Botanical Name :
Saraca indica
Common Name
: Ashoka - Sorrowless Tree of India
Spiritual Name : Without
Grief
The
contemplation that leads you
beyond sufffering.
Legends
and Symbols
When
we enter the Ashram in Pondicherry we find to our left a small
evergreen tree with spreading branches and a dense crown of leaves.
The flowers are very beautiful and spread in dense, fragrant clusters
of apricot and orange-red with elongated stamens. There are numerous
legends around the Ashoka which is sacred to Hindus and Buddhists.
It is believed that when Sita was kept confined in a garden in
Lanka by Ravana, and when Hanuman met her, Sita was sitting under
an Ashoka tree. It is there that Hanuman showed to her Rama's
ring and brought to her the message of hope and victory from Rama.
The
name of this flower is interesting. Its common name in India is
'Ashoka', and its spiritual name, as give by the Mother, is 'without
grief', both of which mean the same thing. There are not many
flowers which have this striking harmony in their names.
General
Information
The
Ashoka tree is often found on temple sites and rock carvings.
It commonly grows wild along streams or in the shade of evergreen
forests in India, Burma, Ceylon and in the Malayan region.
Saraca
indica must be a native of India. The origin of saraca is obscure.
It belongs to leguminosae, has 4 to 8 brown seeds in a pink or
rosy 6-10 inches long seed pod which turns later into green and
finally brown.
Propagation
by seeds is quite easy and the tree grows well in most gardens.
Medical
uses
A decoction
of the bark is used in monorrhagia. It can be used also as an
astringent in cases of internal haemorrhoids. The pounded flowers,
mixed in water, help in dysentery. The drug is also used in scorpion
sting.
Some
quotations from Sri Aurobindo
"How
shall he be deluded, whence shall he have sorrow who sees everywhere
the Oneness?"
*
"When
I look back on my past life, I see that if I had not failed
and suffered, I would have lost my life's supreme blessings;
yet at the time of the suffering and failure, I was vexed with
the sense of calamity. Because we cannot see anything but the
one fact under our noses, therefore we indulge in all these
snifflings and clamours. Be silent, ye foolish hearts! Slay
the ego, learn to see and feel vastly and universally."
*
"When
thou art able to see how necessary is suffering to final delight,
failure to utter effectiveness and retardation to the last rapidity,
then thou mayst begin to understand something, however faintly
and dimly, of God's workings."
-
Sri Aurobindo
