"According to M. Eliade, humans realise the sacred because it expresses itself, shows itself as something wholly different from the profane. To characterise this expression of the sacred he suggests the term "hierophany" (from Greek hieros - sacred, and phainomai - appear, express). It can be suggested that the history of all religions, from the most primitive to the most developed, consists of [...] a sum of expressions of the divine. And thus, a sacred stone, or a sacred tree, or anything else is deified for being hierophanies, for "showing" that which is no longer a stone or a tree, but something completely different for its sacredness. For those familiar with divine experience the whole nature opens as cosmic sanctification, and Cosmos becomes a hierophany in itself." - Encyclopedia of Trypillian Civilisation
