Etz Haim – The Tree of Life

The vast Cosmos is a manifestation of the Tree of Life – every galaxy an emerging blossom on one of the great boughs of this single Tree.

In the Creation story of Genesis the Tree of Life, Etz Haim in Hebrew, stands in the midst of the Garden of Eden – the universe of diversifying forms. Eden is not a place, but a state of higher awareness. The Tree of Life is the stillness out of which the continual creativity of the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil emerges. In Hebrew, the words translated as good and evil mean the movement to buildup and breakdown formless creative patterns and their emerging forms.

The garden of Eden symbolises the beauty of divergent forms and their manifestation as the continually emerging Cosmos and natural world.

The movement of creative patterns continually unfold out of the formless and dissolve back into the formless.

The four worlds as described in the Book of Genesis:

Tree of Life, eternal Being – Stillness.

Tree of Knowledge of good and evil – the formless universe of primal movements, the creative impulse of Life.

Eden – the universe of luxuriant, diversifying forms, giving life to the Cosmos,

the foundation of what we experience as the physical universe.

Being is the essence of all creative life which is a continual movement out of stillness: this movement continually creates and sustains all forms of life out of the eternal present moment. Take a conscious breath, and feel the inner stillness out of which each breath emerges.

All life is continually emerging and dissolving out of nothing that we can say is anything: all sub-atomic particles are continually appearing and disappearing into and out of the formless womb of creative space, which ceaselessly nourishes physical matter.

Every flower and insect, every bird, and all the creatures that live upon the land and swim within the rivers and seas, are part of the Great Tree of Life.

You are connected to the whole of life. Whatever happens to the myriad  forms of life in the world around you, has a direct affect on you.  

The Tree of Life and Torah:

The Torah, or the laws given to Moses, are not a set of rules governing human behaviour. Torah is the teaching on life’s creative patterns, which tells us that everything is alive, and that we are intimately connected to the whole of life.

Torah signifies the laws which give space and movement to the whole of life.

It was often said by the mystics and prophets of the tradition that the Torah is oral; it can only be taught by word of mouth. And that it was only permitted to be written down if it was in danger of being forgotten.

Why was this warning given to us? Because the Law is not, and can never be, fixed or contained by either the mind or the written word.

The Laws which govern Life are continually transforming with the unfolding of creation into the form and matter from which they are inseparable. We cannot say “here they are, we have defined them in a book.” Or “there they are, we hold all the answers to life’s problems and mysteries.”

When we truly awaken to the realization that all life is One; feel it in our breath and blood, in the cells of our flesh and bones, taking each step of the way with awareness of Being, then all our life negating, behavior will cease.

Through conscious presence the Torah lives in you as the abundance of the Tree of Life. Take a conscious breath, breathe with awareness. 

The Laws of Life give us insight into the continuing story of the emergence of existence. If we can live from the place of unknowing deep within, we allow ourselves To Be. From the place of unknowing, at your very core, know that you are supported by Eternal Presence as you move within the continual creative flow of the universe – Genesis of the great river of life.