Pomegranate and the Mediation of Balance in Early Medicine

The pomegranate tree was also the source of life-giving waters in Mesopotamian religion (Muthmann 1982: 13–14), and Neoassyrian seals often depicted pomegranate, the “tree of life” (Avigad 1990: 165). Scholars have suggested that the Tree of Life from the book of Genesis was a pomegranate because of this symbolic history, though of course many fruit-bearing trees have auditioned for this role.