Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A fig tree (Ficus religiosa) native to India, having gray bark and heart-shaped leaves with a long tip. It is revered by Buddhists as the species of tree under which the Buddha attained enlightenment.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun Same as pipul-tree.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun Alternative form of peepul.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun fig tree of India noted for great size and longevity; lacks the prop roots of the banyan; regarded as sacred by Buddhists

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Hindi pīpal, from Sanskrit pippalam.]

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Examples

  • This bhendi leaf is a glossy one resembling pipal leaf.

    Archive 2007-06-01 Anjali 2007

  • This bhendi leaf is a glossy one resembling pipal leaf.

    Kejyarcha Kairi Lonche Anjali 2007

  • Somehow, through it all, Buddhists believe that the pipal tree that once shaded Siddhartha has managed to survive.

    Big Trouble Under The Banyan Tree 2008

  • Ever since, millions of his followers have considered the tree (actually a pipal, though known as a banyan) and an adjoining temple the holiest of sites, which they try to visit at least once in their lives.

    Big Trouble Under The Banyan Tree 2008

  • He is said to have attained Enlightenment, or to have become a Buddha, which means "Awakened One", at the age of 35, after 49 days meditating underneath a pipal tree.

    "Buddha's Skull Found in Nanking?" Jan 2008

  • Your "inosent pipal '" have been preparing missile production lines, fighters, bunkers, tunnels, command centers, mortar and machine gun positions, ammo stores, booby traps and so on, spent hundreds of millions of Iranian and EU money and years of workforce.

    On Thursday, the Legg report will be published along with... 2008

  • ~ Sitting as surrender -- Just because the story of Siddhartha Guatama says he realized enlightenment while sitting under a pipal tree, does that mean that we must also literally sit if we want to do the same?

    Speedlinking 12/13/07 William Harryman 2007

  • A time when the sun hangs low on the horizon, half hidden by the pipal trees which line our compound walls all the way down the long driveway to the bolted wrought-iron gates.

    Excerpt: Sister of My Heart by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni 1999

  • His eyes kept searching out the transformed figure of Ayesha the seer, who was resting in the shade of a pipal-tree in the company of Mishal Akhtar, her mother Mrs. Qureishi, and the lovesick Osman with his bullock.

    The Satanic Verses Rushdie, Salman 1967

  • Ten years will make a banyan sapling, or a pipal, into a sturdy trunk, and lo, by that time, in some visitation of drought or cholera or smallpox, or because some housewife was childless, coloured threads are being tied upon the tree or some rude symbolic painting put upon it.

    New Ideas in India During the Nineteenth Century A Study of Social, Political, and Religious Developments John Morrison

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