Akshaya Vata

(“indestructible banyan tree”) In Hindu
mythology, a particular banyan tree that
existed before the creation of the universe and will be the only thing to survive the cosmic dissolution (pralaya) at
the end of the cosmic cycle. According to
one mythic account, the sage
Markandeya saw a vision of pralaya in
which the only thing remaining was this
single tree, under which lay the god
Krishna in infant form, sucking on his
toes. The akshaya vata is identified with
a particular banyan tree in Allahabad at
the junction of the Ganges and Yamuna
rivers, where it is now enclosed within
the fort built by the Moghul emperor
Akbar. Earlier writers report an
enormous tree on the site, but in modern times the tree is quite small. In some
stories it was cut down by one of Akbar’s
successors. According to the seventhcentury Chinese pilgrim Hsuan Tsang,
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Akshaya Vata
one of the preferred methods for
committing religious suicide was to
jump from the branches of the vata
tree; this practice is also mentioned
four centuries later by the Islamic
scholar Alberuni.