Building the Tree of Life Part 3: Another Tree of Life?

 

Another overlay?

The presence of an overlay on top of the garden, church and cemetery of Rennes-le-Château should be described as remarkable, even though, since the publication of this information on this site, few researchers seem to have understood the real significance of this – perhaps as such discoveries take the story away from Mary Magdalene or treasure located in or near the town. Equally, though the Kabbalah and the Tree of Life were the central focus of attention and obsession for most esoteric seekers in the 19th and early 20th century, today, it takes most people with an interest into the esoteric outside of their comfort zone.
Of course, with such a discovery, and the means through which it was achieved – superimposition of designs on maps - there is then a danger to play too much. The best evidence of such overindulgence is also on display in Rennes-le-Château. Still, play we shall, though at the same time making sure that we do not fall into self-delusion.

Attempt one

As there is one overlay possible, it is indeed logical to pose the question: is there another overlay elsewhere? The question would then be: where? The answer: the church.
For one, anything on a grander scheme than the garden/church/cemetery would largely have been outside of the means of Saunière’s time to map correctly, unless it was a totally new project, e.g. creating a modern version of the garden of Versailles, where one can begin with a level playing field.
Trying to find a Tree of Life on the scale of some of the pentagrams and other designs, is in our opinion, futile. But the church of Rennes is a logical choice, as it is both small-scale, and to a large extent, under control of Saunière. So if he was interested in a Tree of Life, why not use the design more than once?

As a result, a number of attempts have been made to see whether this was indeed the case.

This is attempt one: the crown is placed near the altar, and then four spheres overlap with four statues; two close to, but not precisely on other statues; the two of the middle spheres do not fall on anything, but do map onto the central gallery of the church. The final sphere then ends at the confessional. If we only give scores for precise matches, we have 5/10, though this might be deemed harsh. Equally, when we look at the “veil”, we note that this falls precisely onto the altar. This is therefore quite a good fit, with two spheres perhaps purposefully moved somewhat to the inside, as he needed to work with the existing layout.

Attempt two

Attempt two: this time, the crown overlaps with the confessional. Five statues match perfectly, and Asmodeus “almost”. We will give half a point to Asmodeus, for he could obviously not have been positioned in the middle of entrance door, but still touches the outside of the sphere. Though the score is therefore 6.5/10, somehow, this design seems to fit not as good as our first attempt.

Attempt three

Attempt three: the final sphere of the Tree of Life falls precisely on the altar. Four spheres fall on statues; the “Veils of the Unmanifest” fall on the back of the church, specifically the confessional. The score here is 5/10, but we note that some of the subdivisions in the church now match very well on the subdivisions of the Tree of Life, specifically the line of 7-8, which separates the congregation from the priest. The “triangle” of the garden is now also represented by the Chancel, the Altar and the Statue of St Anthony of Padua. Like attempt one, two statues fall close, but are not exact.

Further detail

If we provide an overview of which sphere would fall on which saint, in attempt three, we get the following:

In attempt two, we have the following overlap:

Conclusions?

It is premature to draw any conclusions as to which Tree of Life might be the correct one – if any. At the present moment in time, we merely posit this as possibilities. Boldly stepping where it is too early to conclude, however, and speaking intuitively, I believe that attempt one and three is both correct, and that Saunière realised he could incorporate more than one depiction of the Tree of Life in his church.
Whatever attempt, if any, is correct, in the final analysis the most important discovery is that of the Tree of Life in the garden/church/cemetery, which is beyond the possibility of a coincidence.

Filip Coppens, with help from Corjan de Raaf