Donchee

History

A Buddhist tradition of female renunciants

Female renunciants have been present since the origin of Buddhism.

In Sri Lanka and Myanmar, they have established monasteries for anagārikās. Similar orders exist in Thailand.

In Thailand, where it is illegal for a woman to take a bhikkhuni ordination, they are called maechi. In Burma, an eight precept nun is addressed as thilashin or sayalay, whereas a fully ordained woman is called a rahan-ma ("female monk").

In Cambodia, they are called donchees. According to Guthrie, dunchees are the "heirs of an ancient form of female asceticism that was once accorded high status in Cambodia".

Death and renewal for the widows of the Khmer Rouges

During the tyranny of the Khmer Rouges regime, public practise of Buddhism was forbidden, monks were defrocked and pagodas destroyed or used as granaries, prisons or execution sites. After the regime was overthrown, women who had lost their husbands and sons began the revival of Buddhism by cleaning the temples. After large number of widows were left derelict by the massacres of the Khmer population between 1975 and 1979, new donchee communities were formed as shelters.

In search of a place for women in contemporary Khmer Buddhism

After the fall of the Communist regime in 1991, the dunchee played an important role in the reconciliation of Cambodia, as the voat became a place where the dunchee could help heal the wounds and traumas of the younger generations and a conference was organized in Phnom Penh in 1997 to discuss this emerging role of the donchee.

However, the role and status of donchee and of women in general in Cambodian Buddhism is questioned. The fact that the monastic opportunities that exist for young men are largely absent for young women is one consequence of the fact that full female ordination is no longer available in Theravada Buddhism. Other see this inequality between the bikkhu and the dunchee as a form of complementarity where one can find refuge.