Ordained Married Women in Tang China: Two Case Studies

Historical records and tomb inscriptions have provided foundational insights into the lives of elite women in the Tang Dynasty. However, our understanding of their beliefs—particularly their modes of participation and how they negotiated the tensions between faith and familial responsibilities—remains limited. Most existing scholarship has concentrated on their relationships with parents and children, exploring how they balanced personal spiritual obligations with filial piety and filial duties. In contrast, relatively little attention has been paid to how they managed their relationships with their husbands. This gap in research is partly attributable to the prevailing assumption that women involved in religious ordination were unmarried, either divorced or widowed. This study examines tomb inscriptions of two prominent elite women—Madame Li and Lady Liu—to investigate how they negotiated their faith within the context of their familial and marital relationships. I argue that, owing to their social status, women in the Tang Dynasty, particularly those from the noble and elite classes, engaged in religious activities through a variety of modes that reflect their multifaceted participation in religious life. This broader participation not only challenges conventional perceptions of women’s religious involvement but also reveals the complex ways in which gender, social status, and religious expression intersected during this period.