Balsamea Aranyaka

And this our life, exempt from public haunt,
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones, and good in everything.
– William Shakespeare, in As You Like It

The groves were God’s first temples.
– William Cullen Bryant, in A Forest Hymn

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There is no book like that written into the heart by the voice of the forest. Human nature, if allowed, can be the tablet on which the forest writes her instructions, songs, and inspirations.

Aranyaka is a Sanskrit term referring to trees, forest or wilderness (ara, aran, aranya) and scripture. It can be loosely translated “The Wilderness Books.” It may also connote forest monks or their writings. The Aranyaka is part of the ancient Hindu texts contained in the Vedas. The Princeton University lexical database WordNet defines it as “a treatise resembling a Brahmana but to be read or expounded by anchorites in the quiet of the forest.” For more information, see the Wikipedia article about the Aranyaka. There is also a Hindu scripture known as the Brihad-aranyaka Upanishad (“great forest book”), regarded as one of the oldest texts of the Upanishads.

(For more about the Aranyaka, see this search listing at sacred-texts.com, or go to www.sacred-texts.com and click on Search.)

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Did you ever come upon a place and felt that there was “something special” about it, but you could not say specifically why you felt that way?

This is how the owner of Balsamea Forest Refuge felt about a certain stretch of land many times while driving by it. After about two years of being only generally familiar with it as viewed from the road, an opportunity arose to purchase a piece of that land. That piece is now called Balsamea, or Balsamea Forest Refuge.

What does this have to do with Aranyaka? Actually, nothing, except in our imaginative pleasure with finding words for what we feel at Balsamea. We chose the name “Aranyaka” as a way to refer to the spiritual enrichment of communing with the forest. More specifically, it is the name we gave to a special location within the Balsamea Forest Refuge, located in the heart of its denser balsam fir and spruce stand, at the feet of three giant pines (two white and one red) that are among the oldest on the property. We are slowly, carefully developing that spot into something like a natural chapel, as a hub of special refuge, with trails extending out from it in four directions. It is just one of those spots in the forest that somehow “speaks to you,” if you happen to be someone susceptible to hearing its particular voice.

Because they are primeval, because they outlive us, because they are fixed, trees seem to emanate a sense of permanence. And though rooted in earth, they seem to touch the sky. For these reasons it is natural to feel we might learn wisdom from them, to haunt about them with the idea that if we could only read their silent riddle rightly we should learn some secret vital to our own lives; or even, more specifically, some secret vital to our real, our lasting and spiritual existence.
– Kim Taplin, Tongues in Trees, 1989, p. 14.

One day after meditating on the pine needle laden floor of this special three-pine Aranyaka natural chapel, the Balsamean took a notion to remove some trees to make space for sharing it with friends. He walked slowly amidst the open spaces under the three great pines, carefully considering which to cut down of the smaller trees growing densely around the perimeter, and how they might be used to make things for the Aranyaka natural chapel, or just stacked as firewood.

For an unknown reason he looked up into a tree as he stood thinking on the east side of the three-pine Aranyaka chapel site. He found a small owl quietly watching him from a balsam fir branch only about two feet above his head. They studied each other intently until the Balsamean slowly stepped away. The owl did not move.

“Okay,” said the Balsamean, “I will not cut down your trees.”

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In the sense that aranya means “belonging to the wilderness” or forest, we enjoy the feeling of belonging, of being truly “home,” of being solidly grounded and safe in the forest, among friends, even while “alone” in terms of having any human company. Our reverent feelings for the forest make us never lonely there.

We don’t quite think of the forest, our aranya, as something to worship, but as a community of peaceful fellowship with the nature of things as they are. Although we do not institutionalize this sense of reverence in any specifically religious way (though friends among us may, and can if they wish), for all Friends of Balsamea the forest — at Balsamea and everywhere — does involve some degree of recognition of Nature as sacred.

Balsamea is our Aranyaka because we find written in its nature, and arising from our immersion in that nature, a kind of “scripture” or “writing” or teaching. It is the ineffable soul of Nature inspiring the souls, hearts and minds of people.

Lead Us From the Unreal To Real,
Lead Us From Darkness To Light,
Lead Us From Death To Immortality,
Aum (the universal sound)
Let There Be Peace Peace Peace.

- Brihadaranyaka Upanishad 1.3.28.

Immortality? Is there such a thing? We don’t know, and don’t really concern ourselves with it. We know only that through immersion in the natural Aranyaka, breathed continually in and out by the forest, we enjoy a sense of the interconnectedness, the “interbeing” of everything, and the continuity of life streaming from long before us, through our present moment, into whatever comes next, not as separate times but as a continuum solidly grounded in the earth.

What we write at Balsamea is our Aranyaka, our forest-inspired book. Thus, we arrive at the name of this blog, Balsamea Aranyaka.

One impulse from a vernal wood
May teach you more of man,
Of moral evil and of good,
Than all the ages can.
– William Wordsworth, The Tables Turned

By the way, when contemplating names for this felt-sense of harmony with the forest, we also contemplated a concatenation of two German words, Kiefer (pine tree) and Zuflukt (refuge), for the term “Kieferzuflukt.” We just like the sound of the word! Some day we may use it to designate another special spot in the forest, perhaps one to be known for a spirit or sense of playfulness.

- The Balsamean