The end of summer usually means the end of fun for Taiwan’s college students when they return to their crowded classrooms and dormitories, either from their families’ homes or directly from summer camp. In 1996, however, 129 female students did not return to school. As hundreds of worried parents and relatives gradually learned that the whereabouts of these young women were unknown, a frantic search began. They soon realized that all of the missing students had disappeared after participating in a summer camp held by the Zhongtai Chansi (中台禪寺). Although the confronted monastic authorities claimed to be in the dark, all of the clues pointed to the monastery as the last place the women had been seen. Driven to desperation, the searchers refused to leave and even occupied the monastery compound by force. When police officers and journalists arrived they learned that the monks and nuns of Zhongtai Chansi had already inducted all of the girls into the order, shaved their heads and had concealed them for days in the monastery garden. [1]
When they were interviewed, all of the young women claimed that they had joined the monastic order entirely of their own free will, and they refused to return home with their parents. Some parents became so angry that they tied their daughters’ hands and feet as one might truss up a pig and dragged their daughter home. Other heartbroken parents kneeled down in front of their tonsured daughters, begging them to return home. Images of weeping parents and screaming, kicking daughters were quickly broadcast through the public media and attracted national attention and concern.
Not only did the dramatic the event of Zhongtai Chansi shock the families of these young women, but it also subverted the traditional stereotype of Buddhist nuns as marginalized pathetic member in the Chinese and Taiwanese society. The Chinese patriarchal society has enforced certain stereotypes of Buddhist nuns by referring to them as “aberrant and unusual” women. In Religious Trends in Modern China, published in 1953, Wing-tsit Chan (陳榮捷) presented the image of Chinese nuns as discarded women abandoned by the patriarchal family system. [2] He explained that most nuns were pressured to enter the Buddhist order either because of their parents’ poverty, or because of marriage problems. However, these descriptions of nuns as discarded women, poverty-stricken or widowed, fail to explain the contemporary devotion of well-educated young women to the Buddhist order.
In 1996, the devotion of these young women to celibate monastic life demonstrates female agency and autonomy in pursuing their own religious career by abandoning patriarchal social order and values. No longer are functional explanations, which consider becoming a Buddhist nun as a career to solve the social problem of poverty, enough to account for such collective action.
In this paper, I will probe this issue from the perspective of symbolism. I will discuss how a traditional symbol of women’s devotion to religious life, Guanyin (觀音, Avalokitesvara, the Bodhisatava of Compassion), has come to life in order to justify these actions of devotions, and how Guanyin’s story can serve as an avenue to understand the family conflicts of these women.
In the world of Chinese Buddhism, women have traditionally been pushed to one side. But in contemporary Taiwan things look quite different. Here not only do Buddhist nuns constitute at least 75% of the clerical population, but approximately one third of Taiwanese Buddhist nuns are under the age of thirty and have either a professional diploma or a college degree. [3] Among Taiwanese Buddhist nuns there is a strong correlation between age and education, the younger cohort being far better educated as a rule.
Since the ordination system was established in 1953, women in Taiwanese Buddhism have become fully ordained nuns (bhiksuni, 比丘尼) in increasing numbers. More than 75 percent of the Buddhist clergy ordained after 1953 were women. [4] In some Buddhist orders, such as the Foguangshan order (the Buddha Light Order, 佛光山), the figure even runs to 80 percent or higher. [5] Today, there are more than twenty thousand Buddhist nuns in Taiwan, including novices and fully ordained nuns. Not only has the population of Buddhist nuns increased to an unprecedented level, but the educational profile of Buddhist nuns itself has also changed dramatically. More and more Taiwanese nuns pursue higher education. By offering fellowships to promote advanced clerical education, the Huseng Xiehui (護僧協會, the Buddhist Association for Supporting the Monastic Community) has sponsored many Taiwanese monks and nuns to study abroad since 1987. Among the 68 awarded fellowships, four monks chose to study in India, Sri Lanka, and Tibet, while 64 nuns have pursued graduate degrees in Europe, the U. S. and Japan. [6] The ratio of qualified college teachers between monks and nuns is one to eight. Most significantly, as the educational level rises, the average age of Taiwanese nuns decreases. [7]
During the 1980s and 1990s so many female college students entered Buddhist orders that the term xushini (學士尼, the Scholar Nun, literally, “nuns with bachelor’s degrees”) has emerged. By abandoning a privileged position and collectively taking the robe, these young women have attracted a great deal of attention. In addition they have established new orders and actively engage in philanthropic, missionary, educational and even political work. While most such activities are not considered traditional monastic practices, they are recognized as an important aspect of contemporary Taiwanese Buddhism. [8]
Furthermore, these Buddhist nuns are able to transfer their educational resources to engage in all sorts of secular affairs, ranging from philanthropy, missionary administration, public media, community recycling programs, and associations for promoting animal and human rights. [9] Meanwhile, the communities of Taiwanese nuns have developed strong connections with laywomen volunteers’ organizations by claiming that their religious activities represent family morality and social reform. They have proven to be more capable than monks in mobilizing women’s resources. [10] Among these bhiksuni communities, Fojiao Ciji Gongde Hui (佛教慈濟功德會, the Buddhist Compassion Relief Tzu Chi Association; hereafter, CJ) is most renowned for its female leadership and overwhelming membership from housewives, earning it the epithet, “kingdom of housewives” (jiating zhufu wangguo, 家庭主婦王國). [11]
In addition to an increasing effort to identify themselves as professional clergy, these Taiwanese scholar nuns generally refer to their spiritual vocation as a “religious career.” Meantime, the lay society also tends to treat them as something like career women. For instance, Bhiksuni Yifa (依法), the first Taiwanese Buddhist nun achieving her doctoral degree from Yale’s department of religious studies (1996), was named an “Outstanding Representative of Youth” by Taiwan’s Association of Young Merchants in 1997 for her contributions to education. The following year, Bhiksuni Hongxiang (宏祥), who increased the enrollment of her Dharma Center in the Taipei County from ten followers to two hundred between 1993 and 1995, was cited by the Association of Career Women in the Republic of China as a role model for Taiwanese businesswomen.
Chinese patriarchal society very often interprets women’s devotion to celibate Buddhist orders as a personal act of private withdrawal from the secular world. This situation is especially clear when we examine the promotion of monks in the clerical system. Sometimes religious isolation begins to look like a punishment for those women who have been seen as failing in their socially dictated gender role—wives unable to bear children and young widows come to mind. Given such prejudices, how can the scholar nun present her religious practice as a career? This interesting and dramatic shift in gender distribution of the Buddhist membership, and the process that is bringing it about, are the subjects of my research.
In the past two decades Taiwanese society has witnessed groups of female college students entering the Buddhist order, and “discovered” many famous and powerful Buddhist nuns. These two phenomena reveal an ongoing process in which both the format and image of women’s devotion to religious life are changing. I will analyze the religious and gender implications behind these two phenomena through the affiliation of these nuns with the image of Guanyin.
Guanyin has been represented in many different images—from normal human form to multiple-headed, multi-armed spirits. [12] The images of a lady in a white robe and of the thousand-armed and thousand-eyed are most popular in Taiwan. From the late sixteenth century to the present the worship of Guanyin has dominated the religious life of Taiwanese women, and the most important of the incarnations of Guanyin in Taiwan is the legendary figure of Princess Miaoshan (妙善). Originating in a fourteenth-century baojuan (寶卷, precious scripture) and popularized by pilgrimage activities devoted to Guanyin, the legend of Princess Miaoshan has inspired innumerable Buddhist women to adopt vegetarianism and forswear marriage. [13] In the legend, Princess Miaoshan refuses marriage in order to fulfill her religious commitment, and finally gains the recognition of her father by healing his mysterious illness as the incarnation of the thousand-armed and thousand-eyed Guanyin. This legend is told in booklets and in books supplemented with personal testimonies to the miraculous power of Guanyin. When a miraculous cure is needed, Taiwanese pray to the thousand-armed and thousand-eyed image of Guanyin found on the altars of Buddhist temples.
Historically, Chinese monks referred to Taiwan as Guanyin’s dharma field because of the scale of the pilgrimage activities devoted to the figure. The pilgrimage centers are always located in mountains and are connected with important ritual activities on the coast of Southeastern China. In the early days of Guanyin’s Taiwanese existence, temples in her honor were built by Chinese missionary monks and by local communities inspired by the mysterious incense bags they knew of from mainland Chinese Guanyin temples. [14] Even during the Japanese colonial administration (1895-1945), Chinese monks continuously advertised in Taiwanese newspapers, touting the great value of pilgrimages to Zhejiang province’s Mt. Putuo (普陀山).
Since the fourteenth century, a type of lay Buddhism referred to as “vegetarian religion” (zhaijiao, 齋教) has dominated the religious horizon of Taiwan; female devotees tried to follow the example of Princess Miaoshan and led religious lives very similar to those of Buddhist nuns. Though they never put on a nun’s robe or shaved their heads, these women observed a strict asceticism and denied themselves meat and sex. [15]
The Chinese monks who fled to Taiwan after World War II were astonished to find that on their new island home, female devotees, most of them these vegetarian women, outnumbered monks. Such influential Chinese scholar monks as Yinshun (印順) and Mingfu (明復) attribute the overwhelming number of Taiwanese nuns to the popularity of Guanyin worship in Taiwan. “Since Taiwan was the land dedicated to the Compassionate (and female) Bodhisattva, Guanyin,” Mingfu has said, “the number of Buddhist nuns tended to be greater than that of monks.” [16] Taiwan has historically been considered a special place for Guanyin because of the remarkable number of female devotees and nuns found there.
In Taiwan Buddhist nuns and Guanyin cannot be spoken of separately. Though monks established most of the pilgrimage centers dedicated to Guanyin, men are not thought of as speaking for her, to the extent that nuns are seen as charismatic thanks to the blessing of Guanyin. The most remarkable examples are Bhiksuni Fuhui (福慧, 1930-1985) and Zhengyan (證嚴, 1925 to the present). These nuns are greatly worshipped for their healing abilities--Fuhui performed miraculous healings by distributing “Great Compassion Water” (dabei shui, 大悲水) in the name of the Thousand-Armed and Thousand-Eyed Guanyin, and Zhengyan established the Buddhist Ciji Hospital system. Although they represent the opposite extremes of nuns’ charisma, from traditional to modern, both are respected as the incarnation of Guanyin.
3.1 The Divine Incarnation of Guanyin: Bhiksuni Fuhui
Known for her miraculous healing powers, Bhiksuni Fuhui founded Da Xinshan Si (大興善寺, Great Merit Accumulation Nunnery, hereafter, DXSS) in the 1970s in Taiwan’s Miaoli County. [17] In time she began to perform miraculous healings and established a small nunnery, which quickly became a bustling market crowded with the sick who placed their trust in her. Critically ill patients visited in great numbers to receive the holy water that Fuhui had blessed. Though after her death in 1985 the nunnery was moved, pilgrims continued to make their way to the new site, where her relics were stored; it has become a sacred place, famed for its healing water. [18] At the present time, close to fifty tourist buses arrive every morning at the XSS; this number increases to five hundred for annual festivals. Ordinary tourists and pious housewives organize and conduct monthly pilgrimages to ensure the tranquility and health of themselves and their families. As a small nunnery, established by a nun with eleven disciples, DXSS has become one of the greatest pilgrimage centers in Taiwan.
Offering food and eating special food (including drinking the blessed water) pervades almost every procedure of the pilgrim to DXSS. Fuhui established a strict rule against accepting any donations except for fresh vegetables and raw noodles. The donated food is used to feed the visitors, and one of the mystic legends is that the meal prepared is always exactly the right amount for the number of visitors. On the way to DXSS, pilgrims conduct Buddhist
prayers and share donated breakfast on the bus. From the entrance of DXSS, pilgrims move toward the nunnery on their hands and knees along the muddy and rugged road while chanting a confession verse to pay their respect to Fuhui. Climbing and arriving the Dharma Hall, they wash hands and ascend to the Guanyin Hall to worship the statue of Fuhui. To the right side of the alter, two nuns distribute holy water in small orange bowls, and in three-gallon white plastic buckets. The latter is the assigned monthly amount for each family. After making vows and drinking the blessed water in front of the statue of Fuhui, pilgrims descend from the Guanyin Hall to the spacious tent to eat the noodles (Pingan mian, 平安麵, the “noodle of tranquility”). Six times in the year – the opening of the nunnery, the birthdays of Buddha, Guanyin, and Fuhui, and the dates of Guanyin entering the Order and achieving enlightenment – DXSS treats pilgrims with the rice ball soup (Pingan wan, 平安圓, the “ ball of tranquility”).
Fuhui is viewed as the incarnation of Guanyin for her performance of miraculous healing through the Great Compassion Water. The sincere recitation of the “Supreme Spell of Thousand-armed and Thousand-eyed Guanyin” is a very important Buddhist practice, which is believed to transform ordinary water into miraculous medicine. The power of the Great Compassion Water of DXSS is attributed to Fuhui. Her strict ascetic regimen included fasting by limiting her intake to nothing but Great Compassion Water, meditating all night (and even for weeks), maintaining a vow of silence at an abandoned house and subsisting on discarded vegetables. Despite her extremely strict diet, she provided food for others. The efficacy of the holy water is usually attributed to the power of Guanyin, a transcendent authority. So remarkable were her healings that Fuhui was viewed as the incarnation of Guanyin. [19]
Fuhui’s statue, which contains her relics, depicts her as a smiling nun sitting with legs folded. It is on display at the Guanyin Hall along with the statues of the Sakyamuni Buddha as a child and various images of Guanyin, from the lady in white to the Thousand-armed and Thousand-eyed Guanyin. The exhibition of various statues of Guanyin on the same altar usually identifies the temple as a “natal home” of Guanyin. Moreover, pilgrims to DXSS honored Fuhui as the “Bodhisattva who saves the world through great kindness and great compassion” and the “Bodhisattva master who alleviates difficulty and suffering”--these are in fact the most popular titles assigned to Guanyin. Moreover, Fuhui’s disciples and supplicants claim that Fuhui often appears in dreams as a figure in a white robe. Guanyin is the most distinctive female symbol within Chinese Buddhism. The female characteristics of Guanyin are believed to contribute to “her” widespread pervasive devotion among women, as is the case with the divine image of Fuhui.
3. 2 The Selected Agent of Guanyin: Bhiksuni Zhengyan
The image of Zhengyan is also referred to as an incarnation of Guanyin, but her relationship with Guanyin is constructed in a different way. Though Zhengyan also devoted herself to certain form of asceticism, such as offering food and medical care in emergency, she established her reputation by organizing philanthropic work. The CJ founded and directed by Zhengyan, was one of the most successful grassroots movements in Taiwan during the last two decades of the twentieth century. [20] Through the association, which is devoted to various philanthropic activities around the world, Zhengyan wields great power as a Buddhist nun, since three million laywomen (they make up at least 80% of the association’s membership) do her bidding. Not only is Zhengyan’s association a financial force to be reckoned with, the hospital it runs also offers excellent opportunities for its members to “experience the reality of suffering” through routine volunteer service. The CJ is the embodiment of a moral revival movement, and Zhengyan is a symbol of limitless compassion, a “Taiwanese Mother Theresa” as well as the “Consciousness of Taiwan (台灣的良心, Taiwan de liangxin).” [21]
Through strength of will and personality, Zhengyan created a modern vocation--modeled on that of Guanyin—at the meeting place of human resources, modern technology and religious community. Most importantly, the Ciji Buddhist Hospital fulfills Zhengyan’s commitment to the bodhisattva vow of compassion as well as simultaneously connecting her with the maternal side of Guanyin. All of the statues and pictures dedicated to Zhengyan by her followers are displayed in the hospital and the convent, and they are exclusively in the form of the female image of Guanyin.
Unlike Fuhui, the personal charisma of Zhengyan is not only attributable to the efficacy (ling, 靈) of Guanyin but also to the strength of her own filial piety. [22] The miraculous recovery of parents from illness thanks to Guanyin’s blessings constitutes the main theme in lives of these two heroines’. Zhengyan’s adoptive mother was often confined to bed by poor health. So critical was her condition on one occasion that Zhengyan appealed to Guanyin: if her mother was cured, Zhengyan was willing to offer her own life as a replacement. For three nights Guanyin appeared in Zhengyan’s dreams as a gentle figure dressed in white; in a shabby cottage she handed medicine to Zhengyan and watched her prepare it and administer it to her mother. After the third night’s dream, Zhengyan’s mother suddenly recovered. In thanks, Zhengyan embarked on a lifelong vegetarian diet. From then on, villagers addressed Zhengyan as “the filial daughter” (xiaonü, 孝女).
Miracle does not happen every time. The sincerity of Zhengyan did not bring back her father. From her teens Zhengyan showed great competence in helping her adoptive father run a string of dramatic theaters. When her father had a stroke, Zhengyan moved him from his office back to the family home, which worsened his condition. To save him, Zhengyan braved foul weather, kneeling on the muddy ground through a long rainy night to pray to Guanyin. But her efforts were in vain: he died. Zhengyan experienced the torments of guilt. Crazed, she searched for her father’s soul, and consulted spirit mediums that promised to look for her father in hell. Finally, she was inspired by Buddhism and determined to enter the Buddhist order. [23]
After arranging the family business so it would support her mother and four younger brothers, Zhengyan left home twice in order to fulfill her religious commitments. When her daughter had been absent from home for several months, Zhengyan’s mother finally accepted her decision. In time Zhengyan gave up the life of a wandering mendicant and took up residence in a small temple that bore a remarkable resemblance to the cottage that had appeared in her dreams. So ramshackle was the hermitage that Zhengyan had to place her small cot next to the altar set up for the worship of Guanyin. On the first and fifteenth days of every month she meditated in this small cell to transfer merit to her father. Soon her neighbors, who noticed a bright light radiating from this poor temple twice every month, recognized her pious devotion. Zhengyan finally released herself from guilt by entering the Buddhist order. [24]
She interpreted her father’s death as an even more profound teaching from Guanyin, the lesson of the reality of sorrow and the need to transform filial piety into transcendent compassion. [25]
More than once, Zhengyan’s public appearances were marked by emotional outbursts in which she revisited her father’s death. “If my father’s doctor had told me not to move him, if I had known anything about medicine, I would not have taken him home from that hot and noisy office.” [26] While the explanation most commonly offered for Zhengyan’s determination to build the Buddhist Ciji Hospital involved the story of an aboriginal Taiwanese woman who was refused emergency medical treatment when she could not pay, I tend to believe that Zhengyan was also motivated by her father’s death. Her habit of addressing doctors and nurses as “Venerable One in White” (baiyi dashi, 白衣大士), Guanyin’s popular epithet, support my argument. Most importantly, like Miaoshan, Zhengyan is recognized as a filial daughter who extended her compassion to all people.
To a great degree, the popularity and consequent success of Zhengyan’s order has been attributed to similarities between her story and that of Miaoshan, the well-known incarnation of Guanyin. After the first version of the biography of Zhengyan, written by Chen Huijian 陳慧劍in 1982, in 1995 a new chapter was added to Zhengyan’s official biography: this section focuses on a reference made by Zhengyan to the members of the Ciji Association, as being the thousand arms and thousand eyes of Bodisattva Guanyin. [27]
This inspirational legend of Princess Miaoshan reflects the conflict between filial piety and religious piety. While her father hopes that a suitable marriage will guarantee Princess Miaoshan’s happiness and maintain the good name of the family, to her it gives rise to a momentous conflict between her duty to her family and to her religious beliefs. [28] Miaoshan’s devotion to Buddhism so enrages her father that he tries to murder her. She barely escapes, only to set out on a living journey to the underworld. At the moment when she releases the suffering ghosts from their infernal captivity, Miaoshan reveals her identity as Guanyin. Apprised that her father has fallen ill--a punishment for having killed Miaoshan’s fellow nuns instead of her--Miaoshan disguises herself as a mendicant Buddhist and cures her father by treating him with medicine made from her eyes and arms. Finally, her father recognizes her and is converted to Buddhism, at which point Miaoshan miraculously grows new eyes and arms, becoming the thousand-eyed and thousand-armed incarnation of Guanyin. By combining filial piety with transcendent compassion for all human beings, Miaoshan finally wins the recognition her father has withheld and symbolically resolves the dilemma faced by all Chinese women.
As the beneficiary of the miraculous healing of Guanyin, the role of Zhengyan is distinctive from that of Miaoshan. However, some striking similarities exist between the legend of Miaoshan and the biography of Zhengyan. First of all, both involve the conflict between filial piety and religious commitment, a fundamental dilemma for Chinese women, particularly for gaining the recognition of their parents. Zhengyan was a filial daughter who resisted marriage and converted to Buddhism on behalf of her deceased father. This leads to the second motif: suffering daughters find relief in repaying filial piety with the universal compassion of Guanyin to all human beings. Thirdly, both stories demonstrate the continued influence of traditional gender expectations on Buddhist women through the feminine characteristics of Guanyin. The feminine attributes of Guanyin, combined with the virtues of healing and nurturing, form a powerful image of female religiosity. While Miaoshan shared food with animals, and saved hungry ghosts in hell, Zhengyan initiated her philanthropic organization by offering emergency aid and food to the poor. The establishment of the Ciji Hospital was also aimed at helping the poor. Guanyin symbolizes the feminization of Buddhist virtue: unconditional love and universal compassion. In turn, Chinese daughters are able to justify their religious commitment by identifying themselves with Guanyin.
Both Fuhui and Zhengyan are associated with the feminine attributes of Guanyin, and exhibit her divinity through healing and nurturing. They continuously demonstrated the strong commitment of Taiwanese nuns to the example set by Guanyin. By establishing the CJ, in particular, Zhengyan did so in a more accessible way. She established the Ciji Buddhist Hospital and the Ciji Nursing and Medical Schools to lend the “Venerable One in White” a palpable presence in the mundane world, while the thousands of volunteer workers who partially staff these establishments act like the thousand arms and thousand eyes of Guanyin.
The theme of being the thousand arms and thousand eyes of Guanyin has become a social symbol signifying the cooperation and loyalty of CJ membership. Zhengyan specifically encourages her followers to function as her “arms and eyes” in fulfilling the Buddhist vocation. In this way, the missionary and philanthropic work of CJ are defined as the path of Bodhisattva Guanyin, and every member is recognized as a potential Bodhisattva him/herself. The affiliation with Guanyin not only constitutes the communal identity of CJ, but also creates a meaningful relationship between Zhengyan and her followers.
In comparison, the image of Fuhui is the divine incarnation of Guanyin rather than the selected agent of Guanyin as in the case of Zhengyan. The extraordinary asceticism brought Fuhui the magical power of healing, which is a difficult example to follow. Therefore, the power of Fuhui is similar to the legend of Princess Miaoshan. By contrast, the institutionalized discipline for the followers of Guanyin established by Zhengyan is much easier to follow. However, neither the divine incarnation beyond description, nor the skillful adoption of organization strategy, detracts from the charisma of these two Buddhist nuns. Unselfish giving and self-sacrifice in the name of Guanyin characterize the religiosity of these two nuns.
It is not Zhengyan’s domestic image or the Great Compassion Water of Fuhui that have awakened Taiwanese society to the thousand-armed and thousand-eyed image of Guanyin, but the contemporary image of Buddhist nuns as women of ability, industry and esoteric knowledge. Whether in the crowded streets of Taipei or on small village roads in southern Taiwan, people are used to seeing nuns driving cars and using cellular phones. Nuns also give public lectures on radio, television, and at large public gatherings. Inside nunnery walls, many nuns are surfing the Internet and setting up complicated computing systems. Abroad, Taiwanese nuns are busy developing missionary sites in American Chinatowns and remote European towns. Today, Taiwanese nuns are active in conducting public discussions on religious affairs on television, publishing Buddhist books, exhibiting their art work and teaching various classes. Taiwanese nuns now penetrate almost every corner of social life.
The biographies of Zhengyan endow the metaphor of the thousand arms and thousand eyes with a strong notion of community. As Zhengyan became identified with Guanyin, Princess Miaoshan ceased to be regarded primarily as a filial daughter and came to be seen as a potent nun. When Zhengyan herself spoke of the thousand eyes and thousand arms of Guanyin she was offering a modern interpretation of Guanyin, and the increasing visibility and vitality of scholar nuns guaranteed that the image would strongly reverberate throughout society.
The utilization of the symbol of Guanyin by the CJ exemplifies the expanding notion of community among Taiwanese Buddhist women. In the legend of Princess Miaoshan, as well as mentioned in the case of Fuhui, the Thousand-armed and Thousand-eyed image of Guanyin is referred to as the healing power its spell inherited. More specifically, within the legend of Princess Miaoshan, arms and eyes function as medicine without subjectivity. However, the relationship of these arms and eyes with Guanyin represents the collectivity of the path of Bodhisattva Guanyin in terms of the relation between nuns and laypersons. For the scholar nuns, busy with their missionary work, a set of almighty arms and eyes is necessary. For instance, may Taiwanese Buddhist groups address lay devotees as the “Thousand-Armed and Thousand-Eyed Bodhisattva.”
In addition to the help they receive from laypersons, these nuns equip themselves with secular professional skills (mainly their college education). Young nuns tend to describe their religious vocation as that of Thousand-armed and Thousand-eyed Guanyin. For example, the nuns of the Foguangshan order refer to their yearly activity (mainly social education and public lectures) as “the work of the Thousand-Armed and Thousand-Eyed Guanyin.” [29] The “borrowing” identity is not only attribute to the almighty influence of Guanyin, but also indicates the skillful capability of utilizing modern techniques, and the busy schedule of missionary work. For the scholar nuns, busy with their missionary work, a set of almighty arms and eyes is necessary.
Both the ability to adjust to the modern world and the mutual support offered among these arms and eyes contribute to Taiwanese nuns’ self-identity. The monastic communities of Taiwan nuns prefer to conduct missionaries and work collectively. This makes it easier for individual nuns, as compared to their male counterparts, to confront the charge of spiritual proud, in dealing with conventional gender politics. Therefore, nuns tend to aggregate into groups for safety and support, both financially and spiritually. The close tie among nuns has been an accented phenomenon over the last two decades, as large monastic communities have emerged, such as the Xiangguang Bhiksuni sangha, the Foguanshan Order, Zhongtai Chansi. The symbols of the arms and eyes of Guanyin inspire the notion of community among the members of these nunneries, and also play an important role in internalizing their loyalty.
Along with the social changes of the last thirty years of the twentieth century have come anxieties. As Taiwanese women have struggled to make traditional gender roles work in an age of two-parent employment, anxiety has inspired many women’s search for recognition through the Buddhist order. The catch is that some Taiwanese women have chosen a very traditional way to protest an unchanging family structure. Scholar nuns are certainly religious figures, but the emphasis they place on the priesthood as an alternative route for recognition makes it very much like a secular career. If taking the robe initiates a woman’s career it also reflects a strong feminist consciousness, even though it is legitimized in the context of religious reform.
The model provided by the Thousand-armed and Thousand-eyed Guanyin has long affected the religious life of Taiwanese Buddhist women by persuading them that recognition in a patrilineal society is possible. But, the younger generation of scholar nuns possesses a new set of social resources, such as higher education and a commitment to the modernization of Buddhism--they have put the image of Guanyin to a new use. They were able to resolve all of the tensions in their lives by turning to modern Buddhist nun-hood.
The rapid industrialization and economic boom of Taiwan in the 1970s did little to modify the patrilineal family system. Society continued to confine womanhood by marriage. Similar to the radical response of the father of Princess Miaoshan to her taking the vow of celibacy, most Taiwanese parents still view the Buddhist nun-hood as a refugee for discarded women—those whose social positions are no longer defined through marriage. Thus, these parents of nuns feel shame and guilt: they have failed to fulfill their responsibility to their daughters by finding them mates.
The first public conflict of any size between women’s religious commitments and filial piety occurred in the 1996 Zhongtai Chansi Event. In a patrilineal society such as Taiwan’s, the sort of behavior evinced by these college girls and the monks and nuns of the monastery cannot be tolerated. In newspapers, on radio and television, members of the public attacked the Buddhist order as socially nonproductive; they reverted to longstanding criticisms of Buddhism, pointing out that it was not of this world. [30] In addition, Buddhism was criticized for “destroying the promising future of these members of the social elite.” [31] Though other voices supported the would-be nuns and suggested that their actions were reasonable reactions to being treated like chattel, many more accused these college girls of un-filial behavior—they were throwing away the investment made in them by their families and, more broadly, by society. [32]
However, the increasing financial independence and education of young women, particularly after the obligatory education initiated in 1968, marriage may be no more the first concern of young women. The relatively privileged status of the Taiwanese scholar nuns provides an excellent example of the interaction between financial autonomy and spiritual pursuit of women.
If the parents of scholar nuns express deep reservations about a life choice that promises no social payoff, the young nuns have chosen a path they hope will lead them to freedom. The older generation views the Buddhist nun-hood as marginal and shut off from the patriarchal family system, while their daughters see in the Buddhist order a relatively autonomous life. Modern Buddhist nun-hood can involve a more flexible and mentally engaging existence than marriage, and their members may choose to concentrate on public Buddhist education, what they consider “Human Buddhism” (renjian fojiao, 人間佛教).
Drawing on the miraculous healing power of Thousand-Eyed and Thousand-Armed Guanyin, Taiwanese scholar nuns are able to release themselves from frustrating family ties and from the womanhood of their mothers. In addition, by enriching their healing power through modern expertise, they transform themselves and their followers into the almighty hands and eyes of Guanyin. They expand the path of Guanyin and replace the recognition they once had from their patrilineal families with a broader social approval.
By investigating the communal and individual identity of the Scholar Nuns, I also find that the changing interpretation of the image of Guanyin offers an important dynamic for these women to legitimize their religious motivation. The distinctive images of two charismatic nun leaders, Fuhui and Zhengyan, particularly illuminate how the symbolism of Guanyin functions for different groups in different positions. It is the diversity of interpretation, rather than the diversity of the images of Guanyin, that constitutes a new format of female religiosity.
[1] “Zhongtai Chansi tidu fengpo” 中台禪寺剃度風波 (The mass tonsure at Zhongtai Chansi), Zhongguo Shibao 中國時報6 September 1996, 3.
[2] Chan, Wing-tsit. Religious Trends in Modern China. New York: Columbia University Press, 1953.
[3] My estimates are based on discussions with several deans of Buddhist institutes, whose figures are consistent with the educational reforms that took place in Taiwan during the second half of the twentieth century. Obligatory education began in 1968, and during the 1970s women made up about 33% of the population of college students in Taiwan. See Hsiu-Lien Annette Lu, “Women’s Liberation: The Taiwanese Experience,” in The Other Taiwan: 1945 to the Present, edited by Murray A. Rubinstein (New York: M. E. Sharpe, 1994), 292.
[4] Yiao Lixiang 姚麗香. “Taiwan Diqu Guangfu yilai zongjiao bianqian zhi tantao” 台灣地區光復以來宗教變遷之探討 (The investigation on the religious change in the post-war Taiwan), MA thesis. National Taiwan University 國立台灣大學, 1984; Taiwan diqu guangfuhou Fojiao bianqian zhi tantao 台灣地區光復後佛教變遷之探討 (The Development of Taiwanese Buddhism after the Japanese Colonization), a project report to the National Science Committee 國科會 1988.
[5] Unfortunately, there are no national statistics on the number, average age and educational background of the Taiwanese Buddhist clergy. In 1996, Ding Min丁敏investigated four Taiwanese Buddhist orders and found their monastic members younger and possessing higher educational degrees than other Buddhist groups. These four orders were: (1) among the 851 monastic members of the Foguangshan order (168 monks and 683 nuns), 89 had university degrees, 11 had master degrees, and 47 were studying overseas (5 were in Ph. D. programs); (2) among the 60 monastic members of the Nongchansi 農禪寺, 23 had graduated from university, one had a masters, one a doctoral degree, and 6 were studying in graduate programs; (3) among the 79 monastic members of the Lingquansi (29 monks and 50 nuns), 31 had bachelor degrees and 6 had master degrees; and (4) among the 80 some nuns of the Xiangguangsi, 74% were college educated. See Ding Min, “Taiwan shehui bianqian zhong de xinxing nisengtuan – Xiangguang nisengtuan de jueqi” 台灣社會變遷中的新興尼僧團──香光尼僧團的崛起 (The Recently Rising Bhiksuni Sangha in the transformation of Taiwanese society – the rising Xiangguan Bhiksuni Sangha), 1996 nian Foxue yanjiu lunwenji: dangdai Taiwan de shehui yu zongjiao 1996年佛學研究論文集: 當代台灣的社會與宗教 (The Assays on Buddhist Studies in 1996: Contemporary Taiwanese Society and Religions) (Taipei: Foguang shuju 佛光書局, 1996), vol. 1: 63-64. In 1997, the Foguangshan Order published a report , which showed it recruited 1,336 monastic members (82% were nuns), which data was different from that of Ding Min. Moreover, among them, 1259 had graduated from college or Buddhist Institutes and 24 had graduate school degrees. Also see Foguangshan Zongwu Weiyuanhui 佛光山宗務委員會 ed., Foguangshan Kaishan Sanshi Zhounian Jiniantekan 佛光山開山30週年紀念特刊 (The Memorial Issue of the Thirtieth Anniversary of the Foguangshan Order) (Kaoxiong: Foguan chubanshe 佛光出版社, 1997), 114. However, we must keep in mind that these four orders represent the developing direction of Taiwanese Buddhism rather than the general situation.
[6] I am indebted to Venerable Kaizheng 開證, who organizes this fund and provides me this data.
[7] According to the official calculation published in 1992, 63.03% of the Buddhist clergy were merely junior high school graduates or of even a lower educational background. Only 12.06% of Taiwanese monks and nuns were college graduates. See Naizhengbu Tongjichu 內政部統計處 ed., Zhonghuaminguo Bashiyinian Taiwan Diqu Zongjiaotuanti Diaochabaokao 中華民國八十一年台灣地區宗教團體調查報告 (The Report on the Taiwanese Religious Groups in 1992) (Taipei: Neizhengbu 內政部, 1993), 11-12. I am suspicious of the results of this official survey of 1992 because there existed no established procedure for this kind of “national” investigation, and the low-ranked officials conducting this investigation were often neither serious nor professional. My estimation is based on discussions with several deans of Buddhist Institutes. Their estimation is coherent with the educational reform in Taiwan: obligatory education began in 1968. Those nuns beyond 30 years old in 1997 entered elementary school in about 1974. About 33% of college students were female in 1970’s, while the statistics of 1974 showed that 20 % of women were illiterate. See Hsiu-Lien Annette Lu, “ Women’s Liberation: The Taiwanese Experience,” 292. Age-difference does play a significant role in estimating the educational background of Taiwanese Buddhist nuns.
[8] Liang Yufang 梁玉芳. “Nuxing zijue yu Xueshini zhi yong xian” 女性自覺與學士尼之湧現 (Feminist Consciousness and the increase of the Scholar Buddhist nuns), United Times 聯合報 3/1/1997, 5; and Cai Wenting 蔡文婷，”Putidaoshang nuer duo” 菩提道上女兒多(Daughters of the Buddha) Guanghua 光華 Sinorama 22. 12 (December 1997): 82-101.
[9] One of the best books of recording the variety and vitality of Taiwanese Buddhist nuns’ religious vocation is Lin Xinju 林新居, Fomen Renwu Fangtanpian 佛門人物訪談篇 (Interviews with Buddhist Figures), Taipei : Bodhi-evergreen Publisher菩提長青出版社, 1993.
[10] Karma Lekshe Tsomo, “Mahâprjâpatî’s Legacy: the Buddhist Women’s Movement,” in Buddhist Women Across Cultures: Realizations (New York: State University of New York, 1999), 19-21.
[11] Hung, Chian-yu J. and Robert P. Weller, “Merit and Mothering: Women and Social Welfare in Taiwanese Buddhism, ” Journal of Asian Studies 57. 2 (May 1998): 379- 396.
[12] Chun-fang Yu described the diversity of Avalokitesvara images in her new book, Kuan-yin: the Chinese Transformation of Avalokitesvara, New York: Columbia University Press, 2001.
[13] Glen Dudbridge, The Legend of Miaoshan (London: Ithaca Press, 1978); C. N. Tay, "Kuan yin: The Cult of Half Asia," History of Religions 16 (1976): 147-76.
[14] Yin Zhangyi 尹章義, “Fojiao zai Taiwan de zhankai (1661- 1985)” 佛教在台灣的發展 (The early development of Buddhism in Taiwan), in Taiwan fojiao de lishi yu wenhua 台灣佛教的歷史與文化 (The Culture and History of Taiwanese Buddhism), edited by Jiang Canteng 江燦騰and Gong Pengcheng 龔鵬程 (Taipei: Prajnaparamita Foundation, 1994), 15–48.
[15] The Chinese system of Buddhist ordination somehow shifted these vegetarian women into the ranks of the Buddhist nuns between the 1960s and the 1970s. (More careful study of the religious change that took place during this period would no doubt yield interesting results, but the focus of this paper is somewhat different.
[16] Minfu明復, Yijuji 一句偈 (One word above all affects my life )(Taipei: Universal Gate , 1995): 200.
[17] Chen Huijian 陳慧劍, “Wuming biqiuni suifanglu” 無名比丘尼 (Interview with an anonymous nun), in Dangdai Fomen renwu 當代佛門人物 (Contemporary Buddhist figures), edited by Chen Huijian (Taipei: Dongda 東大, 1984), 285-97.
[18] Li Fengnian 李逢年, “Jiuhuashan Daxingshansi menmian buda mingqi buxiao” 九華山大興善寺門面不大名氣大 (The door of the Daxingshan nunnery at Mt. Jiuhua is small but its renown is great), Lianhe bao, 6 December 1995, 34; Lin Xiufang 林秀芳, “Taiwan Jiuhuashan chuanqi” 台灣九華山傳奇(The legend of Taiwan’s Mt. Jiuhua), Lianhe bao , 26 October 1995, 40.
[19] Jiushi pusa xinghua ganyinglu 救世菩薩興化感應錄 (Testimonies on the incarnation of a Bodhisattva Savior), edited by Jiuhuashan Daxingshansi 九華山大興善寺 (Miaoli: Jiuhuashan Daxingshansi, 1987), 4, 9, 155, 157, 217.
[20] Chian-yu J.Hung and Robert P. Weller, “Merit and Mothering: Women and Social Welfare in Taiwanese Buddhism,” 379-96; Li Ding-tzan 李丁讚, “Zongjiao yu zhimin: Taiwan Fojiao de bianqian yu zhuanxing (1895-1995)”宗教與殖民—台灣佛教的變遷與轉型 (Religion and colonial discourse: The historical transformation of Buddhism in Taiwan, 1895-1995), Minzusuo Jikan (Bulletin of the Institute of Ethnology) 81 (spring 1996): 19-52.
[21] Zhao Xianming趙驤明, Taiwan Sanjuren: Diyiwei Taiwanren zongtong Li Denghui, jishijiuren de huopusa Shi Zhengyan, Taiwan de jingying zhi shen Wang Rongqing 台灣三巨頭-第一位台灣人總統, 濟世救人的活菩薩釋證嚴, 台灣的經營之神王永慶 (The Three Taiwanese giants: The first Taiwanese president, Li Denghui; the living Bodhisattva Zhengyan; and the god of economic administrators, Wang Yongqing) (Taipei: Kaijin wenhua 開今文化, 1994), 149-51.
[22] P. Steven Sangren, “Dialectics of Alienation: Individuals and Collectivities in Chinese Religion,” Man 26 (1991): 67-86.
[23] Chen Huijian, Zhengyan fashi de Ciji shijie 證嚴法師的慈濟世界 (The Ciji world of Venerable Zhengyan) (Taipei: Ciji wenhua chubanshe 慈濟文化出版社, 1988).
[24] Based on the series of interviews I conducted, it seems that a desire to repay Guanyin for the miraculous healing of parents or grandparents accounted for the entry of a large number of women into monastic orders in Taiwan.
[25] I was told the story of a Taiwanese nun whose experience closely resembled that of Zhengyan: she had taken her monastic vows in the hope that this would guarantee her mother’s earthly salvation. When her mother died, the nun did not falter in her devotion to Guanyin and maintained her original vows (field note, Jinshan 金山,Taipei, 1996).
[26] The first tape of Zhengyan, Jingsiyu 靜思語, is a collection of her public talks and has been widespread since 1980s.
[27] Yu Change 雲菁, Qianshou foxin: Zhengyan fashi 千手佛心-證嚴法師 (Thousand-Armed and Buddha-Minded: Mistress Zhengyan), Tainan: Daqian wenhua 大千文化, 1995.
[28] P. Steven Sangren, "Female Gender in Chinese Religious Symbols: Kuan Yin, Ma Tsu, and the Eternal Mother," Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society 9: 1 (1983): 4-25.
[29] Field note. One of the first nuns to promote the image of the thousand-armed and thousand-eyed Guanyin in the Foguangshan order was Bhiksuni Yongyun 永芸. She has proposed and organized a series of missionary activities and publications, the latter entitled “Activities of the Thousand-Eyed and Thousand-Armed Guanyin”千眼牽手系列活動 (see Zheng Zhenghuang 鄭振煌, Yuanyang de Fanchang: Fojiao zai Yaxiya 遠揚的梵唱-佛教在亞細亞 (The spread of Buddhist music: Asian Buddhism) (Taiepi: Foguang, 1994), i-iii. Yongyun has spoken of relying on different aspects of Guanyin for different people’s needs. To a great degree, the process Youngyun is involved in is coherent with Sangren’s theory of ling , see P. Steven Sangren, “Dialectics of Alienation: Individuals and Collectivities in Chinese Religion,” 67-86.
[30] Sinologists and anthropologists generally characterize Buddhism as marked by “other-worldly,” symbolism in contrast to Confucian-defined patriarchal values. Not only have scholars of Taoism tended to oppose Buddhism to the "indigenous" Taoism that "dominates" the family and village religious practices, but scholars of Buddhism describe the Buddhist monastery as a self-supporting and quite insular community. See Erik Zurcher, The Buddhist Conquest of China. (Leiden: Brill, 1959), and “Buddhist Influence on Early Taoism,” T’oung Pao 66. 1-3 [1988]: 84 –147).
[31] Huang An 黃安, “Women qianghuilai de zhishi quke”我們搶回來的只是軀殼 (What we take back is only her body), Meihua baodao 美華報導344 (14–27 September 1996), 50-51.
[32] Yikong 依空, “Zhuangyan de chujia, yuanman de aijia” 莊嚴的出家圓滿的愛家(To leave the household in dignity; to love the family with contentment), Pumen 普門206 (November 1996): 31-34; Lu Junyi 盧俊義, “Bie niuqule shijian de jiaodian: tan Zhongtai Chansi xueyuan tidu chujia shijian” 別扭曲事實的焦點-談中台禪寺學員出家事件 (Don’t twist the focus: Discussing the ordination event of the students of the Zhongtai Chansi), Ziyou shibao 自由時報7 September 1996, 18; Xu Chengzong 許承宗, “Cong Zhongtai Chansi shijian shuo Taiwan shehui” 從中台禪寺事件說台灣社會 (Reflections on Taiwanese society in light of the Zhongtai Chansi event); and Shen Ye沈野 , “Shengren bu si dadao bu zhi” 聖人不世大盜不再 (No saint, no great criminal), Dujia baodao獨家報導 423 (September 15- 21, 1996): 7, 24-25.