TAIPING (“great peace” or “great equity”) denotes a pan-
Chinese social ideal and utopian slogan of rebels and dynasty
founders. Ping (“level, balanced, just, harmonious”), daping
(“great peace”), or taiping (“supreme peace”) first appear in
Confucian texts of the pre-Han (pre-206 BCE) era. There
these terms denoted the ideal state of the world that had ex-
isted in high antiquity and that could again be brought about
by a sage ruler who practiced the proper rites and music
(Daxue, Li ji). The term never implied social equality in a
modern sense but rather referred to a society where, as Xunzi
defined it, each individual occupies the place that he should
and fulfills his task according to his capacities. At the same
time, Great Peace was not limited to human society but de-
noted a cosmic harmony that resulted in a seasonal climate,
plentiful harvests, and longevity of all living beings (Chunqiu
fanlu, Yantie lun). It was a state in which all the concentric
spheres of the organic Chinese universe, which contained na-
ture as well as society, were perfectly attuned, communicated
with each other in a balanced rhythm of timeliness, and
brought maximum fulfillment to each living being.
During the Han dynasty (206 BCE–220 CE), Great Peace
became the social ideal of the official Confucian state doc-
trine (which it remains to this day). However, when the Han
declined, “Great Peace” became the slogan also of popular
movements of revolt inspired by Daoism. Daoism had earlier
found a place for the concept in its own philosophy. The
Daoist philosopher Zhuangzi (fourth century BCE) had called
a government that conformed to the order of nature taiping,
an idea that was in no contradiction to the Confucian defini-
tion of the term. The Daoist popular movements were op-
posed not to the ideal of Great Peace but to the dynasty that
subscribed to it and had failed to bring it about. Thus, tai-
ping cannot be called a “revolutionary” ideal, although two
of the greatest social upheavals in Chinese history are called
Taiping rebellions.
Twice during the Han period, a group of fangshi
(“masters of [esoteric] techniques”) presented at court a Tai-
ping jing (Classic of Great Peace). It was rejected because of
its Daoist tenor. This or a similar Classic of Great Peace be-
came the sacred scripture of the first Taiping or “Yellow Tur-
ban” Rebellion (184 CE), which eventually brought down the
Han empire. This scripture, still extant in a revised version
(probably sixth century), elaborates the messianic element in
the Taiping tradition: the Great Peace that the princes of
high antiquity brought about through a Daoist government
of “nonintervention” (wuwei) is a state that will be recreated
in the near future as a result of revelations by a divine mes-
senger called Celestial Master (Tianshi). The religious origi-
nality of this view lies in its substitution of the Confucian
virtues and rites with Daoist spiritual exercises and other
methods of longevity as the means by which to reach
Taiping.
The rebellion of 184 was crushed, but it engendered a
messianic ideology that flourished during the Period of Dis-
union (220–581), was rekindled in all subsequent periods of
upheaval, and formed the basis of Daoist as well as Buddhist
messianism and eschatology in China. This Taiping ideology
centered around the expectation that a divine or human sage
ruler, the Perfect Lord of Great Peace (Taiping Zhenjun),
emissary of Heaven, will appear on a prophesied date at the
height of a period of cosmic chaos and human suffering. He
will save the elect (zhongmin, the “seed people”) from the de-
monic forces sent to destroy all evildoers, and will usher in
the reign of Great Peace (as related in the Dongyuan shenzhou
jing). Even in this religious setting, the messianic kingdom
is often no more and no less than a glorious new Chinese
dynasty, although in some Daoist traditions it is developed
into a paradisiacal utopia.Dynasty founders, especially those of the Tang, 618–
906, and the Ming, 1368–1644, tapped this messianic tradi-
tion by casting themselves in the role of the sage ruler of Tai-
ping. Ten times in Chinese history Taiping was chosen as
the name of a reign period (nianhao). Emperor Taiwu of the
Northern Wei called both himself and a period of his reign
(440–452) “Perfect Lord of Great Peace.”The second Taiping rebellion (1850–1865) was the
most powerful of several great uprisings toward the end of
the Manchu dynasty. In 1851, the visionary rebel leader
Hong Xiuquan (1813–1864) from Canton proclaimed the
Heavenly Kingdom of Great Peace (Taiping Tianguo) with
himself as Emperor of Great Peace (Taiping Tianzi). His reli-
gion was a combination of Chinese traditions with many ele-
ments from Protestant Christianity (monotheism, ten com-
mandments, Sunday worship, iconoclasm, condemnation of
“Chinese idol-worship”). Hong called himself the younger
brother of Jesus Christ. God had endowed him with imperial
legitimation (in the shape of a seal), with the (Daoist) power
to kill demons (a sword), and with divine scriptures (revela-
tion in Chinese religion is always in the form of writing). The
Taiping theocracy established in Nanjing was destroyed in
1864, but the Taiping ideal lives on in Daoism and in most
of the modern Chinese syncretist religions.SEE ALSO Daoism, overview article; Millenarianism, article
on Chinese Millenarian Movements.BIBLIOGRAPHY
The basic texts on the Taiping ideal of antiquity and the Daoist
Taiping Dao movement are presented in Werner Eichhorn’s
“Tai-ping und Tai-ping Religion,” Mitteilungen des Instituts
für Orientforschung 5 (1957): 113–140; see also Max Kalten-
mark’s “The Ideology of the Tai-ping ching,” in Facets of
Taoism, edited by Holmes Welch and myself (New Haven,
1979), pp. 19–52. On medieval Daoist messianism, see my
article “The Image of the Perfect Ruler in Early Taoist Messi-
anism: Lao-tzu and Li Hung,” History of Religions 9 (1969–
1970): 216–247, and “Taoist Messianism,” Numen 31
(1984): 161–174. The religion of the nineteenth-century
Taiping Tianguo movement is the subject of a detailed mono-
graph by Vincent Shih, The Taiping Ideology (Seattle, 1967).TAIPING 8961