Filial Bhikṣuṇīs: More Aspects of Chinese Buddhist Nuns in the Reconciliation of Confucianism and Buddhism

Scholars of Chinese Buddhism have shown how Buddhist nuns were depicted as ideals of filial women in the Biographies of Bhikṣuṇīs, and in epigraphical texts, as a Buddhist response to the criticism from Confucians. Most of the nuns’ impressive filial deeds in the hagiographies that have been discussed occurred before their renunciation. By employing examples found in the Continued Biographies of Bhikṣuṇīs and other epitaphs of Chinese Bhikṣuṇīs, I introduce more roles Chinese Buddhist nuns played and the efforts they made as filial women in the confrontation of these two traditions, highlighting how nuns maintained their images of filial women after their renunciation. This study sheds light on more aspects of Buddhist nuns in the transformation of leaving the family from an unfilial action to a filial behavior in China, and on how these women undermined the boundary between the religious and the secular spaces in this reconciliation.