So I began on a grassy hill topped with a single, large, dead tree with a crack/hollow in it, with a bright off-white large sun directly behind it and the horizon of the hill...I recognize this as my "dream spot" and proceed to enter the tree. I find myself above snowy mountain peaks, in the sky, amidst an RPG character creation screen with low opacity boarders, allowing you to see the blue of the sky, with the menus to the left and the character image to the right. I was fiddling around, choosing clothing and appearances when I realized I was getting too absorbed into this experience and bolstered up my awareness. I settled for whatever happened to already be there at the moment, and descended into my avatar, landing on the mountain.
The avatar I chose had a long poncho of sorts that only draped down the front and back of my body, with openings on the sides. It was kinda of grey-ish and woolen, with intricate red and blue zig zag geometric patterns sewn into it. My hair was longer than it actually is and I had a tall staff in my right hand. I proceeded down this curving mountain path into a small cave. Not too far into the cave was an altar topped with a red geode of sorts with white tips, adorned with gem-encrusted amulets and other artifacts. I felt the energy of this altar for a while and then proceeded to sit in this stone throne behind it, against a wall. An aboriginal seeming woman then appeared out of nowhere and with a rising motion of her flat palms, used telekinesis to lift up the top of the altar, which was hollow underneath like a box, and place it over my head. A white light with a sort of flowing white-firey like tunnel appeared in the darkness and I shot through it and found myself in the small streets of Cusco. I was in the body of some portly blonde Caucasian tourist girl wearing big brown hiking boots, a tube top and shorts, with a purple woven cholo hat and some other accessories that were also made of thick purple alpaca wool.
I walked around the city as this girl for a while before coming to Plaza de Armas. I figured "ok whatsup with this now" and the light portal appeared once more and I shot through it. I found myself in what seemed like the Sacred Valley and saw a Kintu, three Coca leaves united. I was levitating in the valley when I saw many more Coca leaves appear and swirl around and through me with solar-colored energy (orange, orange-red, yellows etc). They swirled through me and my energy body and I just let myself feel the sensations. Afterwards the scenery shifted to that of something similar to the night sky or the cosmos, and the colors of the energy became cooler as well. The energies became a torsion field around and through my aura and continued scintillating throughout my energy system. The session ends after this tune up of sorts.
To see leaves in your dream, signify new found happiness and improvements in various aspects of your life. It is symbolic of fertility, growth and openness. Alternatively, leaves represent a passage of time. Depending on the color and type of leaf, the dream could be highlighting a certain period of time. The leaves may also be a metaphor to "leave" you alone.
To see brown or withered leaves in your dream, signifies fallen hopes, despair, sadness and loss. If you are sweeping or raking leaves, then it represents the end of a project, relationship or situation. It also signifies experience.
To dream of leaves, denotes happiness and wonderful improvement in your business.
Withered leaves, indicate false hopes and gloomy forebodings will harass your spirit into a whirlpool of despondency and loss.
If a young woman dreams of withered leaves, she will be left lonely on the road to conjugality. Death is sometimes implied.
If the leaves are green and fresh, she will come into a legacy and marry a wealthy and prepossessing husband.
Seeing leaves in your dream means new found happiness and an improvement in various aspects of your life. It is symbolic of growth and openness. Seeing brown or withered leaves in your dream means fallen hopes, despair, and loss.
To see mountains in your dream, signify many major obstacles and challenges that you have to overcome. If you are on top of the mountain, then it indicates that you have achieved and realized your goals. You have recognized your full potential. Alternatively, mountains denote a higher realm of consciousness, knowledge, and spiritual truth.
To dream that you are climbing a mountain, signifies your determination and ambition.
To dream that you fall off a mountain, refers to your rush to succeed without thoroughly thinking about your path to success. Perhaps you are being pushed upward into a direction that you do not want to go or that you are not ready for. Falling off a mountain also means that you have a tendency to give up too easily or escape from demanding situations. You take the easy way out.
To dream that you are energetic, symbolizes growth, activity, expansion and insight. You need to channel your energy in a positive way.
To see the altar in your dream, suggests that you are making a great personal sacrifice. You may also be expressing concerns about your spirituality. The dream may also be a pun on your need to "alter" some behavior, attitude or aspect of your life.
To see a priest at the altar in your dream, signifies strife and disharmony in both your work and home. The dream may also point to some guilt that you are suppressing and refusing to acknowledge.
To dream that you are kneeing in front of the altar, represents unfulfilled desires.
To dream of seing{sic} a priest at the altar, denotes quarrels and unsatisfactory states in your business and home. To see a marriage, sorrow to friends, and death to old age.
An altar would hardly be shown you in a dream, accept to warn you against the commission of error. Repentance is also implied.
To look up at the clear blue sky in your dream, denotes hope, possibilities, creativity, peace and freedom of expression. As the saying goes "the sky's the limit." If the sky is cloudy and overcast, then it foretells of sadness and trouble.
To see a green colored sky in your dream, symbolizes high hopes. The strange color of the sky helps to instantly draw your attention to it. The color green and the sky itself both represent hope, nature or creativity. So these are the qualities that you need to focus on. It is also indicative of a positive outlook and prosperous future.
To see a red colored sky in your dream, represents looming danger. Alternatively, it suggests that something is coming to an end. If the sky is white, then it symbolizes desires. If you dream of a colorful sky in your dream, then it denotes romance.
To dream that the sky is falling, represents your fear of the unknown. You feel that your hopes and dreams have been shattered. Perhaps you have been too idealistic and the dream is an attempt to bring you back to reality.
To dream that something is falling out of the sky, signifies your pessimistic attitude. You are losing perspective on a situation. If the object is getting closer and casting a shadow on you, then it indicates that you are being ignorant about some situation. You need to get out from under the shadow and gain a different perspective on things.
To dream of the sky, signifies distinguished honors and interesting travel with cultured companions, if the sky is clear. Otherwise, it portends blasted expectations, and trouble with women.
To dream of floating in the sky among weird faces and animals, and wondering all the while if you are really awake, or only dreaming, foretells that all trouble, the most excruciating pain, that reach even the dullest sense will be distilled into one drop called jealousy, and will be inserted into your faithful love, and loyalty will suffer dethronement.
To see the sky turn red, indicates that public disquiet and rioting may be expected.
To look up at the clear blue sky in your dream indicates peace and freedom of expression. If the sky is cloudy and overcast, then it foretells of sadness and trouble.
The different meanings which have been attached to the symbolism of the mountain stem not so much from any inherent multiplicity as from the
various implications of each of its component elements: its height, verticality,
mass and shape. Deriving from the first idea (height) are interpretations such as
that of Teillard, who equates the mountain with inner ‘loftiness’ of spirit (56),
that is, transposing the notion of ascent to the realm of the spirit. In alchemy, on
the other hand, the reference is nearly always to the hollow mountain, the hollow
being a cavern which is the ‘philosophers’ oven’. The vertical axis of the mountain drawn from its peak down to its base links it with the world-axis, and,
anatomically, with the spinal column. Because of its grandiose proportions, the
mountain came to symbolize, for the Chinese, the greatness and generosity of the
Emperor; it is the fourth of the twelve imperial emblems (5). But the profoundest
symbolism is one that imparts a sacred character by uniting the concept of mass,
as an expression of being, with the idea of verticality. As in the case of the cross
or the Cosmic Tree, the location of this mountain is at the ‘Centre’ of the world.
This same profound significance is common to almost all traditions: suffice it to
recall mount Meru of the Hindus, the Haraberezaiti of the Iranians, Tabor of the
Israelites, Himingbjör of the Germanic peoples, to mention only a few. Furthermore, the temple-mountains such as Borobudur, the Mesopotamian ziggurats or
the pre-Columbian teocallis are all built after the pattern of this symbol. Seen
from above, the mountain grows gradually wider, and in this respect it corresponds to the inverted tree whose roots grow up towards heaven while its foliage
points downwards, thereby expressing multiplicity, the universe in expansion,
involution and materialization. This is why Eliade says that ‘the peak of the
cosmic mountain is not only the highest point on earth, it is also the earth’s navel,
the point where creation had its beginning’—the root (18). The mystic sense of
the peak also comes from the fact that it is the point of contact between heaven
and earth, or the centre through which the world-axis passes, binding the three
levels together. It is, incidentally, also the focal point of Inversion—the point of
intersection of the immense St. Andrew’s cross, which expresses the relationship
between the different worlds. Other sacred mountains are Sumeru of the UralAltaic peoples (17) and Caf in Moslem mythology—a huge mountain the base of which is formed by a single emerald called Sakhrat (8). Mount Meru is said to be
of gold and located at the North Pole (8), thus underlining the idea of the Centre
and, in particular, linking it with the Pole Star—the ‘hole’ through which all things
temporal and spatial must pass in order to divest themselves of their worldly
characteristics. This polar mountain is also to be found in other symbolic traditions, always bearing the same symbolism of the world-axis (25); its mythic
characteristics were, in all probability, based upon the fixed position of the Pole
Star. It is also called the ‘white mountain’, in which case it embraces both the
basic mountain-symbolism with all the implications outlined above and that of
the colour white (intelligence and purity). This was the predominating characteristic of Mount Olympus (49), the supreme, celestial mountain which Schneider
sees as corresponding to Jupiter and equivalent to the principle of the number
one. There is another mountain, relevant to the symbolism of the number two,
and that is the mountain of Mars and Janus—that is, as the Gemini; basically,
they represent two different aspects of the same mountain, but blending together
the symbolism of the ‘two worlds’ of Atma and Buddhi, or the two essential,
rhythmic aspects of manifest creation—light and darkness, life and death, immortality and mortality. This mountain has two peaks, in order to give visual expression to its dual or ambivalent meaning. It occurs constantly in traditional, megalithic culture, particularly in the form of a landscape, illustrating yet again the
Protean myth of the Gemini, which bursts out in so many different forms in
primitive thought and art. This mountain is also a form of mandorla consisting of
the intersection of the circle of the heavens with that of the earth, and this
mandorla is, as it were, the crucible of life, containing the opposite poles of life
(good and bad, love and hate, fidelity and treachery, affirmation and negation, the
numbers 2 and 11—both equal to one plus one—and finally construction and
destruction). Incidentally, the animals which correspond to this all-embracing
significance of the mandorla are the whale and the shark (51). In Hindu legend, the
castle of Indra was built on this mountain; whereas in Roman legend it was the
castle of Mars, and the home of the thunderbolt, the two-headed eagle and the
Gemini. It has been called the ‘mountain of stone’ and is at once the abode of the
living (the exterior of the mountain) and of the dead (the hollow interior) (50).
Krappe has borne this out with the observation that ‘The interior of a mountain
has frequently been taken as the location of the Land of the Dead: the derivation
of the Celtic and Irish fairy-hills, and of the legend, widespread in Asia and
Europe, of a demiurge or hero asleep inside a mountain, one day to emerge and
renew all things sublunar’ (35). This myth has obvious connexions with the myth
of Entanglement—of the castle inextricably entangled in a wood and also with the story of the ‘Sleeping Beauty’. All such myths are concerned with the mystery of
a disappearance between appearance and reappearance. Schneider lists the following trades and professions as being associated with Mars: those of the king,
physician, warrior and miner, as well as the martyr (51). In Western tradition, the
mountain-symbol appears in the legend of the Grail, as Montsalvat (the ‘mountain of salvation’ or ‘of health’)—just as much a ‘polar mountain’ as it is a ‘sacred
island’, according to Guénon; but always it is inaccessible or difficult to find (like
the ‘centre’ of the labyrinth) (28). In general, the mountain, the hill and the
mountain-top are all associated with the idea of meditation, spiritual elevation
and the communion of the blessed. In mediaeval emblems, the symbolism of the
‘mountain of salvation’ is further defined by a complementary figure surmounting it, such as the fleur-de-lis, the star, the lunar crescent, the cross, steps, the
crown, the circle, the triangle, or the number three. The letter Z sometimes occurs,
standing for Zion; similarly, an R is short for Regeneratio (4). Some of these
symbols have lent themselves to a poetic treatment that is well worth examination. From the moment when the mountain, so to speak, divests itself of its
terrestrial and material character and becomes the image of an idea, the more
numerous the component elements pertaining to this idea, the greater will be its
clarity and force. Hence, mount Meru of India is considered to have the shape of
a pure, seven-sided pyramid (corresponding to the seven planetary spheres, the
seven essential virtues and the seven Directions of space) and each face has one of
the colours of the rainbow. Seen as a whole, the mountain is a shining white, by
which token it may be equated with the ‘polar mountain’ and the all-embracing
image of totality (also symbolized by the pyramid-symbol), tending towards
Oneness (symbolized by the peak)—to avail ourselves of the concepts of Nicholas of Cusa.
For a young woman to dream of crossing a mountain in company with her cousin and dead brother, who was smiling, denotes she will have a distinctive change in her life for the better, but there are warnings against allurements and deceitfulness of friends. If she becomes exhausted and refuses to go further, she will be slightly disappointed in not gaining quite so exalted a position as was hoped for by her.
If you ascend a mountain in your dreams, and the way is pleasant and verdant, you will rise swiftly to wealth and prominence. If the mountain is rugged, and you fail to reach the top, you may expect reverses in your life, and should strive to overcome all weakness in your nature. To awaken when you are at a dangerous point in ascending, denotes that you will find affairs taking a flattering turn when they appear gloomy.
Seeing mountains in your dream means many major obstacles and challenges that you have to overcome. If you are on top of the mountain, then it means that you have achieved and realized your goals. Alternatively, mountains indicates a higher realm of consciousness, knowledge, and spiritual truth. Dreaming that you are climbing a mountain means your determination and ambition. Dreaming that you fall off a mountain, suggests that you are in a hurry to succeed without thoroughly thinking about your path to success. It also means that you have a tendency to give up or escape from demanding situations.
Climbing a real mountain is not always fun but it usually challenging and rewarding. Some say that the mountain may represent spirituality while others suggest mental development and self-awareness. The most literal interpretation of climbing a mountain is that it represents attainment of goals. If you are ascending a mountain you may be are working hard and trying to accomplish your goals, whether they are spiritual, emotional, or material.
A hollow is the abstract aspect of the cavern, and the inverse of the
mountain. There are many symbolic significances superimposed upon the basic
sense of the hollow, such as that of the Abode of the Dead, of Memories and of
the Past, with further allusions to the mother and also to the unconscious (15), as
the link between all these different aspects.
To dream of something that is hollow, represents the womb and nurturance. It may also symbolize some hidden secrets. Alternatively, it may indicate that you are feeling empty, worthless, or insignificant in your waking life.
Dreaming of something that is hollow, represents the womb and nurturance. It may also symbolize your hidden secrets. Alternatively, it may indicate that you are feeling empty, worthless, or insignificant in your waking life.
(From the Sanskrit avatāraḥ, descent [of a deity from heaven], avatar : ava, down + tarati, he crosses). 1). The incarnation of a Hindu deity, especially Vishnu, in human or animal form. 2). An embodiment, as of a quality or concept; an archetype: the very avatar of cunning. 3). A temporary manifestation or aspect of a continuing entity: occultism in its present avatar. 4). incarnations of Hindu gods, especially Vishnu. The doctrine of avatara first occurs in the Bhagavad-Gita, where Krishna declares: "For the preservation of the righteous, the destruction of the wicked, and the establishment of dharma [virtue], I come into being from age to age." Vishnu is believed to have taken nine avatara, in both animal and human form, with a tenth yet to come. The avatara of Shiva are imitations of those of Vishnu.The idea of the avatar or avatāra is central to Hindu mythology especially to the concept of the god "Vishnu". An avatar is the earthly form assumed by a deity. Avatar is also a term used in Hindu religion to indicate the incarnation of a deity. Avatara is one of the Hindu gods who has taken on animal or human form in different ages for the welfare of the world. In Hindu mythology, the god Brahma (originally known as the creator Prajapati) became successively incarnated as a boar, a tortoise, and a fish, to assist the development of the world in prehistory. Certain Hindu scriptures ascribe these incarnations to the god Vishnu (the preserver), but since the manifestation of divine power takes many different forms in Hindu mythology, the distinction is academic. Various scriptures ascribe to Vishnu ten major incarnations: (1) Matsya (the fish), associated with legends of a great deluge in which Manu, progenitor of the human race, was saved from destruction; (2) Kurma (the tortoise), whose back supported great mountains while the gods and demons churned the ocean to retrieve divine objects and entities lost in the deluge; (3) Vahura (the boar), who raised up the earth from the seas; (4) Nara-sinha (the man-lion), who delivered the world from the tyranny of a demon; (5) Vamana (the dwarf), who recovered areas of the universe from demons; (6) Parasu-rama (Rama with the axe), who delivered Brahmins from dominion by the warrior caste during the second age of the world; (7) Rama, hero of the religious epic Ramayana, who opposed the demon Ravana; (8) Krishna popular incarnation chronicled in the religious epic Mahabharata (especially in theBhagavad-Gita section) and Srimad Bhagavatam; (9) Buddha, the great religious teacher; and (10) Kalki, an incarnation yet to come, who is prophesied to appear on a white horse with a sword blazing like a comet, to destroy the wicked, stabilize creation and restore purity to the world. In other religious works, as many as 22 incarnations are listed, including various great saints and sages. According to Hindu belief, a perfected human soul has no further karma (action and reaction) and is absorbed into divinity at death, but may elect to be incarnated for the good of the world. The deity Shri Krishna, in the Bhagavad-Gita (4:7-8) specifically promises: "Arjuna, whenever there is decline of dharma (righteous duty), and unrighteousness is dominant, then I am reborn. For the protection of the virtuous, the destruction of evil-doers, and to reestablish righteousness, I am reborn from age to age." Belief in repeated divine reincarnations of the deities for the good of the world, as distinct from one unique Messianic event, is one of the major theological differences between Hinduism and Western religions such as Judaism and Christianity.
To dream that you are climbing a hill, signifies your struggles in achieving a goal. You need to focus your energies on the prize. To dream that you are standing on top of a hill, suggests that you have succeeded in your endeavors. You have the necessary resources to complete the task at hand.
Dreaming that you are climbing a hill means your struggles in achieving a goal. Dreaming that you are standing on top of a hill means that you have succeeded in your endeavors or that you have now have the resources to complete a task at hand.
The tree is one of the most essential of traditional symbols. Very often
the symbolic tree is of no particular genus, although some peoples have singled
out one species as exemplifying par excellence the generic qualities. Thus, the oak
was sacred to the Celts; the ash to the Scandinavian peoples; the lime-tree in Germany; the fig-tree in India. Mythological associations between gods and trees
are extremely frequent: so, Attis and the pine; Osiris and the cedar; Jupiter and
the oak; Apollo and the laurel, etc. They express a kind of ‘elective correspondence’ (26, 17). In its most general sense, the symbolism of the tree denotes the
life of the cosmos: its consistence, growth, proliferation, generative and regenerative processes. It stands for inexhaustible life, and is therefore equivalent to a
symbol of immortality. According to Eliade, the concept of ‘life without death’
stands, ontologically speaking, for ‘absolute reality’ and, consequently, the tree
becomes a symbol of this absolute reality, that is, of the centre of the world.
Because a tree has a long, vertical shape, the centre-of-the-world symbolism is
expressed in terms of a world-axis (17). The tree, with its roots underground and
its branches rising to the sky, symbolizes an upward trend (3) and is therefore
related to other symbols, such as the ladder and the mountain, which stand for the
general relationship between the ‘three worlds’ (the lower world: the underworld,
hell; the middle world: earth; the upper world: heaven). Christian symbolism—
and especially Romanesque art—is fully aware of the primary significance of the
tree as an axis linking different worlds (14). According to Rabanus Maurus,
however, in his Allegoriae in Sacram Scripturam (46), it also symbolizes human
nature (which follows from the equation of the macrocosm with the microcosm).
The tree also corresponds to the Cross of Redemption and the Cross is often
depicted, in Christian iconography, as the Tree of Life (17). It is, of course, the
vertical arm of the Cross which is identified with the tree, and hence with the
‘world-axis’. The world-axis symbolism (which goes back to pre-Neolithic times)
has a further symbolic implication: that of the central point in the cosmos. Clearly,
the tree (or the cross) can only be the axis linking the three worlds if it stands in
the centre of the cosmos they constitute. It is interesting to note that the three
worlds of tree-symbolism reflect the three main portions of the structure of the
tree: roots, trunk and foliage. Within the general significance of the tree as worldaxis and as a symbol of the inexhaustible life-process (growth and development),
different mythologies and folklores distinguish three or four different shades of
meaning. Some of these are merely aspects of the basic symbolism, but others are
of a subtlety which gives further enrichment to the symbol. At the most primitive
level, there are the ‘Tree of Life’ and the ‘Tree of Death’ (35), rather than, as in
later stages, the cosmic tree and the tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil; but
the two trees are merely two different representations of the same idea. The
arbor vitae is found frequently, in a variety of forms, in Eastern art. The—
apparently purely decorative—motif of hom (the central tree), placed between
two fabulous beings or two animals facing each other, is a theme of Mesopotamian origin, brought both to the West and to the Far East by Persians, Arabs and
Byzantines (6). In Romanesque decoration it is the labyrinthine foliage of the
Tree of Life which receives most emphasis (the symbolic meaning remaining
unchanged, but with the addition of the theme of Entanglement) (46). An important point in connexion with the ‘cosmic tree’ symbol is that it often appears
upside down, with its roots in heaven and its foliage on earth; here, the natural
symbolism based on the analogy with actual trees has been displaced by a meaning expressing the idea of involution, as derived from the doctrines of emanation:
namely, that every process of physical growth is a spiritual opus in reverse.
Thus, Blavatsky says: ‘In the beginning, its roots were generated in Heaven, and
grew out of the Rootless Root of all-being. . . . Its trunk grew and developed,
crossing the plains of Pleroma, it shot out crossways its luxuriant branches, first
on the plane of hardly differentiated matter, and then downward till they touched
the terrestrial plane. Thus . . . (it) is said to grow with its roots above and its
branches below’ (9). This concept is already found in the Upanishads, where it is
said that the branches of the tree are: ether, air, fire, water and earth. In the Zohar
of Hebrew tradition it is also stated that ‘the Tree of Life spreads downwards
from above, and is entirely bathed in the light of the sun’. Dante, too, portrays the
pattern of the celestial spheres as the foliage of a tree whose roots (i.e. origin)
spread upwards (Uranus). In other traditions, on the other hand, no such inversion occurs, and this symbolic aspect gives way to the symbolism of vertical
upward growth. In Nordic mythology, the cosmic tree, called Yggdrasil, sends its
roots down into the very core of the earth, where hell lies (Völuspâ, 19;
Grimnismâl, 31) (17).
We can next consider the two-tree symbolism in the Bible. In Paradise there
were the Tree of Life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Both were
centrally placed in the Garden of Eden. In this connexion, Schneider says (50):
‘Why does God not mention the Tree of Life to Adam? Is it because it was a
second tree of knowledge or is it because it was hidden from the sight of Adam
until he came to recognize it with his new-found knowledge of good and evil—of
wisdom? We prefer the latter hypothesis. The Tree of Life, once discovered, can
confer immortality; but to discover it is not easy. It is “hidden”, like the herb of
immortality which Gilgamesh seeks at the bottom of the sea, or is guarded by
monsters, like the golden apples of the Hesperides. The two trees occur more
frequently than might be expected. At the East gate of the Babylonian heaven, for
instance, there grew the Tree of Truth and the Tree of Life.’ The doubling of the
tree does not modify the symbol’s fundamental significance, but it does add
further symbolic implications connected with the dual nature of the Gemini: the tree, under the influence of the symbolism of the number two, then reflects the
parallel worlds of living and knowing (the Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge). As is often the case with symbols, many more specialized meanings have
been developed on the basis of the general tree-symbolism already outlined. Here
are a few: firstly, the triple tree. According to Schneider, the Tree of Life, when it
rises no higher than the mountain of Mars (the world of phenomena) is regarded
as a pillar supporting heaven. It is made up of three roots and three trunks—or
rather one central trunk with two large boughs corresponding to the two peaks of
the mountain of Mars (the two faces of Janus). Here the central trunk or axis
unifies the dualism expressed in the two-tree symbolism. In its lunar aspect, it is
the Tree of Life and emphasizes the moon’s identification with the realm of
phenomena; in its solar aspect it relates to knowledge and death (which, in symbolism, are often associated). In iconography, the Tree of Life (or the lunar side of
a double or triple tree) is depicted in bloom; the tree of death or knowledge (or the
solar side of a double or triple tree) is dry, and shows signs of fire (50). Psychology has interpreted this symbolic duality in sexual terms, Jung affirming that the
tree has a symbolic, bisexual nature, as can also be seen in the fact that, in Latin,
the endings of the names of trees are masculine even though their gender is
feminine (31). This conjunctio confirms the unifying significance of the cosmic
tree. Other symbols are often brought into association with the tree, sometimes
by analogy with real situations, sometimes through the juxtaposition of psychic
images and projections. The resulting composite symbolism is, of course, richer
and more complex, but also more specific, and consequently less spontaneous
and of less scope. The tree is frequently related to the rock or the mountain on
which it grows. On the other hand, the Tree of Life, as found in the celestial
Jerusalem, bears twelve fruits, or sun-shapes (symbols of the Zodiac, perhaps).
In many images, the sun, the moon and the stars are associated with the tree, thus
stressing its cosmic and astral character. In India we find a triple tree, with three
suns, the image of the Trimurti; and in China a tree with the twelve suns of the
Zodiac (25). In alchemy, a tree with moons denotes the lunar opus (the Lesser
Work) and the tree with suns the solar opus (the Great Work). The tree with the
signs of the seven planets (or metals) stands for prime matter (protohyle), from
which all differentiations emerge. Again, in alchemy, the Tree of Knowledge is
called arbor philosophica (a symbol of evolution, or of the growth of an idea, a
vocation or a force). ‘To plant the philosophers’ tree’ is tantamount to stimulating the creative imagination (32). Another interesting symbol is that of the ‘seatree’ or coral, related to the mythic sea king. The fountain, the dragon and the
snake are also frequently related to the tree. Symbol LVII of Bosch’s Ars Symbolica shows the dragon beside the tree of the Hesperides. As regards the symbolism of
levels, it is possible to establish a vertical scale of analogies: dragons and snakes
(primal forces) are associated with the roots; the lion, the unicorn, the stag and
other animals expressing the ideas of elevation, aggression and penetration, correspond to the trunk; and birds and heavenly bodies are brought into relation with
the foliage. Colour correspondences, are: roots/black; trunk/white; foliage/red.
The snake coiled round the tree introduces another symbol, that of the spiral. The
tree as world-axis is surrounded by the sequence of cycles which characterizes
the revealed world. This is an interpretation applicable to the serpent watching at
the foot of the tree on which the Golden Fleece is suspended (25). Endless
instances could be quoted of such associations of symbols, full of psychological
implications. Another typical combination of symbols, extremely frequent in
folktales, is that of the ‘singing tree’. In the Passio S. Perpetuae XI (Cambridge,
1891) we read that St. Saturius, a martyr alongside St. Perpetua, dreamed on the
eve of his martyrdom ‘that, having shed his mortal flesh, he was carried eastward
by four angels. Going up a gentle slope, they reached a spot bathed in the most
beautiful light: it was Paradise opening before us’, he adds, ‘like a garden, with
trees bearing roses and many other flower-blooms; trees tall as cypresses, singing
the while’ (46). The sacrificial stake, the harp-lyre, the ship-of-death and the
drum are all symbols derived from the tree seen as the path leading to the other
world (50) (Plate XXIX). Gershom G. Scholem, in Les Origines de la Kabbale,
speaks of the symbolism of the tree in connexion with hierarchical, vertical structures (such as the ‘sefirothic tree’ of the Cabbala, a theme that we cannot develop
here). He asks himself whether the ‘tree of Porphyry’, which was a widespread
symbol during the Middle Ages, was of a similar nature. In any case, it is reminiscent of the Arbor elementalis of Raymond Lull (1295), whose trunk symbolizes
the primordial substance of Creation, or hyle, and whose branches and leaves
represent its nine accidents. The figure ten has the same connotation as in the
sefiroth, the ‘sum of all the real which can be determined by numbers’.
The tree in your dream is you. The health, size and overall quality of the tree is indicative of how you feel about yourself. This interpretation is to be made only when the tree is the focal point of the dream. Also, consider whether the tree is alive with leaves, flowers or fruit, or if it's barren. You may see trees in your dream as a part of a landscape or as a secondary symbol. At those times, consider all of the details as they may have different interpretations than the one just given.