Sister Vajirā

Sister Vajirā
Sister Vajirā
	Nanavira Thera
Based in	Sri Lanka
Website	nanavira.org pathpress.org

Sister Vajirā (Hannelore Wolf) was a

ten precept-holder nun in Sri Lanka

.

Lay life

Hannelore was looking for religious meanings and in early summer 1949 she came across the teachings of the

Ceylon and become a nun. Ven. Nārada gave Pali names to many Buddhists and Hannelore became Vajirā. After much turmoil she finally got her chance to go to Ceylon. She took on the 10 training rules and was ordained as Sister Vajirā by Ven. Nārada on the full moon of July in 1955 at the Vihāra Mahā Devi Hermitage at Biyagāma near Colombo, where other Buddhist nuns (dasa sil mata

or dasa sila upāsikā) lived.

Life as a nun

To provide her with greater quietude, supporters built a bungalow for her in the palm-tree forest of the monastery garden. However, she suffered internal lack and noticed that she could not possibly meditate all day long and became physically ill. Taking on scholastic work offered itself as a way out of her frustration. Having learned English quickly, she then started intensive Pali studies and soon started to translate texts and carried on correspondence about Dhamma topics with various people.

One of the dāyakas of the monastery offered her healthier conditions and arranged for a nice bungalow to be built, into which she moved in 1959. Young Sinhalese women venerated her very much there, and one of them lived temporarily with her as a disciple.

Around autumn of 1961 the English monk Ven.

sotāpatti, or Stream-entry in late January 1962. The one who has "entered the stream" has ipso facto abandoned personality-view (sakkāya-ditthi), which is the self-view implicit in the experience of an ordinary worldling not free from ignorance, and understood the essential meaning of the Buddha's teaching on the Four Noble Truths

. But the rapidity and intensity of the change of her views caused a kind of nervous breakdown and she disrobed, returning to Germany on 22 February 1962.

Back in Germany

Upon her return to Hamburg she ceased to have any contact with her former Buddhist friends. This, commented Ven. Nāṇavīra, was "a good sign, not a bad one- when one has got what one wants, one stops making a fuss about it and sits down quietly."[1] After recovering from her breakdown she started to work for a textile machine factory, Artos, in Hamburg. She still held Ven. Nāṇavīra in high esteem. In 1986

Clearing the Path

and she consented. Dr Hellmuth Hecker visited her in 1989, they had a two and half hours conversation and she stated that she was still a Buddhist. She died on 7 December 1991 in her room in Maschen.

Published work

The Letters of Sister Vajira - Correspondence between Nanavira Thera and Sister Vajira, Path Press Publications, 2010,
ISBN 9789460900020

Sakka’s Quest: Sakkapañha Sutta (DN 21) , Buddhist Publication Society, 1959

Notes

^ op. cit., p.353 (Letter 84)

References

Ñāṇavīra Thera, Clearing the Path: Writings of Ñāṇavīra Thera (1960–1965),
ISBN 955-9032-00-3

External links

Ñāṇavīra Thera Dhamma Page - An archive of Ñāṇavīra Thera's writings.
Path Press - Publishers of works by Ñāṇavīra Thera
Full Biography—by Dr. Hellmuth Hecker.
Sakka’s Quest: Sakkapañha Sutta, Introduction, Translation and Comments, Buddhist Publication Society, Kandy, 1959.
Last Days of the Buddha: The Mahāparinibbāna Sutta, Buddhist Publication Society, Kandy, 1964. Translation from the Pali into English, revised by Francis Story and introduced by Nyanaponika Thera.
Letters - An archive of Vajirā's letters.

[1] op. cit., p.353 (Letter 84)