Li Hongzhi Introduces Falun Gong in Changchun (1992)
On May 13, 1992, a little-known former grain clerk named Li Hongzhi stepped in front of an audience in Changchun, in China's northeastern Jilin province, to deliver his first public lecture on a practice he called Falun Gong, or Falun Dafa. The talk marked the public debut of a spiritual movement that would grow to claim tens of millions of adherents across China within a decade, only to become the target of one of the Chinese Communist Party's most extensive suppression campaigns after 1999.
The Qigong Boom and Li Hongzhi's Emergence
By the early 1990s, China was in the midst of a nationwide 'qigong boom,' a surge of popular interest in traditional breathing exercises, meditation, and slow-motion movements believed to cultivate internal energy and promote health. Hundreds of qigong masters and schools competed for followers in a society emerging from decades of political upheaval and searching for new sources of meaning, community, and physical wellbeing. Li Hongzhi, born in 1951 or 1952 in Jilin province, entered this crowded field with a synthesis he called Falun Gong, or Falun Dafa, meaning 'Practice of the Wheel of Law.' He drew on qigong exercise traditions but layered them with a more explicit moral and spiritual framework rooted in Buddhist and Daoist concepts, emphasizing the principles of truthfulness, compassion, and forbearance alongside a set of five physical exercises. Unlike many qigong masters who charged substantial fees, Li initially positioned his teachings as widely accessible, which helped distinguish Falun Gong from crowded commercial competitors and appealed to a public wary of expensive, less transparent programs.
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Li Hongzhi initially registered Falun Gong with a state-run qigong research society in China, meaning the practice began with tacit official approval before later becoming the target of a nationwide ban in 1999. The movement's core teachings were eventually compiled into a book, Zhuan Falun, published in 1994, which practitioners often study alongside performing the group's five signature exercises.
The First Lecture in Changchun
Li Hongzhi delivered his inaugural public lecture on Falun Gong on May 13, 1992, in Changchun, the city where he had spent much of his life. The session introduced attendees to the movement's core exercises and its underlying philosophy, blending physical practice with moral teaching in a format that echoed, yet distinguished itself from, the many qigong lectures circulating at the time. Word of the new practice spread quickly through informal networks, local qigong associations, and eventually through official channels, since Falun Gong was initially registered with the China Qigong Science Research Society, a state-affiliated body overseeing the qigong movement. Over the following months and years, Li traveled extensively throughout China, giving lectures in numerous cities and provinces, training practitioners who would go on to organize local practice groups. His teachings were compiled into books, most notably Falun Gong (1993) and Zhuan Falun (1994), which became central texts for the movement and were distributed widely, often free or at low cost, reinforcing the grassroots, community-based character of the movement's early growth.
Rapid Growth and Later Suppression
Falun Gong's growth in the 1990s was remarkable: by some estimates, tens of millions of people across China practiced the exercises in parks, courtyards, and community spaces by the late 1990s, drawn by claims of health benefits and a moral community amid rapid social change. This scale increasingly worried Chinese authorities, particularly after an April 1999 gathering of roughly 10,000 practitioners outside the central government compound in Beijing to protest unfavorable media coverage. The demonstration, one of the largest since the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests, prompted the government to launch a sweeping crackdown in July 1999, banning Falun Gong, arresting practitioners, and mounting an extensive propaganda campaign against the movement. Li Hongzhi, who had relocated to the United States in 1996 or 1998 (accounts vary), continued to lead Falun Gong from abroad, and the organization subsequently established institutions including the Shen Yun performing arts company and the Epoch Times newspaper. The Chinese government's crackdown drew international criticism from human rights organizations, which documented allegations of torture, forced labor, and other abuses against detained practitioners, making Falun Gong's origins on that May afternoon in Changchun the starting point of a decades-long and deeply contested chapter in modern Chinese history.