Xuanyuan teaching
Confucian folk religion founded in Taiwan in 1952
Xuanyuandao (軒轅道 "Way of Xuanyuan"), also known as Xuanyuanism (軒轅教) or Huangdiism (黄帝教), is a Confucian folk religion of China which was founded in Taipei, Taiwan, in 1952. The founder was Wang Hansheng (王寒生) (1899–1989), a legislator. The Church of Xuanyuan aims to restore the "national religion" of archaic (pre-Han dynasty) China, with Huangdi as the universal God.
Theology and practices
The Church of Xuanyuan subsumes all the ways of worship to local deities under one national god, Xuanyuan Huangdi (軒轅黄帝 "Xuanyuan the Yellow Deity"). According to the Shiji, Xuanyuan was the name of Huangdi, and he is traditionally considered the thearch (progenitor god) of the Han Chinese race.
Xuanyuanism is based on Confucian rationalism, and therefore rejects practices it considers superstitious that are found in other sects of Chinese folk religion, such as scripture writing through god mediumship.
Diffusion
As of 2013 the Xuanyuandao has 200,000 adherents in Taiwan and is also active in China, where it runs temples, schools, and members take part in the sacrifices celebrated at the Xuanyuan Temple, the largest temple dedicated to Huangdi in the world. Huangdi is also worshipped in Chinese folk religion by millions of people who do not necessarily belong to the Church of Xuanyuan.
See also
Chinese salvationist religions
Confucian church
Footnotes
References
Sources
Christian Jochim, "Carrying Confucianism into the Modern World: The Taiwan Case". In Philip Clart, Charles Brewer Jones.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Xuanyuan teaching” is confucian folk religion founded in Taiwan in 1952. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Xuanyuan, teaching and Confucian, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “confucian folk religion founded in Taiwan in 1952” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 14, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q30727200. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1952, 1899, 1989 and 2013.
A concise general-reference account can conceal disagreements about scope, terminology or the weight assigned to individual sources. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Xuanyuan teaching”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Xuanyuan teaching primary sources, Xuanyuan teaching archive and Xuanyuan research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Xuanyuan teaching”?
- Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
- What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Xuanyuan teaching” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.