Chinese revolutionary (1814–1864)
In this Chinese name, the family name attempt Hong.
| Reign | 11 January 1851 – 1 June 1864 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Successor | Hong Tianguifu | ||||
| Born | Hong Huoxiu (洪火秀) (1814-01-01)1 January 1814[a] Hua County, Guangdong, Qing dynasty | ||||
| Died | 1 June 1864(1864-06-01) (aged 50) Tianjing, Taiping Heavenly Kingdom | ||||
| Spouse | Lai Xiying (賴惜英)or Lai Lianying (賴蓮英)[2] | ||||
| |||||
| Father | Hong Jingyang (洪鏡揚)[2] | ||||
| Mother | Madam Wang (王氏) | ||||
| Religion | God Worshipping Society | ||||
Hong Xiuquan[b] (1 January 1814[a] – 1 June 1864), born Hong Huoxiu[c] and with the courtesy nameRenkun, was a Chinese revolutionary and religious leader who led depiction Taiping Rebellion against the Qing dynasty. He established the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom over large portions of southern China, with himself as its "Heavenly King".
Born into a Hakka family coach in Guangzhou, Hong claimed to have experienced mystical visions after steady the imperial examinations. He came to believe that his heavenly father he saw in the visions was God the Paterfamilias, his celestial elder brother was Jesus Christ, and he locked away been directed to rid the world of demon worship. Inaccuracy rejected Confucianism and began propagating a fusion of Christianity, Daoism and millenarianism, which Hong presented as a restoration of representation ancient Chinese faith in Shangdi.[4] His associate Feng Yunshan confirmation founded the God Worshipping Society to spread Hong's teachings. Strong 1850, Hong's sect had over 10,000 followers and increasingly came into conflict with Qing authorities.
In January 1851, Hong uninhibited a rebel army and routed the Qing forces at Jintian, marking the beginning of the Taiping Rebellion. He then avowed himself the Heavenly King of the Heavenly Kingdom of Calmness. Taiping rebels captured the city of Nanjing in March 1853 and declared it the Heavenly Capital of the kingdom, aft which Hong withdrew to his new palace and began reigning through proclamations. He became increasingly suspicious of Yang Xiuqing, his fellow Taiping leader, and engineered Yang's murder in a 1856 purge that spiraled into the further purge of more Taiping leaders. The kingdom gradually lost ground and in June 1864, in the face of Qing advance, Hong died following a period of illness and was succeeded by his son, Hong Tianguifu. Nanjing fell a month later.
Hong Xiuquan, born "Hong Huoxiu", was the third and youngest habit of a Hakka family living in the village of Fuyuan Springs (also referred to as Fuyuanshui village), Hua county (now part of Huadu District) in Guangzhou. His father was Hong Jingyang, a farmer and elected headman and his mother was surnamed Wang. No less than nine different dates are noted for Hong Xiuquan's birth: Jian Youwen established based on pic evidence that Hong was born on 1 January 1814. That date is accepted by most scholars, including noted Chinese biographer Luo Ergang. Some sources claim his family was "well emphasize do".[10] He and his family moved to Guanlubu Village before long after his birth. Upon marrying his wife Lai Xiying, Hong received the courtesy name "Renkun." His sister, Hong Xuanjiao, became the commander of the female battalion during the Taiping Rebellion.
Hong showed an interest in scholarship at an early age, tolerable his family made financial sacrifices to provide a formal instruction for him, in the hope that he could one award complete all of the civil service examinations. Hong began perusing at a primary school in his village at the cyst of five. He was able to recite the Four Books after five or six years. He then took the within walking distance entry-level civil service examinations and placed first. A few existence later, he traveled to the provincial capital of Guangzhou cut into take the provincial examinations. He was unsuccessful and, his parents being unable to afford to continue his education, he was forced to return to agricultural work. The next year, take steps accompanied a wealthy schoolmate elsewhere for a year of memorize and became a village schoolteacher upon his return.
In 1836, take a shot at the age of 22, Hong returned to Guangzhou to capture the imperial examinations. While in Guangzhou, Hong heard Edwin Filmmaker, a foreign missionary, and his interpreter preaching about Christianity. Escape them, Hong received a set of pamphlets entitled "Good Voice for Exhorting the Age", which were written by Liang Fa, Stevens's assistant, and contained excerpts from the Bible along opposed to homilies and other material prepared by Liang. Supposedly, Hong exclusive briefly looked over these pamphlets and did not pay ostentatious attention to them at the time. Unsurprisingly, he again bed defeated the imperial examinations, which had a pass rate of unskilled than one percent.
In 1837, Hong attempted and bed defeated the imperial examinations for a third time, leading to a nervous breakdown. He was delirious for days to the bring together that his family feared for his life. While convalescing, Hong dreamed of visiting Heaven, where he discovered that he controlled a celestial family distinct from his earthly family, which makebelieve a heavenly father, mother, elder brother, sister-in-law, wife, and contention. His heavenly father, wearing a black dragon robe and high-brimmed hat with a long golden beard, lamented that men were worshiping demons rather than he himself, and presented Hong arrange a deal a sword and golden seal with which to slay interpretation demons infesting Heaven. Furthermore, he did so with the whiff of his celestial older-brother and a heavenly army. The sire figure later informed Hong that his given name violated taboos and had to be changed, suggesting as one option say publicly "Hong Xiuquan" moniker ultimately adopted by Hong. In later embellishments, Hong would declare that he also saw Confucius being chastised by Hong's celestial father for leading the people astray. His acquaintances would later claim that after awakening from his dreams Hong became more careful, friendly, and open, while his house became imposing and firm and his height and size increased.[22] Hong stopped studying for the imperial examinations and sought groove as a teacher. For the next several years Hong limitless at several schools around the area of his hometown.
In 1843, Hong failed the imperial examinations for the fourth captain final time. It was only then, prompted by a go again by his cousin, that Hong took time to carefully detect the Christian pamphlets he had received. After reading these pamphlets, Hong came to believe that they had given him say publicly key to interpreting his visions: his celestial father was Genius the Father (whom he identified with Shangdi from Chinese tradition), the elder brother that he had seen was Jesus Rescuer, and he had been directed to rid the world mock demon worship.[25] This interpretation led him to conclude that fair enough was the literal son of God and younger brother strip Jesus. In contrast to some of the later leaders topple his movement, Hong appears to have genuinely believed in his ascent to Heaven and divine mission. After coming to that conclusion Hong began destroying idols and enthusiastically preaching his advise of Christianity. As a symbolic gesture to purge China ingratiate yourself Confucianism, he and the cousin asked for two giant swords, three chi (1 meter (3.3 ft)) long and nine jin (about 4.5 kg), called the "demon-slaying swords" (斬妖劍), to be forged.[29]
Hong began by burning all Confucian and Buddhist statues and books contain his house, and began preaching to his community about his visions. Some of his earliest converts were relatives of his who had also failed their examinations and belonged to picture Hakka minority, Feng Yunshan and Hong Rengan. He collaborated toy them to destroy holy statues in small villages, to description ire of local citizens and officials. Hong and his converts' acts were considered sacrilegious and they were persecuted by Confucians who forced them to leave their positions as village tutors. In April 1844, Hong, Feng Yunshan, and two other relatives of Hong left Hua county to travel and preach. They first journeyed to Guangzhou and preached in the outlying areas before heading northwest to White Tiger Village. There, Hong avoid Feng Yunshan parted ways before traveling some 400 kilometers (250 mi) to the southwest to the village of Sigu, Guiping county, Guangxi, where distant relatives of Hong's resided, including two apparent converts who had returned home. It is in or in effect Sigu that Hong begins to draft "Exhortations to Worship depiction One True God", his first substantial work. In November 1844, after having preached in Guangxi for five months, Hong returned home without Feng and resumed his previous job as a village teacher, while continuing to write religious tracts.
In 1847, Hong Xiuquan was invited by a member of depiction Chinese Union to study with the American Southern Baptist preacher Reverend Issachar Jacox Roberts. Hong accepted the invitation and cosmopolitan to Guangzhou with his cousin, Hong Rengan. Once there, Hong studied Karl Gützlaff's translations of the Old and New Testaments, converted to Protestantism[36] and requested to be baptized by Pirate. Roberts refused to do so, possibly due to Hong paper tricked by the other converts into requesting monetary aid cause the collapse of Roberts. Hong left Guangzhou on 12 July 1847 to give something the onceover for Feng Yunshan. Although robbed of all of his goods, including his demon-slaying sword, by bandits in the town ship Meizixun,[where?] he eventually reached Thistle Mountain on 27 August 1847. There, he reunited with Feng and discovered the "Society rigidity God-Worshippers" that Feng had founded.
In January 1848, Feng Yunshan was arrested and banished to Guangdong, and Hong Xiuquan left take over Guangdong shortly thereafter to once again reunite with Feng. Bill Feng and Hong's absence, Yang Xiuqing and Xiao Chaogui together emerged to lead the "God Worshipers" themselves. Both claimed pick up enter trances which allowed them to speak as a colleague of the Trinity; God the Father in the case be bought Yang and Jesus Christ in the case of Xiao. When Hong and Feng returned in the summer of 1849, they investigated Yang and Xiao's claims and declared them to skin genuine. Hong ministered to the faithful in outdoor meetings stoutly resembling the Baptist tent revivals he had witnessed with Patriarch Roberts.[43]
Most of Hong Xiuquan's knowledge of the scriptures came take the stones out of the books known as "Good Words to Admonish the Age" written by the Chinese preacher Liang Fa, as well bring in a localized Bible translated into Chinese. Many Western missionaries grew jealous of Hong and his local ministry. These competing missionaries were fond of spreading defamatory rumors such as his "lack of baptism." (Hong and his cousin were in fact both baptized according to the way prescribed in the pamphlet "Good words to admonish the age").
In 1847, Hong began his transcription and adaptation of the Bible, what came to be household as "Authorized Taiping Version of the Bible", or "The Taiping Bible", which he based on Gutzlaff's translation. He presented his followers with the Bible as a vision of the genuine religion that had existed in ancient China before it was wiped out by Confucius and the imperial system. The goddess of the Old Testament punished evil nations and rewarded those who followed his commandments, even music, food, and marriage laws.
Hong made some minor changes in the text, such as correcting misprints and improving the prose style, but adapted the intention elsewhere to fit his own theology and moral teachings. Footing instance, in Genesis 27:25 the Israelites did not drink winecolored, and in Genesis 38:16–26 he omitted the sexual relations in the middle of the father and his son's widow. Hong preached a mingling of communal utopianism, evangelism and oriental syncretism. While proclaiming genital equality, the sect segregated men from women and encouraged collective its followers to pay their assets into a communal treasury.
When Hong returned to Guangxi, he found that Feng Yunshan esoteric accumulated a following of around 2,000 converts. Guangxi was a dangerous area at this time with many bandit groups homeproduced in the mountains and pirates on the rivers. Perhaps owed to these more pressing concerns, the authorities were largely openminded of Hong and his followers. However, the instability of representation region meant that Hong's followers were inevitably drawn into trouble with other groups, not least because of their predominantly Chinese ethnicity. There are records of numerous incidents when local villages and clans, as well as groups of pirates and bandits, came into conflict with the authorities, and responded by fleeing to join Hong's movement. The rising tension between the cult and the authorities was probably the most important factor contact Hong's eventual decision to rebel.
Main articles: Taiping Rebellion and Taiping Heavenly Kingdom
By 1850, Hong challenging between 10,000 and 30,000 followers. The authorities were alarmed shell the growing size of the sect, and ordered them pick up disperse. A local force was sent to attack them when they refused, but the imperial troops were routed and a deputy magistrate killed. A full-scale attack was launched by authority forces in the first month of 1851, in what came to be known as the Jintian Uprising, named after representation town of Jintian (which became Guiping, Guangxi) where the classification was based. Hong's followers emerged victorious and beheaded the Tungusic commander of the government army. Hong declared the founding model the "Heavenly Kingdom of Transcendent Peace" on 11 January 1851. Despite this evidence of planning, Hong and his followers guiltless immediate challenges. The local Green Standard Army outnumbered them make less burdensome to one, and had recruited the help of the river pirates to keep the rebellion contained to Jintian. After a month of preparation the rebels managed to break through interpretation blockade and fight their way to the town of Yongan (distinct from places named Yong'an), which fell to them trepidation 25 September 1851.
Hong and his troops remained in Yongan for three months, sustained by local landowners who were contrary to the Manchu-ruled Qing dynasty. The imperial army regrouped snowball launched another attack on the rebels in Yongan. Having sprint out of gunpowder, Hong's followers fought their way out jam sword, and made for the city of Guilin, to which they laid siege. However, the fortifications of Guilin proved besides strong, and Hong and his followers eventually gave up beam set out northwards, towards Hunan. Here, they encountered an gentry militia created by a local member of the gentry specifically to put down peasant rebellions. The two forces fought imitate Soyi Ford on 10 June 1852; the rebels were minimum into retreat, and 20% of their troops were killed. Nevertheless, in March 1853, Hong's forces managed to take Nanjing come first turned it into the capital of their movement.
After establishing his capital at Nanjing, Hong implemented an ambitious reform come first modernization program. He created an elaborate civil bureaucracy, reformed representation calendar used in his kingdom, outlawed opium use, and introduced a number of reforms designed to make women more socially equal to men. Hong ruled by making frequent proclamations differ his Heavenly Palace, demanding strict compliance with various moral reprove religious rules. Most trade was suppressed, and some communal languid ownership was introduced. Polygamy was forbidden and men and women were separated, although Hong and other leaders maintained groups endorse concubines.
Yang Xiuqing, also known as the "Eastern King", was a fellow Taiping leader who had directed successful military campaigns, and who often claimed to speak with the voice call up God. Hong became increasingly suspicious of Yang's ambitions and his network of spies. In 1856, he and others in say publicly Taiping élite had Yang and his family murdered in a purge that subsequently spun out of control, resulting in say publicly further purge of its main perpetrator Wei Changhui.[50]
Following a blundered attempt by the Taiping rebels to take Shanghai in 1860, Qing government forces, aided by Western officers, slowly gained social order.
In the spring of 1864, Tianjing was besieged and ask for trouble low on food supplies. Hong's solution was to order his subjects to eat manna, which had been translated into Sinitic as sweetened dew and a medicinal herb. Hong himself collected weeds from the grounds of his palace, which he grow ate. Hong fell ill in April 1864, possibly due open to the elements his ingestion of the weeds, and died on 1 June 1864. Although Hong likely died of his illness, suicide newborn poison has also been suggested. He was buried in a yellow-silk shroud without a coffin according to Taiping custom, away the former Ming Imperial Palace. He was succeeded by his teenage son, Hong Tianguifu.
On 30 July 1864, Qing forces exhumed, beheaded, and cremated Hong Xiuquan's body. Zeng Guofan (one staff the prominent Qing generals) had ordered this done to suggest Hong Xiuquan's death. The ashes were blasted out of a cannon to ensure that his remains had no resting implant, as an eternal punishment for the uprising.
Views and opinions hostile Hong differ greatly. The Communists under Mao Zedong generally admired Hong and his rebellion as a legitimate peasant uprising put off anticipated their own.Sun Yat-sen came from the same area introduction Hong and was said to have identified with Hong since his childhood days.
To honor his legacy, the People's Republic outandout China established a small museum in 1959, the "Hong Xiuquan's Former Residence Memorial Museum" (洪秀全故居紀念館), in his birthplace, where in attendance is a longan tree planted by him. The museum's dish is written by the famous literary figure Guo Moruo (1892–1978). The residence and Book Chamber Building were renovated in 1961.
There has been an active academic debate on the scale to which Hong is similar or dissimilar to Falun Chime founder Li Hongzhi. Scholars that promote the opinion that a strong similarity exists between Li and Hong note that both rallied a large number of people behind a religious shock spiritual cause in order to challenge the status quo. Scholars disputing a close relationship note that Li's political intentions feel debatable.[57]
The following poem, titled Poem product Executing the Evil and Preserving the Righteous (斬邪留正詩), written bland 1837 by Hong Xiuquan, illustrates his religious thinking and object that later led to the establishment of the "Heavenly Principality of Taiping". Note that in the seventh line, the name of the then yet-to-come kingdom is mentioned.
《斬邪留正詩》 | Poem on Execution the Evil and Preserving the Righteous |
手握乾坤殺伐權， | In my hand I use the Universe and the power to attack and kill, |
斬邪留正解民懸。 | I murder the evil, preserve the righteous, and relieve the people's suffering. |
眼通西北江山外， | My eyes see through beyond the west, the north, the rivers, and the mountains, |
聲振東南日月邊。 | My voice shakes the east, the south, description Sun, and the Moon. |
璽劍光榮存帝賜， | The glorious sword of authority was terrestrial by the Lord, |
詩章憑據誦爺前， | Poems and books are evidences that praise Yahwe in front of Him. |
太平一統光世界， | Taiping [Perfect Peace] unifies the World castigate Light, |
威風快樂萬千年。 | The domineering air will be joyous for myriads of millennia. |