Tannourine nestles in the heights of the district
of Batroun, nearly 4,000 feet up and about fifty
miles from Beirut, capital of Lebanon. The name
comes from a Syriac word, being the plural form
of tannour, meaning an oven for baking bread, although
some see the word tannour as meaning lighting or
a place that is lit.
The region is one of great beauty, with springs
bubbling up in the fields on all sides and abundant
greenery. At Tannourine we find the most extensive
forest of cedars, covering fifteen hundred acres
at an altitude of almost six thousand feet. This
forest is of great beauty and is in fact registered
as a nature reserve to be protected. Its trees stretch
along the road running from the north side to as
far as Hadeth el-Jebbeh.
There are in Lebanon several forests of cedar trees,
the most famous of which is on the slopes of Kornet
as-Sawdat, overlooking Bsharri and known as `Arz
ar-Rabb, the Cedars of the Lord, To this should
be added the forests of Jaj, Barouk and Tannourine.
Formerly all the mountains of Lebanon, from the
North to Mount Hermon in the South, were covered
with cedar trees, but these were cut down by our
ancestors and their wood sold to the kings of the
Levant and to the Pharaohs of Egypt. It is our sacred
duty to replant millions of them so as to restore
the forests on our hills and so to make good the
mistake made by our forebears when they sold off
their “green inheritance”, their celestial environment.
Not without meaning is it said that the grains of
these cedar trees sown in Lebanon are harvested
in Paradise, and also that their ancestral seed
sown in Lebanon was gathered in the earthly Eden.
The cedar of Lebanon is mentioned fifty times in
Holy Scripture.
The responsible authorities, namely the ministries
of Agriculture and of the Environment, the municipalities,
and the “green NGOs”, are making serious efforts
to combat the Cephaleia tanneurineusis, an insect
parasite of the cedar, for it causes grave harm
in the forests of cedars and pines, devouring the
leaves of the cedars and causing the trees to dry
up. The female Cephaleia lay their eggs in the new
buds and the larva commence their work of destruction
as soon as they hatch. A wide campaign of dusting
with insecticide is needed and helicopters take
part in this operation, particularly from early
April to late June.
I feel that I must mention here the prophesy of
Ezekiel, which says in ch. 31, v. 3-9, “Behold,
the Assyrian was like a cedar in Libanus, with fair
branches and full of leaves, of high stature, and
his top was elevated among the thick boughs. The
waters nourished him, the deep set him up on high,
the streams thereof ran about his roots, and it
sent forth its rivulets to all the trees of the
country. And therefore was his height exalted above
all the trees of the country: and his branches were
multiplied and his boughs were elevated, because
of many waters. And when he had spread forth his
shadow, all the fowls of the air made their nests
in his boughs, and all the beasts of the forest
brought forth their young under his branches, and
the assembly of many nations dwelt under his shadow.
And he was most beautiful for his greatness and
for the spreading of his shadow; for his root was
near great waters. The cedars in the paradise of
God were not higher than he: the fir trees did not
equal his top: neither were the plane trees to be
compared to him for branches. No tree in the paradise
of God was like him in his beauty. For I made him
beautiful and thick set with many branches: and
all the trees of pleasure that were in the paradise
of God, envied him.” (Challoner version)
Joseph Matar
Translation from the French: K.J. Mortimer
- Forest of Cedars in Tanourine: >> View
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