One Hell of a Villain Origin Story (Article)
On Hong Xiuquan, the alleged younger brother of Jesus Christ who failed four exams and became the leader of a rebellion.
Dear readers,
Believe it or not, what you are about to read is about fiction. Please keep this in mind.
Moving on…
Testing
This post was inspired by
’s article on IQ tests, specifically why he believes that IQ tests are 💩 (his words, not mine, though I agree with those words):
I recommend you read Mr. Chicago’s article for yourself. But to summarize, the author talked about Nicholas Lemann’s book The Big Test and how standardized tests such as SAT are used to “gatekeep” elite positions and exclude certain groups such as Catholics and Jews in the United States back in the day.
The article and the book it covered also got into the so-called “Negro Problem” in which IQ test results are used to denigrate black people of the United States; basically the blacks tend to get low scores on these tests and racists use these results to claim that black people are inherently dumber than white people (or every other people for that matter).
But I’m not here to talk about IQ tests or race realism. Not in a fiction-based Substack publication. Again, read Mr. Chicago’s article for yourself and send those angry racist comments over there instead of here (though be sure to read the article first, also the book it was covering for that matter).
Instead, I want to shift gears to history - Chinese history. To be more specific, the Taiping Rebellion. In the aforementioned article, I left this comment:
Like most Asian societies, Indonesia is very big on standardized tests, even things that now seem dumb like Entrance Examinations for Junior High (lol). It made me think how the East has a strange love fest with tests. One that drew my eye is the Civil Service Examinations which was done in China during the Imperial times. It had a reputation for being "meritocratic", even to this day. But I suspect it had always been a gatekeeping thing. If you're interested in obscure Chinese history, I recommend you look up Hong Xiuquan. The man failed the examinations four times and ended up leading a destructive rebellion that could have brought the empire down long before it did; he was also a pretty smart guy. However, he came from a peasant family and was an ethnic minority. Also, he was of a certain personality. So again, it makes me wonder why he truly failed those exams.
I’m sure I’m giving away my hand by putting this comment here, but that’s fine. Standardized testing is something that’s very, very old. Apparently, China’s Imperial Examinations, administered to find worthy candidates for civil service, dated back to 165 BC during the Han Dynasty. And like with today, getting a good score in that exam basically meant that you are a “smart person”.
I don’t doubt that these tests do measure something. But does passing a test, whether it be the civil service examinations of Imperial China or the SAT/ACT of Imperial America truly mean the difference between intelligence or stupidity?
This question brings me to the topic of this article, one Hong Xiuquan, now remembered by history to be the leader of the destructive Taiping Rebellion.
Hong Xiuquan
The late Qing period was a rather turbulent period for China. The Chinese to this day remembers it as a ‘century of humiliation’ in which various foreign powers (the British, the French, even the Japanese) were taking advantage of Chinese weakness, resulting in even more instability for the empire and even a couple of destructive conflicts.
The Taiping Rebellion was one such conflict. It was a bloody affair that was estimated to have killed about 20 to 30 million people in less than 15 years. As a point of comparison, the American Civil War which also took place in the mid-19th century killed a little over 1 million people in about 4 years. Yet in the grand scheme of Chinese history, the Taiping Rebellion is often grouped with other late-Qing era internal conflicts such as the unfortunately named Boxer Rebellion (which has nothing to do with underwear, I assure you).
So the Taiping Rebellion, though generally unknown in the West, was a big deal. This raises the question: just what kind of person was Hong Xiuquan?
Apparently, there wasn’t one single authoritative source regarding his early life. That said, we know that his family were rural peasants from Southern China (around Guangdong/Canton). He was also a member of an ethnic minority known as the Hakka.
Hong’s ethnic background is important. Many people, especially in the West, have the impression that China is this homogenous society (at least once you take out obvious non-Han ethnic groups like the Mongolians or the Tibetans). But this is obviously false.
This can be seen in the language. What in America is known as the “Chinese language” is technically known as Mandarin, so-called because it’s the language used by the Mandarins (Imperial administrators) of China. Here in Indonesia where there is a significant Chinese population (who are mostly Hakkas, funnily enough), we don’t really say ‘Bahasa Cina/Tionghoa’. Instead we say ‘Bahasa Mandarin’ because there are other “Chinese languages” being spoken here.
Another thing about the Hakka is that they were historically a despised minority. This topic is far too complicated for this article, so I won’t get into all the details. But one reason for the Hakka’s unfortunate status is their transient nature as a people, meaning they like to move from place to place (which is why you’ll find a lot of them overseas). Apparently, the Hakka were considered as the “Jews” or “Gypsies” of China.
Even here in Indonesia, they also have a tendency to get in trouble with the majority population (no offense to my “Chindo” friends and readers). But I’m digressing hard here, let’s go back to Qing China.
Now with that background set up, let’s return to the man himself: Hong Xiuquan. As I have said in my comment, he took the civil service examinations and failed. Four times.
Now why was that, because he was stupid? This is easily the least likely explanation. Hong had been educated from a young age, and in time he was able to recite the Four Books of Confucianism. He also placed first in his local entry-level civil service examinations.
But when he took the provincial examinations in Guangzhou, he failed. So maybe he wasn’t smart enough? This is possible. After all, the Chinese Imperial examinations were notorious for their high failure rate. Also, passing it was not just a matter of answering the questions correctly, but also doing so in the right way.
So this brings us to a darker explanation for Hong’s failures: was he screwed over? Did the examiners deliberately fail him because they didn’t want him as an Imperial civil servant?
Remember Hong’s background: a peasant, a member of a despised ethnic group, and possibly poor as dirt (his family spent all their money just to put their son through school and an opportunity to take these tests).
There is a saying, traditionally attributed to Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, which goes something like this: “it’s not about who votes, but about who counts the votes”.
Similarly, sometimes it’s not about who takes the tests but who grades them. Anyone who has had teachers or professors who either like them a lot or hate them a lot will know this.
Now I’ll be honest, I’m not a scholar of Chinese history. My knowledge of this period is surface level. That’s why when I was brainstorming for this article, I decided to see what ChatGPT has to say about this topic. The following is what the robot put out (caveat lector):
[Start of AI writing]
Hong Xiuquan failed the imperial examinations for a few interrelated reasons, both personal and systemic:
1. Extreme Difficulty of the Exams
The keju (imperial examination) system was notoriously difficult:
Highly competitive: Only a tiny fraction of candidates passed.
Rigid curriculum: Focused on Confucian classics, memorization, essay writing, and mastery of orthodox interpretations.
High standards: Examiners expected not only correct answers but elegant, precise expression according to established literary models.
Hong, though intelligent, may not have excelled in the exact style or rote memorization demanded.
2. His Background
Hong was from a poor Hakka family in Guangdong. While he had some access to education, his resources were limited compared to wealthier, better-connected candidates.
Many successful examinees had tutors, networks, and generations of preparation; Hong was largely self-taught or reliant on village schooling.
3. Multiple Failures
Hong failed the exams multiple times (4 attempts, 1827-1837).
Each failure likely compounded stress, financial strain, and personal frustration.
4. Psychological Pressure
The pressure of upward mobility through the exam system was intense for people like Hong, who saw it as their only route out of poverty.
His repeated failure contributed to a mental and spiritual crisis, eventually leading to his visions and religious awakening that fueled the Taiping movement.
5. Systemic Corruption and Bias
By the 19th century, the examination system was also increasingly criticized for corruption, favoritism, and rote learning that stifled creativity.
As a Hakka and an outsider to dominant Han clans in Guangdong, Hong may have faced social bias.
[End of AI writing]
Now while I did suspect the “systemic corruption and bias” (#5) explanation from the start, I phrased the prompt in such a way to make sure that it wouldn’t favor one explanation over another. The fact that it did mention it is rather telling. Perhaps there was something to this, or maybe the robot was just making things up. But at the very least, this established that the notion that Hong Xiuquan might have been systematically screwed over in these examinations is not just the crazy idea of a random Indonesian/American writer on Substack.
Moving on, the “extreme difficulty” (#1) explanation is the simple surface explanation, and is definitely true to a certain extent. The “background” (#2) explanation is also fairly simple. Even if you take out the potential of “foul play” on the part of the examiners, Hong was already in a disadvantaged position.
What caught my eye, other than the fifth explanation is the third and fourth explanations: “multiple failures” and psychological pressure”, respectively. Because regardless of why and how Hong failed these exams, these must have had an effect on him.
This brings me to the Taiping Rebellion itself…
One Hell of a Villain Origin Story
Saying that a historical figure is a villain is a tricky thing. I’d imagine the vast majority of the Chinese today likely consider Hong Xiuquan to be one. But apparently, Sun Yat-sen - the father of modern China, also a Hakka himself - held the Taiping “heavenly king” in high regard.
Regardless, it’s hard to imagine the Taiping Rebellion happening had Hong Xiuquan passed his imperial examinations. Perhaps a similarly destructive rebellion might have broken out in China; it was a turbulent time, and the Boxer Rebellion did break out a few decades later. But the point is that this is the kind of backstory that creates “villains”.
So far, this article is probably giving the impression that Hong Xiuquan was some misunderstood hero screwed over by an uncaring system. And if that’s your take on Hong, that’s fine. But the full story was not so simple, just as Hong’s examination failures was not as simple as him being stupid or “not smart enough”.
In the comment I reposted earlier, I mentioned that Hong was “of a certain personality”. What I meant is that Hong struck me as an intellectually gifted person who nonetheless struggled with systematic thinking.
So now it’s time to cover Hong’s religious beliefs…
The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom and the God Fearing Society were… interesting, to say the least. Their beliefs are often described as a syncretic version of Protestant Christianity and Confucianism. But frankly, this understates just how strange their beliefs were (at least to Westerners).
Firstly, the Christology is what I would charitably describe as heretical. Given his denial of the Divinity of Christ, Hong Xiuquan may well found himself in the same company as Arius or Charles Taze Russell.
But there’s more. Hong also believed himself to be the younger brother of Jesus Christ.
Yes, you heard me correctly.
I read up a little bit just to get the context for this strange religious tenet. And frankly, it is as strange in context as it is out of context. Here’s Wikipedia’s own description of the “Taiping creed” in detail:
All this is to say that Hong didn’t have the most orthodox of beliefs, Christian or Confucian.
Prior to all this, Hong even converted to (actual) Christianity but Issachar Jacox Roberts, the Baptist missionary who at the time was preaching in the area, refused to baptize him. The reason was unclear, but I personally suspect that it was because Roberts sensed that Hong had either failed to fully grasp the Christian religion or he had refused to. After all, not too long after this incident, he was robbed of his “demon-slaying sword” by bandits; perhaps a tragedy, but it also implied that he had been keeping that sword around.
There’s no denying that Hong was a smart person. And I’m not just talking about book smarts. The Taiping Rebellion which took a good chunk of Southern China away from the Qing for over a decade was his handiwork. When rallying people to his cause, he was able to convince many different types of people which included some Westerners (initially) to members of his own family such as his sister Hong Xuanjiao, who became the leader of the Taiping female battalion.
But perhaps he was too smart, too clever for his own good. Or to put it another way: his intelligence far outweighed his discipline, leading to a heterodox belief system that were at odds with not just Confucian Chinese society but also the Christian missionaries who inspired him.
Closing
So I said before that this article is about fiction. It might not seem that way, but it is. First, there’s the fiction of standardized tests and the idea that they measure “intelligence”.
Of greater importance is the life of Hong Xiuquan, a fodder for fiction. This is the kind of thing that you might find in an epic fantasy novel or period story. Or at least it should be.
Hong Xiuquan might have been a hero or a villain. But regardless, what you cannot deny is that he was a person. He had his beliefs, his virtues and flaws, his hopes and dreams, and even his disappointments. Eventually, his life ended in tragedy. He died as his “heavenly kingdom” was collapsing all around him, and was succeeded by his teenage son. That son didn’t have a happy ending either, as he was executed by “death of a thousand cuts” at the tender age of 14.
Truly a Greek tragedy in Chinese garbs. If I didn’t know any better, I would have thought this was the work of some poet or novelist.
But then again, as the saying goes: truth is stranger than fiction.
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Oh man, this article really took me back. I used to read about him in high school and came to a similar set of conclusions as you did—though not with this level of detail. One small nitpick, though: I think it’s worth emphasizing that Hong actively rejected Confucianism. Not surprising given his repeated failures in the imperial civil service exams, and the entire system that upheld them was rooted in Confucian classics and ideals.
That said, the “Chinese” elements in his syncretic theology don’t really stem from Confucianism but rather a fusion of Taoist mysticism, Buddhist eschatology, and early pre-Confucian theology and social structure &organization as found in ancient Chinese cosmological texts—ironically, many of which are embedded within the Confucian canon, like the Four Books and Five Classics. So in a sense, he may have mined from pre-Confucian worldviews while rejecting the Confucian moral framework those same texts came to represent. So imagine reading only the Old Testament to construct an entirely different theology, all while rejecting the mainstream religious interpretation that incorporates it.
It also gets really interesting when you look at how Hong might’ve conceptualized the Christian God. His references to "Shangdi" (The Lord on High), sometimes referred to as "Di" or "Tian"—a term for a supreme heavenly deity found in pre-Confucian belief systems—suggest he fused the idea of the Christian God with native Chinese monotheistic traditions. Historically, “Shangdi” was first used by Jesuits to refer to the Christian God when they began their missionary work in the late Ming and early Qing dynasties. But the term was changed in favor of “Tianzhu” (Lord of Heaven) in 1715 by Pope Clement XI, because TL;DR: the Christian God is the creator of the universe, whereas Shangdi is merely a divine ruler within an existing cosmology.
However, Protestant missionaries, the ones from whom Hong learned Christianity, continued using "Shangdi" into the 19th century, only clarifying their meaning 13 years *after* the rebellion ended to distinguish the Christian God from the original Chinese cosmological figure. So all this fusion and confusion—perhaps throw in widespread discontent with the current social order in the form of the ruling Qing in its latter years and the accompanying racism towards the ruling Manchus for safe measure—ended up creating proto-unitarian millenarian theology that evolved based on Hong's own understanding of it. Also, a bit of a tangent, but the character of Hong's own surname is the same as "flood", as in the Great Flood of Noah, a wild coincidence that he emphasized a lot and set the tone for the amount of death and destruction that followed in his wake as his rebellion unfolded.
Anyways, end of ramble. Thanks again for writing this—it was a great read and brought a lot back to mind!
Well written, Germanicus! Learned a whole lot from this and it's helpful in expanding consciousness. I don't know much about Chinese history but I'm glad to read about it. I do see the parallels with testing here and there, despite the time gap: these tests are remarkably limited in what they claim to "test" and it is not free from considerable flaws.
Thanks for the shout out! I'm thrilled to be a part of your work here!