उपवनविनोद (आचार्य शार्ङ्गधर - वृक्षायुर्वेद, भू-जल संधान एवं उद्यान-विज्ञान सटीक)

4 UPAVANA VINODA
heaven for as many years as there are fruits and flowers and leaves in the
plant he plants¹".
Birdwood in this connection quotes an authority which says : "The
Brahmanas promise that he who plants one Aswattha, two Champakas, three
Nāgakeśaras, seven Tālas, twelve Nārikelas, and devotes them with their
shade, leaves, flowers, and fruits to public use, shall certainly inherit the
kingdom of Heaven."²
This is no mere irrational superstition. There is a plain reason behind the
practice prescribed. The Agnipurāṇa has the following explanatory verses :
"The man who plants trees bearing fruits and flowers for the enjoyment of the
public attains to a supreme state of bliss. The man who plants thirty trees
giving shade, fruits and flowers, and ten mango trees, is not destined to go to
hell. Gods, demons, angels, seraphs, and the whole of the flying fraternity,
beasts, and birds and men—all receive some sort of delight through trees.
The gods get pleasure through flowers, the manes through fruits, and men and
birds and beasts through shade. The man who plants trees giving fragrant
flowers and sweet fruits, is re-born, as a result, as a Brahmin in a respectable
family enjoying prestige and wealth in a prosperous country. So one should
plant such trees and look after them as if they were one's own children which,
in fact, religiously speaking they are. The mortal sons are meant for purely
selfish purposes whereas the 'tree-sons' serve purely altruistic ones. Leaves
and flowers and fruits and shades and roots and barks and wood (timber)
benefit others and bring salvation to our forefathers. One should worship
trees as one worships a sage free from the vice of envy, because it provides
with shade and fruits and flowers even to its very cutter. The all-giving
'tree-son', which does not bear a grudge even to its 'cutter-father' out of selfish
consideration, brings about the complete salvation to the planter. So the
Brahmin should always plant them with due ceremony and treat them
as his sons."³
The Varāha Purāṇa observes on the same point—"A man by planting
trees attains to the same bliss as he does by gift of cows and land. Just
as a pious son saves the family, just as good but difficult rules followed
with care save the performer from hell, so also do trees full of flowers
and fruits save the planter."⁴ In the same chapter Gokarṇa says—"That
(the tree) which is taken for fuel is called "agnihotra" (the sacrificial fire) ;
the tree by reason of shade and rest for travellers, the nest of birds, and
1 Chap. 26, Vṛkṣaropanam.
2 Indian Arts, Part 1, pp. 85—91.
3 Chap. on तड़ागवृक्षप्रशंसा ।
4 Chap. on Gokarṇamāhātmya.