China existed in a state of political, social, and economic unrest at the dawn of the twentieth century. The Qing Dynasty, which had ruled for nearly three centuries, was almost incapable of exerting political control over China in the midst of Western aggression in the country. Foreign businessmen and merchants had been exporting wealth out of China for decades by 1900, and China was powerless to stop the unequal trading. Western military power, far more advanced than the Chinese military, guarded China’s ports and trading centers, which ensured Western profit at China’s misfortune. Western educators in China attempted to unravel Confucian tradition and replace it with Western learning and thought, an assailment on traditional Chinese
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The Boxers targeted Christians in China because they perceived Christianity as a threat to Chinese culture and a purveyor of political and economic corruption. But despite the close proximity of many Christians in China to the danger posed by the Boxers, the majority of foreign and native Christians in China were unaware of the peril they faced by 1900. The Boxers, who viewed foreign corruption of Chinese culture as a problem that needed immediate eradication, set out to drive all foreigners from China, and remove all traces of Western culture after foreign retreat. Christian missionaries, by far the largest group of Western foreigners in China, faced the brunt of Boxer …show more content…
In fact, denominational feuding not only spread among foreign missionaries in China, but among Chinese Christian converts too. For example in the Kho-Khoi region, an organized attack had been carried out on a member of a Baptist congregation, which ended with many of his animals being unmercifully slaughtered. “Now we’ll take their whole flock of disciples,” Baptist opposition in the region proclaimed, “and dispose of them, one sheep at a time.” Another Christian man in the Kho-Khoi area was instructed to refrain from attending services at his church by members of another denomination as part of a resolution to a crime he committed. “For punishment,” his accusers declared, “you must now pay your share to the building of our chapel, and promise not to attend services at your other church.” Such infighting was common among missionaries, but in these examples, Chinese Christian converts were bickering amongst each other over religious denomination. These events clearly show that many Chinese Christians embraced the type of Christian infighting that took place in the western world, which was shown to them in the behavior of foreign missionaries in China. Such infighting created further resentment from the Boxers toward foreigners in
The Boxers targeted Christians in China because they perceived Christianity as a threat to Chinese culture and a purveyor of political and economic corruption. But despite the close proximity of many Christians in China to the danger posed by the Boxers, the majority of foreign and native Christians in China were unaware of the peril they faced by 1900. The Boxers, who viewed foreign corruption of Chinese culture as a problem that needed immediate eradication, set out to drive all foreigners from China, and remove all traces of Western culture after foreign retreat. Christian missionaries, by far the largest group of Western foreigners in China, faced the brunt of Boxer …show more content…
In fact, denominational feuding not only spread among foreign missionaries in China, but among Chinese Christian converts too. For example in the Kho-Khoi region, an organized attack had been carried out on a member of a Baptist congregation, which ended with many of his animals being unmercifully slaughtered. “Now we’ll take their whole flock of disciples,” Baptist opposition in the region proclaimed, “and dispose of them, one sheep at a time.” Another Christian man in the Kho-Khoi area was instructed to refrain from attending services at his church by members of another denomination as part of a resolution to a crime he committed. “For punishment,” his accusers declared, “you must now pay your share to the building of our chapel, and promise not to attend services at your other church.” Such infighting was common among missionaries, but in these examples, Chinese Christian converts were bickering amongst each other over religious denomination. These events clearly show that many Chinese Christians embraced the type of Christian infighting that took place in the western world, which was shown to them in the behavior of foreign missionaries in China. Such infighting created further resentment from the Boxers toward foreigners in