Himalayan Hermitess：The Life of a Tibetan Buddhist Nun

Kurtis R.Schaeffer Yang Gongwei

（1.Tibetology Center， University of Virginia，U.S.A; 2. Southwest Nationalities Research Academy，

Southwest University for Nationalities，Chengdu，610041，Sichuan，China）

JOURNAL OF ETHNOLOGY， VOL. 6， NO.4， 22-28， 2015 （CN51-1731/C， in Chinese）

DOI：10.3969/j.issn.1674-9391.2015.04.04

Abstract：

In 1961， anthropologist Corneille Jest was conducting fieldwork in Dolpo， the highland region of the Nepal Himalayan region immediately west of Mustang， when a local Buddhist leader told him the tale of a certain woman. Her name， the Tibetan-speaking Buddhist told the anthropologist， was Ani Chokyi， meaning “Chokyi the Nun”. She had lived an exceptional life， and her story was well known throughout Dolpo. Jest noted that a written biography of Ani Chokyi was not available in the village where he conducted his research， though he was told that there was a copy in another temple.

Four decades later it is possible to know something more of Ani Chokyi，because manuscripts of her life story are now available， thanks to the joint efforts of the Nepalese and German governments in preserving texts from across the Nepal Himalaya.Orgyan Chokyi， the Ani Chokyi of Jests account， was a nun and hermitess who lived， worked， and wrote in Dolpo during the late seventeenth and early eigthteenth centuries. Throughout her life she practiced meditation， herded goats， fasted alone and with her female companions， and travelled a good stretch of the Himalayas， from Mount Kailash to Kathmandu.

Seen against a backdrop of the activities of religious women in Dolpo， Orgyan Chokyis life is probably not unique.Women were involved in a variety of religious vocations in medieval Nepalese Himalayas. They were nuns and patrons， temple keepers and hermits， queens and goatherds. A traveler through Dolpo in the early 1660s remarked on the deep faith of the women there： “All of the women have great faith in the Dharma and are very persistent in their efforts in meditation. As they walk along a path or gather to plow their fields， at the beginning and end of each furrow， they set the plow down and sit in meditation. I have neither seen， nor heard of people in any other country who are able to blend their work and religious activity all of the time”. What distinguishes Orgyan Chokyi from the women represented in this travelogue from three centuries ago is that she was able to write her story. Autobiographies by women were uncommon in Tibet.As the earliest datable Tibetan womans autobiography， it thus holds an important place in Tibetan literature.

Like no other genre of Tibetan literature，the autobiography holds the potential to reveal the most intimate details of religious life in its full spectrum， from evanescent experiences of realization to the mundane sufferings of daily life in the concrete social and psychological peculiarities of real persons. The autobiography in Buddhists cultures is also an important instrument of religious edification and inspiration， and， as such， is always based on conventions drawn from centuries of narrative literature. Orgyan Chokyi does  not disappoint the reader on either account.She writes the story of her quest for the eremitic life in vivid and gripping terms， employing simple and direct phrasing that evokes the hardships of daily life in Dolpo while never losing sight of the fundamental themes of Buddhism. In this she shares in what may be called a rural style of Tibetan life-writing in the Nepalese Himalayas.

Autobiography has had a long life in Tibet with a complex development， as Janet Gyatso has recently illustrated in her work on the esoteric autobiographical poetry of Jikmay Lingpa. Rather than consider Orgyan Chokyis work exclusively as autobiography， in this book， I have chosen to spend more time presenting it as hagiography—an edifying story of a religiously significant person， or simply the story of a saint. As such I refer to her story as a Life in an attempt to render the Tibetan term namtar（rnam thar） into understandable English. I， thus， speak of the Life of Orgyan Chokyi， and more generally of the Lives of Tibetan holy figures in general， when I speak of Tibetan namtar as hagiography.

Tibetan Lives were primarily presented as teachings， didactic tales for the inspiration of students. As a hagiographic work of religious edification， the Life of Orgyan Chokyi can thus be considered both commemorative and didactic. It commemorates an exceptional individuals course through the suffering of samsara and the joy of liberation， while at the same time counseling its audience in proper ethnical behavior.But， to consider Orgyan Chokyis tale as a hagiography—a Life-makes sense only if she can be considered a saint， or more precisely if the category of saint may considered useful to understand the Life. I do think that this is a useful language to understand the work， for Orgyan Chokyi shares a great deal with the saints of European Christianity， the subject that has generally formed the basis upon which the modern study of hagiography has developed.

Medieval historian Patrick Geary suggests a concise three-point program for the study of hagiography， a program that I have found productive. “To understand a hagiographic work，” he writes， “we must consider the hagiographic tradition within which it was produced; the other texts copied， adapted， read， or composed by the hagiographer; and the specific circumstances that brought him or her to focus this tradition on a particular work.” In short， the hagiographic “text stands at a threefold intersection of genre， total textual production， and historical circumstance. Without any one of these three it is not fully comprehensible.” Although he writes from a disciplinary perspective very different from Buddhist studies—i.e. that of medieval European history—Gearys remarks suggest that we seek to understand Orgyan Chokyis Life in relation to themes broadly relevant to hagiography in Tibet， to the production of hagiography and other religious writings in Dolpo， and to the historical situation of Buddhism in the Tibetan cultural regions of northwest Nepal during the seventeenth and eighteen centuries.

In examining Orgyan Chokyis Life in relation to Lives as a genre， I have chosen to focus primarily on the Life of Milarepa composed by Tsangnyon Heruka. There are several reasons for this. Orgyan Chokyi claims to have read about Milarepa， and the two Lives share crucial themes.The Life of Orgyan Chokyi consists of a series of episodes threaded through a pair of overarching themes： joy and sorrow. Chokyis joys and suffering， however， are not merely convenient categories with which to divide up the episodes of her life story. As a pair， these themes allude specifically to the Buddhist notions of liberation and suffering， to the sukha of meditative experience and the duhkha of worldly work， the bliss promised in nirvana and the torment guaranteed in samsara.

Orgyan Chokyis Life is also unique for the strong equation it makes between the female body， and the key term in the Buddhist view of human life in its unenlightened state， samsara. Her work thematizes gender， for in it women are among the most significant symbols of suffering. This book is also a work of local religious history and of local womens history in particular. This is part of the beauty of the Life—that it speaks about Orgyan Chokyis personal religious career， a career intimately bound with the lives of her female companions. I have attempted throughout to minimize speculation about the religious activities of women based upon sources from other times and places， though at certain points this has been unavoidable due to the paucity of sources at hand. It is possible to gain a general sense of womens religious lives from current anthropological work or from contemporary firsthand accounts， and quite tempting to do so， given the relative lack of Tibetan literature by or about women in the pre-modern period. I have sought to portray their lives， as far as possible， through literature composed during this period and from this region.This restriction has no doubt resulted in an incomplete picture of the religious life of Himalayan women two hundred years ago. Yet， perhaps this is the value of the Life. It is partial. It is particular. It is but a single instantiation of Buddhist life and literature in a small part of the Himalayas.

But it is partial in ways that are unique and interesting.The Life of Orgyan Chokyi affords us a view of religious life in the Nepalese Himalayan region hitherto inaccessible. The Lives of men from this area do not address the same concerns for the spiritual implications of gender and suffering， or for the religious life of women that are to be found in this work. As such， this Life may be read as a rich source for the cultural history of the Tibetan borderlands， a history that takes into account human experience at multiple levels of social life. It harps on the suffering of this life and on the suffering of women even in their efforts to participate in Buddhist traditions. The study of womens history and the social construction of gender in Tibet—and within Buddhist cultures more generally—cannot do any better than to rely on such localized work as Orgyan Chokyis Life， for in such works we see broad cultural themes played out in concrete situations.

Key Words： Himalayan; Tibetan; nun; autobiography

References：

Aziz， Barbara N. The works of Pha-dam-pa Sangs-rgyas as Revealed in Dingri Folklore. In Tibetan Studies in Honour of Hugh Richardson. edited by Michael Aris and Aung San Suu Kyi， pp21-29.Vikas， New Delhi. 1980.

Jest，Corneille. Monuments of Northern Nepal. Unesco. Paris.1981.