Case file · High strangeness
Mahavatar Babaji and the Dunagiri cave
In 'Autobiography of a Yogi' (1946) Paramahansa Yogananda wrote of Babaji, a deathless yogi living for centuries in the Himalayas, who met the yogi Lahiri Mahasaya in 1861 near Ranikhet.
1861 CE · 29.82, 79.45 · status: claim
The account
Lahiri Mahasaya said Babaji called him to a cave on Dunagiri mountain and initiated him into Kriya Yoga. Disciples reported further meetings up to the 20th century. The cave near Ranikhet is now a pilgrimage site.
The sceptical view
Babaji's existence is known only through Yogananda's writings and the testimony of a small circle of devotees; there is no independent evidence of an immortal.
Connections in the atlas
- Ashwatthama, the wandering immortal
- The hermits of the Zhongnan Mountains
- Grotto-heavens of the Taoist immortals