- title:: [Was there widespread religious strife in pre-modern Asia?](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/tz63wf/was_there_widespread_religious_strife_in/) - author:: [[JSTORRobinhood]] (flaired user: Late Imperial China) - via:: [[rAskHistorians]] - date:: 2022-04-09 - [b] related:: [What became of the God Worshipping Society after the fall of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom?](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/ektk6s/what_became_of_the_god_worshipping_society_after/fddsof9/) by [[EnclavedMicrostate]] 2020-06-06 There were definitely periods of religious and sectarian violence or violence can at least in part trace its origins to tension between belief systems. There were also periods of violence driven by people of one group against people of another which may not have been strictly a result of conflicts in belief systems. I will consider all of these forms of violence to be 'religious strife' (for the purpose of this answer just to give a more fleshed out answer). As for whether or not religious violence was widespread, that is more difficult to answer since 'widespread' definitely needs additional qualifiers. These periods of upheaval, of both state-sponsored and popular origins, certainly impacted large swathes of Chinese society as you'll see so in a way, they were 'widespread' events. But I also can't speak much about Korean and Japanese history before the modern era so across the whole of East Asia, giving a solid answer to how widespread such events were requires additional input. The Tang dynasty experienced periods of religious strife during its long hold over the Chinese heartland. The Tang maintained strong trading relationships and in the south, there were many merchants of different faiths who intermingled with Tang subjects directly. During this period, a number of different faiths mixed including the Nestorian sect of Christianity, Islam, Zoroastrianism, etc. But even during the late 7th century only a few decades after the total unification of China under Tang rule, there were accounts of violence against the state and by the state against non-Tang subjects who were broadly of non-Chinese faiths (namely Chinese sects of Buddhism, Daoism, or Confucianism). In 684CE for instance, the governor of Guangzhou was apparently murdered by a foreign ship captain. Then in 758, there was a sacking of Guangzhou by Persian and Arab sailors, causing a precipitous drop in the quantity of maritime trade coming into the port for decades due to the damage done. Not long after than in about 800, a southern Chinese official named Wang E apparently enriched himself greatly by imposing heavy tariffs well beyond legal requirements on any foreign merchants who wished to conduct trade in Guangdong then pocketing the difference between the Wang E rate and the legal rate. During the reign of Tang Wuzong in the Huichang era (841-846), the emperor himself mandated the persecution of what were deemed to be alien or 'foreigner' sects within the declining Tang empire. Buddhist temples were plundered and destroyed, their treasures sent to the imperial treasury. Other religions were targeted as well, causing damage to the multicultural fabric of the empire as well as to the various religious communities in the Tang. To top everything off, the rebellion of Huang Chao in the late 9th century towards the end of the Tang saw a massacre of a large number of non-Chinese inhabitants of Guangzhou, with Christian, Muslim, and Middle Eastern people seemingly targeted.1 Each of these events is an example of inter-group conflict and perhaps the most obvious example of religious conflict stems from the state-sponsored culling of religions under Tang Wuzong. In more recent, early modern Chinese history, there were a number of major rebellions which were at least in part influenced by what we could call religious factors. As the Yuan Dynasty was beset by serious problems towards the end of Mongol rule of China in the early and mid-14th century, the Red Turbans who rose up in various movements against the Yuan could be argued to have been in part influenced by the White Lotus system of beliefs.2 The ultimate victor and founder of the Ming dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang, had been an itinerant, semi-literate Buddhist monk before joining one of the rebel movements against the Yuan in the mid-14th century. Zhu Yuanzhang has also been described as 'the single most important sectarian leader to become an emperor', no doubt a testament to the degree with which Zhu wielded religion as a tool of rebellion.2 As the newly enthroned Hongwu Emperor, Zhu then seems to have distanced himself from his 'heterodox' Buddhist beliefs to officially endorse the Confucian orthodoxy, but even then, the new dynastic name his chose, Ming, seems to at least echo some of the Buddhist and White Lotus teachings. But irrespective of how much or little his previous life influenced his tenure on the throne, it is definitely possible to say that the rebellion he led had at least a degree of religious influence and thus serves as an example of religious conflict within China. Later on towards the end of the Ming, sectarian disagreement broke out among the ruling scholar-gentry class stemming from increasing factional politics between not just civil officials, but also between eunuchs, state institutions, and others. But that is a whole other can of worms which can be opened at another time. ^d637fe The Qing experienced a number of religious movements as well. Perhaps most famously, the Taiping War in the mid-19th century is a pretty clear example of... conflict with religious characteristics. It really isn't a good enough characterization to simply call the Taiping rebellion a strictly 'Christian' rebellion despite the sort of influences that Hong Xiuquan drew from. Hong had contact with Christian missionaries in China both before and during the rebellion and also had access to print materials designed to help introduce the fashionable, 19th-century evangelical Christian faith to the Qing populace. But regardless, the modus operandi of the Taiping Kingdom's administration and the realized belief system in place within the rebelling forces seem to indicate (at least to me) that the Taiping religion was more of a syncretic sect with strong Christian influence than strictly adhering to some sort of Christian denomination.4 Nonetheless, it would be difficult to avoid the fact that this movement was in part driven by sectarian divides even if a great deal of the chaos and destruction merely capitalized upon the greatly weakened Qing dynasty and not necessarily on diametrically opposed belief systems. For further reading on non-Taiping Qing dynasty religious rebellions, I have linked some papers [here](https://www.jstor.org/stable/188811) and [here](https://www.jstor.org/stable/41649980). For even more research, there was also another Red Turban Rebellion in the mid-19th century, which also had a degree of religious influence, which might be of interest. ^f25a0b So to summarize, yes, sectarian strife was not unheard of in China. China has long been a heterogenous society especially when it comes to beliefs with orthodox and heterodox systems in constant tension with one another at all levels and with varying levels of popular and official patronage. Within certain belief systems, there were even orthodox and heterodox strains (Confucian factionalism and Buddhist sects, for instance). It is then not too surprising that violence and conflict would arise from such a sociopolitical environment. ^49c7c5 1. Adam Fong. ["'Together They Might make Trouble': Cross-Cultural Interactions in Tang Dynasty Guangzhou, 618-907 C.E."](https://www.jstor.org/stable/43818461) in _Journal of World History, vol. 25, n. 4._ University of Hawai'i Press. 2. Hok-Lam Chan. ["The 'Song' Dynasty Legacy: Symbolism and Legitimation from Han Liner to Zhu Yuanzhang of the Ming Dynasty"](https://www.jstor.org/stable/40213653) in _Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies,_ _vol. 68, n. 1_. Harvard-Yenching Institute. 3. Frederick Wakeman, Jr. ["Rebellion and Revolution: The Study of Popular Movements in Chinese History"](https://www.jstor.org/stable/2053720) in _The Journal of Asian Studies, vol. 36, n. 2._ Cambridge University Press. 4. Eugene Boardman. ["Christian Influence Upon the Ideology of the Taiping Rebellion"](https://www.jstor.org/stable/2049091) in _The Far Eastern Quarterly, vol. 10, n. 2._ Association for Asian Studies.