Jingjian
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Zhu Jingjian (; 292–361) was a Chinese Buddhist nun, referred to as the first nun in China.Lily Xiao Hong Lee, Clara Lau, A.D. Stefanowska:
Biographical Dictionary of Chinese Women: Antiquity Through Sui, 1600 B.C.E
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After having been widowed, she was active as a teacher in
Luoyang Luoyang ( zh, s=洛阳, t=洛陽, p=Luòyáng) is a city located in the confluence area of the Luo River and the Yellow River in the west of Henan province, China. Governed as a prefecture-level city, it borders the provincial capital of Zheng ...
. She became interested in Buddhism, and was instructed in the subject by the monk Fashi. In this time there were monks, but no nuns, in China. However, she, and a couple of other women after her, became learned in Buddhism and started to live as de facto nuns. In 357, she made her vows and from that year onward, she was referred to as a nun and as such a pioneer. She has been called the first Buddhist nun in China. However, as she and the nuns that followed during the 4th century was never formally ordained in accordance to the ''vinaya'' ritual, they were formally known as novices rather than fully ordained nuns, and it was not until Huiguo in the following century that nuns in China was formally recognized as such.


References

292 births 361 deaths 4th-century Chinese women 4th-century Chinese people 4th-century Buddhist nuns {{Buddhist-clergy-stub