooting themselves and fastening themselves to this corrupt world." After the Fall, as Milton described in Paradise Lost, Adam and Eve tried to hide their guilt and shame "under a pillared shade, high overarched, and echoing walks between".

The tree is still echoing the warning: You grow straight and upright until such time as you transgress the limits prescribed for you. As soon as you transgress, you begin to bend downwards rooting yourself in corruption. Like the banyan, the peepal tree ashwattha (that which does not last till tomorrow), also represents a great truth in the Indian tradition.

The Gita (XV.1-4) says: "They speak of a Cosmic Tree. It is the ever-changing tree of the phenomenal world. Its roots go up, and its branches go down. He who knows it is a man of knowledge. Its form is not visible here, neither its end, nor origin, nor its basis. After cutting down the firmly fixed tree by the mighty sword of non-attachment, one attains the goal from which there is no return."

This idea of the cosmic tree is found in several other traditions also. For the Hebrew tradition states that the Tree of Life spreads downwards from above, and is entirely bathed in the light of the sun. Dante too portrays the pattern of the celestial spheres as the foliage of a tree whose roots (origin) spread upwards.