In the Christian faith, through Christ, with his sacrifice on the tree or the Crucifixion on the cross, an opening takes place in the birth-death cycle, a promise for eternal life. The table on which the icon is "written" (where writing refers to the word, and therefore the icon is intended as "theology in the image") represents the tree of life in Paradise, Eden, where wood indicates the principle of Paradise.

  

The Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. (Genesis 2,9)