In general, trees represent the deepest and most significant intellectual concepts: the ones that come to us most directly from the Lord. This varies depending on us and our states: the people of the Most Ancient Church, who were in a state of loving the Lord, understood truth automatically and internally through what the Writings call "perception"; people in lower states (including most of us) have to work a little harder to learn it from the Word and by willing to follow the Lord. In other parts of the Bible, especially in the prophets and New Testament parables, the meaning of "tree" is broader, meaning not just a person's intellectual concepts but the whole person.

'Trees,' as in Joel 1:10-12, signify knowledges.

2955. 'I will bury my dead' means that they would emerge from night and be made alive. This is clear from the meaning of 'burying' and of 'one who is dead', dealt with above in 2917, 2923, 2925, 2931, 2948. They are spoken of here as being made alive because they are on their way to receiving faith; for it is from faith, that is to say, from the good that is the fruit of it, that they receive life. That life has no other source. A further reason why 'I will bury my dead' means emerging from spiritual night and being made alive is that once the previous Church has died, a new one is established by the Lord to take its place, and so life is imparted to take the place of death, and morning to take the place of night. And there is the further reason still that with everyone who is being reformed and becoming spiritual, that which has died in him is so to speak buried, and that which is new and made alive rises up, so that instead of the night with him, that is, instead of darkness and cold, morning breaks, bringing its light and warmth. This explains why with angels, who have the Lord's life in them, in place of men's idea of burial of the dead there is the idea of resurrection and of new life. This is indeed so, for some Church always exists on earth, and when the old Church breathes its last and night has fallen, a new one rises up somewhere else, and morning breaks.