Knowra Falun Gong Falun Gong Falun Gong is a Chinese spiritual movement founded by Li Hongzhi in 1992. It combines meditative exercises and qigong with moral teachings and ideas drawn from Buddhism and Taoism.
Qigong : A Chinese system of coordinated movement, breathing, and attention practiced for health, martial arts, or spiritual cultivation. Falun Gong presents its exercises as a form of qigong, while joining them to distinctive moral teachings.
Li Hongzhi : The Chinese spiritual teacher who founded Falun Gong and developed its teachings. His lectures and writings established Falun Gong's practices, cosmology, and organization.
Falun Gong practitioners : People who practice Falun Gong's exercises and follow its spiritual teachings. Practitioners spread the exercises through voluntary teaching and formed communities in China and abroad.
Persecution of Falun Gong : The Chinese government's campaign against Falun Gong practitioners that began in 1999 and includes detention and coercive measures. The crackdown transformed the movement's practice in China and became central to its overseas advocacy.
Buddhism : A religious and philosophical tradition based on teachings associated with Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha. Falun Gong draws on Buddhist ideas but is a distinct modern movement, not a Buddhist school.
Meditation : A family of practices that train attention, awareness, or contemplation. Falun Gong includes still meditation alongside its moving exercises.
China in the 1990s : A period of economic and social change in the People's Republic of China after the 1989 protests. Falun Gong grew amid a broad 1990s boom in qigong and spiritual practice.
Falun Dafa Association : A network of organizations that supports Falun Gong practice and public activities in different countries. These organizations coordinate instruction and advocacy outside mainland China.
Tiananmen protest of 25 April 1999 : A large, peaceful gathering of Falun Gong practitioners near Zhongnanhai in Beijing on 25 April 1999. The gathering preceded the government's ban and is often treated as a turning point in state relations.
Taoism : A Chinese religious and philosophical tradition concerned with the Dao and ways of living in harmony with it. Falun Gong incorporates ideas associated with Taoism without belonging to an established Taoist lineage.
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