Martin Seeger

‘Against the Stream’: The Thai Female Buddhist Saint Mae Chi Kaew Sianglam (1901–1991)

Both Thai and Western academia have recently paid increasing attention to the changing roles of Thai Buddhist women. Still conspicuously missing, however, are more in-depth studies of female Buddhist saints in Thailand and the attendant symbolism, which would provide a more adequate depiction of the contemporary Thai Buddhist landscape. Similar to the prominent role of the mae chi in monastic education, the emergence of hagiographies and the veneration of female Buddhist saints has not, to date, been given sufficient attention in academic studies. To help remedy this situation, this paper provides a life account of one of the most outstanding female practitioners of modern Thai Buddhism: Mae Chi Kaew Sianglam (1901–1991). A summary of an increasing number of available biographical materials on Mae Chi Kaews life is followed by a thematic analysis in which the author examines various aspects of her life accounts and her veneration. The purpose is to study the enormous significance of Mae Chi Kaews biographies and attendant symbolic representations in the context of the religious landscape of Thai Buddhism. The author shows that many hagiographical elements in the sacred biographies of Mae Chi Kaew approximate the hagiographical paradigms not only of the Buddha and other Pali canonical figures, but also of modern saints of the Thai forest tradition. At the same time, however, significant hagiographical and venerational particularities can be observed.

Reversal of Female Power, Transcendentality, and Gender in Thai Buddhism: The Thai Buddhist female saint Khun Mae Bunruean Tongbuntoem (1895–1964)

Recently we have seen an increasing number of publications, mostly of an ethnographic nature, describing and discussing the significant religious roles and achievements of Thai Buddhist women, not only in the field of Buddhist education, and with regard to their monastic roles, but also in terms of their roles as accomplished Buddhist practitioners. This paper examines the changes occurring in the status and position of women in Thai Buddhist practice. In this regard I focus on the analysis of one of the first widely acknowledged female saints of modern Thai Buddhism: Khun Mae Bunruean Tongbuntoem (1895–1964). Khun Mae Bunruean has obtained her increasing reputation through the advanced meditative achievements which her followers believe she possessed. I use hagiographical accounts of her as a focal point to unravel and examine Thai beliefs in relation to female sainthood in present-day Thai Buddhism. This is done by discussing gendered hagiographical writing against the background of relevant canonical and post-canonical Pali texts that have exerted authority in religious discourses on gender by informing and nurturing Thai religious value systems. This textual research is complemented by the ethnographic examination of Thai Buddhist beliefs and venerational practices which cannot be found in authoritative Pali texts but which still play a significant role in the understanding of the particularities of female saints in modern Thai Buddhism. I do not confine myself to hagiographical accounts and venerational practices directly linked to gender, but also devote some attention to other conspicuous aspects, elements, and expressions of Mae Bunrueans sainthood and her veneration.

Book Review: The Ascendancy of Theravāda Buddhism in Southeast AsiaAssavavirulhakarnPrapod, The Ascendancy of Theravāda Buddhism in Southeast Asia, Silkworm Books, Chiang Mai, xix + 272 pp.

temporal scope of the text is also impressive, spanning several generations of post-colonial turmoil and change. In this reader’s view, an analysis of the first decade after the end of the war, leading up to §æi míi, would have further strengthened the analysis. Not only is this era also ‘postrevolutionary’, as the title of the book suggests, but inclusion of this critical and oft-overlooked period might have revealed important continuities between preand post-§æi míi society. For example, it might have revealed the increasing importance of the household to family survival during the post-war subsidy period of food scarcity, when many women were compelled to participate in the informal economy. Such points are not meant to detract from Werner’s highly original and well researched work, but might have provided even more evidence for her critical observation and conclusion that the state ultimately undermined its own agenda for gender equality, which its elaborate discourses and policies were designed to advance.