“And the dead tree gives no shelter”: Ecclesiastes

Abstract

Eliot cites a verse from Ezekiel as his source for the phrase “Son of man” and another Old Testament verse, this time from Ecclesiastes, as the source for a line about a dead tree and a cricket: What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow Out of this stony rubbish? Son of man, You cannot say, or guess, for you know only A heap of broken images, where the sun beats, And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief, And the dry stone no sound of water. (WL 19–24) His note for “And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief” sends us to Ecclesiastes 12:5, which reads: “Also when they shall be afraid of that which is high, and fears shall be in the way, and the almond tree shall flourish, and the grasshopper shall be a burden, and desire shall fail: because man goeth to his long home, and the mourners go about the streets.”