Muurrbay, Tree of Life

Artwork: Aunty Shaa Smith

Story told by Aunty Shaa Smith

The Muurrbay tree is a white fig. The old people who tell this story say that this white fig was so huge it covered about an acre of land. It was really huge. This white fig was a place where people gathered. They would have gathered in a season when the fruit was ready for picking and eating. When they gathered, they came from the east and the west. So, they came from the coast and they came from the mountains. They shared this fruit, this sacred fruit. There was this whole sense of sharing and caring. The people gathered in this state of harmony and togetherness. Sitting together and singing together and just celebrating the sacredness of that. This is what they did.

Then one day, for some reason, the people started fighting over this tree. They started fighting over the Murrbay. The one mob were saying, ‘You have all come around to our side and taken all the big figs and left us all with the little ones’. And another mob were saying, ‘The father gave this tree to us, this is ours’. So, this went on and they were raising their fists and they were shouting at each other and bad mouthing each other.

In the Gumbaynggirr tradition we have the father, the first man, we have the mother, and we have the son. These are our three ancient ancestors. So the father, Baabaga, he heard and he saw the people fighting and bad mouthing each other and he said to them, ‘All you people have turned completely evil, so I am going to take this tree away from you all forever’. So, he pulled up this huge, huge tree out of the ground, roots and all. He pulled it up and took it up into the sky. In some of the storytelling the old people say that all these birds came, lots and lots of birds came and helped Baabaga, the father, take the tree up into the sky. And some people tried to hang onto the vines and the roots to hold it down and keep it on the earth but they couldn’t. So they went up into the sky with the tree. That’s where the tree remains today.

The tree is now the place where, when a person dies, their spirit goes to eat the fruit, eat the sacred fruit before they journey on. When a person dies the Ngalunggirr, the cleverman, will call out to the spirit, ‘yuway’ and the spirit will answer back ‘yuway’. That will keep going on until the spirit stops answering back. Then the Ngalunggirr says that spirit is good, they are at the Muurrbay tree now.

So, the Muurrbay tree carries the spirit of wholeness, which is what we all long for, what we yearn for- our wholeness. It’s our wholeness with ourselves, with each other and with the earth.

Muurrbay ya. Muurrbay ya. 

Jagii wajaana minya  

Gunumbay ngalinya  

Muurrbay ya. Muurrbay ya.  

Ganggaali gaaba warrii  

Duguula ngayinggi  

Muurrbay Tree, Muurrbay tree (white fig) 

Sacred fruit of the earth 

Give life (connection, belonging) to you and me 

Muurrbay tree, Muurrbay tree 

Calls us west, east 

Together, next to each other, to live (sit) in harmony