The Deadliest Civil War Wasn’t in America

While the United States was tearing itself apart in the American Civil War, another civil war was raging on the other side of the world, and it was even de*dlier. At the center of it was Hong Xiuquan, a failed Chinese scholar who experienced a series of mysterious visions after repeatedly failing China's imperial civil service examinations. Years later, after reading a Christian religious tract, Hong came to an extraordinary conclusion: the heavenly father in his visions was God, the older brother he had encountered was Jesus Christ and Hong himself was God's second son. What began as one man's religious revelation became the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom: a revolutionary state with its own capital, government, laws, kings and enormous armies. The Taiping Rebellion would engulf some of China's richest and most populated regions, nearly topple the Qing Dynasty, draw the attention of Western powers, and contribute to the loss of at least 20 million people. But this wasn't simply the story of one man's strange beliefs. China was already under extraordinary pressure from population growth, economic hardship, ethnic conflict, government corruption and foreign intervention. Hong Xiuquan didn't create those fractures. He gave them a heavenly language, and then he gave them an army. This is the story of Hong Xiuquan and the Taiping Rebellion, one of the de*dliest conflicts in human history. CHAPTERS 00:00 — The Civil War Not in America 01:30 — The Revolution Karl Marx Watched 03:22 — The Young Scholar 05:05 — God's Second Son 08:00 — Building the Heavenly Army 09:11 — The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom 10:42 — Heaven Becomes a State 12:07 — Taiping Northern Expedition 12:50 — Kingdom Tears Itself Apart 13:59 — Zeng Guofan & Xiang Army 15:47 — New Young Leaders 17:40 — Xiang Army Closes In 19:12 — Aftermath of Fall of of Nanjing 20:06 — Remnants of the Taiping 20:45 — The Black Flags & Tonkin 21:13 — Karl Marx Final Assessment 21:45 — Legacy of Hong Xiuquan