The tree is one of the essential symbols due to its tradition and antiquity, it is present in the three manifestations, the symbolic, the hermetic and the religious. We find anthropomorphic interpretations of the tree in the beliefs of many ancient peoples, who considered it the residence of the divinities, this gave them certain virtues or divine qualities. The symbolism derives from its vertical form, the tall and straight trees were the object of special worship, their verticality leads from the earth to the sky, the roots are deeply embedded in the earth, and the last branches caress the sun. It is a living being with natural phenomena, growing, fructifying, decaying and sprouting again, life and death in perpetual succession; deciduous trees represent death and resurrection, and evergreen immortality, such as cypresses (Cupressus sempervirens) that in Europe we put in cemeteries as a symbol of mourning and the immortality of the soul, associating it with spiritual virtues by their smell, calling it a smell of holiness. The upper world, the earthly world and the underworld are united by the tree, creating a link between them and the person who through this symbol identifies and also creates his link with the three worlds. In hermetic symbolism, many times they are represented in an inverted way, with their roots towards the sky, it is called the Cosmic tree or Tree of Life, it is from the roots that it receives spiritual food, and it spreads throughout the earth; we find references in Dante Paradise 18,28, and in Ramon Llull's work Arbor elemental 1295. In Christianity its oldest reference is found in the Old Testament in the garden of Eden, Yahweh wanting to release the concerns that wisdom entails, prohibited Adam and Eve eat the fruits of the Tree of Knowledge, also called the Tree of Good and Evil; This Biblical tree represents duality, the separation between the human and the divine, the serpent the temptation, and the fruit the forbidden knowledge. When tasting the fruit of this tree, they were aware of their nakedness, and Yahweh expelled them from Paradise, referring to the second tree, that of Immortality "Here is the man who is already like one of us, knowing good and evil, lest he now eat from the Tree of Life and become immortal "Genesis 3:20.
THE TREE
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