Prince Siddhartha's wife: Yasodhara

The Buddha did not have a wife, but the person who became the Buddha (Siddhartha) did.

Princess Yasodhara (Bimba Devi, aka Rāhulamātā)

Sid and Bimba agreed leaving would be good.

Rāhulamātā is the name, generally given in the ancient texts, of "Rāhula's mother" (e.g., Vin.i.82) was Prince Siddhattha Gotama's wife.

She is also called Bhaddakaccā* and, in later texts, Yasodharā (BuA., p.245; Dvy.253), which is a descriptive title not a name. Her name was Bimbā (J.ii.392f.; DA.ii.422), and "princess" is the human meaning of devī. She was probably also called Bimbāsundarī (J.vi.478 [12]), "Beautiful Bimba."

• *For example, Bu.xxvi.15; Mhv.ii.24 calls her Bhaddakaccānā ("Lucky Kaccana"), but see Thomas, op. cit., 49; she is also called Subhaddakā, this being probably a variant of Bhaddakaccānā.
• The Untold Story of Yasodhara: Prince Siddhartha's Wife (Tricycle)
• VIDEO: What about the Buddha's WIFE?

Scythian Princess Bimba/Yasodhara

The Northern (Mahayana) texts seem to favor the name of Yasodharā, but they call her the daughter of Dandapānī. (See also Rockhill, op. cit., where various other names are given as well).

It is probable that the name of Gotama's wife was Bimbā, and that Bhaddakaccā, Subhaddakā, Yosadhāri, and other names were descriptive epithets applied to her, which later became regarded as additional names.

It is also possible that in Gotama's court there was also a Yasodharā, the daughter of Dandapānī, and that there was a later confusion of names.

The Commentarial explanation (e.g., AA.i.204), that she was called Bhaddakaccānā because her body was the color of burnished gold, is probably correct. To suggest (e.g., Thomas, op. cit., 49) that the name bears any reference to the Kaccānagotta seems to be wrong because the Kaccāna clan (gotta) was a Brahmin clan, and the Sākiyans (Scythians, Sakas) were not Brahmins but "nobles" (khattiyas, deemed "warrior caste" though they were not likely part of proto-India's caste system).

Rāhulamātā was born on the same day as the Bodhisatta (J.i.54; BuA. 106, 228). She married him (Prince Siddhattha Gotama) when they were both 16 years old. (The following account is taken chiefly from J.i.58ff). She was placed at the head of 40,000 women, given to Siddhattha by the Sākiyans after he had proved his manly prowess to their satisfaction.

Siddhartha Gotama renounced his riches and royal position and left the household life on the day of the birth of their son, Rāhula. (According to one account, referred to in the Jātaka Commentary, i.62, Rāhula was seven days old).

It is said that just before he left home, he took a last look at his wife from the door of her room, not daring to go nearer, lest he should inadvertently awake her.

When as the Buddha he returned and paid his first visit to the country/seasonal capital city of Kapilavatthu after his great enlightenment, on the second day of that visit, he walked for alms in the streets. This news of this quickly spread, and Rāhulamātā looked out of her window to see if it were true.

She saw the Buddha and was so struck by the beaming glory of his personality that she uttered eight verses in its praise.

These verses have been handed down under the name of Narasīha-gāthā; on that day, after the Buddha had finished his meal in the palace, which he took at the invitation of his father, King Suddhodana, all the ladies of the court, with the exception of Rāhulamātā, went to pay him honor.

She refused to go, saying that if she had any virtue in her the Buddha would come to her. The Buddha went to her with his two chief male disciples and gave orders that she should be allowed to greet him as she wished.

She fell at his feet, and clasping them with her hands, put her head on them. King Suddhodana related to the Buddha how, from the time he had left home, Rāhulamātā had herself abandoned all luxury and had lived in the same manner as she had heard that the Buddha lived:

• wearing saffron robes,
• eating only once a day,
• sleeping on the ground,
• and so on.

The Buddha then related the Candakinnara Jātaka, to show how, in the past, too, her loyalty had been supreme.

On the seventh day of the Buddha's visit, when he left the palace at the end of his meal, Rāhulamātā sent Rāhula to him saying: "That is your father. Go and ask him for your inheritance."

Prince Rāhula followed the Buddha and, at the Buddha's request, was ordained as a monk-in-training (samanera) by Ven. Sāriputta. The account of this event is given in Vin.i.82; this is probably the only passage in the Pitakas where Rāhulamātā, is mentioned by name.

Later, when the Buddha allowed women to join the Order, Rāhulamātā became a nun under Mahā Pajāpatī Gotamī (AA.i.198).

Buddhaghosa identifies (AA.i.204f) Rāhulamātā with Bhaddakaccānā who, in the Anguttara Nikāya (A.i.25), is mentioned as chief among nuns in the possession of supernormal powers (mahābhiññappattānam).

She was one of the four disciples of the Buddha who possessed such attainment, the others being Sāriputta, Moggallāna, and Bakkula. She had wished for this achievement ta the time of Padumuttara Buddha.

In this account Bhaddakaccānā is mentioned as the daughter of the Sākyan Suppabuddha and his wife Amitā.*

• *Cf. Mhv.ii.21f. It is said (DhA.iii.44f) that Suppabuddha did not forgive the Buddha for leaving his daughter; Devadatta was Bhaddakaccanā's brother, and it has been suggested that Devadatta's enmity against the Buddha was for reasons similar to her father's.

She joined the Order of Nuns under Pajāpatī Gotamī in the company of Janapada-kalyānī (the "Belle of the Land," the Buddha's half-sister Sundari Nandā).

In the Nuns' Order she was known as Bhaddakaccānā ("Lucky Kaccana") Therī ("senior nun"). Later, she developed insight and became an arahant (fully enlightened). She could, with one effort, recall one asankheyya (indeterminate kappa or kalpa) and 100,000 ordinary kappas (AA.i.205).

In the Therī Apadāna (Ap.ii.584ff) an account is found of a therī (senior nun), Yasodharā by name, who is evidently to be identified as Rāhulamātā because she speaks of herself (vvs. 10, 11) as the Buddha's pajāpatī before he left the household (agāra) and says that she was the chief (pāmokkhā sabbaissarā) of 90,000 women.

In the time of Dīpankara Buddha, when the Bodhisatta was born as Sumedha, she was a Brahmin maiden, Sumittā by name, and gave eight handfuls of lotuses to Sumedha, which he, in turn, offered to the Buddha. Dīpankara, in declaring that Sumedha would ultimately become the Buddha, added that Sumittā would be his companion in several lives.

The Apadāna account (vvs. 1ff) mentions how, just before her passing into final nirvana, at the age of 78, she took leave of the Buddha and performed various miracles. It also states (Ap.ii.592f) that 18,000 arahant nuns, companions of Yasodharā, also passed on the same day. More: Rāhulamātā

• Prettiest lady in the universe, the Arhat Yasodhara Maha Theri (Ven. Bimba, Bhaddhakaccana, Rahulamata)
• G.P. Malalasekera, Dictionary of Pali Proper Names, edited by Dhr. Seven (ed.), Wisdom Quarterly

Becoming [Mexican] Frida Kahlo (BBC)

New book gathers every single documented Frida Kahlo, including lost works

Goddess and God of Christianity, Catholic icons, a Mary and the Jesus. Which Mary?

Revolutionary Che Guevara, artist Frida Kahlo, and Goddess la Virgin de Guadalupe

• Who's Frida Kahlo?
• The Eyebrow Lady? Isn't she Che Guevara's divine consort?
• We prefer to think of her as the Unibrow Goddess, thank you. What is a "divine consort"?
• Y'know, like, Goddesses are always paired with Gods. There's Krishna and Radha, Shiva and Parvati, the Buddha and Kwan Yin, the Jesus and Mary [Magdelene] Chain, Muhammad and Khadija, and now Che and Frida.
• Oh, yeah, something like that -- iconic -- but the Buddha did not have a wife. Prince Siddhartha (who later became the Buddha) did, and here name was Bimba (though the world remembers her as Yasodhara, which is a description, and by many other names).

BBC: Becoming Frida Kahlo

A divine couple, Frida and Che (modern art)

There are many myths that surround the passionate, radical Mexican painter Frida Kahlo (Magdalena Carmen Frida Kahlo y Calderón, 1907–1954), the most famous female artist of the 20th century.

This compelling art documentary attempts to set the record straight. It reveals how politics, love, and art shaped Frida as an individual and as an artist. And it shows how she ultimately strived to be free from the control and influence of men.

• WATCH NOW: Becoming Frida Kahlo (BBC Select)
• Watch Becoming Frida Kahlo and more acclaimed documentaries on BBC Select today. Restrictions apply.* Get it on Apple TV Prime Video, The Roku Channel

Becoming Frida Kahlo on BBC Select

Her Story: Frida Kahlo · Mexican feminist icon, artist (She Made History.com)

Episode 1: "Tragedy Strikes"

Frida Kahlo, husband Diego Rivera

When an accident changes Frida’s life, she channels pain and heartache into painting. Frida Kahlo was a rebel from the outset, challenging norms from an early age. As a young woman, she met Mexican Diego Rivera, a superstar artist who would go on to change her. But a tragic accident thwarted Frida’s plans. Left facing a life of pain and injury, she channeled this tragedy and used it as the catalyst for her artistic career.

Episode 2: "Travel and Turmoil"

Kahlo’s potent portrait on US-Mexico border

Now married and living in 1930s America, Frida witnesses the ugly side of capitalism. Frida Kahlo traveled to America alongside her lover Diego Rivera, who’d been commissioned to produce an important mural. But Frida was determined to succeed in her own right. She was shocked by the vast gap between rich and poor in America. Then after losing a child to miscarriage and her mother to illness, she produced some of her most visceral and devastating works.

Episode 3: "The Final Years"

Dangerous politics and turbulent [bisexual] love distort and devastate Frida Kahlo’s world. After a short affair with Leon Trotsky, Frida finally achieved her own solo exhibition in Europe. But all does not go according to plan. She learns that husband Diego Rivera wants a divorce. Pouring her pain into her work, she creates her masterpiece: The Two Fridas. Her last years are spent in agony, while creating some of her most enduring images. Source

• BBC Select 2025; Crystal Quintero, Pfc. Sandoval, Dhr. Seven (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Happily Ever After into the afterlife (sutra)

American scholar-monk Bhikkhu Bodhi

Happily ever after, and even after that!

At Sunday Sangha last week (July 2018) we got into a discussion about the fact that of course we “cling” to our loved ones (spouses, children, parents, friends).

Then Brian mentioned that at a recent retreat, American Theravada monk Bhikkhu Bodhi pointed out that while many of the Buddha’s teachings were given to monastics, many [possibly most] of them were not. They were given to “regular people,” who were married and had children, and so on.

It’s important to know who the Buddha was talking to when we try to understand these teachings. This brought to mind a sutra wherein the Buddha tells Nakula-pita and his wife Nakula-mata how they could remain together and in love with each other as long as they lived and on into future lives as well!

“This discourse also shows that far from demanding that his lay disciples spurn the desires of the world, the Buddha was ready to show those still under the sway of worldly desire how to obtain the objects of their desire. The one requirement he laid down was that the fulfillment of desire be regulated by ethical principles” (Bhikkhu Bodhi’s In the Buddha’s Words). Here’s what it says in the text:

SUTRA: "To Nakula's Father"

In the Buddha’s Words

(AN 4:55) One morning the Blessed One (the Buddha) dressed, took his upper robe and bowl, and went to the household of Nakulapita. Having arrived, he sat down on the seat specially prepared for him.

Then the householders, husband and wife Nakulapita and Nakulamata, approached him and, after paying homage, sat respectfully to one side. So seated, the householder Nakulapita said to the Blessed One:

“Venerable sir, ever since the young housewife Nakulamata was brought home to me [for an arranged marriage], when I was young, I am unaware of having wronged her even in my thoughts, still less in my deeds. Our wish is to be in one another’s sight so long as this life lasts and in the future life as well.

“Then Nakulamata the housewife addressed the Blessed One: 'Venerable sir, ever since I was taken to the home of my young husband Nakulapita, when I was a young girl, I am unaware of having wronged him even in my thoughts, still less in my deeds.

Householder stream enterers are well on The Way

“Our wish is to be in one another’s sight so long as this life lasts and in the future as well.

“Then the Blessed One said: 'If, householders, both wife and husband wish to be in one another’s sights so long as this life lasts and in the future as well, they should have:

• the same faith (saddha, confidence) [in this case having toether entered the first stage of enlightenment],
• the same moral discipline (sila),
• the same generosity (dana),
• the same wisdom (panna).

“Then they will be in one another’s sight so long as this life lasts and in the future life as well” (AN 4:55).

How sweet is that? Happily Ever After, and Even After That!

• Jan Rosamond, Dharma Town Times (dharmatown.org, July 26, 2018); Ashley Wells, Dhr. Seven (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

If we had GODDESSES to worship

Dhr. Seven, Amber Larson, Ashley Wells, Crystal Quintero (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly Wiki edit

Buddhist Goddess Prajnaparamita

The world needs goddesses (devis) to worship if it is going to honor "gods" (devas) like we used to have in the Jewish and early Christian traditions, which were taken away by Rome when they converted these ideas into an imperial Psy-Op to conquer the world, and females were relegated to an afterthought with the triumph of beloved Western icon Mother Mary (like the East's Kwan Yin). Later Buddhism was not immune to the worldwide sexist rampage that took away our sacred feminine figures keeping a more androgynous.

Originally, females were honored as chief disciples (Khema, Uppalavanna), enlightened matriarchs (Maha Pajapati Gotami, Rahulamata Bhaddhakaccana a.k.a. Yasodhara or Princess Bimba, Kisa Gotami, Maha Maya Devi often portrayed as a salabhanjika), and exemplary nuns (bhiksunis, anis, theris, sayalays) and supporters (Ambapali, Queen Mallika). A feminine revival largely forgot them but set up other Buddhist "goddesses" such as Prajnaparamita, the 21 Tārās like Green Tara, the apsaras, dakinis, tantrikas, yakshinis, and of course the universally beloved Kwan Yin Bodhisattva. Even the Jewish-Christian God YHWH (Yahweh, Jehovah) once had a consort or wife named Asherah, and Rabbi Jesus (Issa, Y'shua) had Mary Magdalene.

WHEN GOD WAS A WOMAN: Archaeologically documented is the story of the religion of the Goddess. Under Her, women's roles were far more prominent than in patriarchal Abrahamic (Jewish, Christian, Muslim) cultures. Author Merlin Stone describes this ancient system and, with its disintegration, the worldwide decline in women's status. Index, maps, and illustrations. More

Crappy JAP Survivor's Shallow, Parvati

Parvati (Sanskrit पार्वती) or Uma (as in Thurman) is the Hindu goddess of fertility, love, and devotion, as well as of divine strength and power.

Known by many other names, she is the gentle and nurturing aspect of the Hindu goddess Shakti and one of the central deities of the Goddess-oriented Shakta sect.

Goddess Saraswati

She is the Mother Goddess in Hinduism and has many attributes and aspects. Each of her aspects is expressed with a different name -- giving her over 100 names in regional Hindu stories of India.

Along with Lakshmi (goddess of wealth and prosperity) and Saraswati (goddess of knowledge and learning), she forms the Trinity of Goddesses (Tri-devi).

Wall carvings in Ellora Caves: Kalyanasundara wedding scene of Shiva/Parvati (wiki)

  

Deva Shiva and Devi Parvati like Greek gods

Parvati is the consort or wife of the Hindu god Shiva -- the protector, the destroyer (of evil), and regenerator of universe and all life, according to the Shaiva sect.

She is the daughter of the mountain King Himavan and Queen Mena. Parvati is also the mother of Hindu deities Ganesha and Kartikeya.

Shiva, Parvati (British Museum)

The Puranas also reference her as the sister of the preserver god Vishnu [who gets equated with the Buddha and other for being peaceful] and river goddess Ganga.

Along with Shiva, Parvati is a central deity in the Shaiva sect. In Hindu belief, she is the recreative energy and power of Shiva, and she is the cause of a bond that connects all beings and [not] a means of their spiritual release.

Uma Karuna Thurman among some pigs

In Hindu temples dedicated to her and Shiva, she is symbolically represented as the argha or yoni (womb, vulva, vagina, abode, uterus linked to the Shiva lingam).

She is found extensively in ancient Indian literature, and her statues and iconography grace Hindu temples all over South Asia and Southeast Asia. More

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Young Sadhvi once put her foot in her mouth in defense of Hindutva nationalism. And in an instant, there vanished our peaceful super heroine.

Social Dynamic of Theravada; Katy Perry

Ven. Thanissaro (accesstoinsight); Ashley Wells, CC Liu, Crystal Quintero Wisdom Quarterly

The Buddha taught a "forest tradition" for the end of suffering and gaining of enlightenment.

 .

Social Dynamic of Theravad Buddhist Practice

Pure and Simple (Kee Nanayon)

Upasika (devout female layfollower) Kee Nanayon, also known by her penname K. Khao-suan-luang, was arguably the foremost female Dharma teacher in 20th-century Thailand.

 

Born in 1901 to a Chinese merchant family in Rajburi, a town west of Bangkok...Her mother was a very religious woman and taught her the rudiments of Buddhist practice, such as nightly chants and the observance of the precepts, from an early age.
 

In later life she described how, at the age 6, she became so filled with fear and loathing at the miseries her mother went through in being pregnant and giving birth to a younger sibling that, on seeing the newborn child for the first time -- "sleeping quietly, a little red thing with black, black hair" -- she ran away from home for three days.

This experience, plus the anguish she must have felt when her parents separated, probably lay behind her decision, made when she was still quite young, never to submit to what she saw as the slavery of marriage.

During her teens she devoted her spare time to Dharma books and to meditation, and her working hours to a small business to support her father in his old age.

Her meditation progressed. It went well enough that she was able to teach her father meditation with fairly good results in the last year of his life. After his death she continued her business with the thought of saving up enough money to enable herself to live the remainder of her life in a secluded place and give herself fully to the practice.

Her aunt and uncle, who were also interested in Dharma practice, had a small home near a forested hill called Khao Suan Luang ("Royal Park Mountain") outside of Rajburi, where she often went to practice.

In 1945, life disrupted by World War II had begun to return to normal, so she gave up her business, joined her aunt and uncle in moving to the hill, and there the three of them began a life devoted entirely to meditation.

The small retreat they made for themselves in an abandoned monastic dwelling eventually grew to become the nucleus of a women's practice center that has flourished to this day.

 

Life at the retreat was frugal, in line with the fact that outside support was minimal in the early years. However, even now that the center has become well-known and well-established, the same frugal style has been maintained for its benefits in subduing greed, pride, and other mental defilements, as well as for the sublime forms of pleasure (piti and sukha) it offers by unburdening the heart.

The women practicing at the center are all vegetarian and abstain from such stimulants as tobacco, coffee, tea, and betel nut.

They meet daily for chanting, group meditation, and discussion of the practice. In the years when Upasika Kee's health was still strong, she would hold special meetings at which the members would report on their practice, after which she would give a talk touching on any important issues that had been brought up. It was during such sessions that most of the talks recorded in this volume were given.

Charts from the teachings of the Thai Living Buddhist Master Ajahn Jamnian

• Thai Forest Tradition Buddhist Master Ajahn Jamnian
• The Journey of One Buddhist Nun (SUNY Press)

In the center's early years, small groups of friends and relatives would visit on occasion to give support and to listen to Upasika Kee's Dharma talks. As word spread of the high standard of her teachings and practice, larger and larger groups came to visit, and more women began to join the community.

When tape recording was introduced to Thailand in the mid-1950's, friends began recording her talks and, in 1956, a group of them printed a small volume of her transcribed talks for free distribution.

By the mid-1960's, the stream of free Dharma literature from Royal Park Mountain -- Upasika Kee's talks and poetry -- had grown to a flood. This attracted even more people to her center and established her as one of the best-known Dharma teachers, male or female, in Thailand.

 

Upasika Kee was something of an autodidact (self taught). Although she picked up the rudiments of meditation during her frequent visits to Thai Buddhist monasteries in her youth, she practiced mostly on her own without any formal study under a meditation teacher.

Most of her instruction came from books -- the Pali canon and the works of contemporary Buddhist teachers -- and was tested in the crucible of her own relentless honesty.

Her later teachings show the influence of the writings of Ven. Buddhadasa, although she transformed his [teaching] concepts in ways that made them entirely her own. More

Royal Katy Perry (a.k.a. silly Catty Purry) is a tabloid  "princess" (wizzed.com)

.

Does Katy Perry want to be a nun?
"You skank, you can't buy our convent! I mean, we already sold it to this guy for less money, and the greedy Vatican can't stop us. And, by the way, you and your music suck!" -- this is the subtext, but the real story goes like this:

According to TIME, Two nuns want to stop Katy Perry from buying their convent.
 
"We feel we are being forced to violate our canonical vows"

Joanna Plucinska (TIME.com, July 21, 2015)

Katy Perry (Axelle/Bauer-Griffin-FilmMagic)

A couple of nuns are making Katy Perry’s life very difficult these days. The pop star wants to purchase an 8-acre property in Los Angeles, on which the nuns’ convent happens to be sited.

But the nuns, who are among five remaining members of an order known as the Sisters of the Most Holy and Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary, are having none of it. In court documents released on Friday, they say the sale would go against their sacred vows.
 
Perry has been competing with L.A. restaurateur and developer Dana Hollister for the property, which also includes a retreat house for priests, the New York Times reports.
 

Journey of One Buddhist Nun

Perry is offering a $10 million all-cash deal, with an additional $4.5 million to purchase a new retreat house for priests to replace the current one. Hollister is also willing to pay $10 million and an additional $5.5 million to buy out the lease on the priests’ house.
 
The Times says that the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles favors the Perry deal and claims to have control over the property, while the nuns prefer the Hollister arrangement.

“In selling to Katy Perry, we feel we are being forced to violate our canonical vows to the Catholic Church,” Sister Catherine Rose Holzman wrote to the Archdiocese of Los Angeles in a May 22 letter. The letter, among others, was revealed in court documents the nuns filed on Friday, CNBC uncovered.
 
The nuns said their objection to the sale to Perry had nothing to do with her risque performance style, the Times reports. Instead, they reportedly favor the Hollister deal because it would keep the convent open to the public. More

Craving, motherhood, and rebirth (sutra)

Amber Larson, Dhr. Seven, Crystal Quintero, Wisdom Quarterly, Mata Sutta (SN 15.14-19)

There are better ways to be pregnant, to deliver, and to mother (Nirrimi Firebrace/NM)

 .

Craving is our first mother (Rudi'Peni)

Thus have I heard. At one time the Blessed One was staying in Savatthi when he proclaimed:

"Rebirth (again becoming, this continued wandering on through samsara -- a process which is impermanent, impersonal, and unsatisfactory) runs far back into an incomprehensible past. Yet no beginning point is discerned when beings -- hindered by ignorance, ensnared by craving, [and inflamed by aversion manifesting as anger and fear] -- set off on this wandering.

 

"So long has this wandering been going on that it is difficult to come across any being who has not already been one's mother, father, sister, brother, son, and daughter at some time in the past.

 

"And why is that?

"Rebirth (or the "continued wandering on" that is samsara) runs far back into an incomprehensible past. Yet no beginning point is to be discerned when beings -- hindered by ignorance, ensnared by craving -- set off on this wandering [this journey through time and place, this continued wandering on in search of pleasure now here, now there, in search of final satisfaction, fulfillment, security].

These three things are true.

"Long have we all experienced suffering (disappointment, dissatisfaction, distress), experienced pain, experienced loss (separation from the loved), swelling up cemeteries -- long enough to become disenchanted with all formations (conditional phenomena, composite things, i.e., Five Aggregates of Clinging), enough to become dispassionate, enough to be liberated."

Motherhood
But motherhood is the most beautiful thing

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American Self-Realization Fellowship guru dies

Spiritual leader Sri Daya Mata dies in US
(Sify/IANS, Dec. 1) American-born, female successor to Indian spiritual leader Paramahansa Yogananda, Sri Daya Mata (born Faye Wright), has passed away after heading the worldwide religious movement founded in 1920 for over half a century. She was 96.

One of the first women in modern history to head an international religious movement, Daya Mata who died Monday in Los Angeles served as president and sangha-mata ("community-mother") for the Self-Realization Fellowship/Yogoda Satsanga Society of India (SRF/YSS), founded by Yogananda, author of Autobiography of a Yogi.

Faye Wright was born in Salt Lake City, Utah, on January 31, 1914. "Sri Daya Mata," as she came to be known, grew up in a Mormon family. Her grandfather, Abraham Reister Wright, was an architect of the Mormon Tabernacle in Salt Lake City and constructed a Tabernacle replica that now resides in the Smithsonian Institute in Washington.

In October 1931, at the age of 17, Faye Wright moved to Los Angeles and joined the Self-Realization Fellowship Monastic Order, according to a press release from the organization. More>>

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