The White Lotus bands mainly used guerrilla tactics, and once they disbanded, they were virtually indistinguishable from the local population. The Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th ed.. . . The White Lotus Rebellion 1796-1804 In the densely forested border area between the provinces Hubei, Sichuan and Shaanxi, a lot of homeless peasant refugees(liumin, see also shed people) had gathered to escape the grip of landowners, creditors and tax collectors. Wang Lun likely failed because he did not make any attempts to raise wide public support. Instead, Britain began a lucrative, illicit trade in opium, traded from British imperial India into Canton, far from Beijing. Alternate titles: Bailianjiao, Pai-lien chiao, San Jos State University - The White Lotus Religion in China. Unable to build up a support base, he was forced to quickly flee all three cities that he attacked in order to evade government troops. Beginning as tax protests, the eventual rebellion gained growing support and sympathy from many ordinary people. Buddhist sects, such as the White Lotus sect, a group that attracted many followers among the Chinese lower classes. Main article: White Lotus Rebellion Beginning in 1794, two decades after Wang Lun's failed uprising, a movement also arose in the mountainous region that separates Sichuan from Hubei and Shaanxi in central China as tax protests. In China, the Qing Dynasty had just put down the White Lotus Rebellion, a tax protest that ultimately killed about 16 million people a reminder that mass death and population growth don't . It is only as historical sources look back upon these events do they began to summarize the various aspects of these uprisings as the "White Lotus rebellion.". The White Lotus Rebellion Another important rebellion launched by members of the White Lotus Society was the White Lotus Rebellion . The calamitous Opium Wars seemed to prove that the alien ruling dynasty had lost the Mandate of Heaven and needed to be overthrown. The White Lotus peasant rebellion broke out in 1795 (White Lotus was the name of a secret society that had first fought against the Mongols). As you might expect, the collapse of China's Qing dynasty was a long and complex process. All our content comes from Wikipedia and under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License. After the strnggle had lasted six years, Lin Chi-hich was captunredd. In the stockades they were organized into local militia defense corps. The Qings were from Manchuria, and they established their dynasty as a conquering force of the Ming dynasty by non-Chinese outsiders, maintaining that identity and organization throughout their 268-year reign. BJ Ter Haar has argued that the term "White Lotus" was used primarily by Ming and Qing imperial bureaucrats to disparagingly explain a wide range of unconnected millenarian traditions, rebel movements, and popular religious practices. It is only as historical sources look back upon these events do they began to summarize the various aspects of these uprisings as the "White Lotus rebellion. The elites' self-proclaimed position as outsiders contributed to their eventual demise. It took nine years of warfare and great loss. id In particular, the court marked itself off from its subjects in certain religious, linguistic, ritual, and social characteristics, always presenting themselves as outside conquerors. White Lotus Rebellion, Chinese anti-Manchu uprising that occurred during the Ch'ing dynasty. [12] The experience of suppressing the rebellion led to improvement in the organization and training of the militia, as many of their leaders wrote extensively on mobilization, enlistment and local defense methods. In 1775, a chief of the White Lotus Society, named Liu Sung, was banished from Anhwei to Kansuh after sending people to the area under pretext of healing diseases by prayer and incantation, to gain adherents to his cause in Western China. The group later reemerged in the late 18th century in the form of an inspired Chinese movement. Rather, it consisted of uncoordinated roving bands using hit-and-run guerrilla tactics. . This internecine war lasted over ten years, at a cost of tens of thousands of lives and an expenditure, by the government alone, of two hundred million taels in money. (present perfect, tell). }, Page last modified: This rebellion was less successful than that of the Red Turbans, and the Qing government succeeded in crushing this uprising. As one Qing official complained: The rebels are all our own subjects. The doctrine of the White Lotus includes an alleged forecast to the advent of the Buddha. Unable to build up a support base, he was forced to quickly flee all three cities that he attacked in order to evade government troops. The river flooded constantly, and other natural disasters also occurred. Then a turn of fortune and successive victories of the imperialists would almost annihilate their armies and crush all their hopes. The White Lotus is a syncretic religious and political movement which forecasts the imminent advent of the "King of Light" , i.e., the future Buddha Maitreya. //]]>. The White Lotus War (1796-1804) in central China marked the end of the Qing dynasty's golden age and the fatal weakening of the imperial system itself. //