Traditions and Tree-lore associated
with the Apple
The
symbolism of the Apple
Hundreds
of stories testify to the high esteem in which the Apple was held as the fruit
of love, fertility, consummation, life, eternal youth and immortality.
What
is the magic of this little tree and its fruits, that all over Europe it has
been chosen as our tree of life?
We
have already noted its lovely blossoms and the fact that its fruits are larger
than any others in the Northern temperate zone. This is true even for the wild
Crab apple, whose fruits may only be little more than an inch across.
But
there is more.
Let
us look at the apple with the eyes of an ancient myth-maker, who looks at the
world around us to find metaphors and poetic images to describe the energies,
which weave the world, so they can be talked about in the way people in an oral
culture understand:
-
Apples
are round and yellow like little suns and turn red as the sun does when it
sinks to its ‘death’ at sunset. Every year, the apples return as the sun
does every day, resurrected and immortal.
-
Beholding
an apple tree laden with small golden round fruits must have contributed to
the widespread representation of the Apple as the Tree of Life, because it
is a good symbol for a Universe full of Stars (=Suns).
The fact that we still hang golden and silver balls on our Christmas tree
has its roots in this same tradition, but only very few of us are of its
deeper meaning.
-
The
apple has a thick layer of flesh. This can be sweet, sour, or bitter like
life itself. When it gets bumped and bruised too much, it is susceptible to
rotting. Apples can has spots all over them. All these characteristics can
be used as metaphors for the way we are marked by life.
-
Organic
apples can have little worms inside them, tiny relatives of the great
serpent, which is a universal symbol of the life force. More about this
later (page …)
-
A
poet can see the three phases of the triple Goddess (Virgin, Mother, Crone)
in the appearance of the fruit. When it is young, it has rose cheeks
reminiscent of the Virgin. When the apple is mature it has the round
fullness that we associate with the Mother. When it’s old, its skin
wrinkles like that of an old Crone.
-
The
centre of the fruit reveals intimate ‘secrets’. The word ‘secret’ is
closely related to ‘sacred’, which means ‘holy’. Half of everything,
which is truly ‘whole’ will always be hidden or intangible, because it
is either inside, underneath or on the other side, etc. Hence, half of the
sacred is always secret. If we desire to be initiated into the secrets of
the apple, we have to go beyond its outer appearance.
-
If
we cut the apple in two halves from stalk to flower-remnant, we see some of
its seeds in a core that resembles the female genitalia: the labia majora
and labia minora, the outer and inner lips of the female vulva.
-
If
we cut the apple horizontally in two halves, we see that the core has the
shape of the five star, the magic pentagram!
Like the five petals of the apple blossoms, the pentagram within the apple
reminds us of the five stages of the Triple Goddess energy: Birth (or
Creation), Initiation, Consummation, Repose and Death. In sacred numerology,
which explores the quality rather the quantity of numbers, five is the
number of movement. (One is a point of awareness. Two points can make a
line in time-space. Three points can make a triangle, which is a plane. Four
points can make the first solid 3-dimensional structure: the pyramid. And
the fifth point adds the possibility of movement.)
We still recognise this ‘character’ of number 5 in the word
‘quintessence’, the most essential part of any substance: its process.
The pentagram can be drawn by just one unbroken line. This 5th
principle brings things to life and makes relationships and connections. The
four elements of ancient philosophy are connected by this fifth principle,
which makes exchange and interaction possible.
In this context, it is also very interesting to note that the pentacle is
the orbit described by the planet Venus. This planet was named after the
Goddess of Love in the Roman Pantheon. Her name in Greek mythology is
Aphrodite and in Celtic mythology she is Olwen, the laughing Goddess of the
Orchards. One of Aphrodite’s children is Cupid, the winged creature with
the bow and arrow, who shoots arrows at our hearts, which have the power to
make us fall in love.
Venus is the Morning and Evening Star, which heralds the rising of the Sun.
She is also the first one to shine after the Sun has set, a promise of its
rebirth.
-
The
‘sixth sense’ (which reaches across different dimensions and beyond
ordinary time and space) is represented by the seeds within the magic
pentagram of the apple core. The seeds are the tangible signs of the promise
of resurrection. They represent new life, the principle of eternal youth in
the endless cycle of death and rebirth.
-
The
fruit of life grows on the tree. Then it falls onto the Earth (fall from
paradise?) The flesh may possibly be eaten to sustain other life or it rots
slowly, thus creating an excellent environment for the small seeds to start
growing. Even the slight rise in temperature due to bacterial activity in
the rotting apple will assist the seeds to grow.
The
Apple was chosen in Europe as the fruit of life when we had a culture with an
oral tradition. There were no books to pass on the wisdom of generations of
ancestors. Instead, Nature itself was used as ‘the sacred book’!
In
Nature’s sacred book, the apple provides one of the clearest illustrations,
which shows modern people how our ancestors used the world all around them to
remember the collective human insight into the purpose of life and death, the
promise of renewal and so on. The mythology and lore of the Apple shows us how
ancient people were masters and mistresses at making exquisitely poetic and
effective memory aids.
Even
the Gods and Goddesses (which are personifications of the energies that shape
the world we live in) can only be immortal because they are cyclic, rhythmic
patterns.
We
are reminded of this when the myths tell us, that they need to eat an apple a
day to renew themselves. The Apple is a wonderful symbol of a nourishing food,
which carries the seed of its own renewal in its beautiful core.
There
are countless examples from many different cultures of the association of the
Apple tree with love and sexuality, the great mystery of life and death, and the
connection between this world and the Otherworld. The best we can do here is to
give just a few examples of the huge amount of material available.
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Apples
as the food of the Gods
In
Scandinavian myths, the North-European Gods kept themselves forever young, and
therefore immortal, by eating the gifts of Iduna.
Iduna is the Goddess of youth and spring, who is born of flowers. Her name means
‘at-one-ness’ or ‘wholeness’. She nurtures an apple orchard in Asgard,
which is the place where the Gods live. Every evening, at twilight, all the Gods
and Goddesses visit Iduna in her orchard and are given one of her apples to
renew themselves.
One day, Loki, the fire God, whose transforming powers makes him a true
trickster, steals Iduna’s basket. The results are devastating. All the Gods
and Goddesses loose their youth and beauty and age with agonising speed. The
Earth withers and becomes barren. The rivers run dry and the people and animals
starve.
We
recognise the same theme in many other myths. An example is the story of Demeter
and Persephone in Greek mythology. Demeter, Goddess of growth and abundance,
looses her daughter Persephone, because the God Hades has taken her to the
Underworld.
Another name for Persephone was ‘Kore’, which literally means ‘core’, as
in ‘apple-core’. Without Persephone, Demeter has no core, no heart. Having
thus lost her renewing energy, Demeter cannot grow and the Earth becomes a
desolate wasteland.
The story was re-lived every year in the Eleusian (or Elysian) mysteries and
took place during the fruiting time of the year. The ‘Eleusian Fields’,
where the initiates celebrate these mysteries of the cycles of life and death,
are the Greek equivalent of the apple orchards of many other myths and legends.
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Avalon,
the magic apple-land
Whereas
the Scandinavian heroes go to Valhalla, the feasting hall in Asgard, the Celtic
heroes go to Avalon. The Welsh word for ‘apple’ is ‘afal’ and shows the
origin of the name ‘Avalon’, the Apple island. This magical Celtic Paradise,
also known as the ‘Isle of the Blessed’, ‘the Land of Youth’ and ‘the
Land of the Ever-living, lies in the direction of the setting sun and here the
heroes are healed and renewed. One day, when the land and life on Earth is in
need of them, they will return.
Like many other Celtic heroes, King Arthur does not truly die, but sails off
through the mist to the western island of Avalon, the apple-land.
As in so many paradisiacal orchards there is a Tree of Life/Tree of Knowledge
with a serpent guardian. In the Isle of the Blessed this is Goddess Cerridwen,
who is the energy of transformation. She knows the mysteries of Life and Death
and the Wisdom of the Cyclic Seasons. Her emblem is the Cauldron, the material
vessel in which the energy of the life force undergoes transformative changes.
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The
Irish Land of Youth
The
Irish name for Avalon was ‘Avallach’ or ’Emain Ablach’ (Emain of the
Apple Trees).
Lady Augusta Gregory relates two instances of heroes who are summoned to the
Land of Youth in her “Irish myths and legends”.
An otherworldly woman brings the Celtic hero Bran mac Febal a silver
white-blossomed apple branch from Emain, in which the bloom and the branch were
one.
The hero Cormac is called to the Land of Promise by a ‘shining branch’,
which has nine apples of red gold that cure all troubles when the branch is
shaken, because the sweet and otherworldly music bestows bliss and contentment
on the listener.
One
way of understanding these stories is, that they may be descriptions of a
shamanic or druidic initiation into the realm of the spirit world or Otherworld.
It is also interesting to note, that the most famous places of Druidic learning
and initiation were on Western Islands, such as Anglesey and Iona. They are part
of the ‘many-coloured islands of the West’, which can be seen as
stepping-stones between this world and the next. Even in our modern times the
population of the many Islands west of Britain are curiously enough, still famed
for being often more psychically gifted and ‘tuned in’ than the average
Brit.
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