Neytiri takes Jake to a strange place where nerve-like strands sag from trees. “This is the place for prayers to be heard -and sometimes answered. I call this place Aplianokri, the tree of voices.” She and Jake connect with the trees to form synaptic bond with nature.
The Na’vi’s level of communication is way higher than ours, giving room for them to pair with animals, birds and even plants. While we communicate with ourselves vocally & visually, they communicate with nature using nerve fibers. Our own primary mode of communication is secondary to them. Their lives are blended with nature in the bond “sahelu”, enabling them to take full advantage of the good things it has to offer. They live with earth.
Sahelu... bonding with nature
Today, man has succeeded in naming every living parasite except himself! We are the number-one parasites at the zenith of the pyramid, always seeking to dominate and take from earth without giving thought to what to give back.
Genesis 1:28 says “And God blessed them, and God said unto them, be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.”
God asked us to, didn’t He?
Yes, but I would like us to note that “replenish” comes before “subdue” in the quoted verse. We are to give first and then take. God’s mandate is that we live with earth symbiotically and not parasitically as we’ve done for the past 195,000 years. Dinosaurs are the animals believed to possess the smallest brain size to body ratio, yet research has it that they lived on earth for about 165 million years and left it rich and peaceful. Maybe because they never did anything to deplete the ozone layer, or mine any minerals, or drill and spill oil, or develop non-biodegradable materials, or invent nuclear weapons, or cut down the trees for furniture.
Man on the other hand –with the highest brain to body ratio –has not lived for up to 0.2% of this period and we’ve hurt nature so badly; our knowing is our undoing, isn’t it?
It is very expedient that we understand the importance of nature with all its creatures -both tamed and wild -and then humbly take our place as one set of creatures just like a host of others in the entire kingdom of creatures. Let’s stop living on earth; let’s start living with it.
Let’s learn from the Na’vi and respect our environment just as they respect the “Home tree”. Earth can really be our ‘Aplianokri‘, a place where prayers are heard and answered; if only we would stop doing those things that pitch us against the curse of Mother Nature.
Click here to see the stand of this movie review on Luck & Planning: The 7th Lesson from AVATAR.
