Ordained in 1974, he trained in the Thai Forest Tradition of Theravada Buddhism under his teacher Ajahn Chah.

[citation needed] He won a scholarship to study theoretical physics[2] at Emmanuel College, University of Cambridge in the late 1960s.

[3] After graduation, he taught mathematics at a high school in Devon for one year before travelling to Thailand to become a monk and train with Ajahn Chah Bodhinyana Mahathera.

[1] Brahm was ordained in Bangkok at the age of twenty-three by Somdet Kiaw, the abbot of Wat Saket.

He subsequently spent nine years studying and training in the forest meditation tradition under Ajahn Chah.

Left in charge, Ajahn Brahm took on the role and was soon being invited to provide his teachings in other parts of Australia and Southeast Asia.

He has been a speaker at the International Buddhist Summit in Phnom Penh in 2002 and at three Global Conferences on Buddhism.

[citation needed] He also dedicates time and attention to the sick and dying, those in prison or ill with cancer, people wanting to learn to meditate, and also to his Sangha of monks at Bodhinyana.

[5][6] The ordination ceremony took place at Ajahn Brahm's Bodhinyana Monastery at Serpentine, Australia.

Although bhikkhuni[7] ordinations had taken place in California and Sri Lanka, this was the first in the Thai Forest Tradition and proved highly controversial in Thailand.

There is no consensus in the wider tradition that bhikkhuni ordinations could be valid, having last been performed in Thailand over 1,000 years ago, though the matter has been under active discussion for some time.

Someone like Bhikkhu Bodhi [a respected Theravada scholar–monk] has researched the Pali Vinaya and his paper is one of the most eloquent I've seen—fair, balanced, comes out on the side of "It's possible, why don't we do this?

"[8]For his actions of 22 October 2009, on 1 November 2009, at a meeting of senior members of the Thai forest monastic Sangha in the Ajahn Chah lineage, held at Wat Pah Pong, Ubon Ratchathani, Brahm was removed from the Ajahn Chah Forest Sangha lineage and is no longer associated with the main monastery in Thailand, Wat Pah Pong, nor with any of the other Western Forest Sangha branch monasteries of the Ajahn Chah tradition.

Its long-term aspiration is to develop a monastery with a harmonious and meditative atmosphere, for women who wish to train towards full ordination.

At a conference in Singapore in 2014, he said he was very proud to have been able to perform a same-sex marriage blessing for a couple in Norway, and stressed that Buddhist teachings do not discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation.

[13][14] In 2015, during the Rohingya refugee crisis, the Buddhist Society of Western Australia donated money to support displaced orphans in Bangladesh.

[17] Whilst still a junior monk, Ajahn Brahm was asked to undertake the compilation of an English-language guide to the Buddhist monastic code—the vinaya.

[20] He returned to the office of Spiritual Director of the Buddhist Society of Western Australia on 22 April 2018, after briefly resigning in March, following a contentious vote by members of the BSWA during their annual general meeting.

[22] Under the auspices of the Diamond Jubilee of King Rama IX, Bhumibol Adulyadej, in June 2006, Ajahn Brahm was given the title of Phra Visuddhisamvarathera.

[23] On 5 September 2019, Ajahn Brahm was awarded the Order of Australia, General Division medal, for services to Buddhism and gender equality.