Ethnic and Religious Violence in South C

Front. Hist.
China 2016, 11(4): 532–562

DOI 10.3868/s020-005-016-0032-5

RESEARCH ARTICLE
Robert J. Antony
Ethnic and Religious Violence in South China: The

Hakka-Tiandihui Uprising of 1802
Abstract In 1802 the second major Tiandihui (Heaven and Earth Society)
uprising erupted in the mountains of Huizhou prefecture near Canton. Before it
was suppressed over a year later, the disturbances came to involve several tens of
thousands of people and nearly a quarter of Guangdong province. This study,
which is based on extant historical sources and fieldwork, takes an interdisciplinary
approach, combining the methodologies of history, anthropology, and folklore.
The areas where the uprising occurred were predominantly Hakka, an ethnic
Chinese minority who came into conflict with the earlier settlers, known as the
Punti. As violence escalated, both sides organized their own paramilitary units:
Hakka formed Tiandihui groups and Punti formed Ox Head Societies.
Significantly too, the Tiandihui groups in Huizhou belonged to a much wider
network of secret society and sectarian organizations that spread across the Hakka
heartland on the Jiangxi, Fujian, and Guangdong border. This article addresses key
issues concerning the social, political, and religious contexts and motivations of this
Hakka-led uprising.
Keywords Hakka, Punti, Tiandihui, ethnic feuds, violence, Buddhist lay sects,
Dachengjiao
Introduction
In 1802 in the mountains of Huizhou prefecture, Guangdong province, Hakka
communities banded together to form secret societies that rose up in revolt. As a
marginalized ethnic minority, the Hakka organized themselves in this way for
mutual aid and self-protection. Official records usually labeled them as the Heaven

Robert J. Antony ( )
Canton’s Thirteen Hongs Research Center, Guangzhou University, Guangzhou 510006, China
E-mail: rjantony2015@outlook.com
Ethnic and Religious Violence in South China 533
and Earth Society (Tiandihui 天地會) or the Adding Brothers Society (Tiandihui
1
添弟會). The year 1802 marks the first major Tiandihui rebellion in Guangdong
and the second major Tiandihui rebellion in Chinese history. Before the uprising
was suppressed over a year later, the disturbances came to involve tens of thousands
of people and almost a quarter of Guangdong province. Significantly, too, the
Map 1 Distribution of Tiandihui, Dachengjiao, and Hakka Areas in Early 19th Century
Guangdong, Jiangxi, and Fujian

1
The Adding Brothers Society, which in Chinese is a homonym for the Heaven and Earth
Society, in the nineteenth century appeared as a frequent variant for the latter society.
534 Robert J. Antony
Tiandihui groups in Huizhou forged links with a much wider network of secret
society and sectarian organizations that spread across the Hakka heartland on the
Jiangxi, Fujian, and Guangdong borders (see Map 1). Oddly enough, up to now,
this important rebellion and its wider connections have received little attention
from scholars.
The present article is based on extent historical records and fieldwork carried out
by the author in 2002 and 2011. It takes an interdisciplinary approach that
incorporates historical and anthropological methodologies in order to examine the
roots and nature of the uprising. The archival materials are the most valuable
written sources and provide a depth of understanding that is virtually unobtainable
from any other available written sources. The richest trove of materials is to be
found in the Qing central government’s palace memorial collections
(gongzhongdang and lufu zouzhe) and Guangdong’s judicial records (Guangdong
si xingbu dang’an), which are housed in Beijing at the First Historical Archives and
in Taipei at the Palace Museum. The archival records include summaries, often
quite detailed, of testimonies, depositions, and confessions, as well as minute
descriptions of military campaigns and judicial procedures. Careful examination of
the archival records tells us not only about the state and its values, but also about
the conditions and beliefs of ordinary people.
The fieldwork, which I conducted in the summer of 2002 in Boluo and spring
of 2011 in Huidong, was essential to my research; it has revealed important
information on the rebellion and local conditions that one cannot find in the
written sources. I was able not only to visit the actual sites of the Tiandihui
uprising, including several “ruins” of Tiandihui stockades deep in the mountains,
but more importantly I was able to interview descendants of Chen Lanjisi 陳爛屐四,
the Hakka rebel leader in Boluo county, and also able to make a copy of the Chen
family’s informative 1833 genealogy, as well as to collect other epigraphic
materials.
I address several important questions concerning the Hakka-Tiandihui uprising
of 1802. Was it a sudden aberration or was it a manifestation of longstanding social
polarizations and ethnic conflicts in the region? Those few scholars who have
touched on the incident see it merely as a secret society rebellion that aimed to
overthrow the Qing dynasty. But were there other, perhaps deeper, objectives?
What were the chief motives of the Hakka insurgents? Another important, but
neglected, aspect of the uprising concerns the Tiandihui’s connections with
sectarian groups—usually labelled as White Lotus in the sources—that practiced
vegetarianism and recited sutras. Who were these sutra-chanting vegetarians and
what role did they play in the uprising? In answering these questions, the following
is divided into four sections. First, I discuss the Tiandihui uprising in Huizhou in
1802–3. Next, I put the uprising in a larger historical context concerning the
Huizhou area, the Hakka settlers, and the conflicts between the Hakka and Punti
before 1802. This is followed by a section on the relationships between the

Tiandihui and folk religion, with a focus on the connections between the
Tiandihui and lay Buddhists groups in the Hakka heartland along the Jiangxi,
Guangdong, and Fujian borders. The last section explores certain ways in which
the Tiandihui’s seditious propaganda may have related to aspects of popular culture
in south China.
The Tiandihui Uprising in 1802

By the start of the nineteenth century, several Tiandihui groups were already
operating in Guangdong, particularly in the Chaozhou and Huizhou areas. In fact,
one of the earliest leaders, a man named Chen Biao 陳彪, came from Huizhou. In
the early 1780s, and perhaps earlier, he was involved in the establishment of several
Tiandihui cells in Zhangzhou in southern Fujian and possibly also in Huizhou.2
By 1803, besides the Tiandihui groups in Huizhou, there were other groups in
Yangjiang, Haikang, Dongguan, Zengcheng, Xingning, Xinning, Chaoyang,
Huilai, Jieyang, Xiangshan, Xinhui, Changle, and Longmen.3 Officials estimated
that at the time of the uprising 80–90% of the Tiandihui members in Huizhou
were Hakka.4
The disturbances in Huizhou that started in 1802 came to involve several
thousand, and perhaps as many as ten thousand, “society bandits” (huifei 會匪), as
they were labeled in official reports. The Tiandihui first came to the attention of
Guangdong officials in the summer of 1802, when Governor-General Jueluo
Jiqing 覺羅吉慶 received information that people in Renshan village in Guishan
county had organized a Tiandihui cell and were stirring up trouble.5 Jueluo Jiqing
personally led several hundred soldiers from the Canton garrison to Huizhou to
investigate, and after arriving a month later, he discovered that Tiandihui activities
were much more widespread than first reported by local officials. He ordered a
crackdown, and soon afterwards the Guishan magistrate, Fu Bilai 傅碧萊, arrested
nearly a hundred Tiandihui members, and local Punti militia also apprehended
another hundred society bandits, who were subsequently handed over to the
authorities. Another 190 members surrendered to local authorities, also handing
over weapons and sixty cloth banners. Having received word of the arrests, the

2
Tiandihui, 1:96–98.
3
Qin Baoqi, Qing qianqi Tiandihui yanjiu, 169–79.
4
Nawenyigong zouyi, 724–25.
5
Gongzhongdang (8601 addendum 3) JQ 7.7.29. Dates for archival materials are given
according to the Chinese lunar calendar, thus JQ 7.7.29 stands for the 29th day of the 7th lunar
month of the 7th year of the Jiaqing reign.
remaining members fled into the mountains to hide out.6

Cai Buyun 蔡步云 was one of the men arrested. He was a native of Zhangpu
county in Fujian and had some time earlier arrived in Guishan seeking work.
During his interrogation he confessed to being one of the original Tiandihui
leaders in Guishan. On May 12, 1802, he said, Chen Yaben 陳亞本, a Guishan
native, visited him at his home, and as they talked about their hardships and
troubles, Chen suggested that they organize a Tiandihui cell to rob Punti villages
and markets. Afterwards both men quickly recruited another sixteen like-minded
men who gathered four days later at Chen’s home to be initiated. Each man was
given a five-colored cloth banner on which were written the words “follow
Heaven to carry out the way” (shuntian xingdao 順天行道), which they were to
keep on their person as a secret identification and membership registration. Chen
Yaben took the title Great King (dawang 大王) and Cai Buyun took the title Great
General (dayuanshuai 大元帥); other initiates were also given titles as generals and
commanders. Afterwards each man returned to their homes in Renshan,
Baimanghua, Pingshan, and elsewhere, where they recruited more followers and
prepared weapons for raids on Punti villages and markets. Before they could act,
however, they were discovered by the authorities and arrests were made. After a
hasty trial in Huizhou, Cai Buyun and another 23 men were summarily executed;
another 75 followers were sentenced to exile in Xinjiang.7 Chen Yaben, who had
fled into hiding, was soon afterwards arrested and also summarily executed.8
Other society members fled into neighboring Boluo and Yongan counties
where they joined forces with other Tiandihui groups. By late summer there were
already several thousand Tiandihui members spread across Guishan, Boluo, and
Yongan counties, as well as new reports of other groups in Lufeng, Dongguan,
Zengcheng, Longmen, Xiangshan, and other nearby counties. A twenty-six-
year-old man with the curious name Chen Lanjisi (Broken Shoes the Fourth) was
the Tiandihui leader in Boluo, which became the epicenter of the uprising. Chen
came from a well-to-do Hakka family, but one that had seen better times.9 He
had begun organizing his association in the summer of 1801, or perhaps as early as
1799, and had over several thousand followers by the time of the outbreak of

6
Gongzhongdang (8653) JQ 7.8.4; and Nawenyigong zouyi, 724–27.
7
Gongzhongdang (8714) JQ 7.8.11; and fieldnotes from Huidong county, which includes
Renshan, Baimanghua, Pingshan, in May 2011.
8
Waijidang, JQ 8.12.21.
9
Chen shi zupu, no pagination; and fieldnotes from Yangjingkeng village, Boluo county, June
2002. Villagers told me that Chen Lanjisi was the fourth son of Chen Shizhuang’s second wife
and that he acquired his nickname because he always wore a pair of torn and broken wooden
clogs, indication of the family’s declining affluence.
disturbances in Guishan in May 1802. After receiving word of the arrests in

Guishan, Chen Lanjisi, perhaps anticipating trouble from the local authorities, led
his followers and their families into the remote and inaccessible area known locally
as Goat Dung Mountain (Yangshishan 羊屎山), where they had previously
prepared stockades, stored food, procured gunpowder, and made weapons. Chen
also produced a banner with the familiar phrase shuntian xingdao and gave
followers pieces of red cloth to bind around their heads. Figure 1 depicts one of the
extant banners preserved in the First Historical Archives in Beijing. On the eighth
day of the eighth lunar month (September 4), considered an auspicious day, he
made sacrifices to his banner (jiqi 祭旗), put on yellow robes and took the title
Great King. He bestowed on his seventy-year-old father, Chen Shizhuang 陳士莊,
the title Venerable Great King (laodawang 老大王), who likewise put on yellow
robes. Chen Lanjisi also gave titles to over twenty of his closest and most loyal
Fig. 1 Tiandihui Banner Used by Chen Lanjisi

Source: First Historical Archires, Beijing.
followers. For a month he and his men continually descended from their mountain
stronghold to raid Punti villages and markets in the nearby lowlands. Soldiers
finally captured Chen Lanjisi in October 1802 at a place called Zhoushan on the
Boluo and Zengcheng border. Other followers fled into the nearby Luofu
Mountains, where they continued to cause unrest for almost another year.10
In the meantime the uprising had spread into Yongan county, where
disturbances lingered on into the winter of 1803. There the uprising had actually
been provoked by a Punti-led Ox Head Society (Niutouhui 牛頭會) and local
officials. Hearing about the disturbances in Boluo, one of the leaders of the Ox
Head Society, Lan Xiuwen 藍修文, decided to act first. He gathered his men and
arrested Wen Dengyuan 温登元, a local Tiandihui leader, and then turned him
over to the county magistrate. Unfortunately Wen Dengyuan died in custody
shortly afterwards. Then Zeng Qinghao 曾清浩, Lai Dongbao 赖東保, Guan
Yuelong 官粤瓏, and other Tiandihui leaders assembled their groups in their
mountain stockades at a place called Tianzizhang, where they offered a human
sacrifice (likely a captured Punti villager) to their banner and soon afterwards began
attacking Ox Head Society villages and markets in Qingxi, Huangtang,
Zhongpuwei, and elsewhere. According to the local gazetteer, no Punti villages
were spared. Several thousand troops were called to the scene to suppress the
uprising, and Punti communities also organized militia (tuanlian 團練) and hired
local mercenaries (xiangyong 鄉勇) to protect their homes and fight “Hakka
bandits” (kezei 客賊). By winter, the situation in the Tiandihui stockades had
become desperate; pressed on all sides by soldiers and militia and running out of
food and supplies, insurgents broke through the blockade to pillage lowland areas
or to flee elsewhere. Fighting spread to neighboring Xingning, Zengcheng,
Dongguan, Lianping, Longmen, and Longchuan counties.11
The fighting had been most devastating in Boluo and Yongan counties, where
mopping up operations involving soldiers and militia continued for over a year. In
late 1802, Nayancheng, the special commissioner sent by the Jiaqing Emperor to
investigate the uprising, reported that some 160 villages and markets in Boluo and
over 80 in Yongan had been looted and burned by society bandits. Even more
Hakka villages and stockades had been destroyed. The number of people
killed—Hakka, Punti, and soldiers—remains unknown, but could have reached

10
Lufu zouzhe (2683) JQ 7.9.20; Shangyudang, JQ 7.10.1; Gongzhongdang (8905) JQ 7.10.3;
and Boluo xianzhi (1988), 120.
11
Gongzhongdang (9149) JQ 7.9.3, and (8907) JQ 7.10.3; Guangdongsi xingbu dang’an (20023)
JQ 8.7.28, and (20024) JQ 8.8.4; Nawenyigong zouyi, 793–98, 908; and Yongan xian sanzhi
(1822), 522–38. On human sacrifices to banners, see Paul Katz, “Banner Worship and Human
Sacrifice in Chinese Military History.”
the tens of thousands. The destruction of crops and disruption of people’s

livelihoods had been so great that the emperor approved tax relief for three years in
both counties. As for the Chen family, according to their 1833 genealogy (Fig. 2),
nearly 80% of the family had been killed during the fighting, and with defeat the
government also had confiscated most of their lands and property. Although local
and provincial officials pursued a pacification policy that encouraged Tiandihui
members who had surrendered to return home and rebuild their villages, it would
be another ten years before many of them felt safe enough to do so. Many Hakka
refugees, in fact, never returned home but scattered and resettled elsewhere in
Fig. 2 Page from the Boluo Chen Family Genealogy, 1833

Source: Boluo Chen Family Genealogy, 1833.

Guangdong and Guangxi.12 On the one hand, hundreds of officers and Punti
militia leaders received rewards for valorous service during the fighting; on the
other hand, a large number of officials were reprimanded and punished for
negligence in handling the suppression of the uprising. Governor-General Jueluo
Jiqing, who was dismissed from office and ordered back to Beijing to stand trial for
malfeasance, returned to Canton in disgrace, where he committed suicide.13
Hakka-Punti Ethnic Strife

Actually long before 1802 the Huizhou area already had a reputation as a hotbed of
armed feuds and dissidence. Huizhou prefecture is a mountainous area with
generally poor soil and low agricultural yields. It was also an area prone to natural
disasters: floods, droughts, famines, and occasionally earthquakes. The Luofu
Mountains, a major geographical feature of the region, has for centuries been the
home of Buddhist and Daoist ascetics, as well as bandits and dissidents of all sorts.
Although poor and backward, Huizhou was strategically located on the East River,
which linked the prefectural capital with Canton to the west and Jiangxi province
upriver to the north.
Huizhou prefecture supported a mixed population with diverse customs and
languages. The politically and economically dominant group was called Punti, or
native residents, who claimed to be descendants of the earliest Han Chinese settlers
in Guangdong and who were by and large Cantonese speakers. They also generally
laid claim to the best lands and operated the largest number of markets. The Hakka,
literally “guest people” (kemin 客民 or kejia 客家 ), had begun moving into
Huizhou prefecture in large numbers probably in the mid-sixteenth century and
settled in the less arable hilly areas where they farmed indigo, made charcoal, and
worked mines. Those that settled in Guishan and Yongan counties for the most
part came from nearby Xingning and Changle counties, as well as from Wuping
and Anyuan on the Jiangxi-Fujian border; they were predominantly miners. Those
that migrated to Boluo were mostly from Xingning and Changle, and engaged
chiefly in indigo farming. Most Hakka, however, did not own the lands where
they lived and worked, and they had to pay rent to absentee Punti landlords who

12
Nawenyigong zouyi, 724–27; and Chen shi zupu. Descendants of Chen Lanjisi told me that
he had not been captured and executed by officials, but had changed his name and fled to
Lianzhou, a mountainous area on the Guangdong-Hunan border, where he settled and lived
until in his eighties (fieldnotes from Yangjingkeng village, Boluo county, June 2002, and from
Tiandeng village, Lianzhou, November 2015). This is, however, impossible to prove.
13
Shangyudang, JQ 7.11.19, and JQ 7.12.9; and Gongzhongdang (9547) JQ 7.11.21. On
Jueluo Jiqing’s case see Tang Ruiyu, Qingdai lizhi tanwei, 87–111.
often lived in market towns and cities. In the late Qing period an estimated 80% of
the population in Boluo were tenants and itinerant laborers. Punti looked down
upon the Hakka, referring to them derogatorily as ruffians and brutes; the term
“guest people” itself was a constant reminder of their permanent status as
outsiders.14
By the eighteenth century the Hakka, like other Chinese, were feeling the
pressure of increased population and so continued in even greater numbers to
move into Huizhou and other areas occupied or claimed by the Punti. Once a
Hakka community was formed it tended to grow rapidly as more newcomers,
mostly relatives and friends from the same home areas, arrived and settled. For
example, Jiaoziwo village in Boluo was first settled in the Ming dynasty by the Xie
family, Hakkas from Nanxiong in northern Guangdong; in the Qianlong period a
new wave of settlers of the Chen, Wang, Wu, Huang, Lian, Wen, and He
surnames relocated in the same area. Indicative of its isolation as late as the 1980s
the village had a population of only 220 people. Chashan village, situated in Boluo
on the mountainous border with Longmen county, was settled during the
turbulent Ming-Qing transition by members of the Qiu family from Fujian; later
in the Kangxi period a branch of Chen Lanjisi’s family moved and settled there.
Villagers withstood the harsh environment to sustain a subsistence living growing
peanuts, sweet potatoes, and vegetables.15 From the perspective of Punti landlords,
the Hakka migrants were like swarms of ants and bees. By the early nineteenth
century, the majority of the population in Boluo and Yongan were Hakka.16
As newcomers to the area Hakka settlers generally lacked strong lineages and
therefore they formed their own communal organizations based on native-place
and language.17 At first encouraged by local officials, Hakka in Huizhou in the
early seventeenth century organized villages into community pacts or alliances
(xiangyue 鄉約 ). Originally intended by officials to restrain the Hakka and
incorporate them more fully into the state’s orthodox political culture, according
to Professor Sow-Theng Leong, the xiangyue system instead “actually encouraged
ethnic solidarity and mobilization,” which in turn “facilitated extralocal
organization for interethnic conflict.” 18 In the 1640s, for example, several
thousand Hakka miners in Boluo county organized themselves into a Xing-Chang
Pact (yue 約), referring to the two counties of Xingning and Changle where they

14
Sow-Theng Leong, Migration and Ethnicity in Chinese History: Hakkas, Pengmin, and their
Neighbors, 45, 47, 70–71; and Boluo xianzhi (1988), 184.
15
Chen shi zupu; and “Guangdongsheng Huiyang dichuming zhi,” no pagination.
16
Chen shi zupu; and Leong, Migration and Ethnicity in Chinese History, 70–71.
17
See Myron Cohen, “The Hakka or ‘Guest People’.”
18
Leong, Migration and Ethnicity in Chinese History, 51, 72.
had originated. They had become so strong that they refused to pay rents and
taxes.19 By the 1750s numerous other Hakka strongholds had also organized
themselves into intervillage alliances that defied landlords and officials. In
Zengcheng, for instance, Hakka formed multi-surname pacts consisting of
anywhere from ten to several hundred villages. 20 Over the next century, as
rivalries and conflicts with native Punti and local officials mounted, Hakka settlers
increasingly organized themselves into fortified villages defended by paramilitary
units.
Punti, too, had organized their villages and market towns into alliances,
constructed fortified villages, and formed militia units. In Yongan most Punti
communities were fortified with walls, and in Boluo in the Qianlong period 48%
of the 461 villages listed in the gazetteer had the word wei 圍, zhai 寨, or bao 堡
in its name, terms that indicated walled communities.21 In Yongan in the early
1820s the Punti had 37 multi-village alliances. The Fenghuang alliance, for
instance, which was headquartered in the market town of the same name, was led
by a military degree-holder named Gan Runchang and a local scholar named
Huang Tongruo. During the time of the Tiandihui disturbances the alliance
organized a militia of several hundred local volunteers and hired mercenaries and
constructed fortifications and watchtowers.22 Throughout the areas in Huizhou
where the uprising erupted, Punti organized Ox Head Societies with the avowed
purpose to protect their families and property from Hakka bandits. Oxen, which
were quite scarce and thus valuable commodities in mountain areas, were favorite
targets of bandits, and in fact, there was a long tradition of cattle theft perpetrated
by Hakka in Yongan, Guishan, and Boluo.23
Actually almost as soon as Hakka moved into Huizhou prefecture tensions and
conflicts flared up between them and the Punti. Local gazetteers frequently
described the Hakka as wild and belligerent, and in fact, no better than bandits.24
In the late Ming, thousands of Hakka migrants in Guishan, for example, engaged
in illegal zinc and lead mining. Because the same mountainous areas where they
settled and mined were also notorious bandit strongholds, the Hakka were often
associated with outlaws.25 In nearby Boluo county, following a severe famine in
1624 Hakka settlers, described in the official records as roving bandits (liuzei 流賊)

19
Boluo xianzhi (1988), 30–31.
20
Leong, Migration and Ethnicity in Chinese History, 61–62.
21
Yongan xian sanzhi, 167; and Boluo xianzhi (2001), 74–75.
22
Yongan xian sanzhi, 167–70, 526–27.
23
Nawenyigong zouyi, 724–27; Lufu zouzhe (2684) JQ 8.1.3; and Shangyudang, JQ 8.2.6.
24
See, for example, Huizhou fuzhi (1688), 5:14.
25
Leong, Migration and Ethnicity in Chinese History, 45.
and vagabonds (liumin 流民), rose up to plunder Punti granaries in several markets
and towns. The disturbances continued on and off until the spring of 1630. In one
case, from the autumn of 1629, fighting had erupted after gangs of Hakka indigo
farmers and charcoal makers from Fujian, who had moved into the foothills of the
Luofu Mountains, plundered Punti villages and kidnapped for ransom over 300
people.26
Fighting never ceased between the Hakka and Punti, and in fact intensified over
the next century. In the 1640s roving bandits, vagabonds, and Hakka—people
who were mostly displaced due to the chaos and anarchy of the Ming-Qing
dynastic wars—built lairs in Luofushan, Chashan, Yashan, Qingxishan,
Tianzizhang, and other isolated areas on the borders between Boluo, Zengcheng,
and Yongan. 27 Even after the wars ended and the Qing government had
consolidated its rule over all of China in the 1680s, these same mountain areas
remained troublesome bandit and rebel nests.28 For example, in 1752 and 1753, a
local gentry (gongsheng) named Wang Liangchen 王亮臣 from Chashan, had
organized a sworn brotherhood, disseminated seditious books, certificates, seals,
and white banners to his followers, and fomented an armed uprising in Indigo
Mountain (Lanfenshan 藍汾山) in Zengcheng that spread into Dongguan, Boluo,
and Guishan, the same areas that fifty years later the Tiandihui would stage its
uprising. According to official reports Wang Liangchen claimed to possess
talismans and magical powers whereby he could summon spirit soldiers (shenbing
神兵) and messianic saviors such as Li Kaihua 李開花 and Zhu Hongzhuo 朱洪
29
桌. According to one report, the rebels were poor riffraff (wulaiguntu 無賴棍徒)
who robbed grain from wealthy households. Most of the followers were indigo
farmers and miners, and therefore most likely Hakka. When soldiers from Canton
were sent out to suppress them, the rebels fled back to their old nests in the

26
Huizhou fuzhi (1881), 17:45a; and Boluo xianzhi (1988), 28.
27
Boluo xianzhi (1988), 31–32; and Yongan xian sanzhi, 496.
28
Chen shi zupu; and fieldnotes from Yangjingkeng village, Boluo county, June 2002.
29
Chinese messianism was built on the expectation that one or more saviors would descend to
earth to save a select group of people from impending apocalyptic disasters, such as plagues,
floods, or barbarian invasions. These saviors, who were not regarded primarily as political figures,
frequently appeared as human rulers who would subsequently rule over a radically changed
world. Often too saviors bore the surnames of royal families, thus Li for the Tang dynasty and
Zhu for the Ming dynasty. The elect would be protected from disasters by armies of spirit
soldiers led by spirit generals or saviors. See the extended discussion in Barend ter Haar, Ritual
and Mythology of the Chinese Triads.
mountains.30
Over the next several decades local officials in Huizhou repeatedly reported that
Hakka and Punti villages formed paramilitary units and hired gangs of trained
mercenaries, who then armed themselves with swords and fowling pieces to
engage in armed feuds (xiedou 械鬥) with one another.31 Also the years between
1765 and 1796 witnessed an unusually large number of floods followed by famines;
and as the costs of food rose so too did the numbers of roving vagabonds and
bandits.32 Thus most of the individuals involved in the 1802 uprising grew up and
reached maturity in an atmosphere of almost constant—seemingly perpetual—
ethnic violence, internecine conflict, and natural disasters. On the eve of the
Tiandihui uprising the situation in Huizhou prefecture was already very tense and
contentious; local society was severely polarized and dysfunctional.
Tiandihui-Sectarian Connections
As the missionary and sinologist J. J. M. de Groot explained in 1901, the Tiandihui
was as much a social organization as it was a religious one.33 Its slogans, legends,
written texts, rituals, and ceremonies were all deeply rooted in Daoist, Buddhist,
and folk religious beliefs and practices. Most members venerated the God of War
(Guandi), as well as the Goddess of Mercy (Guanyin), the local Earth God
(Tudigong), and the society’s patriarch Monk Tixi. Members of the Tiandihui in
Huizhou also worshipped a large variety of local protective deities, such as those
they called the Elder Brothers of the Five Houses (Wufang dage 五房大哥): Guan
Tiancheng 關天成, Li Sedi 李色弟, Fang Dahong 方大洪, Zhang Yuantong 張元
34
通, and Lin Yongzhao 林永招. Just before starting his uprising, Chen Lanjisi
went to the God of War Temple in Botang Market near his home village, where
he prayed for advice and made sacrifices to a banner before commencing his
undertaking. He also carried away the statue of Guandi from the temple, which he
took with him on his raids; when he was later defeated, however, he reportedly

30
Kang Yong Qian shiqi chengxiang renmin fankang douzheng ziliao, 2: 669–71; Qingshilu
Guangdong shiliao, 2:109–10, 119–20; and Boluo xianzhi (1988), 42.
31
Qing shilu Guangdong shiliao, 2:203, 230, 368, 483.
32
Boluo xianzhi (1988), 42–44; and Huizhou shigao, 162–63. In 1795, for instance, a severe
famine, with concurrent rising food costs, occurred across Guangdong, Fujian, and Taiwan (see
Tiandihui 6:41–42).
33
J. J. M. de Groot, Sectarianism and Religious Persecution in China, 340.
34
Kang Yong Qian shiqi chengxiang renmin fankang douzheng ziliao, 2:727–28.
destroyed and discarded the icon.35 Tiandihui members typically arranged the
altars that they used in initiation ceremonies with paraphernalia that was
commonly used in Daoist rituals, such as wooden peck measures, oil lamps,
mirrors, rulers, scissors, flags, and swords. The Tiandihui practice of writing
Chinese characters in obscure and unorthodox forms, often in reverse order or as
split characters, was also a practice frequently used by Daoist priests and Buddhist
monks, as well as folk magicians and healers, for writing talismans (fu 符). In the
society’s later manuals (huibu 會簿), certain references to the City of Willows
(Muyangcheng 木楊城), in which the granaries were filled with rice, were derived
from Buddhism, which used the term for Paradise.36
Since at least the fifth century, Buddhist monks have frequently played leading
roles in Chinese rebellions, and the Huizhou uprising was no exception. Monks,
who were never a homogeneous group, included not only those belonging to
recognized clerical organizations (temples and monasteries) but also a great variety
of folk religious adepts, such as miracle workers and wandering ascetics. This latter
group often lived among the common people and roamed about the countryside
where they cured illnesses, told fortunes, practiced magical arts, and spread
apocalyptic teachings. In the Ming and Qing periods there was a tremendous
increase in the numbers of itinerant monks and priests, who were in large part
“free-lance religious entrepreneurs without any certificate or affiliation to the
orthodox institutions.” The government and mainstream religious establishment
considered them dangerous heretics and potential rebels who needed to be
subdued and eliminated.37
According to one official report there were numerous monks, such as Zhisan 知
叁 and Jingtang 敬堂 in Boluo and Sanlian 三連 , and Kuancheng 寬成 in
Yongan, who actively organized and led Tiandihui groups in Huizhou. Monk
Jingtang was a Hakka from Xingning county, who as a child practiced martial arts
and often got into fights. After wandering about for several years, in 1799 he went
to the Luofu Mountains where he became a monk in the Baocheng Temple, but
was later expelled because he refused to follow the precepts. In 1802 he joined the
Tiandihui under Chen Lanjisi, who gave him the title of vanguard commander
(xianfeng 先鋒) in charge of over 300 men. Kuancheng, who came from a large
but poor Hakka family in Yongan, grew up in the Yongfu Temple where he later
shaved his head and became a monk. In 1802, he joined the Tiandihui at its

35
36
Canton Register 2 (July 2, 1829), 63; Tiandihui, 1:18–19; Guangdongsi xingbu dang’an
(20024) JQ 8.8.4; also see Dai Xuanzhi, “Tiandihui yu daojiao,” 157–60.
37
Hubert Seiwert, Popular Religious Movements and Heterodox Sects in Chinese History, 107,
155–56, 211–12.
mountain stronghold in Tielongzhang. There he chanted spells, recited sutras, and

wrote charms for several hundred followers, to whom he also taught mantras that
would protect them from the cannon fire of soldiers. The monk Zhisan also was
said to have practiced magical arts and to have spread heterodox teachings and
books.38 It should not be surprising, therefore, that many Tiandihui rituals and
writings were closely associated with folk Buddhist practices.
In the late Ming and Qing periods, the mountainous border area with
Guangdong and Fujian in southern Jiangxi was the site of numerous lay Buddhist
groups, what officials usually labeled White Lotus sects, organized around
vegetarian halls (zhaitang 齋堂) with a large number of different names, such as
Goddess of Mercy Vegetarian Hall 觀音齋堂, Single-Character Vegetarian Hall
39
一字齋堂, and Great Vehicle Vegetarian Hall 大乘齋堂. Many of the Hakka
who participated in the 1802 uprising, in fact, had migrated from this area to
Huizhou several generations earlier; it would have been natural for them to have
taken their homeland customs and beliefs with them. For example, according to
their genealogy, Chen Lanjisi’s family had originally come from Taihe county in
Jiangxi, later moved to Xingning county across the border in Guangdong, and
then to Boluo county in the mid-sixteenth century. Taihe county was also an area
of lay Buddhist, secret society, and salt smuggling activism in the Qing period.40
Most lay Buddhist cults practiced vegetarianism, chanted sutras, and believed in
the Buddha of the Future (Maitreya); some groups professed millenarian beliefs that
Qing officials condemned as seditious.41 This was particularly true in Ganzhou
prefecture in southern Jiangxi province, a predominantly Hakka area on the border
with Guangdong and Fujian. In fact, this rugged mountainous area had a long
tradition of Buddhist sectarianism and sectarian disturbances. For example, in 1752,
at the same time that Wang Liangchen was leading his revolt in Guangdong, Li
Dexian 李德先 and He Yasi 何亞四 planned an uprising among fellow Hakkas in
the mountains of Shangyou county, Jiangxi, based on their prophecies of an
impending apocalypse. He Yasi, who originally came from nearby Guangdong,
was a charcoal maker and subsistence farmer and Li Dexian was an itinerant
geomancer who came from Chongan county in Fujian; both men had migrated to
Shangyou in search of work. They produced charms, certificates, seals, and banners,

38
Nawenyigong zouyi, 726, 821, 846; Tiandihui, 7:32, 45, 123–24, 145, 151.
39
Lian Lichang, Fujian mimi shehui, 66–68.
40
Chen shi zupu; fieldnotes from Yangjingkeng village, Boluo county, June 2002; on secret
society and salt smuggling in Taihe in the 1820s, see David Faure and He Xi, “The Secret
Society’s Secret,” in this issue.
41
Zhuang Jifa, Qingdai tiandihui yuanliu kao, 82–83; and David Ownby, “The Heaven and
Earth Society as Popular Religion,” 1034–35.
and they claimed to be able to call down spirit soldiers and spirit generals (saviors),
such as Li Kaihua (mentioned above) and Zhu Hongzhu 朱洪竹 (not to be
confused with Zhu Hongzhuo, above), who would spare only those who had
bought their charms and certificates. They also prepared and distributed among
their followers knives, swords, and fowling pieces. Before they could start their
revolt, however, they were discovered by local authorities and promptly arrested
and executed.42
In some cases, including Huizhou (discussed below), Tiandihui groups had close
connections with such sectarian groups, even sharing in one another’s ritual
symbols and organizational structures. Between 1782 and 1806, a lay Buddhist sect
referred to as the Great Vehicle Teaching (Dachengjiao 大乘教 , as well as
Dacheng Luojiao 大乘羅教, Wupanjiao 五盤教, and Laomujiao 老母教, etc.) was
active in the tri-border Jiangxi, Fujian, and Guangdong areas. One of the leaders
was a man named Li Lingkui 李淩魁, who came from Jianning county in Fujian
and had opened up a paper shop in Nanchang, the capital of Jiangxi. At some point
in his career he also had purchased a minor civil service degree, whereby he joined
the ranks of the local gentry elite. In 1782 he took Wu Zixiang 吳子祥 as his
teacher.43 Wu Zixiang instructed his disciple to practice vegetarianism and recite
sutras in order to avoid suffering and catastrophes. Li Lingkui also bought from his
teacher several lay Buddhist scriptures, including Classic on the Great Precepts of
the Great Vehicle (Dacheng dajie jing 大乘大戒經) and Classic on the Root of
Benevolence (Enben jing 恩本經). Later that same year he returned to his home in

42
Kang Yong Qian shiqi chengxiang renmin fankang douzheng ziliao, 2:664–65. Similarly, in
1748–49, officials uncovered a series of lay Buddhist groups, associated with Maitreyan
eschatology and Luo Teaching (luojiao 羅教), in the rugged borderlands between Fujian, Jiangxi,
Guangdong, and Hunan, that were also fomenting uprisings over this vast area, see Kang Yong
Qian shiqi chengxiang renmin fankang douzheng ziliao, 2:648–52, 656; Qing shilu Guangdong
shiliao, 2:61–62; also see Sasaki Masaya, Shinmatsu no himitsu kessha, 183–86; and Daniel
Overmyer, Folk Buddhist Religion, 120–22. The Luo Teaching, which originated in Shandong
in the early sixteenth century as a lay Buddhist vegetarian sect, eclectically combined popular
forms of Pure Land and Chan Buddhism, Daoism, and Confucianism. By the nineteenth century,
it had become widespread among boatmen plying the canals and rivers of southeastern China
and was involved in several uprisings in the Qing dynasty, see Overmyer, Folk Buddhist
Religion, 113–29.
43
Wu Zixiang was one of the most important sect leaders in south China in the mid-Qing
period. He followed a variant of the Luo Teaching referred to as Dachengjiao and later
developed his own teaching called Wupanjiao. Today Wu is respected as the tenth patriarch of
Xiantiandao and Yiguandao, see Ma Xisha and Han Bingfang, Zhongguo minjian zongjiao shi,
368–79.
Fujian, where he copied the scriptures and propagated the sect, earning for himself
more than fifty silver dollars from disciples. In 1801 Li Lingkui and several
acquaintances joined the Tiandihui in Chongan county under a man named Wu
Tao 吳韜 , a martial artist who official records depicted as a “knight-errant”
(haoxia 豪俠). The neophytes each gave Wu one silver dollar and accepted him as
their teacher; in return Wu taught them the secret codes and hand signals and told
them that by joining the Tiandihui they could avoid harassments in their travels.44
Figure 3 summarizes two of Wu Zixian’s Dachengjiao (Wupanjiao) networks, one
in Jiangxi-Fujian and the other in Jiangxi-Guangdong.
Fig. 3 Wu Zixiang’s Sect Networks

Sources: Gongzhongdang (5436) JQ 5.3.27; Tiandihui, 6: 245-46, 259-61; and Ma xisha and
Han Bingfang, Zhongguo minjian zongjiao shi, 368-79.
Li Lingkui now added the Tiandihui teachings to his repertoire, initiating

hundreds of followers over the next several years. Those that followed the
Tiandihui tradition belonged to the Yangpan Teaching 陽盤教 and those who
followed the sectarian teachings by chanting sutras and practicing vegetarianism

44
Tiandihui, 6:245–46, 259, 267.
belonged to the Yinpan Teaching 陰盤教. The latter group was given white
turbans to wear. Nonetheless, despite the two labels both groups were closely
interconnected (reflecting the words “yin” and “yang” in their names), and clear
distinctions between them are hard to make. In 1803, Li Lingkui, who foretold an
impending apocalypse, proclaimed to be the reincarnation of a Tang dynasty
emperor and prepared to lead his followers in revolt. But before he could act he
was arrested and executed.45
Undaunted by the setback, one of his disciples, Liao Ganzhou 廖幹周, made
sacrifices to a banner and rose up in revolt in Shicheng county, Jiangxi, in the tenth
lunar month (November 1803). Just prior to the revolt, Liao took Wang Tianzu
王添組, who was a disciple of Wu Zixiang, as his teacher; Wang claimed to be the
reincarnated Maitreya and said he foresaw an approaching cataclysm. Liao then
gathered over 1,500 followers who wore white turbans emblazoned with red
crosses (likely as talismans). They were assisted by several Buddhist monks who
helped recruit followers who they instructed in reciting sutras and practicing
vegetarianism, as well as disseminating protective charms. Also teachers and
disciples maintained contacts with one another, frequently over long distances, by
sending letters.46
Although Liao Ganzhou and his group were quickly crushed, yet another
disciple, Du Shiming 杜世明, who claimed to have an associate named Zhu
Hongzhu, who he said was a descendent of the Ming royal family, attempted a
new uprising in 1806, but was arrested before he could start.47 On his banners
were written the familiar name Li Kaihua and that of another (royal) savior named
Zhu Qigui 朱七桂. One of Du’s disciples, a 37 year-old drifter named Wu
Wenchun 吳文春, confessed that when he was initiated into the Tiandihui Du
Shiming told him that there were two groups, vegetarians and meat-eaters, and
that he had followers in Fujian, Jiangxi, Guangdong, and Shandong ready to rise
up. Wu was then given three talismans: the first one was to be pasted on the house
gate when the (spirit) soldiers arrived “so that it would be known that I was of the
same teaching (jiao) and would not be killed or injured” (see Fig. 4); the second
talisman, which he was instructed to draw on cloth, was to be wrapped around his
head; and the third one was a silver tally that he was told to wear on his waist as a
form of identification. There was also a banner with the four characters shuntian
xingdao. When the fighting started he was told to paste a “water-mouth charm”
(shuikoufu 水口符) at the entrance to the village so that villagers would not be

45
Ibid., 6:246–48, 253, 273, 276–77.
46
Ibid., 6:259–61, 269–74, 276–78.
47
In this case apparently Zhu Hongzhu, who we can identify as a royal savior, was a fictitious
person.
harmed during the fighting.48 Du Shiming had told Wu that by following these
exorcist measures he would be protected from the impending cataclysm. It was
understood that those without such protective talismans would perish.
Fig. 4 Talisman Used by Wu Wenchun

Source: First Historical Archives, Beijing.
While Li Lingkui and his followers were stirring up trouble in Jiangxi and Fujian,
another branch of the Dachengjiao (by now referred to as Wupanjiao) had spread
into Guangdong (see Fig. 3). About three years before the Huizhou uprising
erupted an itinerant peddler named Xu Qianjin 徐虔進, who was a native of
Boluo, had transmitted the same, or quite similar, lay Buddhist teachings into his
home area. He had learned the teachings from an acquaintance, You Lihe 遊禮和,
who had a shop that sold herbal medicines in Xincheng county in Jiangxi. You
Lihe told his friend that by being a vegetarian and chanting sutras he could avoid
calamities and also become rich. They afterwards went to visit You Lihe’s master,
Wu Qingyuan 吳清遠, in Guixi county, Jiangxi. Significantly, Wu Qingyuan was
the nephew of Wu Zixiang, who, as mentioned earlier, was one of the most
important patriarchs of the Dachengjiao.49 Xu Qianjin took Wu Qingyuan as his
teacher and bought from him a copy of a scripture (although not specifically
mentioned, it was likely either Enben jing or Dacheng dajie jing) for one silver
dollar. Later Xu Qianjin attracted over forty followers in Boluo, where he taught
them to recite sutras and practice vegetarianism to avoid an impending apocalypse.
Xu Qianjin also wrote an incantation (gezhou 歌咒) that he distributed to his
followers:

48
Tiandihui, 6:283–85; also see Lian Lichang, Fujian mimi shehui, 68–69; Barend ter Haar,
Ritual and Mythology of the Chinese Triads, 290–96; and David Ownby, “The Heaven and
Earth Society as Popular Religion,” 1034–36.
49
On Wu Qingyuan, see Ma Xisha and Han Bingfang, Zhongguo minjian zongjiao shi, 378.
In the gengshen year [1800] [spirit] soldiers will arrive, and all under Heaven,
both men and women, will be in chaos.
In the xinyou [year 1801] Buddhas of the five directions will arise, and after
another eighteen [years] Heaven will appear on earth.
In the renxu [year 1802] husbands and wives will have difficulties east and
west, and the wicked multitudes will meet with calamities.
In the guihai year [1803] peace and tranquility will return, and [followers] will
be rewarded with titles as gods and Buddhas.
In the yichou [year 1805] those who follow the [sect’s] teachings and five
Buddhist precepts will be reunited and become complete.50
A few years later (in 1800 and 1801), a number of Xu’s disciples, such as Zhu
Yajin 朱亞金, joined Tiandihui cells in Boluo and Yongan, thereby bringing with
them their sectarian teachings, including the belief in the impending apocalypse.51
For instance, on Chen Lanjisi’s banner (Fig. 1) was the prognostication that “floods
will overflow their natural channels and inundate all under Heaven” (hongshui
hengliu fanlan yu tianxia 洪水橫流汎濫于天下).52 Similar to the above-mentioned
Tiandihui-Dachengjiao groups in Fujian and Jiangxi, those in Huizhou were also
separated into two groups. One group, which recited Buddhist sutras and were
vegetarians, wore white turbans around their heads; according to the Chen family
genealogy, they gathered at night to secretly practice sorcery. Other members
wore red turbans around their heads, and presumably did not follow a vegetarian
diet.53 According to the Daoguang edition of the Yongan gazetteer, “In the 9th
lunar month [1802], Guan Yuelong and Lai Dongbao gathered their motley
throng in Yongan. Guan Yuelong formed an Adding Brothers Society and his
followers wore red turbans as their distinctive mark, while Lai Dongbao formed a
White Lotus [group] and his followers wore white turbans as their distinctive

50
Gongzhongdang (5436) JQ 5. 3.27. The incantation in Chinese reads: 庚申年來刀兵動，天下
男女亂紛紛; 辛酉五方千佛起，再等十八立天來; 壬戍夫妻東西苦，十惡衆生盡遭災; 癸亥年來得安
寧，封仙封佛在其間; 乙丑修行得團園，各人修行五戒全。
51
Gongzhongdang (9072) JQ 7.10.24. After Wu Qingyuan died his wife, neé Zhang 张氏,
continued to spread the Wupanjiao and in 1821 it was revived in Guangdong by Peng Yasheng
彭亚胜 (Ma Xisha and Han Bingfang, Zhongguo minjian zongjiao shi, 378–79).
52
Floods were a standard apocalyptic disaster throughout Chinese history. According to Gustave
Schlegel (Thian Ti Hwui: The Hung-League or Heaven-Earth-League, 225n2), this phrase first
appeared in Mencius, Book III, where it describes a cataclysmic flood that covered the whole
earth during the time of the legendary Emperor Yao. This was a familiar story to many people.
53
Gongzhongdang (8752) JQ 7.8.16; (8796) JQ 7.8.2; and (9072) JQ 7.10.24; and Chen shi
zupu.
mark.”54 Huizhou Tiandihui leaders also disseminated to their followers talismans

(fu 符), wood seals (muyin 木印), bamboo placards (zhupai 竹牌), certificates
(zhao 照), banners (qi 旗), memorials (biaowen 表文), verses (ci 詞) and books
(shu 書), as well as spread rumors (chuanbo yaoyan 傳播謠言) of approaching
cataclysms. As in Liao Ganzhou’s network, mentioned above, teachers and
disciples also kept in touch with each other through letters as well as visitations.55
It was common practice in both the Tiandihui and lay Buddhist traditions for
members to wear white or red clothing and turbans, as well as to display banners,
talismans, and certificates written on white or red cloth. In both traditions during
initiation ceremonies neophytes commonly wore white cloth bands around their
head or waist, and in some cases even wore white clothing. Because white
traditionally represents death in Chinese culture, initiations were meant to be rites
of passage in which new members symbolically died and were subsequently reborn
into the new society or sect. According to Hubert Seiwert, the use of the color
white was a distinctive characteristic of Maitreya sects, and he further suggests that
“there was a connection between the symbol of white clothes and the expectation
of a divine emperor or savior.”56 In other cases, at some Tiandihui initiations new
members wore red cloth bands around their heads or waist; this was also a
common practice among Daoist priests, shamans, and spirit mediums, when
performing religious rites. It was also common practice for bandit and rebel groups
to bind their heads with red cloth before going into battle. In Boluo before going
out on raids or into battle Tiandihui leaders gave their followers red turbans on
which were stamped protective charms, and they were also instructed to paste on
the outer and inner doors of their homes red pieces of cloth with the characters
hong 洪 and ying 英 as charms (see Fig. 1).57 The color red was a general
indicator of divinity and therefore exorcistic power, which derives from the
reddish color of blood which is life’s vital force.58
Based on the above information, it is clear that the Tiandihui groups involved in

54
Yongan xian sanzhi, 522.
55
Gongzhongdang (8752) JQ 7.8.16; (8796) JQ 7.8.23; (9072) JQ 7.10.24; and Tiandihui, 7:45,
86, 141, 151.
56
Hubert Seiwert, Popular Religious Movements and Heterodox Sects in Chinese History, 116,
151, 154.
57
William Stanton, The Triad Society, 117, writing in 1900, explained that during times of
rebellion, society members, “in order to protect their families from violence, nail a square piece
of red cloth over the door-ways of their dwellings, with the character 洪 hung, written on the
outside and the character 英 ying on the inside of it.”
58
Gongzhongdang (9072) JQ 7.10.24; Tiandihui, 7:37–38; and Barend ter Haar, Ritual and
Mythology of the Chinese Triads, 114–15, 116.
the Huizhou uprising belonged to a much larger, but somewhat loose, network of
secret society and lay Buddhist organizations that stretched across Jiangxi, Fujian,
and Guangdong. Significantly too, much of this area was mountainous and settled
by Hakkas, whose lives were precarious and marginalized (see Map 1). Under such
conditions they often took matters into their own hands by forming self-contained
groups for mutual-aid and self-protection. As noted above, many of these groups
also practiced vegetarianism, chanted sutras, and produced talismans in order to
protect their health and improve their livelihoods. Others, particularly the
followers of Li Lingkui, Liao Ganzhou, and Xu Qianjin, believed in an impending
cosmic apocalypse in which only believers, namely those followers who possessed
their talismans, flags, and certificates, would survive.
Interpreting the Tiandihui’s Seditious Propaganda

The Tiandihui has long been depicted as a political organization with the avowed
purpose of overthrowing the Qing dynasty. First and foremost in making such a
portrayal was the Qing government, which condemned and fervently prosecuted
secret societies as dangerous, seditious organizations. Later scholars and writers,
who tended to focus on the oaths and legends of the Tiandihui, perpetuated and
popularized the view that the Tiandihui was founded in the early Qing period
primarily as an anti-Manchu organization that aimed to “overthrow the Qing and
restore the Ming” (fan Qing fu Ming 反清複明). Despite the important studies by
Qin Baoqi and other scholars that have persuasively challenged this interpretation,
the old conventional wisdom continues to today.59
In contrast, what did the Tiandihui members think about their own
organization? Other interpretations are in fact possible. It is likely that the official
views of the Qing government were not shared by the majority of Tiandihui
members. Most of the oaths, rituals, and ceremonies, in fact, were not the
invention of the Tiandihui. Rather they were steeped in the rich folk culture of
south China and therefore quite familiar to the people who joined the society, and
in fact had little to do with sedition and rebellion. Tiandihui organizers readily
utilized elements from popular operas, oral traditions, and novels, such as
Romance of the Three Kingdoms (Sanguo yanyi 三國演義), Outlaws of the Marsh
(Shuihuzhuan 水滸傳), and Investiture of the Gods (Fengshen yanyi 封神演義), to

59
See, for example, Qin Baoqi, Qing qianqi Tiandihui yanjiu; Zhuang Jifa, Qingdai tiandihui
yuanliu kao; and Dian Murray, The Origins of the Tiandihui: The Chinese Triads in Legend
and History. One of the strongest proponents of the old conventional wisdom is He Zhiqing,
Tiandihui qiyuan yanjiu.
help recruit new members.60 Based on his investigation of the Tiandihui uprising
in Huizhou, Governor Hutuli 瑚圖禮 explained that the leaders, such as Chen
Yaben in Guishan and Zeng Qinghao in Yongan, had assumed such titles as Great
King and Great General based on ideas taken from popular adventure stories
(xiaoshuo yanyi 小說演義). Leaders took such pretentious titles, he said, only to
flatter themselves (huxiang biaobang 互相標榜) and to build up prestige among
ignorant villagers.61 The ritual oaths venerating Heaven and Earth as father and
mother and the slogan “follow Heaven to carry out the way” (discussed above), or
its variations, “on behalf of Heaven carry out the way” (titian xingdao 替天行道
and daitian xingdao 代天行道), could be found in popular stories and dramas, as
well as in Daoist rituals.62
While such phrases carried certain political connotations, nonetheless, they also
were common in folk culture and religious practices. For Tiandihui members the
slogan “follow Heaven to carry out the way” may simply have meant “to follow
the will of Heaven” in order to be an upright person. In this regard, one Tiandihui
teacher in Qinzhou in 1805 explained the slogan as “following Heaven is good, [to]
carry out the public way and not harbor an evil mind.”63 Tiandihui certificates
carried by members served not only as registrations of membership and secret
codes, but also were talismans that promised protection against ill health, swindlers,
and evil spirits. Secret code words such as heaven (tian 天), earth (di 地), and
vastness (or flood) (hong 洪), for example, were often written is obscure talismanic
styles (see Fig. 4). The use of talismans, of course, was common throughout village
society. So were multi-colored banners. Although on at least one Huizhou
Tiandihui banner were written the words “wood, create, peck measure,
generation; all under Heaven knows, follow Heaven’s will to revive the Ming; this
is our covenant” (muli doushi tianxia zhi shuntian xingming hehetong 木立斗世天
下知顺天兴明合和同), which has been interpreted by several modern scholars as a
prognostication of the fall of the Qing dynasty (muli doushi) and the restoration of
the Ming (shuntian xingming), in their confessions most society members claimed

60
See Luo Ergang, “Shuhuzhuan yu tiandihui”; and Jean Chesneaux, “The Modern Relevance
of Shui-hu chuan.”
61
Gongzhongdang (9512) JQ 7.11.17.
62
Dai Xuanzhi, “Tiandihui yu daojiao,” 156–61; Ownby, “The Tiandihui as Popular
Religion,” 1032.
63
Tiandihui, 6:195, 199; Nawenyigong zouyi, 1423; Barend ter Haar, Ritual and Mythology of
the Chinese Triads, 341; Wen-hsiung Hsu, “The Triads and their Ideology up to the Early
Nineteenth Century,” 342; and David Ownby, “The Tiandihui as Popular Religion,” 1032–33.
they did not understand the cryptic meaning of the split characters muli doushi64
(See Fig. 1). At least one member told authorities that the four characters stood for
dates, the first three characters for the last years of reign periods for the first three
Qing emperors and the last character for the founding year of the Heaven and
Earth Society; another member said they were magical code words used for
recognition of other members; and another member explained them as a “wish
that the brothers would be in harmony.”65 The lore, symbols, and written texts
were forms of knowledge that functioned as “ritual objects” necessary for
initiations and recognition of other members; they did not require understanding
of their meaning.66 As David Faure and He Xi argue in their contribution to this
special issue, the liturgical tradition and theatrical ceremonies of the Tiandihui
were designed to inspire members to see beyond the harsh reality of daily life and
create a new imagined reality, not to foment rebellion against the Qing dynasty. In
any case, I would argue that such rituals, slogans, certificates, and banners
apparently had multiple meanings according to particular audiences, and therefore
could be understood in different ways by different people.
The altars used in Tiandihui initiation ceremonies included such ritual objects as
five-colored flags (wuseqi 五色旗) and double-edge swords (jian 劍). Although
officials viewed the flags and swords simply as weapons used by bandits and rebels,
such items were also common on altars in temples and frequently used in religious
rituals. For example, the five-colored flags represented different armies of the Five
Encampments (wuying 五營), where spirit soldiers were thought to reside. In
Daoism, these spirit soldiers assisted the religious specialist in his fight against
demons and protected the community from all sorts of calamities. Swords likewise
were used to combat demons. Figure 5, from contemporary Taiwan, depicts two
Daoist priests with flags and swords exorcising demons in a religious rite of cosmic
renewal and cleansing. Just as the spirit armies were invoked to protect a
community, they were likewise used to protect Tiandihui members from
malevolent spirits and apocalyptic chaos. Possession of a particular flag provided the
protection of spirit armies represented by the flag and controlled by the flag.67 As
David Ownby has explained, one of the chief attractions for joining the Tiandihui

64
Sasaki Masaya, Shinmatsu no himitsu kessha, 169–70; Weng Tongwen, “Tiandihui yinyu
‘mulidoushi’ xinyi,” 167–89; and Wen-hsiung Hsu, “The Triads and their Ideology up to the
Early Nineteenth Century,” 346.
65
See Barend ter Haar, Ritual and Mythology of the Chinese Triads, 330n62, 428.
66
Ibid., 424–33.
67
Ibid., 72, 77, 247; and Robert Antony, “Demons, Gangsters, and Secret Societies in Early
Modern South China,” 78–79, 82–85.
Fig. 5 Daoist Priests in Taiwan Exorcising Demons, 2002 (photo by Robert J. Antony)
“appears to have been the promise of access to supernatural power through the
manipulation of spiritual forces.”68
Although the Huizhou Tiandihui displayed various seditious slogans, banners,
and seals, and their leaders took such titles as Great King and Great General,
nonetheless, it is significant that they never targeted government military
installations or county seats, the most conspicuous symbols of Qing authority in
the countryside. Instead, their uprising was aimed at their long-time Punti rivals;
the insurgents attacked Punti villages and markets. In other words, the strife was a
more intensified version of the ongoing conflicts and feuds between Hakka and
Punti. The 1802 Tiandihui uprising was, much like the earlier Lin Shuangwen
uprising on Taiwan, a local disturbance that escalated into a major social disorder.
Both in Huizhou and in Taiwan, the Tiandihui rebels only began their uprisings
after being provoked by officials and local rival groups. As one red banner carried
into battle by Yongan Tiandihui members proclaimed: “Officials compel the good
people [to rebel]” (guan bi liangmin 官逼良民).69

68
David Ownby, “The Heaven and Earth Society as Popular Religion,” 1024.
69
Nawenyigong zouyi, 840. Similarly, in 1886 in Huizhou several thousand Hakka formed a
Triad society and rose up in revolt due to “the oppressive acts of Government officials,” William
Stanton, The Triad Society, 23.
Conclusion
The Tiandihui and Dachengjiao traditions in the tri-province area of Guangdong,
Jiangxi, and Fujian merged and became closely interconnected, not only through a
common membership of leaders and followers but also through shared customs,
rituals, and beliefs. This mountainous borderland was bound together by cultural,
social, and economic ties that traversed provincial boundaries and Skinnerian
macroregions. A highly mobile population of itinerant laborers, peddlers, coolies,
actors, healers, barbers, monks, geomancers, and martial artists—the mainstay of
sect and secret society teachers and members discussed in this article—routinely
circulated across this vast area via rivers and mountain paths. This was a marginal
and ethnically mixed contact zone of endemic feuding and weak state control, an
area where Hakkas were a major component of the population. On the one hand,
Tiandihui and lay Buddhist groups formed along the nodes of communication and
trade routes, in market towns where rivers and roads intersected. One such place
was Wan’an on the Gan River, a necessary stopover for travelers between Jiangxi
and Guangdong; in the early nineteenth century the Tiandihui and lay Buddhist
groups were active there.70 On the other hand, as the late Ming scholar Xiong
Renlin explained, “Various mountain ranges of northern Guangdong, southeastern
Hunan, southwest Fujian, Jiangxi, and south Zhejiang were connected, providing
tracks for the dye-growing [indigo] migrants of Tingzhou. Such paths… were
hidden from the eyes of the state.”71 These were the mountain paths used mainly
by smugglers, bandits, and dissidents, particularly those individuals and groups that
wanted to remain hidden from officials. They were in large part Hakkas.
A large number of the individuals mentioned in this article, in fact, regularly
trekked back and forth between Jiangxi, Fujian, and Guangdong. In 1752, as
mentioned, He Yasi from Guangdong and Li Dexian from Fujian organized a
millenarian rebellion in Jiangxi. Li Lingkui, Liao Ganzhou, and Du Shiming, as
well as their followers, regularly traveled between Fujian and Jiangxi where they
disseminated Tiandihui and lay Buddhist teachings and preached about
sword-bearing demons and impending cosmic catastrophes. In 1802 officials
reported to the throne that Fujianese sojourners, such as Cai Buyun, had been
responsible for disseminating the Adding Brothers Society from their home

70
David Ownby, “The Heaven and Earth Society as Popular Religion,” 1028; Wen-hsiung
Hsu, “The Triads and their Ideology up to the Early Nineteenth Century,” 332–34. On the
laboring poor and their underworld culture see Robert Antony, Unruly People: Crime,
Community, and State in Late Imperial China, 183-89.
71
Cited in Wing-hoi Chan, “Ethnic Labels in a Mountainous Region,” 275.
province to Guangdong and Jiangxi.72 Chen Lanjisi’s family had originated in

Taihe county in Jiangxi, moved to Xingning county in the late Yuan dynasty, and
then resettled in several places in Boluo county in Guangdong in the late Ming and
early Qing; well into the twentieth century they still maintained contacts with
relatives in Jiangxi. 73 Wen Yali 溫亞利 and Wen Yashi 溫亞石 joined the
Tiandihui in Yongan and later helped spread it to Xingning on the Jiangxi
border. 74 Sect and secret society members regularly communicated with one
another through visitations and letters, often over long distances across the three
provinces. There was in fact a discernable pattern here, involving the never-ending
flow of sojourners who earned their livings in various places and through multiple
occupations. For itinerant peddlers, monks, barbers, and actors—many of whom
were Hakkas—the distribution and selling of scriptures, chants, secret society
books, talismans, hand signals, and secret codes was an important supplement to
their other incomes, and in some cases the main income.
It is clear too that the Tiandihui and Dachengjiao traditions derived from
common cultural and religious traditions found in local society. The repeated and
widespread appearance of particular rituals and folk beliefs over a long period of
time and over an extended area of south China was not the result of coincidence
but rather of a shared well-known heritage. For example, charismatic teachers,
such as those mentioned in this article, circulated similar apocalyptic stories to
audiences that readily accepted such forebodings.75 Marginalization and hardships
of everyday life conditioned people’s perceptions and beliefs about a cosmos in
which the natural and supernatural realms were thoroughly entwined. Because folk
beliefs that natural and man-made calamities could be averted by the aid of
imperial descendants, saviors were often said to be royal figures, and therefore the
surnames Li of the Tang dynasty and Zhu of the Ming dynasty were popular.
Besides the frequent usage of names like Li Kaihua and Zhu Hongzhu in numerous
messianic movements, we also find on the talismans of Du Shiming (Fig. 4) and
banners of Chen Lanjisi (Fig. 1) the three surnames Li, Zhu, and Hong, invoked as
talismanic protection, as well as for fraternity and common identity among

72
Shangyudang, JQ 7.10.28. Earlier, in 1791, there was the case involving Peng Shangnian 彭
尚年 from Fujian, Zhu Langsi 朱浪四 from Guangdong, and Huang Zuojin 黃佐金 from
Jiangxi who formed an Adding Brothers Society in Nankang county in northern Jiangxi,
Tiandihui, 6:365–66.
73
Chen shi zupu; according to interviews I conducted in June 2002, the Boluo Chens still have
contacts with relatives across Guangdong, Jiangxi, and Guangxi.
74
75
On contemporary Chinese “redemptive societies” that emphasize salvation in the face of an
imminent apocalypse, see David Ownby’s contribution in this issue.
Tiandihui followers.76
For the Hakka in Huizhou, the Tiandihui and its affiliations with sectarianism
helped construct and define Hakka ethnic identity. According to Sow-Theng
Leong, Hakka ethnicity developed as “a particularistic ethos” that first appeared in
the early nineteenth century when Hakkas began to think of themselves as a
distinct ethnic group. I would argue further that Hakka ethnic identity was a
sociocultural process that began during and was, at least in part, an outcome of the
Huizhou uprising in 1802. As a socially marginalized group Hakka formed
Tiandihui and lay Buddhist associations as ways to create a new identity to offset
the negative identity that they had been ascribed by dominant society.77 These
organizations helped build solidarity by providing an organizational framework
that went beyond kinship and lineage, and by constructing networks of mutual
obligations among the Hakka communities. Tiandihui identities, in fact,
overlapped with Hakka identities, and furthermore acted as visible markers that
distinguished them from the Punti. For Hakka the Tiandihui became a means of
agency and empowerment, as well as an important vehicle for articulating Hakka
identity and ethnicity.78
Finally, what should we make of the Tiandihui uprising in Huizhou in 1802?
On the most basic level, it represented the culmination of long-standing
antagonisms and rivalries between the Hakka and Punti. In this sense, it was an
ethnic conflict in which animosity and vengeance were primary motives. On
another level, the Qing state viewed the uprising as a politically motivated attempt
to topple the dynasty. In the eyes of the government, organizations such as the
Tiandihui and Dachengjiao were seditious in nature as evidenced by their
production of slogans, charms, scriptures, and books which to officials appeared
unorthodox and dangerous. To simply belong to such an organization was a
serious criminal offense. The Qing state treated the confrontation with secret
societies and sects as a conflict of belief systems and as a contest for power.79
But I believe there is more to the story. On a higher level, the eschatological
message preached by sect members, and perpetuated by the Tiandihui as well,

76
Sasaki Masaya, Shinmatsu no himitsu kessha, 172. When neophytes entered the Tiandihui
they took Hong as their new surname; and the word Hong was also invoked on protective
talismans by members (see Figures 1 and 4).
77
Sow-Theng Leong, Migration and Ethnicity in Chinese History, 63, 69, 75; also see Barend
ter Haar, Ritual and Mythology of the Chinese Triads, 402.
78
Two important anthropological studies on Hakka ethnicity in the Hong Kong setting are C.
Fred Blake, Ethnic Groups and Social Change in a Chinese Market Town and Nicole Constable,
“Christianity and Hakka Identity.”
79
Daniel Overmyer, Folk Buddhist Religion, 21.
went beyond the overturning of the dynasty. They called for a profound change in
the cosmos itself. The aim was to usher in a new world of peace and prosperity, a
new form of existence in which Hakkas would play a dominant role. As Hubert
Seiwert has explained, the new ideal world was not necessarily a political utopia
but a religious eschatology. It represented the end of the current world as we know
it and the formation of a new transcendental world.80 In the words of the Boluo
sectarian teacher Xu Qianjin, Heaven would appear on earth and Buddhas would
descend to save the true believers who would thereafter live in complete
tranquility and peace. This would be nothing less than a Hakka paradise.
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Ethnic and Religious Violence in South C

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Ethnic and Religious Violence in South C

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Front. Hist.

China 2016, 11(4): 532–562

Ethnic and Religious Violence in South China: The

before 1802. This is followed by a section on the relationships between the

The Tiandihui Uprising in 1802

remaining members fled into the mountains to hide out.6

disturbances in Guishan in May 1802. After receiving word of the arrests in

Fig. 1 Tiandihui Banner Used by Chen Lanjisi

the tens of thousands. The destruction of crops and disruption of people’s

Fig. 2 Page from the Boluo Chen Family Genealogy, 1833

Hakka-Punti Ethnic Strife

mountain stronghold in Tielongzhang. There he chanted spells, recited sutras, and

Fig. 3 Wu Zixiang’s Sect Networks

Li Lingkui now added the Tiandihui teachings to his repertoire, initiating

Fig. 4 Talisman Used by Wu Wenchun

mark.”54 Huizhou Tiandihui leaders also disseminated to their followers talismans

Interpreting the Tiandihui’s Seditious Propaganda

province to Guangdong and Jiangxi.72 Chen Lanjisi’s family had originated in

“Guangdongsheng Huiyang dichuming zhi” (Gazetteer of place names from Huiyang in

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