Zhixian Liu

Background

Zhixian was born in Shaanxi province, but there is no exact information about the date of her birth. She was a daughter of the Liu family.

Career

Zhixian left household life as a young girl, beginning her practice of meditation at the age of seven. Later when Yang Jian was born in 541, Zhixian unexpectedly appeared and said to the child’s father that his son is blessed by Heaven and by the Buddha. She called the boy Narayana, meaning that he was like an indestructible diamond. Zhixian also said that Yang Jian cannot be brought up in an ordinary household and she should raise him. The family then converted part of their private house into the Prajna Convent where the child lived with her until his thirteenth year. She also predicted that Buddhism would be destroyed but that Yang Jian would restore it. Later this prediction (like all others made by her) came true.

From 574, when Emperor Wu (r. 561-578) of the Northern Zhou dynasty persecuted both Buddhists and Daoists, Zhixian took refuge in Yang Jian’s household. Since the Yang family was closely related to the Northern Zhou imperial house, this served as a safe haven for her and she was able to continue to practice the monastic life in secret. After Yang Jian (Emperor Wen) assumed the throne, he would at times talk with his officials about his childhood in the convent under Zhixian’s care. He supported Buddhism with great fervor but also careful control, causing monasteries and shrines to be built throughout the country to restore what Emperor Wu of Zhou had destroyed and to enhance his own reign.

Zhixian is recorded as having stayed within Prajna Convent for over thirty years, until the proscription of Buddhism and Daoism in 574, and it is likely that she died sometime after the persecution began and before Yang Jian claimed the throne in 581.

Achievements

• Zhixian was known in Chinese history as a Buddhist nun who raised future Emperor Wen, who became a fervid supporter of Buddhism. Besides, she often predicted the future with startlingly correct results.

Connections

Zhixian wasn't married and had no children.

References

• Biographical Dictionary of Chinese Women: Antiquity Through Sui, 1600 B.C.E. - 618 C.E This new volume of the "Biographical Dictionary of Chinese Women" spans more than 2,000 years from antiquity to the early seventh century. It recovers the stories of more than 200 women, nearly all of them unknown in the West.
  1998
• Chinese thought and institutions.
  1957