Falun Gong

A modern Chinese cultivation practice of moral discipline and meditative exercise.

1992 CE → · China, then worldwide · East Asian

Falun Gong, also called Falun Dafa, is a spiritual practice introduced in China in 1992 that combines slow qigong exercises with a moral teaching built on truthfulness, compassion, and forbearance, drawing on Buddhist and Taoist ideas of self-cultivation. It spread rapidly before being banned by the state in 1999, after which its adherents became widely known internationally for reporting persecution. It remains active among practitioners around the world.

Key figures

• Li Hongzhi (founder)

Texts

• Zhuan Falun

Beliefs

• Cultivation of truthfulness, compassion, forbearance
• Moral improvement as the heart of practice
• Meditative energy exercises (qigong)

Rituals

• Slow meditative exercises
• Reading and moral self-cultivation

Grew from

• Taoism (Daoism)
• Buddhism

Connections in the atlas

• Zhuan Falun
• The Han Chinese