Hong Xiuquan the man who claimed he was Jesus’ brother is still a sounding name in Chinese history. Europeans has dismissed Hong Xiuquan’s claims to be Jesus’ brother, but according to a historian who narrates his life, he was never bothered.
Jonathan Fenby who has written about the history of China says that Hong Xiuquan who is one of the men who led peasant rebellions in China in the 19th Century one time fell into some kind of depressive fit and he had a vision.

He then imagined he’d gone up to the skies and there he had met a very tall man with a long beard and thick belt who had told him to come back to Earth and eradicate the demons on Earth.
Hong Xiuquan told his followers that the man he had seen up in the sky was the Christian God, that he, Hong, was the brother of Jesus, and that the devils he had to exterminate on Earth were the Qing dynasty, which was then ruling China and of course was not Chinese. Hong Xiuquan later declared a heavenly kingdom on the Yangtze.

Hong and his disciples took to the road, selling writing brushes and ink and spreading the good news about the heavenly kingdom as they went. The movement grew fast in south-west China.
“When people of this earth keep nothing for their private use, but give all things to God for all to use in common, then every place shall have equal shares, and everyone be clothed and fed,” Hong declared.
Some sources say Hong committed suicide by taking poison on 1 June 1864 at the age of 52 after Qing authorities finally gained a decisive military advantage and all hope of maintaining his kingdom was lost. However, in other sources, he was said to have died of illness.

Hong Rengan, Hong Xiuquan’s cousin, said his illness was caused by “eating manna” – a command taken from the Bible that Hong had given to his people as they starved.
On 30 July 1864, Qing general Li Chendian found Hong’s badly decomposed body in the palace of Nanjing.

Hong was succeeded by his teenage son, Hong Tianguifu. Hong Xiuquan’s rebellion that caused at least 10 million deaths was suppressed by Qing forces later in 1864.

QUESTIONS:
- Is it justifiable to say that the Chinese man HONG XIUGUAN is the brother of Jesus Christ?
- From the story, how would you describe HONG XIUGUAN?
- Is it wrong for someone to declare ‘himself’ as the brother of JESUS Christ?

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