Abstract
During the 1980s and 1990s, Qigong or “breathing arts” became the most wide-spread form of popular religiosity in Chinese cities. Thousands of charismatic Qigong masters appeared, promoting Qigong methods through transmission networks covering the whole country. Falungong became the biggest Qigong group by the mid-1990s. The article examines the hypothesis of links between Qigong and a galaxy of groups which were widespread in pre-Communist China, often called “sectarian” in the academic literature and also known as “White Lotus” sects. By comparing the ideology, the practices and the structure of these groups, it is possible to conclude that Qigong is a modern expression of the Chinese tradition of popular sectarianism.