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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Olaf Stephanos (talk | contribs) at 16:35, 15 July 2009 (Removing blatant original research ("through the auspices..." blah blah). Also, the context for cracking down on Falun Gong comes in the 4th chapter. This lead follows an encyclopaedic narrative.). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

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Falun Gong (Chinese: 法輪功) is a religion founded in China by Li Hongzhi (李洪志) in 1992. Falun Gong has five sets of qigong exercises and teaches the principles "truthfulness, compassion and forbearance" as set out in the main books Falun Gong and Zhuan Falun. The teachings include "cultivation of virtue and character", "moral standards for different levels" and "salvation of all sentient beings". The books, lectures and exercise materials have been translated into 38 languages and are available on the Internet free of charge.

Falun Gong emerged at the end of China's "qigong boom" as a traditional qigong cultivation practice, and has been regarded as one of the most important phenomena to emerge in China in the 1990s. The differences to traditional groups include the absence of rituals of daily worship, a self-conciousness about outside critics, greater emphasis on morality and the apparently theological nature of its teachings, which make it appear to be a religion.

Because Falun Gong practitioners have no membership or roster, numbers are unknown. In 1998, the Chinese government published a figure of 70 million practitioners in China. Clearwisdom.net, a Falun

1. "Falun Gong". www.falundafa.org. 2006-07-01. Retrieved 2007-08-16.
2. "Zhuan Falun". www.falundafa.org. 2000-03-01. Retrieved 2007-08-16.
3. "Answers to Commonly Asked Questions about Falun Gong", Falun Dafa Clearwisdom.net, retrieved June 10, 2006
4. Falun Dafa Has Been Spread to 114 Countries and Regions (Photos)
5. Benjamin Penny, The Past, Present, and Future of Falun Gong, 2001, accessed 16/3/08, Quote: "The best way to describe Falun Gong is as a cultivation system. Cultivation systems have been a feature of Chinese life for at least 2 500 years //"
6. Statement of Professor David Ownby, Unofficial Religions in China: Beyond the Party's Rules, 2005. Quote: "The history of Falun Gong, and of the larger qigong movement from which Falun Gong emerged (...) The Falun Gong emerged in 1992, toward the end of the boom, and was in fact one of the least flamboyant of the schools of qigong"
7. Cite error: The named reference Ownbyming was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
8. Haar, Barend ter, Evaluation and Further References, quote: "One difference between the Falun Gong and traditional groups is the absence of rituals of daily worship or rites of passage (...) Striking differences are also the degree of self-consciousness about outside critics already preceding the persecutions from April 1999 onwards".
9. Falun Gong: Cult or Culture?, ABC Radio National, April 22, 2001. Quote: "That the teacher, the leader, is regarded as being greater and more powerful than normal human beings; that the things that that teacher says are taken as truer and more real and more powerful than anything else, anybody else says, and that there is a well developed, I would call theology, but possibly doctrine, that includes morality, practice and a whole complete world view. So it looks like a religion to me."
10. Joseph Kahn (April 27, 1999). "Notoriety Now for Movement's Leader". New York Times.

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