Let us now take a brief glance at the Symbolical Tree of Life, which plays so important a part in the Simonian Gnosis.  Not, however, that it was peculiar to this system, for several of the schools use the same symbology.  For instance, in the Pistis-Sophia[130] the idea is immensely expanded, and there is much said of an Aeonian Hierarchy called the Five Trees.  As this, however, may have been a later development, let us turn to the ancient Hindu Shastras, and select one out of the many passages that could be adduced, descriptive of the Ashvattha Tree, the Tree of Life, “the Ashvattha of golden wings,” where the bird-souls get their wings and fly away happily, as the Sanatsujatiya tells us.  The passage we choose is from the Bhagavad Gita, that marvellous philosophical episode from the Mahabharata, which from internal evidence, and at the very lowest estimate, must be placed at a date anterior to Simon.  At the beginning of the fifteenth Adyaya we read: 

They say the imperishable Ashvattha is with root above and branches below, of which the sacred hymns are the leaves.  Who knows this, he is a knower of knowledge.  Upwards and downwards stretch its branches, expanded by the potencies (Gunas); the sense-objects are its sprouts.  Downwards, too, its roots are stretched, constraining to action in the world of men.  Here neither its form is comprehended, nor its end, nor beginning, nor its support.  Having cut with the firm sword of detachment (sc. non-attachment to the fruit of action) this Ashvattha, with its overgrown roots, then should he (the disciple) search out that Supreme whither they who come never return again, (with the thought) that now he is come to that primal Being, whence the evolution of old was emanated.

For what is this “sword of detachment” but another aspect of the “fiery sword” of Simon, which is turned about to guard the way to the Tree of Life?  This “sword” is our passions and desires, which now keep us from the golden-leaved Tree of Life, whence we may find wings to carry us to the “Father in Heaven.”  For once we have conquered Desire and turned it into spiritual Will, it then becomes the “Sword of Knowledge”; and the way to the Tree of Spiritual Life being gained, the purified Life becomes the “Wings of the Great Bird” on which we mount, to be carried to its Nest, where peace at last is found.

The simile of the Tree is used in many senses, not the least important of which is that of the heavenly “vine” of the reincarnating Soul, every “life” of which is a branch.  This explains Simon’s citation of the Logion so familiar to us in the Gospel according to Luke: 

     Every tree not bearing good fruit is cut down and cast into the
     fire.

This also explains one of the inner meanings of the wonderful passage in the Gospel according to John: 

     I am the true vine and my Father is the husbandman.  Every branch in
     me that beareth not fruit he taketh away; and every branch that
     beareth fruit he purgeth it that it may bear more fruit.[131]