Chân Không

Sister Chân Không (born Cao Ngọc Phượng in 1938 in Bến Tre, Mekong Delta) is the first fully-ordained monastic disciple of Thích Nhất Hạnh and the Elder Bhikkhunī of the International Plum Village Sangha. Raised in a generous household, she learned compassion early — as a teenager, after encountering a hungry street child, she resolved to dedicate her life to helping the poor, tutoring wealthy students in mathematics to raise money for humanitarian work.

In 1959, she attended a lecture by Thích Nhất Hạnh and felt immediately struck: she had "never before heard anyone speak so beautifully and profoundly." When he founded the School of Youth for Social Service during the Vietnam War, she became one of six principal leaders, training over a thousand volunteers in nonviolent relief work. In 1966, she was among the six founding members of the Order of Interbeing. After departing Vietnam in 1969, she helped organize the Vietnamese Buddhist Peace Delegation and maritime rescue operations for Vietnamese boat people, personally disguising herself as a fisherman to locate refugees at sea.

Formally ordained as a nun in 1988, she co-founded Plum Village Monastery in 1982, transforming rustic French farmland into the largest Buddhist monastery in Europe. She pioneered the practices of "Beginning Anew," "Total Relaxation," and "Touching the Earth" meditations. Her autobiography, "Learning True Love," stands alongside the memoirs of Martin Luther King Jr. and Mahatma Gandhi as a testament to the integration of contemplative practice with nonviolent social action.