The Greater the Devil, the Greater the Magic — Manichaeism
Association for the Liberation of the Proletariat, Marxist Philosophy Group
There are many pejorative words related to “devil” in modern times, such as “falling into the devil’s way” for going astray, “walking fire into the devil” to describe obsession and stubbornness, and “demonized” for being crazy or obsessed. Language is the material shell of consciousness, and in a society with private ownership, the ruling class often controls the use of words. They regard “devil” as an enemy of the “orthodox teaching” and “right path,” and they attack and slander “devil” to the utmost extent. In ancient times, they even used armies and secret agents to hunt down and slaughter it, aiming to eliminate it completely. Who exactly is this so-called “devil” that they go to such lengths to fight?
In the West, from the peasant wars led by Mazda-dak to the Albigensian heresy spreading across Southern Europe; in the East, from the uprising of Chen Shuo-zhen at the beginning of the Tang Dynasty to the White Lotus Rebellion at the end of the Qing Dynasty; workers and oppressed peoples throughout history and across countries have united under the banner of “devil,” holding the belief that “light overcomes darkness, good overcomes evil,” transforming into “devil armies” and rising up to “kill all injustice,” engaging in life-and-death struggles with the brutal exploiting classes. Therefore, “devil” has become a symbol of revolutionary struggle that the exploiting classes fear and hate upon seeing. The emergence of “devil” as a pejorative term precisely reflects the deep hatred of the exploiting classes toward “devil.”
And this “devil,” involved in numerous revolutionary movements, is the Manichaeism that originated in ancient Persia and spread across Eurasia through oral transmission among the laboring masses.
I. The Founding of Manichaeism
In the 3rd century AD, from Europe to India, class struggles were blazing everywhere. Under the impact of repeated slave uprisings, the estates of the slave-owning classes, which brutally exploited and oppressed slaves, were destroyed one after another, and the semi-feudal serfdom that was budding as a new mode of production grew on the ruins. Ancient slave society had reached a state of decline and exhaustion. Slaves and serfs demanded continued revolution to overthrow the evil slave system altogether. Meanwhile, the emerging landlord class also sought to break through the old production relations hindering the development of feudal production.
“Without revolutionary theory, there can be no revolutionary movement.” [1] The broad masses of workers and the emerging landlord class urgently needed a revolutionary theory that could “enable the lower to make the upper, the poor to become rich, chaos to become order, and the weak to become strong,” to oppose reactionary ideas, guide revolutionary struggles, and transform the decayed slave society. Repeated failures of revolutionary struggles taught them lessons—Christianity had long become a tool for the slave-owning classes to numb the people; Zoroastrianism and Buddhism, which preached reincarnation and rebirth, were spiritual opiates that needed to be abandoned entirely; Christianity, with its system of doctrines and mystical teachings, had significant flaws. Therefore, at that time, no existing ideology could meet the needs of revolutionary forces across classes. The era called for a new revolutionary thought.
Revolutionary ideas did not necessarily originate in the most economically developed regions but often in areas with the sharpest class contradictions and fiercest class struggles—in that era, the Mesopotamian plain between the three continents and five seas. Under the impact of slave uprisings, to plunder slaves and wealth abroad and divert people’s attention, the slave-owning classes launched invasions. The Parthian Empire and the subsequent Sassanid Persia, along with the Roman Empire, engaged in prolonged conflicts, making Mesopotamia the front line for requisitions and wars. The brutal national oppression by Parthian and Roman empires made ethnic contradictions in Mesopotamia very acute. Wherever there is oppression, resistance follows. Faced with the brutal oppression of the ruling classes, the broad masses of workers and oppressed nations launched even more vigorous uprisings.
Within Persia, the slave-owning class used religious authority to deceive and suppress the working people, hiding behind the robes of Zoroastrian priests and slave owners, attacking the progressive classes and laborers. At this time, Mani, from a declining slave-owning family, sought to fight against the corrupt priestly class. Summarizing the progressive ideas of the laboring masses at that time, absorbing parts of Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity, and Gnostic heretical sects, and critically transforming Zoroastrianism, he proposed a new ideological school—Manichaeism—centered on intuitive materialism and simple dialectics.
Although Manichaeism inherited the doctrine of the dual gods of good and evil from Zoroastrianism, it removed the contradiction-harmonizing theory of the two gods ultimately uniting, instead emphasizing struggle as its main content. This distinguished it from other religions filled with idealism. It clearly reflected its class stance different from the Persian slave-owning aristocracy—Manichaeism resolutely opposed the decadent lifestyle of the exploiting classes, condemned promiscuity, social oppression, and called for rejecting idol worship, lying, greed, murder, fornication, theft, fraud, witchcraft, falsehood, double-heartedness, and laziness—directly targeting the religious representatives of the reactionary slave-owning class, the Zoroastrian priests.
In the religious worldview of Manichaeism, before the birth of the material universe (the “pre-world,” i.e., the past), there existed a material cosmos. The universe is eternal in time and “vast and infinite” in space [2], divided into two completely different worlds: light and darkness. The dark lord of the dark world led countless demons to invade the bright world, which, due to long peace and lack of war, had no walls, weapons, or defenses, and was ultimately swallowed by darkness. Although the bright world was swallowed, it was not destroyed; it continued to exist in another form and fought against darkness. This struggle entangled light and darkness, forming the real world (“middle world,” i.e., the present), giving rise to all things and humans. The material world was born from the conflict of light and darkness, making it a mixture of both, with ongoing internal struggle. Based on this, Manichaeism promoted the idea of contradiction and struggle in all things, further believing that although the current world is ruled by darkness, with the intensification of the struggle between light and darkness, the world will be reduced to ashes in a great fire. In the blazing flames, light will be liberated, defeated, and sealed away from darkness forever. The mission of Manichaeist believers is to help light triumph over darkness, sealing all evil deeds—conflicts, plunder, murder, war—along with the dark world. When that time comes, all humanity will enter a world of light and happiness—the “post-world,” i.e., the future.
This is the “Two Religions, Three Ages” theory of Manichaeism. The two religions are light and darkness; the three ages are past, present, and future. Through this theory, Manichaeism pointed out that the driving force of material development lies not outside but within the internal struggle of light and darkness. At each stage of development, the main aspect is—past is light, present is darkness, and future will return to light. However, this return is not a simple repetition or cycle—the past light world was weak, lacking walls, weapons, and defenses; the future light world will grow strong through the struggle with darkness and ultimately seal it completely. Manichaeism used simple myth stories to illustrate the transformation of contradictions and the dialectical focus, as well as the wave-like progress of things, systematically proposing dialectical theory.
Mani sent many disciples to the four corners to teach and enlighten the world [3]. In the process of engaging with various ethnic rulers and laboring people for missionary work, Mani and his disciples developed skills in writing and painting, using art to express ideas. Even illiterate people could understand the principles just by looking at their paintings depicting the struggle between light and darkness. They condemned the luxury and decadence of Zoroastrian priests, opposed the wealth disparity of slave society, and promoted the idea that abandoning wealth, practicing asceticism, helping the poor, and simple living could lead to sainthood.
The dialectical thought of “Two Religions, Three Ages” aligned with the social reality of the decline of slavery, sharp class and ethnic contradictions, and the imminent replacement of old production relations by new ones. The formula of negation of negation—“light-dark-light”—revealed that the rule of the reactionary exploiters would eventually perish, telling the workers that the bright world is not a distant illusion but an inevitable future embedded in reality; workers should not wait for a savior from the heavens but create happiness with their own hands; new things are invincible, and a bright future is certain to come!
Because of its alignment with the workers’ desire to oppose oppression, overthrow the decayed slave society, and usher in a new society of brightness and happiness, Manichaeism quickly spread in Sassanid Persia and neighboring regions. Within just over a decade, it developed hundreds of thousands of followers across states and counties [4]. The emerging landlord class, which was relatively weak at the time, also found a theoretical basis for reform from the ideas of the rise and fall of Manichaeism. Therefore, the widespread popularity of Manichaeism had a broad social base, including slaves, serfs, free citizens, and new feudal landlords.
“However, when a new revolutionary thing appears on the horizon, people’s attitudes toward it vary. Some praise and support it, some doubt and discriminate against it, and others curse and try to suppress it. In summary, some think ‘it’s very good,’ others think ‘it’s terrible.’” [5] While the broad masses of workers praised and followed Manichaeism, reactionary forces represented by Zoroastrian priests showed the opposite attitude—they accused Mani of falsely claiming to be the Great Way and deceiving common people [6], colluding with kings and conservative slave-owning classes, plotting to kill Mani and completely suppress this “heresy.” After the Persian slave-owning conservative forces installed their favored king, they prepared to suppress Manichaeism within a few years. Although Mani sensed the impending danger from the ruling class, his own background as a fallen slave owner and his practical dealings with the exploiting classes made it difficult for him to align with the working people. Mani looked upward, unable to see the strength of the masses, and preferred to seek the support of the king for reform rather than organize a nationwide uprising.
Thus, although Mani possessed the objective conditions for organizing a people’s uprising and practicing revolutionary philosophy, he failed to mobilize his followers effectively (“thirty-six directions, simultaneous rise”); moreover, he underestimated the reactionary nature of the ruling class and their potential repression, leaving him unprepared for resistance. Ultimately, he and his sect were ruthlessly suppressed by the joint efforts of the Persian slave-owning class.
In 277 AD, the king summoned Mani to the capital. Upon arrival, Mani was immediately imprisoned. The Zoroastrian priest group demanded that Mani “repent and abandon heresy,” but he firmly refused. He was imprisoned and tortured for two months, and finally executed by crucifixion, sacrificing himself. After his death, the priests further desecrated his body, skinning and hanging it on the gates of Taysafun city to intimidate the people. Simultaneously, the Persian ruling class launched brutal suppression of Manichaeists. Suddenly, blood and chaos engulfed Persia.
The suppression in Persia was a major setback for the initial birth and spread of Manichaeism. As the church leader, Mani’s class limitations and mistaken ideas were significant reasons. Additionally, as a newly born religion, Manichaeism had not yet undergone long-term correction and transformation by the working people; its reactionary nature was still evident—it did not overcome doctrines used in Buddhism and Christianity to numb the people but absorbed some of these elements, preaching reincarnation to reach the bright world of the afterlife, misleading followers to seek peace after death rather than struggle for happiness in the present world. This weakened the practical significance of Manichaeism for revolutionary struggle and made it impossible to organize uprisings based on this ideology. Furthermore, influenced by the hierarchical ideas of the exploiting classes, Manichaeism divided followers into several levels, providing a loophole for the exploiting classes to distort its teachings, expand class differences among followers, and carry out counterrevolutionary tactics like “exile and re-accept.”
However, persecution and slaughter could not stop the spread of progressive ideas. The foundation of Manichaeism—sharp class and ethnic contradictions in Persia—still existed. Its followers either went into exile or went underground, persistently propagating Mani’s ideas. As a result, the core theory of “Two Religions, Three Ages” continued to spread among the broad masses of workers and was transformed into material force for revolutionary struggle.
Two hundred years after Mani’s martyrdom, Mazdak raised the banner of “struggle between light and darkness” and “helping good to defeat evil,” overcoming the backward aspects of early Manichaeism and transforming it into a revolutionary ideological weapon. He launched a massive peasant war, calling oppressed people to fight, destroy the unjust social order under demonic rule, seize wealth to help the poor, and establish an egalitarian society where everyone shares everything equally. The flood of peasant uprisings swept through Sassanid Persia, with revolutionary peasants reclaiming land seized by aristocrats and landlords, destroying granaries and estates, liberating women, and establishing communal farms. The Persian people fought for thirty-eight years, freeing countless slaves and heavily striking the remnants of slavery, greatly promoting the transition of Persian society toward feudalism.
II. The World Influence of Manichaeism — Its Reputation Across Eurasia
Since its inception, Manichaeism was not confined to a small region or ethnicity but spread widely across Eurasia, sowing revolutionary seeds everywhere— in the East, it spread through Central Asia and India, reaching China during the Tang Dynasty, becoming a great banner for peasant uprisings and resistance against tyranny; in the West, it crossed Persia and flew to Rome, gaining support from oppressed slaves, frightening the slave-owning classes allied with Christianity. From the 3rd century until the decline of its “Two Religions, Three Ages” schools in the 18th century, Manichaeism’s ideas permeated the entire feudal history of humanity.
1. Manichaeism in the Western World — The Enemy of Christ
The spread of Manichaeism in the West followed two routes: a southern route from Palestine through Egypt, North Africa, and Spain to Western Europe; and a northern route crossing Rome and Persia to the Balkans.
Once introduced into the Roman Empire, Manichaeism was enthusiastically supported by enslaved and oppressed peoples but also fiercely hated by the reactionary Roman slave-owning aristocracy. Before the 6th century AD, the church regarded Manichaeism as heresy, engaging in fierce struggles with it, which was directly opposed to Christianity, the “orthodox” religion of the slave-owning and landlord classes. Later, as class struggle intensified and Christianity became the spiritual pillar of feudal Europe, Manichaeism “changed its face,” concealing its core ideas of “Two Religions, Three Ages” under the guise of Christianity, continuing to exist as heresy and spreading widely among the laboring people until the rise of utopian socialism in the 15th century.
To curb the spread of revolutionary ideas, reactionary exploiters used state and religious power, employing brutal means. Under Diocletian, Roman rulers wielded the slaughtering sword—ordering governors in Africa to violently suppress Manichaeans, burning scriptures, raiding homes, and resorting to forced labor and execution; at the same time, they promoted reactionary religious sects and idealist philosophies, enslaving the spirit of the people. For a time, reactionary philosophies like Neoplatonism and Neo-Stoicism spread far and wide. Among them, the most notorious and favored by Roman rulers was Christianity, transformed by the slave-owning aristocracy.
“Primitive Christianity was ‘the religion of slaves, freed slaves, the poor, the powerless, and those oppressed or dispersed by Rome’” [7], advocating equality, mutual aid, and shared hardship. Because its doctrines contained contempt for the powerful and a firm belief that justice would triumph, Christianity was initially embraced by the working people. However, it also preached class reconciliation, opposing revolutionary struggles and advocating waiting for divine salvation and enduring suffering in this life to ascend to heaven after death. The Roman slave-owning class exploited this passive aspect, transforming Christianity into a spiritual opiate suitable for their rule. They further developed theological doctrines, unified teachings, and combined them with reactionary philosophy, openly promoting “faith above reason,” claiming that all knowledge besides faith in God was unnecessary. They declared that people should not complain about God’s arrangements but accept everything passively. They also claimed that trying to change one’s social status was against God’s plan—making material desires and sins the root of evil—using the stale ascetic teachings of the aristocrats to keep the laboring people resigned to their miserable, oppressed, and exploited condition.
The exploiting classes spread reactionary ideology to weaken Manichaeism’s influence among the masses while secretly trying to infiltrate the church to seize leadership and sabotage the revolution from within. The wealthy in Rome donated large sums to the church and built grand residences for clergy. They distorted Manichaeism’s teachings, emphasizing its backward elements, turning the revolutionary call to help good triumph over evil into a vague hope of rebirth in the afterlife, transforming the class struggle into personal spiritual practice. These class enemies, filled with hatred for the working people, infiltrated Manichaeism, colluding with Roman rulers to destroy the revolutionary movement.
Despite deep oppression and fierce resistance, whether from external persecution or internal betrayal, the revolutionary people continued to struggle and spread revolutionary ideas. In North Africa, “only by not keeping slaves” did Manichaeism absorb and develop the anti-slavery ideas of primitive Christianity, inheriting the revolutionary role of Gnostic and Donatist groups that organized resistance against Roman rule, fighting against the greed of the rich and social inequality. In the 3rd century, slaves, serfs, peasants, and oppressed “barbarians” launched widespread resistance against the Roman Empire, striking a heavy blow to the reactionary slave system. Manichaeism, riding the wave of this struggle, became a widely spread ideology among Roman workers. Ultimately, under the combined force of popular uprisings and barbarian invasions, Rome—the eternal city of the slave-owning class—collapsed, and the Western Roman Empire was thrown into history’s trash heap, marking the beginning of feudal Europe.
In the northern route from Asia Minor to the Balkans, Manichaeism also faced fierce struggles. In 527 AD, Justinian I ascended the Eastern Roman throne. To launch invasions into Italy and North Africa and revive the empire, he aimed to suppress revolutionary ideas and people’s movements. He ordered the persecution of Manichaeans everywhere—if found associating with others, they were to be executed on the spot. To justify religious persecution, imperial officials held three debates between Christian theologians and Manichaeans, attempting to destroy Manichaeism ideologically. However, the leaders of Manichaeism faced the sword of the Roman rulers unafraid—they were chained but still exposed the evil plots of Byzantine slave owners, demonstrating firm revolutionary stance and high-level theory. Seeing that “literary attack” failed, the Byzantines tore off their masks and resorted to slaughter, killing many Manichaeans. But the revolutionary people could not be eradicated; under successive peasant uprisings, Justinian’s dreams of restoration were shattered, and Byzantine rule was overthrown. Based on the uprising against slavery, Byzantium established a feudal landlord dictatorship.
However, the fall of slavery did not mean the end of the struggle between Manichaeism and Christianity, nor did it free Manichaeism from suppression. After the Germans conquered Rome, their tribal aristocrats gained vast lands, establishing feudal estates on the basis of the former Roman serfdom. The Eastern Byzantine Empire also reformed military districts into feudal landownership systems. In short, the feudal hierarchy of slaves obeying lords, lords obeying the state, and the state obeying God was established throughout the West—“the shackles of slavery remain, or old shackles are replaced by new, equally heavy and insulting ones” [8]. The people’s continued suffering under feudal exploitation and religious oppression persisted after overthrowing Roman slavery.
As the feudal landlord class gained power, they quickly adopted Christianity, which had been the state religion of Rome, as a spiritual tool for rule. Due to the support of feudal rulers, the church not only became the spiritual pillar of feudal rule but also the largest feudal landlord controlling about one-third of all land in medieval Europe, and the primary enemy of all anti-feudal movements. The ideological dominance of Christianity and the brutal persecution of heretics led the working people to seek revolutionary ideas. They used the characteristic of Manichaeism—“reverence for Jesus” (in its doctrines, Jesus is one of the messengers of God)—to portray it as heresy within Christianity, continuing to promote the dualism of good and evil, opposing idol worship, advocating the transformation of the world under demonic rule, and demanding the abolition of feudal hierarchy, redistribution of church lands and wealth. Compared to early Manichaeism, the heretical branches derived from it further developed dialectical thought, explicitly calling the exploiters and exploitative system “evil” and “devil,” directly targeting feudalism. These religions, more accessible than obscure doctrines, quickly became guiding ideas for revolutionary anti-feudal movements.
In 821 AD, the Paulist peasant uprising in Asia Minor marked the beginning of a large-scale anti-feudal movement guided by Manichaean ideas in medieval Europe.
In the early 8th century, the large landholding system in the Byzantine Empire expanded rapidly, with monasteries occupying about a third of the land, and peasants suffering under double exploitation by church and feudal lords. They urgently needed revolutionary ideas capable of education, unity, and organization to fight against the exploiting classes. The Paulist sect became such an ideological banner.
The Paulist sect advocated simplifying church rituals, abolishing idol worship, and opposing Byzantine feudal rule. They called the land and wealth controlled by landlords and the Orthodox Church “the devil’s products.” To destroy this dark kingdom, poor farmers in Asia Minor rose in rebellion, eagerly joining the Paulist sect. They refused to pay rent and taxes to landlords, church, or Byzantine officials, and seized the accumulated wealth of the exploiting classes to distribute among peasants. In response, Byzantine Emperor Michael III wielded the slaughtering sword—using extreme brutal methods like drowning, crucifixion, and beheading to massacre revolutionary peasants. For a time, blood stained Asia Minor, with tens of thousands of peasants slaughtered.
However, the heroic peasant masses were undeterred. In 821 AD, Paulist leader Calbius organized a peasant uprising of 5,000 in Asia Minor, fighting against Byzantine reactionary rule. They defeated the imperial army twice, causing Emperor Michael III to be defeated and flee alone, losing both his army and throne. These military victories greatly strengthened the Paulist forces, who established a peasant revolutionary government—the Paulist Republic—in Dufrei, eastern Turkey, pushing the revolution to its climax.Paul’s faction of farmers simultaneously repelled Byzantine military offensives and crushed their political inducement schemes. When Basil, the Byzantine emperor succeeding Michael III, saw that armed suppression was ineffective, he shifted to a policy of “conciliation.” Basil’s envoy told the leader of Paul’s faction, Chrysocheir: “As long as Chrysocheir can guarantee that Paul’s faction will cease its attacks, Basil is willing to send him a large amount of gold, silver, treasures, silk, and other valuables.” However, Basil’s offer of amnesty and inducements was firmly rejected by Chrysocheir: “If he wants peace, then he must give up his eastern lands and not rule the west. Otherwise, the noble servants will pull him down from the throne!” This vividly demonstrated the revolutionary spirit of the peasant farmers who dared to “pull the emperor off his horse” to end oppression. Enraged, Basil personally led a large army in 871 to suppress Paul’s faction, resulting in another defeat for the Byzantine army before Chrysocheir’s peasant army, with Basil himself narrowly escaping capture. Although, due to internal betrayal and suppression by the ruling class, the uprising of Paul’s faction unfortunately failed; however, the “Christianized” Manichaeism of Paul’s faction was not eradicated but continued to spread secretly across Asia Minor. Its second setback—limiting Basil’s imperial ambitions, establishing peasant regimes, and redistributing land and property—restrained the large Byzantine landowners’ land annexation, struck at the economic and political power of temple estate owners, and partially recovered land seized from peasants, allowing social productive forces to continue developing based on the adjustment of feudal relations. In the early 10th century, the frightened Byzantine rulers ordered the arrest of all followers of Paul’s faction and exiled them to the Balkans and the border areas of Bulgaria, far from Asia Minor. They believed this would detach revolutionary ideas from their social base and oppressed masses, thus crushing the revolution in its infancy and allowing them to rest easy. However, their move only backfired—“using harm as a means to start, ending in harm to oneself. This is the developmental law of all reactionary policies,” and the revolutionary ideas did not leave the masses but spread like seeds, taking root and sprouting again in Bulgaria, a land with a rich revolutionary tradition. By the early 10th century, during four centuries of class differentiation and feudalization, the social productive forces in Bulgaria (present-day Bulgaria and the Romanian Plain) had greatly developed. However, this development only increased the exploitation and oppression of peasants by feudal landlords and strengthened the role of the church and monasteries as pillars of the feudal system. As the peasant class’s anti-feudal struggle deepened, a local Manichaean sect—the Bogomil sect—became popular in Bulgaria. United under the banner of Bogomil, Bulgarian peasants burned estates, drove away livestock, and killed hated landlords. With the exile of Paul’s followers to Bulgaria, the Bogomil and Paul’s heretical sects quickly merged. Bogomil believed that the struggle between good and evil was eternal, and that good would ultimately triumph over evil, so oppression and violence, as products of sin, would also be eradicated with evil’s defeat. It opposed the clergy hierarchy, church feudal privileges, advocated abandoning all church rituals, and called for eliminating all feudal oppression. Addressing Bulgaria’s social inequality and rigid hierarchy, Bogomil also claimed that all rich and noble people were servants of the devil and condemned the greed of the upper clergy. Under the joint attack of the Bogomil and Paulist peasant wars, Bulgaria’s feudal state was on the brink of collapse. In 1025, the Byzantine Empire invaded and occupied Bulgaria, implementing brutal national oppression policies—dividing Bulgaria into four military districts, collecting monetary rents from peasants, forcing them to sell products on the market for currency, and layering exploitation through merchants and usurers beyond physical and material oppression. The Bulgarian landlord class allied with the invaders, surrendering to Byzantium and maintaining high positions within the puppet government established there. Under the dual oppression of nationality and class, the Bulgarian people’s revolutionary movement surged. The Bogomil and Paulist sects organized and launched peasant uprisings in 1078–1079 and 1086, defeating Byzantine garrisons, killing their leaders, and punishing traitorous feudal lords. The insurgents quickly swept through old Bulgarian territories, and after this uprising, the Byzantines were expelled from Bulgaria. “Driving the tiger out through the front door and blocking the wolf at the back”—after great victories against Byzantine invasion, the revolutionary peasants successfully resisted the Crusaders, composed of Western European feudal lords, who invaded Bulgaria in 1096, causing chaos and heavy casualties for these bandits. In fact, this struggle earned Bulgaria’s national independence and laid the foundation for the re-establishment of a Bulgarian national state after the uprising of Asen a century later. The Bulgarian people who followed Bogomil not only fought for national independence but also spread this progressive ideology across Europe. In the 13th century, with peasant wars and the development of Western European cities, emerging capitalist industry and commerce grew. The bourgeoisie opposed feudal despotism through heretical movements, fought for city autonomy, and resisted feudal oppression. In response to increasing resistance, the feudal landowning class continued to refine Christianity as a spiritual weapon. The old patristic doctrines, formulated by “fathers,” had become crude and ineffective at deceiving the working people after continuous struggles. To better spiritually enslave the laboring masses, they further elaborated and systematized these doctrines, creating Scholastic philosophy, which was like an “unceasing stream of urine bubbles.” As feudal society in Europe developed, Scholastic philosophy became more refined and systematic, with Thomas Aquinas as its greatest exponent. He seized upon the “dead elements” in Aristotle’s teachings, using Aristotle’s theories of form and matter and teleology to describe the entire world as a hierarchical society of “small and great, unchanging through eternity,” with God at the top of the cosmic hierarchy. Aquinas sanctified the feudal social order as the eternal world order, promoting the “rationality” of hierarchical oppression, claiming that humans were divinely created into ranks, and that any attempt by oppressed people to elevate their status was sinful. The working people’s resistance was united under heretical banners, challenging the feudal hierarchy. The center of heresy at that time was in southern France, centered around Albi, known as the Albigensian movement. Among its followers, a faction from impoverished peasants and artisans called the Cathars claimed to be pure. This ideology spread widely in cities like Toulouse, believing themselves pure and different from the sinful world. They accepted core Manichaean ideas, advocating that the world was permeated by two opposing forces—good and evil, God and Satan—and that all feudal orders and the Catholic Church were not created by God but were the result of demonic influence. Therefore, they believed these evil forces should be eradicated in the name of “God.” Their movement reflected the discontent of urban lower classes with society, directly opposing the Catholic Church and feudal order. The development of the Albigensian heresy alarmed the church. As early as the 1170s, the church attempted to eliminate the Albigensians but failed. In 1209, Pope Innocent III called for a crusade against them. Feudal knights from northern France, aiming to plunder prosperous southern cities, participated eagerly, led by the fanatic Simon de Montfort. Although resistance in the south failed due to the upper-class bourgeoisie wavering and city-states fighting among themselves, and lacking support from the peasantry, the urban populations did not give up the struggle. They launched uprisings, and Montfort was eventually killed by the people of Toulouse, receiving deserved punishment. Twenty years of class struggle weakened local warlords and the feudal church. King Louis IX incorporated Toulouse into the royal domain in 1229, extending royal authority to the Mediterranean coast. From then on, the territory of France exceeded that of any other feudal power. The peasant wars in the north and the Albigensian movement together struck at the feudal landlords’ power, promoting the rise of the petty bourgeoisie and expanding the unified national market, further fostering the development of capitalism. The Albigensian movement was the last large-scale popular movement in the West primarily led by Manichaean ideas. Afterwards, utopian socialism among peasants and artisans inherited Manichaeism as a revolutionary ideology of the masses, which continued until merging into the wave of modern proletarian socialist revolution.## 2. Manichaeism in the Eastern World—From Ming Cult to White Lotus and the Struggle Against Exploitative Classes During the Tang Dynasty, after pacifying the eastern and western Turkic peoples, the Silk Road revived, facilitating exchanges of ideas and culture among different nations. Buddhism, Nestorian Christianity, and Zoroastrianism entered China via the Silk Road, becoming tools for feudal rulers to lull the working masses’ spirits. Contradictions always existed, and alongside them, ideas resisting exploitation and oppression—such as Maitreya faith in Buddhism and Manichaeism—also arrived quietly, transforming into banners for the oppressed to fight back. During Wu Zetian’s reign, Persian envoys brought the “Two Religions Sutra” and were received by the court, marking the official appearance of Manichaeism in China. Wu Zetian, representing the political interests of the petty landlord class, continued the legalist reform policies of Emperor Taizong after seizing power. To weaken the power of aristocratic landlords and consolidate her rule, she manufactured revolutionary public opinion and attacked Confucianism, which upheld aristocratic hereditary rule. Wu Zetian promoted Buddhism and heretical sects, even venerating the Maitreya faith in Buddhism, claiming “Wu Zetian is Maitreya incarnate, the ruler of Jambudvipa, the Tang dynasty’s microcosm. Therefore, the revolution of Wu Zetian is called Zhou.” Meanwhile, Manichaeism, like her half-brother Maitreya sect, was allowed to spread under the Tang dynasty’s legalist policies as a tool to oppose Confucian ideas. However, because Manichaeism preached “the eternal struggle between good and evil,” its dialectical view of opposition and transformation was doomed to be unpopular with the exploiters. As soon as Manichaeism appeared in China, it provoked opposition from the so-called “orthodox” and “correct teachings,” which labeled it as “foolish and easily contaminated heresy” and “demonic heresy.” After the mid-Tang period, the feudal society saw the rise of large landowners, with their influence expanding, while the small and medium landowner class weakened. Within the landlord class, reactionary elements represented by Confucianism gained dominance. The development of productive forces, emphasizing agriculture and warfare, aimed to limit land annexation, but the legalist ideas weakened. Ideological struggles shifted with the changing class struggle situation, with the conflict between revolutionary peasant ideas and reactionary landlord ideas becoming the main ideological contradiction. Moreover, “a class is both the dominant material force and the dominant spiritual force in society.” The Confucian ideas of “the three bonds and five constants,” which the ruling landlord class revered, once again became the dominant ideology, turning the feudal state of the Song Dynasty into an embodiment of “the principle of Heaven,” representing the absolute spirit. Its purpose was to serve the interests of the decaying landlord class. Subjective idealism, represented by the “Heart School,” also gained influence, advocating that “the universe is my mind, and my mind is the universe.” It regarded all things as mental activities within the human mind, completely denying the existence of the objective world, and claimed that the highest imperial authority and all moral norms in feudal society were inherent and eternal within human consciousness, capable of extending to the entire world. This served to justify obeying feudal morality and maintaining feudal rule, claiming that such morality was innate to human nature and unchanging, thus aiming to uphold feudal domination. The Heart School promoted the idea that “even in poverty and hardship, the mind remains clear; upright people see this as virtue,” encouraging people to endure feudal exploitation and oppression without resistance. Confucian, Buddhist, and Taoist doctrines, centered on Confucianism, became the main ideological weapons used by successive exploitative classes to deceive and enslave the working masses and enforce ideological control. They propagated the divine right of social hierarchy, the unchanging nature of each rank, and urged the laboring people to accept and uphold feudal ethics, endure suffering, and refrain from resistance or struggle. In appearance, since the Tang Dynasty, with the development of social productive forces and the accumulation of class struggle experience, the ruling classes’ ideological efforts became more philosophical and systematic. The exploiters fabricated a complete set of idealist theories—from “God” creating all things to strict adherence to hierarchy—attacking the working people. This was the ideological landscape faced by the working masses in China from the introduction of Manichaeism until the modern era. “The Chinese nation is not only known for its hard work and endurance but also for its love of freedom and revolutionary traditions.” In long-term revolutionary practice, Chinese workers and peasants summarized rich and simple dialectical ideas and cultivated a firm revolutionary spirit. During slavery, they expressed class hatred with slogans like “Join me in death,” and dialectical thinking such as “High cliffs become valleys, deep valleys become tombs,” aiming to realize the ideal society of “a better land.” United in struggle, they overthrew the slave-owning class and slavery system. During the Han Dynasty, Chinese workers and peasants used primitive Taoist doctrines like “Taiping Dao” and “Wu Dou Mi Dao” as revolutionary programs and organizational forms. Under the idea of “all things are interconnected, without concealment or private property,” they opposed social inequality and the dominance of the rich over the poor, calling for “great peace” and launching large-scale peasant wars that heavily struck the decayed rule of aristocratic clans. During the Southern and Northern Dynasties, Southern peasants continued the fight with the “Wu Dou Mi Dao” ideology, smashing the rule of southern clan landlords. Northern peasants, opposing the exploitation and land grabbing by temple feudal lords and monks, launched the Maitreya sect uprising under the call of “The new Buddha appears, removing the old demon,” burning monasteries and slaughtering monks and nuns, ultimately crushing the rule of northern temple feudal lords. Under the revolutionary struggles of Chinese peasants, remnants of slavery were eliminated, and feudal personal dependence gradually loosened. The direction and slogans of peasant wars deepened, with revolutionary slogans such as “Soaring to the sky” and “Equalize and level,” launching more profound attacks on the feudal system. Therefore, the seeds of Manichaeism, once planted in China’s revolutionary fertile soil, quickly sprouted and grew, leading to the establishment of Manichaean temples in various regions like Jing, Yang, Hong, and Yue, and continuously fueling peasant uprisings throughout Chinese history. From the earliest influence of Manichaeism in Zhejiang through uprisings like Chen Shuozhen’s, Chinese peasants, inspired by the propaganda of “good and evil fighting, good will surely triumph over evil,” launched repeated peasant wars aimed at transforming society. These struggles pushed Chinese society forward, with the most significant being the Fang La uprising at the end of the Northern Song, the Red Turban uprisings at the end of the Yuan, and the White Lotus uprising during the Qing Dynasty. During the Song Dynasty, facing the brutal exploitation of the large landlord class that refused to abolish land tenure or curb land annexation, the peasant followers of Manichaeism also developed new ideas. The “Wu Dou Mi Dao” in the Eastern Jin era became a divine position within the aristocratic clan of Wang Ning, and the peasant revolutionary leader Sun E used it as an ideological tool for organizing peasant revolts. Similarly, during the Song Dynasty, Manichaeism was divided into the landlord class’s Mingjiao and the peasant class’s Mojiao, reflecting the internal class struggle within religion. Like the Roman slave owners’ treatment of Manichaeism, the Chinese landlord class in the Song Dynasty used infiltration tactics—altered doctrines, idol creation, temple establishment, strict gender segregation—to strengthen feudal hierarchy’s influence over Manichaeism. Early doctrines of Manichaeism, such as non-killing, reincarnation, and asceticism, were absorbed and promoted by landlords, who also used their influence to seize control of local Manichaean temples in Fujian and Xinjiang, turning temples into feudal estates and exploiting followers. As a result, many temples became instruments of feudal exploitation, no different from other feudal temples. Zhu Xi, the leading figure of Neo-Confucianism, also took a stand. When serving as magistrate of Zhangzhou, he issued the “Admonition List” attacking heresy with Confucian “marriage and family principles”: “Buddhist and heretical sects secretly arise, claiming to be heresy, confusing people’s minds, causing men to delay marriage and women to remain unmarried.” He used state power: “Prohibit and investigate heretical activities… and punish those who know but do not correct.” This was to maintain social order and serve the interests of the landlord class. However, the peasant followers of Manichaeism did not follow the landlord class’s path nor fear harsh repression like the “Baojia” system. They adhered to early Manichaean principles such as “no idol worship,” “gender equality,” “vegetarianism,” and “simple living,” promoting the spirit of “equality” and “mutual aid.” They opposed feudal oppression, male dominance, and gender segregation, gaining support from oppressed workers and peasants regardless of gender or age. During the Song Dynasty, under the banner of Manichaeism, peasants organized, venerating Zhang Jiao as the Great Sage and Manichaeism as the Light of Wisdom, establishing “Tangkou” (local branches). Leaders of Tangkou were usually the most cunning farmers in the village, called “demon heads” or “vegetable heads” by landlords. They regularly held “incense meetings” and “burning incense gatherings” to connect with the masses and propagate revolutionary ideas, using advanced printing techniques like “block printing” to widely distribute propaganda materials. To accommodate peasants’ daytime labor and evening rest, these activities were held at night, with “mixed genders” and “thousands of people in groups.” The followers were simple and frugal, practicing “eating vegetables and abstaining from killing,” embodying the spirit of “equality” and “mutual aid”—helping each other in life, forming a close-knit community. When oppressed by landlords, they united and helped each other selflessly, with “everyone contributing efforts in times of trouble” and “the poor gathering resources to help the needy.” Under the banner of Manichaeism, peasants united, continuing their struggle despite bans and harsh laws, aiming to overthrow the darkness of landlord rule and usher in a bright world free of oppression and exploitation.At the end of the Northern Song Dynasty, the southeastern coastal region became the area with the most severe tax exploitation and extortion by the feudal state of the Song Dynasty, “now heavy taxes and corvée, officials invading fisheries, insufficient agricultural and sericultural output to supply.” “Our people work diligently all year round, wives and children are freezing and starving, seeking a day of full stomachs is impossible.” “The people of the southeast have suffered from exploitation for a long time.” [35] The class struggle situation has become increasingly acute. The “devil heads” of the villages, Fang La, used the doctrine of “Two Religions and Three Realms” in Manichaeism to promote the revolutionary idea that “the law is equal, with no high or low.” He believed that there existed a confrontation between the forces of “Light” and “Darkness” in the world. This struggle develops through three stages: the past, the present, and the future (“Three Realms”). The past was a stalemate where “Light” and “Darkness” were evenly matched. Now, “Darkness” temporarily surpasses and overwhelms “Light,” but through struggle, in the future stage, “Light” will definitely defeat “Darkness.” Using this simple religious language, he expressed a dialectical view of the opposition and transformation of light and dark, profoundly reflecting the revolutionary desire of farmers to resist dark rule and yearn for a society of light, strongly criticizing metaphysical reactionary fallacies such as Confucian “Heaven does not change, the Way does not change,” “The Three Bonds and Five Constants are unchangeable,” which greatly encouraged the peasant movement of the time. Moreover, in response to the ruling class’s attempt to deceive the laboring people into enduring suffering with religion—“abstaining from killing,” “abstaining from theft”—Fang La overcame the defects of primitive Manichaeism, emphasizing the importance of struggle in the transformation between light and dark, pointing out that only “killing” can “save people,” and only by using revolutionary violence to eliminate reactionaries can one truly become a “Buddha” [36]—eliminating dark rule and establishing an infinitely bright world on earth. The peasants under the banner of the devil religion, through revolutionary struggle, challenged the idealist philosophy of “Heavenly Reason” and “The Way is thus,” practicing the philosophy of “helping good to defeat evil.”
Light will surely prevail! Darkness will inevitably fail! The rising peasants, with unwavering confidence, launched the largest peasant war at the end of the Northern Song Dynasty. Fang La’s uprising army occupied Muzhou, seized Hangzhou, and captured half of the southeast’s six prefectures and fifty-two counties, engaging in a life-and-death struggle with the landlord class. Along with the rapid development of Fang La’s uprising, peasants rallied under the banner of “Magic Cult” from across the Yangtze River to the southeast coast, responding with uprisings. The “devil heads” Lu Shina, Zheng Mowang, Qiu Rixin, Yu Dayong, and others organized peasants to rise in Tai, Qu, Yue, and Wen prefectures and counties, igniting the fire of peasant revolution in the southeast. Over a million peasants participated in the war, smashing the Song Dynasty’s greed and usurpation, severely striking the brutal rule of the large landlord class, easing land concentration in the southeast, and opening the way for social and economic development.
Although Fang La’s uprising ultimately failed due to betrayal and heavy suppression, “the fundamental contradiction in the development process of things and the essence of the process dictated by this contradiction will not be eliminated until the process is complete” [37]. Oppression and exploitation still exist; the broad peasantry still needs revolution and liberation. The devil cult did not disappear with the failure of the uprising but thrived and continued unceasingly. In the fourth year of Shaoxing (1134), Emperor Gaozong of Song, Wang Juzheng, said: “In the two Zhe provinces, there is a custom of worshiping the devil, before Fang La, the law prohibitions were lenient, but the custom of worshiping the devil was not yet very intense. After Fang La, the law became stricter, but the custom of worshiping the devil became even more difficult to suppress.” In 1130, Zhong Xiang organized peasant救援 in the Dongting Lake basin, showing compassion to widows, orphans, the disabled, and those in difficulty in livelihood. After the uprising, millions of peasants eagerly participated, sweeping across the lakes and rivers. Meanwhile, the devil cult leaders Wang Zongshi and Miao Luo organized uprisings in Xinzhou and Yanzhou as “Great Sage Heavenly King.” After Zhong Xiang and Yang Yao’s uprising failed, peasants under the banner of the Song Dynasty’s devil cult continued to struggle. In 1140, the Wuzhou Dongyang cultists rebelled, and in 1144, Yu Yi organized an uprising in Xuanzhou Jing County under Manichaeism. Revolution is unstoppable, and the devil cult representing revolution still spread among the broad masses of peasants.
However, the landlord class, which once believed in a faction of Manichaeism, was gradually pushed into the dustbin of history amid class struggles. Believers of “Ming Cult,” who advocated “not killing” and seeking the next life, disappeared as the peasant uprisings organized by devil cults arose across the land, never joining the vast revolutionary tide. Over time, fewer and fewer believed in them, until now only a single grass hut remains on the coast of Fujian, resembling a statue of Shakyamuni’s Manichae. The landlord class in the East, which sought to use Manichaeism as a tool of rule, was also defeated in the people’s revolutionary struggles, just like the Western slave owners.
The decayed Zhao Song Dynasty was shaken to its core by peasant uprisings. Facing the southward advance of the Yuan Dynasty, the large landlord class suppressed anti-invasion fighters and the people’s resistance, betraying national interests and surrendering. China was reunified under the rule of barbaric Mongol aristocrats with remnants of slavery. The Han landlord class merged with the Mongol aristocrats, jointly oppressing the peoples of all ethnic groups in China. The remnants of Mongol slavery led to a partial revival of slavery in some areas. The princes and nobles reared slaves, and the long-relaxed personal dependence relationships were re-tightened. Tenant farmers and poor peasants again became serfs under landlords’ control. Even in handicraft industries, slave labor was restored, with many artisans working shackled, under the whip of landlords. Under joint rule of Mongol aristocrats and various ethnic exploiters, landownership of large landlords rapidly expanded, and many peasants went bankrupt and became serfs. Every autumn harvest, princes and nobles dispatched cavalry to trample farmland, “collect debts and rent, drive peasants, and plunder crops.” Politically, “the wealthy gentry in Jiangnan occupied farmland, forced tenants, had no noble titles but the authority of封君, no official seals but the power of government,” forming fragmented landlord kingdoms. Moreover, the Mongol aristocrats implemented brutal national oppression policies, such as the “Four-Class System,” with Mongols at the top, followed by Semu, Han, and Nan (Southern) peoples. Mongol aristocrats enjoyed various political privileges, even “Mongol personnel beat Han children, who could not retaliate” [39].
Therefore, overthrowing the Yuan Dynasty, breaking free from Mongol national oppression, challenging the reactionary rule of the large landlord class, and ending the brutal exploitation by various ethnic exploiters became the historical mission of the Chinese working people at that time.
The feudal ruling class, faced with the chaos of peasant revolts, panicked. They feared that peasants would completely overthrow them, so they strengthened dictatorship in all aspects. Ideologically, the Yuan Dynasty, led by Mongol aristocrats, distorted the “unchanging Heaven, the unchanging Way,” and the “Three Bonds and Five Constants” as unalterable, and promoted the reactionary fallacies of feudal guardianship. They also allowed other ideologies beneficial to the ruling class’s corrupt rule—Nestorian Christianity, Catholicism, Islam, and other heresies—to spread, seizing land, building churches, deceiving believers, and exploiting various ethnic peoples; spreading the spirit of enduring suffering and seeking rebirth in paradise as spiritual opium. Relying on the evil gods and demons of the landlord class, superstitions like the “River God marriage” were staged everywhere.
However, the contradiction also had its other side. Under the fierce class struggle, the persistent revolutionary peasants merged Manichaeism and Maitreya teachings into a new “Ming Cult” as their spiritual weapon, spreading it from the southeastern coast to the areas along the Yellow River. In Henan, Anhui, Shandong, Hubei, and even along the Great Wall, the shadow of this new Ming Cult could be seen; the White Lotus also spread in the Yangtze River basin and the south. These peasants’ own religions stood in opposition to the above-mentioned ruling classes’ demon gods and spirits.
The broad peasantry opposed “injustice” and demanded equality, seeking to change the extremely unequal social reality under feudalism. Confronting reactionary rule, the Ming Cult believed that the extremely unequal society under Yuan rule would change, and as long as the suffering laborers and peasants wielded weapons and “killed all injustice,” they could turn “injustice” into “peace” and darkness into light. This dialectical revolutionary thought and violent revolutionary ideology provided a theoretical guide for the later Red Turban Army’s united struggle. The uprising leaders, in mobilizing and organizing the masses, used the religious language of the folk Ming Cult to promote social change: “The world will be in chaos,” “The Ming King has already been born, Maitreya has descended!” They declared with confidence: “Darkness is about to pass, light is coming!” Their slogans inspired millions of peasants to fight to overthrow Yuan rule and realize the ideal of “Great Peace.” Moreover, the broad peasantry creatively proposed revolutionary folk songs like “Heaven’s rain line, people’s grievances rise, Central Plains, affairs must change.”
Where does the driving force of history lie? The past ruling classes always believed that the decisive force of historical development was in a few heroic figures, in princes and nobles. Even primitive Manichaeism incorporated the idea of a savior descending to help turn darkness into light. The Red Turban Army at the end of the Yuan Dynasty inherited and developed the revolutionary view that “common people have never been to be lightly regarded,” asserting that it was the struggles of the working masses, intolerant of dark rule and poverty, that were the decisive force in the change from darkness to light. This fundamentally negated the reactionary historical view of Confucianism and Mencius that “the wise are above the foolish.”
In the late Yuan, the opening of the Yellow River, the forced conscription of over 100,000 peasants supervised by 20,000 garrison troops, reopened the old course of the Yellow River, with dead bodies piled along the way, and cries of suffering heard in heaven. The reckless issuance of paper money caused soaring prices, and the oppressed laboring people’s lives became increasingly miserable, with social contradictions intertwined and conflicts intensifying. Before the great Red Turban uprising at the end of the Yuan, there were uprisings like the Bang Hu uprising with the Maitreya banner in the Central Plains, and in the south, leaders like Peng Yingyu and Zhou Ziwang led the White Lotus followers in rebellion. Although these uprisings were suppressed by the Yuan, they foreshadowed a major class struggle to come.
At that time, in the north, led by Han Shantong, and in the south, led by Peng Yingyu, peasants actively organized to prepare for uprising. Han Shantong and Peng Yingyu promoted slogans like “The world is in chaos,” “Maitreya Buddha is born,” “Maitreya descends to change the universe,” and “The world will be bright and harmonious,” using prophecies and religious materials like the Maitreya Sutra and the Great Ming King Birth Sutra as cover. To mobilize river workers, they buried a one-eyed stone figure along the canal, spreading folk songs: “One-eyed stone man, this thing will bring chaos to the world.” When the stone was dug up, class hatred among the workers was ignited. Han Shantong sharply criticized the “extreme poverty in Jiangnan and wealth in the northern frontier,” calling on people to take up arms and rebel against Yuan. Local Ming Cult believers and peasants, led by Han Shantong and Liu Futong, gathered in Yingzhou to prepare for uprising. Although traitors betrayed them, and Yuan troops launched attacks first, Han Shantong was captured and sacrificed, but the revolutionary fire had already been ignited. Liu Futong fled to Yingzhou (present-day Fuyang, Henan), organized the Ming Cult and rallied local people. The uprising broke into Yingzhou, opened granaries, and developed into over 100,000 troops. After Liu Futong’s uprising, Ming Cult followers and peasants across Jianghuai responded, quickly forming a great situation where the north was led by Liu Futong’s “Han Song” peasant regime, and the south by Peng Yingyu’s “Tianwan” peasant regime.
The peasant revolution swept across China. Guided by the philosophy of struggle, the peasants exposed the deception of Confucian “Doctrine of the Mean” and Buddhist “Equality of All Beings,” arming themselves for fierce struggle. They wielded knives and spears, attacking landlords and officials, wherever they went, “killing officials, seizing towns,” “hating the rich as enemies, burning their houses and killing their people” [41]; they resolutely suppressed reactionary landlords and scholars, creating a good situation where “in past years, noble families had few survivors,” “princes and nobles endured insults for a long time, and servants and slaves all smiled.” “Fire spread through Yuehua and San Guan, blood dyed Qin Chuan, ten thousand horses galloped.” [42] The Red Turban Army persisted in armed struggle for thirteen years, fought hundreds of battles, and dealt heavy blows to the Mongol and Han landlord classes, overthrowing the dark rule of the Yuan Dynasty and opening a broad road for the development of social productive forces in the early Ming period. The late Yuan peasant wars also became the largest and longest-lasting peasant revolutionary struggle involving Manichaeism.
朱元璋, who defected from the peasant revolution camp, usurped its achievements and established the new feudal landlord dictatorship of the Ming Dynasty. As a traitor within the Ming Cult, with rich counter-revolutionary experience, Zhu Yuanzhang was highly vigilant of the secret spread and organization of rebellion by the Ming Cult in the past. The Ming Dynasty established secret police agencies like the Factory Guard to specifically investigate “thieves, traitors, and evil words harmful to feudal rule,” arresting so-called “妖人” (heretics), “rebels,” and “great villains.” During the Hongzhi era (1505–1521), the head of the Jinyiwei, Ye Guang, commanded the arrest of “thieves from China and abroad,” capturing thousands. During the Zhengde era (1505–1521), “Liu Xuemeng and others spread ‘evil words,’ gathered hundreds of people in Henan to rebel,” and the Jinyiwei “pursued and captured them, considering them conspirators… and sentenced them to be executed by lingchi.” During the Jiajing era (1521–1566), “officials were corrupt, and common people suffered,” with rebellions led by figures promoting “wealth and happiness” across various regions, with millions involved. In response, Grand Secretary Xu Jie issued a poisonous order: “Secretly instruct the Factory Guard… to arrest and eliminate them gradually, so as to prevent other changes,” using secret agents to arrest uprising leaders and eliminate revolutionary plots through “beheading operations.”
In the process of suppressing peasant uprisings, secret agencies fabricated false cases—“local officials in Yu set up spies in villages to lure and incite foolish people to commit crimes, then spread ‘evil words’ to frame them”; they also conducted collective arrests—“sometimes one person implicated ten or more, or an entire family was involved”; and indiscriminately killed innocents—“some robbers escaped execution, so many civilians were forced to fill their places.”
Facing the intensification of feudal autocratic rule at the end of the Yuan, revolutionary peasant secret societies began to change their religious disguises. In the Ming Dynasty, the Chineseized Manichaeism, after merging with Maitreya and White Lotus teachings, ultimately unified under the guise of the White Lotus. The peasants changed their Buddha names and religious titles, transforming their revolutionary religious disguise into new secret religious forms, spreading the core ideas of “good and evil struggle” and the “Two Religions and Three Realms” of Manichaeism.
The White Lotus believed that two opposing forces, called the Bright and Dark sects, existed in the world. The Bright is light, representing goodness and truth; the Dark is darkness, representing evil and irrationality. These two sides have been fighting continuously in the past, present, and future. After Maitreya Buddha’s descent, light will ultimately defeat darkness. This is called the “Three Realms” of “Qingyang,” “Hongyang,” and “Baiyang.” The followers serve the “Mother of Non-Existence,” and believe in the phrase “Pure vacuum homeland, Mother of Non-Existence.” The Mother of Non-Existence is an immortal ancient Buddha, and all people are her equal children. To save people from suffering, she has sent down the lamps of the Buddha, Shakyamuni, and Maitreya, who govern the past, present, and future of the human world respectively.
The initial opposition of light and dark is the past. The current struggle of light and dark is the present. The future involves the return of light and dark to their original positions: “Light returns to Great Ming, darkness to extreme darkness,” and in the process of transforming from the present to the future, Maitreya descends to the human world. During the great calamity, people can turn danger into safety and avoid disaster. After completely destroying the old system and disrupting the old order, a new millennium of happiness can be established. They also called on believers to regard the four seas as home, viewing fellow believers as brothers and sisters from the same parents, advocating mutual sharing of wealth, mutual aid, and gender equality. These slogans directly reflect the ideas of the broad peasantry. These demands are a direct continuation of Manichaeism’s original ideas of equality, opposition to oppression, and mutual aid.
Under the slogan “White Sun rises after the Red Sun,” the peasants continued to fight against the decadent and brutal exploiters. After the mid-Ming period, White Lotus followers launched many small and medium-sized peasant uprisings.
After the anti-Qing struggle entered a lull, White Lotus and its branch, the Tianli Cult, lurked in secret, continuing to organize various anti-Qing struggles in the form of secret religious societies. The development of capitalism’s embryonic stage brought new changes to the class struggle. The participation of a large number of bankrupt artisans, water and land transport workers, and urban poor infused White Lotus with early proletarian ideas—compared to Manichaeism, the White Lotus in the mid-Qing emphasized equality and fairness, advocating that everyone, regardless of gender or age, should be equal, sharing life and death and hardships, “nothing to carry but a coin to travel the world” [43]. They also promoted that after joining the cult, members would share the wealth equally—“all the assets obtained within the cult are to be divided equally” [44]. During this period, the revolutionary use of religious disguises among peasants reached a peak, with numerous sects and titles—“According to expert Liu Ziyang’s research on folk religions, there are as many as 107 sect names, but some scholars estimate the total to be no less than four or five hundred” [45]. On the other hand, the concealment effect of these religious disguises became more prominent. During the Qianlong period, a county magistrate in Jiangxi, in order to pacify the chaos, studied over fifty heretical texts of devil cults circulating at the time, concluding that these books contained no rebellious words and were “normal” religious texts. However, peasants used such propaganda materials to organize revolutionary movements. The variety, widespread influence, and deep impact became characteristic of Manichaeism’s ideas during the White Lotus stage.
Believers of White Lotus united under new banners to fight against the Qing Dynasty, which inherited the Ming Dynasty’s legacy. Among them, the largest and most influential were the White Lotus uprisings and the Tianli Cult branches in Sichuan and Shandong. The White Lotus, directly evolved from Ming Cult and White Lotus, also participated in uprisings in Guizhou, supporting the development of the revolutionary wave across China, becoming an indispensable force in the great peasant revolutionary tide.
The White Lotus uprising, suppressed by the combined forces of domestic and foreign reactionaries, lasted nine and a half years, fighting in five provinces, dealing heavy blows to the Qing government troops dispatched from sixteen provinces. The Northern Tianli Cult uprising, mainly originating in Hebei and Shandong, with branches carefully prepared, marched into Beijing directly targeting the imperial palace. Although ultimately suppressed, these uprisings severely damaged Qing rule, costing the Qing government two hundred million taels of silver, plunging it into a state of weakened military and financial crisis. The slogan “Qing Dynasty is finished” greatly inspired later peasant uprisings, strengthening their belief that “the world will undergo a great change,” and class struggle gradually moved from a low tide to a climax.
III. Dissolution of the Form, Preservation of the Spirit—The Decline of Manichaeism in China
“Metabolism is a universal and irresistible law of the universe” [46]. The religious disguise of Manichaeism constantly changed; its religious aspects gradually diminished, but its revolutionary dialectical method not only remained intact but shone even more brightly. Through hundreds of years of class struggle, the working people abandoned the hierarchical and passive elements of its doctrine, such as the “savior” complex, and inherited and developed its revolutionary dialectical ideas, equality and fairness, mutual aid, disdain for authority, and the spirit of daring to fight. They continued to oppose oppression and exploitation with simple hopes, firmly believing that light would ultimately defeat the divine and dark, and a society without oppression and exploitation, where everyone is equal, would eventually arrive. The proletarians and peasants of the East and West, through arduous struggle, continued to inherit the revolutionary ideas of Manichaeism and pushed the revolutionary cause forward.
In China, the last manifestation of Manichaeism’s influence was in White Lotus, which, after the suppression of the Tianli Cult uprising in the north, transformed into a form called “Quan Hui” (Fist Society) to continue organizing peasants’ anti-feudal struggles, becoming the precursor to the Boxer Movement that shook the north during the anti-imperialist and anti-feudal struggles. After the failure of the great White Lotus uprising in Sichuan and Chu, revolutionary peasants and artisans regrouped under various “Hui” (societies), among which the most influential were the “Heaven and Earth Society,” “Gelao Society,” “Xiaodao Society,” and “Qinghong Gang.” These peasants, gathered in secret societies, faced the slow disintegration of feudal society and the threat of foreign capitalist invasion aiming to colonize China. They actively participated in the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom revolution. Some responded with uprisings, others joined the Taiping Army, continuing the revolutionary struggle against feudal oppression and exploitation.
During the Taiping Revolution, these remnants of ancient devil cults, although still reciting scriptures about “The Ming King’s descent,” had largely shed their religious disguises and organized the masses using practical programs and activities. These peasant groups, united by hatred of evil, sought equality, and their members called each other brothers and sisters, with no traditional feudal etiquette constraining them. The mutual aid ideas of the peasants were also inherited: “Help when in trouble, avoid bullying,” “Share and distribute the collected money,” and so on.
As the Taiping Revolution rapidly developed, organizations such as Tiandi Hui, Xiaodao Hui, Hongqian Hui, and Bianqian Hui in Guangdong, Guangxi, Fujian, Jiangxi, Hubei, Hunan, and Shanghai responded to the uprising. Leaders like Luo Daguang and Su Sanniang directly joined the Taiping Army. These societies also organized uprisings to establish “Dacheng Kingdom” and “Shengping Heavenly Kingdom.” The Han sects derived from Ming and White Lotus, such as the Qingming Cult, also participated in uprisings in Guizhou, greatly supporting the development of the Taiping revolution, becoming an indispensable force in the great wave of peasant revolution across China.
The Taiping Revolution, suppressed by combined domestic and foreign reactionary forces, failed, plunging China into semi-colonial and semi-feudal society. Feudal governments and foreign invaders colluded in their evil deeds. Foreign invaders used not only powerful ships and cannons but also preached the doctrine of “God loves the world” to enslave the people. Cultural imperialists, missionaries, and churches infiltrated inland China, with foreign devils colluding with feudal officials and local gentry, ravaging villages and cities, seizing land, building churches, and deceiving believers.
Meanwhile, the oppressed and exploited peasant masses once again took up the historical mission of resisting foreign invasion. During the mid-Qing period, when peasant revolts and religious disguises flourished, northern peasant leaders like Wang Lun and Lin Qing began to remove the religious disguises of White Lotus and organized anti-feudal struggles under the guise of “learning martial arts and practicing fists.” Subsequently, various拳会 (fist societies) such as Huwei Bian, Yihetuan (Boxers), Jinzhuang (Golden Bell Shield), Meihua Quan (Plum Blossom Fist), Hongzhuan Hui (Red Brick Society), and Hongyi Jianfu Ying (Red-clad Female Army) emerged like bamboo shoots after rain in northern China, becoming new forms of peasant resistance. The Boxer Movement was an outstanding representative of this revolutionary organization form. Under slogans like “Kill foreigners, eliminate the church,” and “Sweep away the foreign devils,” the peasant struggle directly targeted imperialism and its agents in China, the Qing government.
The Boxer Movement, originating in Shandong, spread rapidly across the land within three months. Despite the powerful ships and cannons of imperialism, they were no match for the wisdom and courage of the working people. Foreign devils were often killed by Boxer fighters and the Red Lanterns, suffering humiliating defeats. The heroic struggle of the peasants shattered imperialist ambitions to carve up China, causing panic among the Western powers and Russia, Britain, Germany to retreat. This formed a nationwide revolutionary climax, shaking the Qing rule, and made the imperialist aggressors realize that the Chinese people are not lambs to be slaughtered. With a long history of struggle and rich experience, they are far stronger than the weak imperialist paper tigers. This grand revolutionary war greatly weakened the Qing government and foreign invaders, creating conditions for bourgeois revolution.
However, the Boxers failed to see through the Qing government’s treachery. Some Boxer organizations followed the mistaken path of “support Qing and eliminate foreign,” ultimately leading the entire Boxer revolutionary movement to perish at the hands of the Qing government and imperialist powers.By this time, Manichaeism was like a cloak draped over the armor of revolutionary fighters, shielding the revolution from the cold wind and rain of exploitative ideas and violence during the preparatory stage, much like the seed’s outer shell protects the seed and the development of the revolution. In modern times, after more than a thousand years of class struggle, production struggle, and scientific experimentation, this cloak has become outdated and no longer able to conceal the body and thoughts of the now powerful revolutionary giant. The new generation of the proletariat and the working people of all nations urgently need new ideological weapons to arm themselves. With the development of socialist thought among the proletariat, the emergence of truly scientific socialism has taken place. Manichaeism and other religious garments, along with the simple materialism and dialectics contained within them, have truly withdrawn from the stage of history. They now serve only as educational materials in museums for modern revolutionary fighters. As a religion, Manichaeism has disappeared, but the revolution continues to flourish.
“For hundreds of years, workers have attempted dozens and hundreds of times to overthrow the oppressors and become the masters of their own lives. But each time they failed, suffered insults, and had to retreat, burying their grievances, shame, anger, and despair in their hearts, looking up at the vast sky, hoping to find a savior there.” [47] The revolution failed, but what were the reasons for its failure? Certainly, the peasant class could not escape the limitations of small-scale production and could not represent a new mode of production. Even if small farmers obtained land through revolution, class differentiation would arise in scattered production, and they could not break out of the feudal production relations. And the revolutionary dialectic, which condensed the blood and wisdom of countless laborers, if confined within religious language, would inevitably be tainted with idealism and metaphysics, making it impossible to guide the working people to a clear understanding of the world. Therefore, they could not propose a thorough revolutionary program and theory, nor guide the revolution to complete victory. “The peasant revolutions of that time always ended in failure, always exploited by landlords and aristocrats during and after the revolution, used as tools for changing dynasties” [48]. But they never gave up the struggle; they shed their heads and spilled their blood, holding onto ideals and plans that “often made their descendants tremble” [49], fighting to establish a bright earthly heaven, sacrificing heroically.
Things inevitably develop through internal contradictions and struggles. “The class struggle, uprisings, and wars of peasants are the true driving forces of history” [50]. Under the struggle of countless workers, the slave system was buried, feudal society collapsed, and capitalism developed on the ruins of feudalism. The rise of capitalism was due to the bourgeoisie’s revolutionary struggle that conformed to the laws of historical development at the time, which to some extent aligned with the interests of the working people, using their strength to establish their own regime. The capitalist mode of production could still accommodate the enormous productive forces created by workers recently liberated from serfdom. However, the laws of historical materialism continued to operate. Starting with the first capitalist overproduction crisis in 1825 in the most developed capitalist countries, the enormous productive forces created by the workers finally reached a point where they could no longer be contained within capitalism’s fragile shell.
Periodically, with shorter intervals, longer durations, more destruction of commodities, longer production stagnation, and increasing unemployment, the destructive impact on social production signaled that capitalism had reached its zenith. It was heading toward its demise according to the law of metabolic renewal. Capitalist society is the last social form of the exploiting class. In capitalist society, production has become socialized; everything has become a commodity, and all production must pass through hundreds and thousands of hands. Capitalist society created the main body of social production—the countless proletariat—but they could not be masters of their own production according to their will. Instead, they were enslaved by the coercion of a small group of capitalists who controlled the means of production. The most active factor in human productivity was subjected to unprecedented restrictions and destruction under capitalist relations of production. The more capitalism develops, the more severe these restrictions and destructions become, until private ownership is destroyed and productivity can no longer develop. To fundamentally transform the private ownership of the means of production, the proletariat must carry out violent revolution, completely destroying all superstructure built upon it. Along with the socialist revolution, the transfer of the means of production into organized labor signifies the end of private ownership of the means of production.
After a brief rise, the bourgeoisie faced the revolutionary struggles of the proletariat and working masses, and once again sang the old tune of the exploiting class’s metaphysics—capitalist society has always been like this, unchanging through the ages; internal “order is maintained,” and all contradictions have been dissolved under “freedom, equality, and fraternity.” But beneath the surface “order” lies the suppression of the working people; “freedom, equality, and fraternity” turn into “infantry, cavalry, and artillery” when the working people fight for their interests. The bourgeois relations of production are already rotten; they can only rely on bayonets to maintain their rule.
Along with the rise of the bourgeoisie and capitalism, a proletariat that is free from private property burdens, truly selfless, and relying on its own labor to master advanced productive forces also emerged. This is the class that can lead the revolution to complete victory. The great teachers of the proletariat, Marx and Engels, summarized all valuable revolutionary experiences of human history from the proletariat’s perspective, established dialectical materialism, and thoroughly overthrew idealism and metaphysics, pointing the way for millions of workers worldwide. The hope for human liberation ultimately lies in the hands of the working people. This dialectic, irrigated with countless blood and wisdom, is truly scientific and revolutionary— the sharpest weapon in the hands of workers.
Thus, the struggle between proletarian socialist thought and bourgeois capitalist thought has become the fundamental content of ideological class struggle.
“Without revolutionary theory, there can be no revolutionary movement” [51]. Before a major revolution, a major ideological struggle is indispensable. Just as before each uprising of the heretical sect, the sect members set an example by living simply, helping each other, and alleviating difficulties. They spread revolutionary theories by going door-to-door, burning incense, reciting scriptures, and preaching doctrines. Today’s socialist revolution must also adhere to ideological and theoretical struggle; revolutionary intellectuals must set an example by fighting personal pleasures, pornography, and laxity; they must resolutely oppose all vile thoughts and reactionary theories created by the exploiting classes, and persistently clear away bourgeois theories with Marxist theory. Only then can the theory be connected with the broadest masses of workers, gathering into a mighty revolutionary tide. Ultimately, all the ugly phenomena caused by the exploitative system in the world will be eradicated, and the oppressed and exploited will realize their long-standing hope of a world without oppression or exploitation, establishing a world of equality and freedom.
This is the final struggle—light will surely prevail!
