The True Nature of Trees
photo by ecstatist
Trees are first and foremost fields of energy.
Secondly, they are fields of living energy.
Thirdly, they are fields of intelligent living energy.
Fourthly, as fields of energy, each tree species has its own unique vibrational qualities.
If we are to consider trees in the truth, mystery and magnificence of their wholeness, we must take into account all of these aspects.
Infra-red image of a tree - photo by wahj
The views of two scientists, one a mathematical cosmologist, the other a quantum physicist, both internationally famous, addressing the question, “What is a tree?”: 
image by Harper Stone
“We think of trees as firewood, as pre-plywood, as unvarnished hardware floors. We have convinced ourselves that they are just inert stuff, standing there for twenty years until we get around to cutting them down. We are deluded,” writes Brian Swimme.
“A tree is a self. It is unseen shaping more than it is leaves or bark, roots or cellulose or fruit … The tree, as a self, organises all its millions of operations so that it can enter into relationships with air, rainfall, and sunlight. What organises all these materials? Is it something we can see? Something we can grab onto? No. The same with humans ... We cannot point to anything and say, “There is the self” … We are in the presence of numinous mystery.”
This numinous mystery belongs to an order of reality which quantum physicist, David Bohm, famously termed the implicate order, out of which the visible form – that is, the explicate order – unfolds. He used the tree as an example to illustrate his point: “What I am suggesting,” he stated¹, “is that in the macroscopic world, such a thing as a tree is built out of the implicate order, which makes possible its living qualities. If we perceive the tree in this way, rather than as a bunch of dead particles into which the property of life has somehow infused when the seed is planted, then its aliveness ceases to be such a mystery.”
image by Harper Stone
Trees possess consciousness and intelligence, as do all living things in varying measures: It is only human ignorance and arrogance that asserts otherwise. Trees and plants possess awareness, sensitivity, memory, and a capacity to feel – all of which attributes have been established scientifically and are sufficiently well documented. Yet they remain virtually unknown, due to the limited and limiting doctrine of materialism which currently pervades virtually all of our academic, scientific as well as educational, establishments – seriously limiting the possibilities of more advanced knowledge.
Kirlian 'electrophotograph' of a leaf - photo by Thorius
The view of another famous scientist, Marcel Vogel, an inventor as well as research chemist with I.B.M., who concluded, after years of research:
“It is a fact: man can and does communicate with plant life … Plants are living objects, sensitive, rooted in space. They may be blind, deaf and dumb in the human sense, but there is no doubt in my mind that they are extremely sensitive … They radiate energy, forces that are beneficial to man. One can feel these forces! They feed into one’s own force-field which in turn feeds back energy to the plant … A Life Force, or Cosmic Energy, surrounding all living things is shareable among plants, animals and humans. Through such sharing, a person and a plant become one! This oneness makes possible a mutual sensitivity allowing plant and man not only to intercommunicate, but to record these communications via the plant on a recording chart.”
There are even scientific studies which reveal how trees communicate with each other.²
Acknowledgements
The above extracts are from Gospel of the Living Tree: for Mystics, Lovers, Poets & Warriors by Roderic Knowles, published by (and available online from) Earth Cosmos Press
¹ David Bohm in conversation with Renée Weber, from The Physicist and the Mystic – Is a Dialogue Between them Possible?, an article in Revision Journal, 1981.↑
² See Jeanne McDermott, “Biologists Begin Eavesdropping on ‘Talking’ Trees,”
Smithsonian, December 1984, p. 84.↑
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