Ashwattha is the mundane tree (or Tree of Life) of the Hindus. It is described as having its roots above and branches below. Its branches represent the external visible world of senses, or visible universe. The leaves are the Vedas or the universe in its intellectual or moral character. The roots represent the Spiritual World and Supreme Being, or First Cause, the Logos. But one has to go beyond the roots to unite oneself with Krishna, the Brahman who is greater than the First Cause and is indestructible. He who is able to cut down this tree with the strong axe of dispassion and go beyond the roots, will not have to incarnate during this "age" of Brahma. Thus, Parabrahmam is the seed, First Cause is the root, Mahat or Universal Soul is the trunk, while the branches are the great egoism. We are asked to cut the tree with an axe of knowledge or secret wisdom. (S.D., I, 406 and 536)

Vishnu, in one of his incarnations, is shown resting under the Banyan tree and there he taught humanity the philosophy and the sciences. Under the shade of this Banyan tree the gurus teach their disciples lessons of immortality and initiate them into the mysteries of life and death. The Banyan tree is called both the "Tree of Knowledge" and the "Tree of Life" (S.D., II, 215). The Secret Doctrine mentions "the ever-living-human-Banyan" which represents a "Wondrous Being" from whom all sages, rishis and hierophants have descended in antiquity. Further:

It is under the direct, silent guidance of this MAHA—(great)—GURU that all the other less divine Teachers and instructors of mankind became from the first awakening of human consciousness, the guides of early Humanity. (S.D., I, 208)

Each man assimilates by self-effort, knowledge and experience, and grows. But as a free-willed being he grows either into a tree of life or a withering tree (black adept).

The symbol of the "Tree" standing for various Initiates was almost universal. Jesus is called "the tree of life," as also all the adepts of the good Law, while those of the left Path are referred to as the "withering trees." (S.D., II, 496)

A similar idea is symbolically represented in the Gospel according to St. John (ch. 15). Jesus says:

I am the true vine and my Father is the Husbandman. Every branch in me that beareth not fruit, he taketh away....As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself except it abide in the vine; no more can ye except ye abide in me. I am the Vine [Christos]—ye are the branches. If a man abide not in me he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered and cast into the fire and burned. (The Key to Theosophy, p. 184)

H.P.B. explains that Atma is the "Husbandman," Buddhi or Spiritual Ego is the Vine, while the animal or Vital Soul or Personality is the "branch." When the branch or personality ceases to take guidance from the Divine nature, it is gradually annihilated.

Tree worship has been very old, writes James Frazer, in his book, The Golden Bow. In the beginning, trees were worshipped as animated things, so that each tree was regarded as a conscious and living thing. At that point, each tree was looked upon as the "body" of the tree-spirit. Later, the tree was regarded as a lifeless inert mass, but occupied and inhabited by a supernal being—and thus became the abode of the tree-spirit. The tree-spirit or god of a tree can leave that tree and from tree-soul he becomes a forest-god, or god of trees in general. Either as tree-soul or as a forest-god these tree-spirits were considered to have powers—of making the rain to fall, the sun to shine, flocks and herds to multiply, and women to have smooth delivery. It is said that when some missionaries tried persuading Lithuanians to cut the trees, many women protested saying that the trees were the houses of gods, from which they were getting rain and sunshine. The Mundaris of Assam believe that if a tree were felled, the forest gods would display their wrath by witholding rain. Sacrifices were offered to the trees in the form of cattle, crops, fowls, etc. Similarly, among the Maoris of Africa, the power of making women fruitful is ascribed to trees. The barren woman had to embrace the tree in order to get the child.

Myths are profound religious conceptions of ancient peoples and nations. There is hidden meaning in every religious and profane legend. No myth, no tradition has ever been pure fiction. "Mythology was primitive mode of thinking the early thought," writes H.P.B.

From the remotest antiquity trees were treated with veneration and connected with gods and mystical forces in nature. Every nation had its sacred tree, with its peculiar characteristics and occult properties. One such tree of importance is the Oak tree, associated with the highest God or Deity of the particular pantheon—with Greeks it was Zeus, with Italians Jupiter, with the Norse Thor, etc. The Druids held Oak and mistletoe in high esteem. They performed none of their sacred rites without Oak leaves.

One such mythical figure or god in relation to mistletoe was the Norse god Baldur, the son of the great God Odin in the Scandinavian myth. Baldur, states H.P.B. is the well-beloved God of goodness, who alone is without sin. He is killed by the crafty Loki. Frigg, the mother of the gods, entreated all the animate and inanimate creatures not to kill the well-beloved. But, of course, she forgot to mention it to "the weak mistletoe bough," and so Loki made a dart of this mistletoe and put it in the hands of blind Hodur who killed Baldur with that dart.

James Frazer mentions in The Golden Bow that mistletoe is worshipped by the Celtic Druid, who believe that anything that comes from Oak is sent from heaven. The mistletoe is not found easily, but when found, they gather it with solemn ceremony, on the sixth day of the waxing moon, which is supposed to be the day when the moon is full of vigour. A priest clad in white climbs the tree and cuts with golden sickle the mistletoe that is gathered in a white cloth. It is used as a remedy against all poisons. It was a cure for epilepsy, sterility in women, ulcers, etc. The mistletoe was a mystic plant in several ancient religions and mythologies. According to the myth, Baldur could not be killed by anything in heaven or earth, save the mistletoe. As long as mistletoe remained on the Oak tree, Baldur was not only immortal, but also invulnerable. Now if we suppose Baldur was the Oak then we understand the meaning. The mistletoe was believed to be the seat of life of the Oak, and as long as mistletoe was intact, so was the Oak. The Oak is deciduous and in winter, when divine life has ceased to animate the branches, it survives in the mistletoe. If Oak is taken to represent the human being, the mistletoe would be his heart. The invulnerable Baldur is personification of the Oak, bearing mistletoe, explains Frazer.

Rudolf Steiner perceived the striking similarity and parallel between cancer growth and the life cycle of the mistletoe, and introduced the latter in cancer therapy in the 1920s. Unlike other plants and trees, the mistletoe does not obey the normal biological rhythm in nature and asserts its autonomy. It has an inherente tendency for indefinite growth and proliferation in its leaves, flowers, berries, and also has the capacity to overcome this tendency through regulated growth. It eats up tumour-like protuberances on the host-tree. This intuitive perception led to scientific research and mistletoe extracts are now used in cancer therapy.

H.P.B. mentions a curious tale about the sacred tree of Kumbum (The Theosophist, March 1883). When two enthusiastic missionaries entered the interiors of Lhasa, to spread Christianity, they saw a wonderful tree—"Tree of Thousand Images," at a Lamasery of Kumbum. There goes a Tibetan legend that when Tsong-Kha-Pa, the renowned Buddhist reformer, devoted himself to religious life, according to custom, his mother cut off his hair and threw it away. A tree sprang up from it, bearing, on every one of its leaves, a Tibetan character. On each leaf there were well-formed Tibetan characters, all of green colour, some lighter and some darker than the leaf itself. These letters were part of the leaf itself and grew along with the leaves. The bark of the tree and branches were also covered with these characters. When one removes a piece of bark, the young bark under it displays different characters from those on the upper layer of the bark. The characters were more perfect than typeset characters of the best type-foundries in the world. The missionaries also noticed "religious sentences" self-printed by nature in chlorophyll. Each lamina (layer), when lifted revealed distinct type. H.P.B. mentions that this is not an uncommon happening in nature. On the shells in the waters of the Red Sea some Hebrew alphabets were found. Upon certain locusts, English alphabets were found. On the wings of certain German butterflies numerals of the year 1881 were found to be marked. So also, we find animals mimicking vegetable growths and caterpillars looking like tree-barks, mosses, etc. Tiger's stripes are mimicry of the stalks of jungle grass. "All these separate instances go to form a case of probable fact as to the...story of the Kumbum tree, since they saw that it is possible for nature herself without miracle to produce vegetable growth in the form of legible characters." H.P.B. states that the letter-tree of Tibet is a fact and the inscriptions in its leaf-cells and fibres are in Senzar—a sacred language used by the adepts.

(Concluded)

Every inimical and uncharitable thought makes for disunion, and every opposite one for harmony....If we treat all men now with unfailing charity and love we are wiping off old scores clean and making no new sorrows; but if we will condemn, punish, resent, in short, consider ourselves Karmic agents without knowing the meaning of that term, we are sowing dragon's teeth, we only are planting cause for future sorrow.

—W. Q. Judge