Chinese history is full of amazing strange people and stories,
for example did you know Jesus had a Chinese brother?
It’s true, ..... possibly.
Today we are going to look at one of the bloodiest events in the 19 Century
and the man commanded by his heavenly father to set it in motion.
Ladies and Gentlemen, today we are talking about Hong XiuQuan.
Hong Xiuquan, born Hong Huoxiu, was born in 1814
in a small Guandong village called Fuyuanshui.
Hong was the youngest of four children
and from an early age showed signs of interest in academia.
When Hong’s family were no longer able to afford his tuition fees,
he became a tutor to make money and pursue his dream
of passing the notoriously difficult civil service examinations.
After coming first in his local civil service examinations
he made the move to Guangzhou
to take on the provincial examinations.
While in Guangzhou,
Hong overheard evangelical missionaries preaching the “good word”.
Despite receiving translated copies of the bible,
Hong Xiuquan apparently put them away and ignored them.
He continued on with his academic career until he reached the imperial civil service exams ...
now here comes my favorite part…
After failing multiple times,
Hong Xiuquan suffered a nervous breakdown
which resulted in him having prophetic visions.
In one dream, Hong met God himself,
and was informed that he was his son and brother of Jesus Christ.
He was given a fiery sword and magic seal
and was instructed to rid China of demons.
After a few years,
Hong rallied a few of his fellow villagers and began destroying Confucian,
Buddhist and Taoist statues and scriptures
preaching a surprisingly well crafted form of warped Christian proto-communism.
We may laugh now at the thought of a Chinese man
proclaiming himself to be the Second son of God
sent on a demon slaying mission,
but this was a time when China was ruled by the then despised Manchu Minority
and China was quickly being invaded and divided by the west,
uprisings occurred every other week.
Hong Xiuquan’s plan seemed as solid as anyone else’s.
What’s more Hong successfully ridded Guangxi of bandits.
He had a plan,
and he was proving himself to be an effective "demon slayer"
regardless of whether they believed he was a prophet,
there was no reason not to follow him.
So it’s no surprise that in the short span of a few years,
Hong amassed an army of tens of thousands.
Once united Hong Xiuquan and his so called “God worshippers"
Travelled throughout China displacing Qing Leadership
in what was the bloodiest rebellion of the 19th Century,
not just in China, but in the entire world.
To put this in perspective,
around 700,000 people were killed during the American civil war
and during World War 1 around 16 million people died,
during Hong XiuQuan’s Taiping Rebellion
An estimated 20 million lost their lives as a result of fighting.
Considering the time that this took place, even today,
that number is staggering.
It’s around 143 times more lives
than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima!
Hong XiuQuan was not playing around.
Their crusade led them to the then capital China, Nanjing,
were they established the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom with Hong Xiuquan as their Emperor.
Once declaring himself Emperor China,
Hong set about putting into effect his reforms,
and for many of them, were actually pretty solid ideas.
Hong declared that women should no longer practice the binding of feet,
a barbaric fashion preference that become almost compulsory under the Qing Rule.
Hong also declared that land should be evenly shared among people,
free from the control of landlords and government
slavery, concubines, arranged marriages, opium smoking, judicial torture,
and the worship of idols were all to be eliminated.
So, if Hong’s crusade was seemingly so successful
and his thoughts on how the country should be run was reasonably solid,
how did he fail?
The main reason for the Taiping’s Kingdom’s downfall
didn’t come enemy attacks but from Hong XiuQuan himself.
Hong’s appointed “East King” Yang Xiuqing also claimed to speak to god
and combined with his network of spies pushed Hong Xiuquan to his mental breaking point.
Hong ordered a massive culling of Yang and his men
which also lead to the purge of his leaders
His paranoia even led to his own family questioning his sanity.
This coupled with the fact that the cities they liberated
were not well protected or had adequate leadership
meant that once the Taiping kingdom was established,
it started collapsing under itself.
Then in 1864, 11 years after capturing China’s Capital City Hong XiuQuan passed away.
some say it was suicide others, illness
As Kingdom lost its king, any last remanence of hope crumbled
and the Qing forces retook the capital
and crushed the rebellion just months after Hong’s passing.
Some say that that was the end of the Taiping Rebellions crusade,
but was it really?
The truth is that while the rebellion may have lost
and the message may have been delivered differently,
much of the Taiping governmental ideology
has lived on in China to this very day.
Sun Yatsen, often called the grandfather of modern China
was often quoted as calling himself Hong XiuQuan the second,
his writings of the People three principles,
echoed many of Hong xiuquan’s own sentiments regarding how a China should be run.
From there, both Mao Zedong and ChangKai shek,
who lead the opposing sides of China’s Civil war
were both heavily influenced by Sun Yatsen.
As we know, Mao Zedong eventually won the civil war
and Changkai shek fled to Taiwan and established his own republic,
and it can be said that for both countries the founding,
ideology and implementation of many policies can directly linked
to the legacy of Hong XiuQuan’s Taiping Rebellion.
So there you have it!
The demon slaying son of God who somehow set the stage for modern Chinese thinking.
If you liked this video and would like to find out more about the bizarreness that is Chinese history
be sure to like comment and subscribe.
Or if you want to be truly amazing,
you can head on over to our patreon page and help this channel grow.
As of right now, new videos will be up every two weeks,
but with your help we can speed up this process
Thank you for watching, I’m Wookong, see you soon.