The Tree
A man was traveling through the desert, hungry, thirsty, and tired, when he came upon a tree bearing luscious fruit and affording plenty of shade, underneath which ran a spring of water. He ate of the fruit, drank of the water, and rested beneath the shade.
When he was about to leave he turned to the tree and said: 'Tree, oh, tree, with what should I bless you?
"Should I bless you that your fruit be sweet? Your fruit is already sweet.
"Should I bless you that your shade be plentiful? Your shade is plentiful. That a spring of water should run beneath you? A spring of water runs beneath you."
"There is one thing with which I can bless you: May it be G-d's will that all the trees planted from your seed should be like you..."
When he was about to leave he turned to the tree and said: 'Tree, oh, tree, with what should I bless you?
"Should I bless you that your fruit be sweet? Your fruit is already sweet.
"Should I bless you that your shade be plentiful? Your shade is plentiful. That a spring of water should run beneath you? A spring of water runs beneath you."
"There is one thing with which I can bless you: May it be G-d's will that all the trees planted from your seed should be like you..."
Branches and Leaves on the Tree of Life
The tree of life, has branches, like our hearts. We represent a tree of life, and when we have children, we branch outwardly, and the next thing we know we are relatives, with Aunts, Uncles, Cousins, Brothers and Sisters, Mothers and Fathers, for this is the leaves, the relative, the new born. The branches to serve as a roadway, towards new creation, or birth of a new life. We belong to each other, because we come from the branches of the Tree of Life. We are relatives to one another.
When we are alive, this means we carry a spirit within our flesh, we need others to nurture us, or love us. This is the nourishment we all seek from our relatives. We travel to one another on the branches to our relatives, our families. These families make up communities. And here we are made up of colorful people, or the Rainbow clan, we of many colors. Finally we are related to the world, the human race. We are born together upon this Earth, as children of G_ah_d (the utterance of heavenly transmission) we call this Oneness, the spirit of the "Tree of Life". We are distinctive and unique, like a flower or a snowflake, yet perfect unto our own, as G_ah_d says, we are the image of "I am". Often though, we feel these differences get in the way of being oneness. We separate and think, "He doesn't understand me!", but often, that very perspective may be exactly what we need to understand, the world at large, the Oneness of G_ah_d.
If we think of us as leaves, on the tree of life, then the twigs and branches lead us to each other. Then we reach the trunk, where our hearts remember the song, the unity of love. This is the law that unites us all together. We need love. We need nourishment from one another. We need to be understood from our point of view. Then we know we are loved. It is a listening, that provides us with love. This is often called the winds of time. For wind is provided because we have waters of the oceans, the tears of our hearts, the leaking if tears for others who feel pain and suffering for those who do not have what we may have. This is why we give to one another, to fill the void of others, to gift them some happiness when they are feeling lowly. To rise them up, are like the roots, that reach downward where the water provides us with nourishment. And nurturing is the love that we all need. The tree of life depends on water from our roots for it's very survival. This joins us together as one nation, the Rainbow Clan, relatives of light, of many colors.
Often we think we walk alone. but in reality we walk with many at all times. Sometimes we walk with the light, but often we walk with those in the darkness of heaven. We are never alone, and this is the meaning of prayer. Prayer joins us together as the wind blows, like dew on a morning when it's cold, the sun shines and warms us, like our hearts that are lowly and needing nourishment, warms our hearts to glowing and to be nourished.
We are not alone, like the many leaves on a tree, we experience the closeness of our relatives. These are our ancestors. We roam as travelers to where our hearts need sustenance. Carrying experiences of our elders, who offered us a path to a new life, a newborn child. We have troubles, traumas, victories, hopes and aspirations, this is what makes us wholeness. We serve each other to bring us nourishment of our tears, we have compassion for one another, and this is love.
Like a seed of life, our thoughts grow out from our beginnings, our dreams. We are shaped by our relatives, or leaves on the tree of life, the branches of this same tree, the road ways to our destiny. We hold each others hands, push us upwards like a seed that seeks sunlight, providing our roots a place to extend towards. Our consciousness offers us a heritage and a dream, and now we are seeking oneness with all our brothers and sisters of one world, the Race of Man and the unification of Heaven. We are waves of many colors, the Rainbow Clan.
We need each other, and provide each other with sustenance like water that feeds roots, the tree of life, within each of us. People are important to us, because they provide us with LOVE. When we exclude others from our lives, we don't offer our relatives a way to feed our souls. We are lonely. Exclusion is not love. Exclusion is separation. And when separation is used, we start to not offer each other sustenance or love that we so desperately need from one another. Only when we allow others to be part of our lives, we are nourished by our relatives, the leaves on the tree of life.
It is not easy to know peace in a world that is full of oppression. If we could only learn to share our hearts with one another and receive the assistance we need from others, to survive! A tree of life, without water or tears, dies. We need to know the heart of sharing, then we can come to peace. We are a great family of many thousands of years, even eons of time, we call evolution. It is important to offer each of our relatives and even strangers, who journey on a path that crosses our own, we need offer them what we can, to know peace in our lives. We are sages, because our souls, have wisdom, we don't access. And to reflect and trust our G_ah_dliness, then we start to know how great we truly are, then we can offer our lives to others in compassion. We each are heroes, legends and living miracles, if we believe in our own faith. It is those who suffer for love who understands that the laws of Heaven are brought to all of man's race, the bright lights of the many colors of all the leaves on the tree of life. It is the ideals of heaven, that form laws unto man, that offers them a way to peace and inward happiness.
We suffer for one thing, and that is for love. We all suffer, and we do so, to bring the children the needs they may receive, their dreams to come true, in a world, that is coming in a new age, the third phase of evolution, Heaven upon Earth. Knowing the laws of man, helps us and guides us onto the branches of the One tree of life, the Oneness. As each of us represent wholeness, we are also part of the whole of G_ah_d's Oneness. We need remember to extend towards others who have lost their way, into a brand new day, the dream that is waiting to blossom and change colors on the seasons of the tree of life. Our love nourishes others with daily blessings, to be safe in a world that is changing. Gift a heart of knowing and a breath of life, to the newborn, and life shall continue onwards, the survival of the "Tree of Life".
Tree's New Year
Tu B'Shevat the 15th of the Hebrew month Shevat is known as the "New Year for Trees". We are like "trees of life", and we need to offer ourselves in soul searching, like so many are doing. We are in a changing age of prophecy all around us, and it's a time of evolution that has us changing, inside the darkness of our hearts, where the light is born within. This is the change, we each are seeking to be who G_ah_d explains us to be the "I am". We are souls with eternal knowledge, if we have trust and faith in ourselves. It is a time of prayer and blessings.
We need offer shelter to the seedlings that live in our shade, which means we offer our hearts that replenish the dreams of others to find their way. We want our relatives to know their souls, to live up to their own Greatness. This offers us sustenance. It is love and blessings, that gift life, to others. When they find their own darkness or the heaven of their own heart's dream, then a sunlight bursts forth from within. This allows their tree of life to grow, to reach higher and higher towards their dreams. We strive only when we know our relatives have compassion for us. We need nourishment from others to survive.
Our roots keep us grounded, and plants us firmly in our dreams. It is Mother Earth, that nurtures us, where the leaves drop down to gift our lives, the suffering we do as elders for the next generation to continue onwards, to a new era of dreams. It is a journey, as the "Tree of Life" that offers us a destiny (tree), a path (branches) and relatives (leaves), that intertwine to be Oneness, we call G_ah_d, the utterance of heavenly transmission, or the song of angels that ring true within our Souls.
We need nourish each other to bring us sweet fruits and blossoms, to cultivate the laws of love, as G_ah_d wanted for us, the Oneness of relatives, the "Tree of Life". The riches of our glory come when we sustain each other, to fall back, to rise up, to fall down and gift life again, and again, do we know the lessons, the experiences we are gifted to feel in a wonderful world that is majestic every day, we breath life while our hearts beat the song of angels within our soul's knowing. We need trust that we are the creatures that was meant to be, to travel over rolling hills, to be divine beings of light (luminous and numinous).
When we smile, we know there is joy for us to share, with one another. We remember the dew of life, the tears we shed in our suffering, the wind that is offered upon our cheeks. We are the life giving for all our relatives, and we are all a part of this greatness. We are all relatives to Oneness. Give hope to each other, and have faith, for we are a birth right, and with each ring around a tree, we are in marriage of a new dream, the child, who provides us with a future, a planted seed, that brings forth fruit, the blossom, who's beauty is forever knowing, we are the "Tree of life", and "Relatives" to each other. It is the bounty of a world, where rocks, plants, and animals can offer us breath, the winds of time, our hearts, that yearn for survival of a dream.
On Tu B'Shvat, we take a fruit, and before enjoying it, we recite a blessing: "Blessed are you, G-d ou G-d, king of the universe, who creates the fruit of the tree." In other words, "You, G_ah_d, are the source of this blessing."
Planting a tree, is a festival of an Arbor day. For it is the tree that a new year begins again. The tree offers us oxygen while we offer carbon monoxide, an exchange of wonder that benefits us all. We are relatives to the trees. And it is important to offer our relatives life. And when we offer our relatives life, they provide for us too.
We celebrate by eating fruit, especially fruits significant to Israel to remember our past, and our elders. "I was born into a world flourishing with ready pleasures. My ancestors planted for me, and I now I plant for my children." This is what faith is all about, the act of planting hope for a new generation. We fertilize a seed with love and with having faith, that it will grow and find life, for our children to enjoy, the blossoms, fruit and a garden of paradise for years to come. It is an important event to cherish in our lives, to continue our faith, to feed our spirit with a deep-rooted trust in our elders, who offers us life. We are creatures of G_ah_d's world, and this gifts us a garden of paradise, when we remember our past, our present and our future, the tree of life continues to give to us, over and over, to sustain our faith, to receive our light, within our darkness. These are the miracles of relatives in our lives.
"The Talmud says that if you have taken water from a well, it is forbidden to throw out the remaining water but should find some way to recycle it. This Tu B'Shevat, let us appreciate the unity and purposefulness of all creation, and rededicate ourselves to protecting it." Rabbi Gavriel Weinberg
Feed one another and gift the tree of life, for future generations, by planting a tree, for tomorrow, a paradise for our children, the next generation, that will sustain our hopes and dreams, the spirit of the "Tree of Life". We bend like the Rainbow, to understand that humility provides us with strength, to carry onwards, to feel the winds of eternal blissfulness, the tears that flow, to know our Souls, continue on. We are beings of evolution, at times personally and at other times, we are part of a greater world, the Oneness. It is the Torah that offers us the laws of love, that gifts us the wisdom of the laws of love, and with these cherished verses, we are fed, the nourishment that continues our lives of peaceful bliss upon a world of paradise. Remember it is a seed that offers us a dream, a fertile ground to new beginnings. We are greatness, the image of "I am". We need be remember to be proud of your Greatness. Be a source of nourishment for all the relatives for we are part of the Rainbow Clan, the many colors of G_ah_d, the song of angels. We are the sustenance for generations to come, the tears that flow, to know the roots of nourishment, that keeps us growing and growing, the heart of our insides blossoms into the light, from within, the soul that feels and grows eternally.
Written by White Buffalo Calf Woman, your Twin Deer Mother, alightfromwithin.org
Ecology and Spirituality in Jewish Tradition
Ecology is a highly practical branch of science. Nothing could be more "down to earth" than preservation of the planet. Yet there is a facet of ecological awareness that is often overlooked. This is its spiritual dimension. When we act as self-absorbed individuals, with little regard for anyone or anything that exists outside ourselves, we immediately fall into moral and spiritual error. As the Yiddish saying goes, "A blind horse heads straight for the pit!"
Thus, countless laws in the Torah adjure us to open our eyes, and act responsibly and compassionately toward the world around us. Among other ecological mandates, it promulgates the laws of bal tashchis (neither to destroy wantonly, nor waste resources unnecessarily); the prohibition of cutting down fruit trees surrounding an enemy city in wartime; the laws of covering excrement, and removing debris from public places, etc. In doing so, the Torah indicates that although we may feel at odds with nature, having to struggle to survive, in truth the world comprises a potentially harmonious whole in which each element is precious.Rav Avraham Yitzhak Kook (1865-1935), Chief Ashkenazic Rabbi of pre-state Israel and a leading 20th century thinker, expresses this idea compellingly: "If you are amazed at how it is possible to speak, hear, smell, touch, see, understand, and feel -- tell your soul that all living things collectively confer upon you the fullness of your experience. Not the least speck of existence is superfluous, everything is needed, and everything serves its purpose. 'You' are present within everything that is beneath you, and your being is bound up with all that transcends you."
A spiritually attuned person will recognize that every creature is essentially bound up with every other creature, and that we share a collective destiny. Thus, our most fundamental attitude should be one of compassion, not acquisitiveness or aggression. This ethic applies toward all levels of creation. As master kabbalist Rabbi Moshe Cordovero of Safed ("RaMaK," 1522-1570) adjures: "One's compassion should extend to all creatures, and one should neither despise nor destroy them; for the Supernal Wisdom [i.e. divine wisdom that brings all existence into being] extends to all of creation -- the "silent" or mineral level, plants, animals, and humans. This is why our sages have warned us against treating food disrespectfully. Just as the Supernal Wisdom despises nothing, since everything is produced there -- as it is written, 'You have formed them all with wisdom' (Psalms 104:24) -- a person should show compassion to all of the works of the Holy One, blessed be He."
The RaMaK's words bespeak a G-d-centered view of the universe, as opposed to one that is man-centered or nature-centered. In the words of the Baal Shem Tov (Rabbi Israel ben Eliezer, founder of Chassidism, 1698-1760), we must seek the welfare of all precisely because we are equally G-d's works, created to perform His will.
"Do not consider yourself superior to anyone else . . ." the founder of Chassidism states. "In truth, you are no different than any other creature, since all things were brought into being to serve G-d. Just as G-d bestows consciousness upon you, He bestows consciousness upon your fellow man. In what way is a human being superior to a worm? A worm serves the Creator with all of his intelligence and ability; and man, too, is compared to a worm, as the verse states, 'I am a worm and not a man' (Psalms 22:7). If G-d had not given you a human intellect, you would only be able to serve Him like a worm. In this sense, you are both equal in the eyes of Heaven. A person should consider himself, the worm, and all creatures as friends in the universe, for we are all created beings whose abilities are G-d-given."
This kinship of all creation and shared mission of serving G-d, each creature in its own way, is often compared to a cosmic song. As we recite during the Sabbath prayers, "The soul of every living being shall bless Your Name . . . All hearts shall revere You, and every innermost part shall sing to Your Name." Indeed, when the Talmud describes the mysteries of the Ma'aseh Merkavah ("Workings of the Chariot," i.e. the mystical experience), it associates this prophetic wisdom with song. The sages relate how Rabbi Elazar ben Arach demonstrated his preparedness to engage in the study of these mysteries before his teacher, Rabbi Yochanan -- at which point the trees of the field were encompassed by heavenly fire and broke into song, echoing the verses of Psalm 148: "Praise G-d from the Earth, sea giants and all watery depths . . . mountains and hills, fruitful trees and all cedars . . . Praise G-d!"
If we listen closely, this song still may be heard. Rabbi Aryeh Levin (the "tzaddik of Jerusalem, 1885-1969), told how he once was walking in the fields with his mentor, Rav Avraham Yitzhak Kook. In the course of their Torah discussion, Rabbi Levin picked a flower. At this, Rav Kook remarked, "All my days I have been careful never to pluck a blade of grass or a flower needlessly, when it had the ability to grow or blossom. You know the teaching of our sages that not a single blade of grass grows here on Earth that does not have an angel above it, commanding it to grow. Every sprout and leaf says something meaningful, every stone whispers some hidden message in the silence -- every creation sings its song."
"These words of our great master," Rabbi Levin concluded, "spoken from a pure and holy heart, engraved themselves deeply in my heart. From that day on, I began to feel a strong sense of compassion for all things."
So may it be for us who hear this story today and contemplate its perennial truth.
Thank you David Sears and Chabad.Org for sharing your wisdom with us!
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It is the Song of Angels that bring us home, into the Greatness that gets along. Do we need love, to rise above? Yes, bring us love that brings us all along, the laws that gets us from the rising tides, our hearts that swell and know our pride. Be that, is heard like Angels Call, we are the Rainbow Hall, where humbleness gifts life along, the path of Brotherhood. We bless the shoulders of grief befall, and send a blessings to that hall, where we know tears, bring us new life, the light, that sheds all our strife. Be your color of bountifulness, the waking of the soul, that should, and we can offer wisdom here, to be the soul, that lives forever deer (journey of life). You the beloved knows good deeds,when we belong to all the leaves (relatives on the tree of life).
