Qing Dynasty Religion

By the time the first opium war broke out, there were rebellions across the land of the Qing dynasty. One of the rebellions was the Taiping Rebellion. Prophet Hong Xiuquan leads the Taiping Rebellion. The uprising promised social reform, land redistribution, liberation for women. It also attacked Confucian values and wanted to create a simpler script for the people with goals were to make literacy more possible for everyone. Nonetheless, local landowners create a military that stops rebellions. The Manchurian government refused to enact these reforms. It created a larger gap in the division of the Manchus and

Consequently, Hong admitted new followers to the God Worshippers Society, a Christian sect propagating Hong’s religion and also accumulated more followers in various events like the Jintian Uprising. Over time, through means of preaching, Hong had amassed over 20,000 ardent followers, which mainly comprised of peasants. However, there were also some flaws with the Taipings and their leaders. They also burned villages and killed villagers, putting the people against their ways of living. This was one of the main reasons why the Taipings were not able to gain a substantial amount of followers to support their rebellion. Nonetheless, the leaders of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, Hong Xiuquan, Hong Rengan and others, sought out to advocate Hong’s ‘Christian’ religion. Hong Xiuquan himself was the one who had started preaching, but over time had delegated this to his subordinate kings. Hong Xiuquan was the ‘first tier’ advocate and the subordinate Taiping kings were the ‘second tier’ advocates. These men, though with different powers, had one common goal, to ‘Christianize’ China . This ultimately led to war between the Taipings and the Qing Dynasty, now known as the Taiping

China has been the home to various religions. At different times different dynasties endorsed certain religions while repressing others. While Buddhism flourished during the Sui and Tang dynasty, it faced opposition from the government during the Song dynasty. Confucianism lost government endorsement during the Sui and Tang but gained momentum during the Song as Neo-Confucianism. Yuan dynasty promoted Islam and Tibet Buddhism but ignored Confucianism. Different rulers sponsored and protected different religions but Confucianism and some form of Buddhism have always been alive in Chinese society from 600 to 1450.

Culture effected government in China from 500 BCE to 500 CE because the balance of belief systems employed in the different dynasties brought stability. The Qin Dynasty was most strongly influenced by Legalism, which believed in using force to create stability. The Han dynasty adopted Confucianism, which adopted the belief of fulfilling your role in order to create stability. Despite the fact that Confucianism and Legalism affected government in the Han and Qin dynasties, Daoism did not influence government and instead believed in natural order being the governing force. They felt that this would create balance between the government and their culture.

Some internal struggles that led to the fall of the Ottoman and the Qing were similar. Both civilizations strode to implement reforms to help restructure society. These reforms were more concentrated and more far-reaching in the Ottoman Empire, but we're just as ineffective as the Qing reforms. One of the Ottomans last sultans, Selim III, attempted to westernize society and the military. He exchanged ambassadors with European powers and allowed them to supervise Ottoman training. Over time, the westerners saw the Ottomans as barriers to more radical reforms. Thus, they began to clash with many classes in society, causing more conflict to arise. In China, many reforms were proposed and backed by radicals. The most well known radicals were the Taipings. Led by Hong Xuiquan, they sponsored

(4, 6, 7) Particularly during its largest period of influence (The Era of Division), they largely welcomed Buddhism, as it offered a type of refuge from the turmoil and war of that time period (ADD EV). Buddhism was very flexible, and as Zong Mi pointed out, was fairly flexible to the needs of the individual worshipper (Document 6). It disregarded previous social structures, and accepted people regardless of social status or education, as displayed in the records of Buddhist teachings transcribed by disciples (Document 4). Though, documents such as this one aren’t fully credible, as the events written about are transcribed by loyal, and heavily biased, disciples (SOURCE). But, around the 840s, the government’s view on Buddhism began to shift. Many confucian administrators claimed that the lack of taxes on the religion caused an economic deficit, feeding state fears and leading to restrictions, and later the open persecution of the religion by Emperor Wuzong (Doc 7). Monasteries either heavily taxed or destroyed, monks/nuns were forced to renounce their religion, and previously Buddhist lands were parceled out to landlords. (ADD EV). So despite the inclusiveness and flexibility of the religion with peasants, the ultimate persecution of worshippers affected buddhist members of the Chinese peasant class

Whats effects does religion have on culture? Why are they connected? Over time, humans have stopped hunting and gather to survive. Instead they have created civilizations as it is more effective. Religion and culture are connected because religion is the basis for civilization and culture. The Han Dynasty is structured with many different social classes, emperors being at the top. Confucianism played a big role on the social structure. Thus, the cultural setting of the dynasty was well documented. For example the many cultural achievements are known to us because they were written down.

During the 1300’s each empire during this time had a religion that was significant to their state and impacted them, this includes the Ottomans and the Ming. During the time period of the Ming dynasty, they based their states’ religion of Neo-Confucianism or “new-Confucianism”. Neo-Confucianism incorporates aspects of Buddhism and Taoism into tradition Confucian beliefs. Their religion had a significant impact on their State. After the Mongols conquered and ruled China, as a result China disunited. One of the main reasons the Ming Dynasty lasted long as an empire, was for the reason the restored and recenter China after the destruction of the Mongols. And their religion benefited them, for it helped unite china. Having one common religion upon an empire, would eventually cause the areas within the empire to unite. In addition the religion of the Ottoman Empire had a similar impact on its society. The ottomans were a Muslim based empire, but unlike other empires they didn’t force people within their empire to convert

The Chinese had many reasons to fear and ultimately reject the Westerners. The first anti-Christian movement was in 1616-1621 in Nanjing. This revolt was started by Shen

Chinese state and that was the major sticking point for the religion in China. For

At this point in history, the Chinese only wanted fellow Chinese to be ruler of their country. In result of the Manchus not being Chinese, rebellions took place habitually for decades. Nonetheless, this was soon to change. Kangxi was the first emperor of the Qing Dynasty,

“Qin Shi Huang was a fierce leader who was feared by his people.”(Source 1) Believing that knowledge about the past was dangerous, as were ideas that encouraged free and independent thinking, he banned the teaching of Confucius. He instead preferred what is known as legalism. Han Fei-tzu, a Legalist and the tutor of Shi Huangdi, wrote, "The ruler alone should possess the power, wielding it like lightning or like thunder." Qin Shi Huang ordered books and writing that did not support his ideas to be burned. Over 460 scholars were killed or enslaved for owning banned books. As religion played a big role in Ancient China the disrespecting of his subject’s beliefs, made him a forbidding

China’s religion is very diverse. One of the first religions is Confucianism. The creator was

The Chinese Empire was large and controlled most of Asia at one point in time. One of the dynasties that ruled the empire was the Ming Family. Ruling from 1368-1644, almost three hundred years, the Ming Dynasty impacted Chinese history very much.

Throughout the dynasties in China and Japan, religion, economy and politics have been affected by each other in various ways. In the book “Religion and Making of Modern East Asia”, Thomas Dubois brings to light the impact religion made on both politics and economy in China and Japan throughout the historical period up till date. In his words, he describes “religion as an extremely political force” (Dubois, 2011, pp. 7-16). As various religions were introduced, it shaped the politics of leaders as most of them saw it as an avenue to impose their religion on the citizens. In all, religion invented political and economic stabilities and instabilities in various dynasties throughout Japan and China