Re: Glastonbury holy thorn destroyed | Forum

megadread wrote:

Rhiannon wrote:

It's not holy because it performs miracles, it's supposed to be holy because Joseph of Arimathea brought the original bit over as a staff and it grew when he stuck it in the ground. As Stonelifter implies, that kind of behaviour from trees isn't so unacceptable.

Yeah yeah it might never have happened. And that tree might not be a descendent of one of the 'real' one (it was planted in the 50s? presumably from a bit from one of the trees at the abbey? i don't know). But surely you can appreciate a bit of the cultural significance the thing has for the local people, it's part of the identity of the place, a tangible link with all the glastonbury legends (yes, mumbo jumbo) that contribute to what the town is.

YEah it's just a tree but have you no romance? I think you're being a bit mean :) But I think you're right, they should get planting another one.

Sorry for being a miserable ba**ard but it fails to move me, this is just another made up myth, the tree is a focus yes, but it's not holy, well that's my opinion.
How long before the oak at the bottom of the path to WKLB becomes "holy" or the willow at Swallowhead, they are both adorned with increasing amounts of tat and are well on their way, aren't they. ?

I don't mind trees becoming "famous", nowt against Major Oak etc, but i do find it tiring to hear trees labelled "holy", they aren't.

It's a shame any tree is ever destroyed imo, even the ones i wipe my a*se on daily but it happens.
Sorry for being so blunt minded, i just can't weep for this tree any more than any other tree cut down that day.

"Made up myths", this is what history is all about, it is the essence of our culture, symbolically represented, in this instance by a hawthorn tree. It has come down through the past, the slips or cuttings carrying forward its legend of a stick being thrust into the ground and miraculously sprouting. Glastonbury abounds in legend, Arthur and Guinevere buried in the grounds of the abbey is another one.
Without these myths and beliefs, we would'nt be a better, more rational society, though Nigel would argue otherwise, we would have lost along the way that creative imagination that humans are so good at.
As for trees and loo paper ;) you can look on them as mere vegetational plants or you can see them as sentinent living entities of this earth, with a right to due respect....
Its the same with prehistoric stones, they can be viewed through the lense of the rational approach of archaeology, or you can build round them myth and folklore and enrich their history, both of which is done on this site...