Understanding Korean society and politics [2/3] - religious landscape and politics in Korean society
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| The 2012 Machael Sandel lecture at Yonsei University, Seoul. He later reminisced,"it was like the Athens gathering at the Pantheon." |
The surge
of public attention on the issue of justice could well be ascribed to the
growing criticality of the “wealth redistribution” issue as their economy was bustling
through the corridor of middle-income countries towards the other end, but a certain
outcry for recalibration of the social justice could be heard as early as 20
years before the Sandel lecture at Yonsei. In 1992 a troubadour named Handol
released a song that had an unlikely title 조율,
pronounced Jo-Yul, which can be translated “Recalibration”. The song pleaded
the Heaven God, Haneul-Nim, to wake up from the deep sleep and recalibrate the
society, which had long gone astray. Apart from the message he wanted to carry,
the song-writer reminded many of the old Korean faith like a shaman invoking
the spirit of a god long forgotten.
The Hananim Faith, the Korean
monotheism
We don’t know why, but almost always left out in the literature dealing with religions in the Korean society is the Hananim faith. Nothing would be more helpful to get the grasp of the native deity than to know how the early missionaries that visited Korea in the late nineteenth century found the Hananim faith of the Koreans.
“Each religion furnishes its share to
the mythology of the country. At the head of their system of belief is Hananim,
whom the Chinese recognize as Shangti.[] Many would introduce as next
inferior to him Buddha (indeed, some go to the temples upon the death of a
relative to pray the Buddha to send his spirit to the good abode). Then come
the ten judges of hades, whose pictures may be seen in Buddhist temples.”
-Every-day life in Korea, published 1898, Daniel Gifford, P. 88-89
[] Shanti is the pronunciation of the Chinese word 上帝, which literally means 'Emperor above' or 'High Emperor'.
“Strange to say, the purest religious
notion which the Korean today possesses is the belief in Hananim, a being
entirely unconnected with either of the imported cults and as far removed from
the crude nature worship. This word Hananim is compounded of the words "
heaven " (sky) and " master," and is the pure Korean counterpart
of the Chinese word " Lord of Heaven."[] The Koreans all consider
this being to be the Supreme Ruler of the universe. He is entirely separated
from and outside the circle of the various spirits and demons that infest all
nature. Considered from this standpoint, the Koreans are strictly monotheists,
and the attributes and powers ascribed to this being are in such consonance with
those of Jehovah that the foreign missionaries (Protestant) have almost
universally accepted the term for use in teaching Christianity. The Roman
Catholics have adopted the term Chun-ju, a pure Chinese word of the same
significance,[] but open to the same objection, namely, that it was used long
before Christianity came, and may therefore be called the name of a heathen
god. But while in China it has been found that idols exist bearing the name
Chun-ju, the Koreans have never attempted to make any physical representation
of Hananim. He has never been worshipped by the use of any idolatrous rites, and
the concept of him in the Korean mind is, so far as it goes, in no way
derogatory to the revealed character of God himself. It is a moot point whether
the Koreans consider the physical heavens to be the person of this god. Some of
the more ignorant ones will deny that he is invisible, and point to the heavens
in proof of their statement ; but they attribute to him a fatherly care of
mankind in sending sunlight and shower, and a retributive power in striking the
wicked with lightning or other disaster.“
-The Passing of Korea,
published 1909, Homer B. Hulbert, P.404-405
Nobody knows when and how the Hananim faith was born at first, but many interpret the “Hwanin” 桓因 in the founding legend is the transliteration of Hananim. The being of Hananim is still alive in everyday life of Koreans. Modern Koreans mention Hananim as lord of the afterworld, to whose side all men return to when dead, and as the god of justice, who never fail to punish the wicked. Perhaps it may be unqualified as religion because no sparate temples or churches were ever built, there was no medium and no gathering ever happened for the being. The relationship with Hananim was formed always directly between the being and the individual person, with no intermediary or representative.
[] The idioms Koreans say in daily life using ‘Hananim’ or ‘Haneul’ include the followings translated word for word: " Hananim, please stop!!", common exclamation at the sight of the unexpected accident or catastrophe like 'Oh, no, Jesus!!', “He is ignorant how fearful Haneul is!”, when the wicked does the evil deed not afraid of the punishment of Hananim. “Hananim (or Haneul) is so mindless.”, When the wicked gets away with bad deeds or when the drought gets unbearably long for farmers. “The punishment from Haneul is waiting for him.”, as a curse for the wicked. “She is in Hanul (Hananim) nara.” or “She went to the side of Hananim.”, or “He got the call from Haneul (Hananim)”, all meaning they passed away. “I will see you again in Haneul nara.”, saying farewell to the dead.[] The idioms are in Korean in the order of the enumeration above: “하나님 맙소사!", "하늘 무서운 줄 모른다!”, “하늘(하나님)도 무심하시지.”, “천벌 받을 놈!!”, “그 분은 하늘(하나남) 나라에 계세요.”, “그 분은 하나님 곁으로 갔어요.”, “그는 하늘의 부름을 받았어요.”, “하늘나라에서 다시 만나요.”.
[] The belief that the dead goes back to the Heaven 하늘나라 is in line with the Korean traditional funeral custom of laying the dead on the bottom board with the seven holes after the shape of the Big Dipper, which symbolizes the Heaven. So, the Korean expression that he lied on Chilsung-Pan 칠성판, or Seven-Star Board, meant that he went to the Heaven 하늘나라. The petroglyphs of the Big Dipper are found on the stones of Dolmen tombs in Korea, which dates back to the bronze age of 1,000 BC to 2700 BC.
The most important aspect in the character of Hananim would be that the
god is fair to all and He does not ask to be worshiped, nor He rewards
the worship to Him. It is like a citizenship given to you as long as you are born human
and willing to stay human regardless of your loyalty to the being. It is a being
of parental nature for all. He cares for all not for any compensation. Most
Korean people, unless otherwise oriented, believe that they will go to a good
place after life as long as they have lived righteously and beneficently. So, Hananim
can be defined as God of Justice and Beneficence, whose hand works
indiscriminately. The existence has always resided in Korean mind making
the undercurrent there, faring and scraping with the religions it
would come across down the aisle of history.
The chronicle of the religions in Korea
With the practice of the indigenous shamanism popular
among the common people throughout their history, the Buddhism has accounted
for the longest period as state religion and then as common people’s faith until
it came across the Christianity, Catholic and Protestant, in 19th
century. Today, Buddhism, Protestant church and Catholicism make the mainstream
religions in the Korean society while the shamanism is being practiced by
professional shamans (Musok-in) or by the people sporadically. The religious
chronicle would look like the following roughly:
-5C Shamanism, Ancestral worship
5C
– 14C Buddhism as state religion
(Period
of Three Kingdoms to Koryo Dynasty)
14C -19C Buddhism and shamanism coexisting with
Confucianism as state ideology (Joseon
Dynasty)
19C -present Christianity, Catholic and Protestant, coexisting with Buddhism and Shamanism
The most frequently
excavated relics in the ancient Korean sites include the bronze mirror along with
the dagger, which may suggest the theocratic nature of the rulers in the
ancient Korean society. Though the role of the royalty as secular ruler seems
to have been separated from the shamanistic practice from the early years, the
ritual for the Heaven was served as late as in the time of Koryo Dynasty
(918-1392). Yet the shamanism is still
alive in everyday life in Korea. The shamans called Mudang usually claim to represent a certain god or spirit, which can be a mountain
spirit or a spirit of a dead. They become Mudang at first suffering the “spiritual
sickness” that comes to a person, usually woman, like a destiny. Many confess the
only way to get out of the sickness was become Mudang through the ritual of receiving
the spirit in the person, called Naerimgut. After the rite they live their life as fortune
teller and spirit medium.
Apart from the modern-day professional shamans, the belief in the nature
gods is still in practice by the common people. Everything has a soul. The
ritual for the god of place, or Gosa, is still being served by
Koreans. When they open a new business or move to a new office, it is not rare
to see the executives in business suit bowing on the floor to the sacrifice as
colleagues are watching by. When they buy a new car, they don’t go to Mudang,
or Buddhist monks. They serve a gosa ceremony themselves, bowing to
the car and offering the traditional wine Mageolri. Those practices are
indigenous to Korean culture and have nothing to do with the imported
religions.
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| Gosa, ritual for the god of place, is being held in celebration of the opening of a new restaurant in Seoul. Many would feel insecure in the corner of their mind if they don’t serve the ritual when they open a new business or move to a new office. |
[]
According to the Memorabilia of the Three Kingdoms, Garak ( Gaya ) States 三國遺事 駕洛國記, the first Buddhist monk
accompanied the queen-to-be in 48 AD on her way to see the first king Kim Suro
of 金官伽倻 Geum-gwan Gaya. A small
pagoda 婆娑石塔 that she is said to have brought
from her place on the ship, made of a stone only found in India, is still kept
near Busan. Several temples that claim to have been built by the accompanying
monk are scattered around in the southern part of the peninsula. There are even
record on the Chinese side that the Buddhism came from Korea. 『山海經』 第18 海內經. 東海之內 北海之隅 有國名曰 朝鮮天毒 其人水居 偎人愛之 [朝鮮 今樂浪郡也. 天毒卽天竺國 貴道德 有文書金銀錢貨 浮屠出此國中也] Translation:
[[Shanhai Jing]] In the East Sea and in the corner of North Sea is
located Joseon. People live by water and they respect and love each other. [
Joseon is now the Lolang* area. They take ethics preciously, they have script,
books, gold, silver, coins and paper bills. Buddhism came out of this country.
] * Here Lolang樂浪 is assumed Chinese
bìngyīn 倂音 for the Korean word 나라 pronounced “nara”. [ … ]
part is an editor’s note by 郭璞 Guo Pu (276–324). The
original Shanhai Jing is ascribed to 3–4C BC.
It seems
that Baekje (18-660 AD), one of the Three Kingdoms, took the religion as state faith
as early as 6th century and propagated the religion to Silla and to
the Archipelago to be called Japan later. Since then, the religion from India stayed
as the official and mainstream faith until the end of Koryo Dynasty (918-1392),
for a period of about millennia. During
the time of Joseon Dynasty (1393-1910) it was repressed by the ruling literati
class, who were the fanatic followers of the Neo-Confucianism, and the social
status of the Buddhist monks were placed on par with the lowest class along
with the Mudang. Yet it stayed popular among the common people, especially with
women regardless of the social status. Many court ladies stayed fervent
Buddhist.
Buddhism sees the human as living in the Saha World 사바세계 娑婆世界 , the world of confusion and suffering, that comes from the human desire, delusion and hatred. It is only through realizing in you the state of selflessness that you can get the “awakening” and then you can become another Buddha to be free from Karma, the vicious circle of living the Saha World life after life. It asks people to live righteously and beneficently, so the philosophy of the Buddhism did not scrape with the indigenous Hananim faith of Koreans. In fact, the character of Buddha was compatible with Hananim in that the being did not ask for worship. The worshipping was only voluntary. It just suggested the way to get over the pain of life. And the eternal life of freedom and bliss was reachable by way of self-edification and restraint to get the “awakening”, not by acts of worshipping.
Apart from the Buddhism as philosophy, the religion also served as faith for blessing both for the state and individuals. It was when Koryo was invaded by the Mongols in 13th century that the Tripitaka, the Buddhist canon comprised of eighty thousand woodblocks 팔만대장경, were made in the wish to get over the national tribulation with the power of Buddha. The Tripitaka had been regarded as the most precious treasure in the circle of the Buddhist countries in East Asia before the arrival of modern times.
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| Mothers praying for their child and grandchild to get the best result in the college entrance at a Buddhist Temple in Gangnam, Seoul (Photo by BBS, Buddhism Broadcasting System) |
The Buddhism as faith for blessing also went hand in hand with the Hananim faith. Many temples had Chilsung-Dang, Shrine for Seven Stars, a place for praying to the Big Dipper, which may have served as embodiment of the Hananim, being there in the same unchanging location in the sky. It was not Shamanism because there was no Mudang there and the prayer was made by the praying person directly offering a bowl of clear water to the being. Chilsung-Dang, much smaller in size, was usually located behind the main hall of the temple, in a higher place, perhaps meant to be closer to the heaven.
Given the length and depth that the Buddhism had in the Korean society, it would be only natural that Buddhism impinged on the shaping of Korean mind. The primary sentiment Koreans look at others in is that of compassion, 연민 pronounced Yeonmin, that they are all human companions going through this Saha World together in the same confusion and pain. Others are as miserable and pathetic as I. That explains the important Korean sentiment called “ Jeong” or 정. They build up strong ties of attachment with the colleagues or neighbors who they spent years together with. Their attachment out of the Korean “jeong” 정 would feel naïve and pure, excessive in some cultures, but if you understand the emotion stems out of the philosophical compassion embodied in the Korean mind, it would come much easier to apprehend. They are not stingy in giving help to total strangers in need either. Foreigner visitors often experience cool hospitality from Koreans in a manner unfamiliar in the culture he or she is from. They behave so nonchalantly when giving help. They just turn back after giving and go their way, thinking you would do the same to others in the next life, if not in this life.
The Christianity, the way it came to Korea
The
Roman Catholicism began to be known to the Korean society as early as in the
beginning of the 17th century by the people who returned from the
trip to China, but the diffusion of the new faith began in the late 18th
century by a father and son, who came back from Beijing as faithful Catholics. The
numbers of the Catholics reached thousands only through the network of Korean
believers, with no official church, when the first persecution was made in
1801. The early Korean Catholics were drawn to the idea of all people being
equal before God. They refused serving Jesa, the ritual of ancestry worship,
posing an unfamiliar threat to the social order of the neo-Confucianism the leadership
of Joseon Dynasty cherished and imposed. It was after several persecutions, many
a martyr and a military attack from France that Joseon Dynasty lifted the
repression on the Catholicism in 1880s when the yet Confucian leadership
apprehended the political situation Korea was laid in where the repression
could be neither wise nor sustainable.
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The statue of the first Korean Catholic Priest and Martir Kim Dae Geon (1821-46) was dedicated in St. Peter Cathedral in Vatican in September 16 of 2023. |
[] Yonsei University is regarded as one of the two best private universities in South Korea along with Korea University, which was founded by Koreans. With Seoul National University, the three universities are often referred to as SKY, taking the initial from the three, as most coveted schools in Korea, like Ivy schools in USA.
In
terms of proselytization the Protestantism was much more successful than the
Catholicism despite their late arrival. It is known there were about one
hundred thousand protestants in Korea by the time the country went under Japan
in 1910. There were about four hundred thousand when Korea was liberated in 1945. It should be noted that the Protestant church was more successful in
Northern part, especially in Pyong Yang, than in the South before the division.
It could be because the northern part of Peninsula had been lesser beneficiary
of the Joseon regime than the south, making the departure from the old order
easier, or it could be because of the inherent cultural openness of the
northern people, who might have preserved more of the Nomadic temperament inside
than the southern people.
Some of
the critical differences between Catholicism and Protestantism in Korea should
be noteworthy here. Though Catholicism had started quite prohibitive of the
traditional practices such as Jesa and ancestral worship under the initiatives
of the early grassroot believers, the Roman Catholic church grew quite lenient,
even receptive of the traditional family rituals. The laborious recitations for
the dead in the Catholic portfolio of regimented rituals made the people feel less
guilty about not serving Jesa. In contrast the Korean Protestant pastors chose
to demonize those practices as idolatry quite stridently, which many church-goers
took as faithful to their belief. Some aggressive Protestant pastors even labelled
the Catholic as heretical for their leniency on the traditional practices on
top of the worship of Maria they condemned as idolatry.
Another difference was in the adoption of the name of the God. As soon as the American missionaries began the evangelizing activities, they began to use the Korean native word Hananim almost right away to refer to the God. The question arose to some whether it was ethical to use the proper name of the Korean native deity in place of Lord, Father or Jehovar, but the argument for the practical benefits in propagation from the familiarity of the name to Koreans prevailed, so the first hymn songs and Protestant Bible in Korean used the name Hananim, in the way most Koreans pronounced at the time, from the beginning.[] The Catholic churches on the other hand inherited the expression Cheonju 天主, that the Chinese Catholic adopted in direct translation of ‘Lord of the Heaven’. They also thought using the proper name of the Korean native god was not appropriate. It was only in 1977 that the Korean Catholic church adopted the pure Korean expression Haneu(l)-nim 하느님 in a slightly different pronunciation from that of the Protestants. []
[] Horace Underwood was one of the early missionaries against using “Hananim” in lieu of Jehovah. According to the memoir ‘Underwood of Korea’ by his wife, Lillias H. Underwood, he thought to use the native name “Hananim” in lieu of Jehovah was as inappropriate as to call Jehovah Zeus in Greece because they could differ in nature. It could be a blasphemy to call Jehovah by other name than His own, too, he thought. See P.123-126 of 'Underwood of Korea'.
[] The most common way of pronouncing the native diety was "Hananim". All the literature by the 19C missionaries recorded it as "Hananim" with no exception. In the olden Korean it was written ㅎ. ㄴ. 님 . The letter " . " is today's "ㅏ". "Haneunim" 하느님 or "Haneulnim" 하늘님 expressions are closer to their etymological origin Haneul, meaning heaven, so Koreans know immediately it refers to their native god, whichever way it is pronounced. In their national anthem, they use "Haneunim". The song "Recalibration" used " Haneul- nim". The Protestant pastors teach to the believers that the name "Hananim" is the term only the Protestant churches created and use, meaning the only God, since in Korean 'hana' means 'one'.
Intended or not, as result, the native name of the indigenous Korean monotheistic god, in the two ways most commonly pronounced, was taken up by two branches of the Christianity. The problem is that the nature of the native Korean god Hananim is not always compatible with the God of Christianity. The troubadour who called out to wake up Haneul-nim in his song “Recalibration” was trying to arouse the native god of justice as a solution to the loss of the indiscriminate justice and the moral chaos in which the Korean society had fell into, having forgotten where it came from. []
[] The video of the song "Recalibration" sung by singer Han Young Ae is available at this end of this article with the lyric translated.
Protestant
Churches under the Japanese rule
Though the Japanese were not friendly with the missionaries, the colonial situation would not work disadvantageously for the Christianity because the tribulation Koreans was undergoing could be easily likened to the biblical ones, the Babylonian Captivity and the Israeli sufferings under Rome, resonating with many Koreans. The Protestants were in the forefront of the national resistance against the Japanese rule in the beginning. Almost half of the 33 signatories for the Independence Declaration in 1919 was Protestants, when the Protestant Christians accounted for less than 2%. However, the Protestant leadership would go down the full spectrum of political stance as the Japanese grip of rule tightened towards the Pacific War. Around the end of the colonial period the Protestant pastorship, which now was being led by Koreans, became the most proactive collaborators to the Japanese imperialists. They voluntarily carried out the campaign to donate the church bells to the Japanese military. They collectively bowed to the Shinto shrine and joined the ceremony of Japanese Shinto baptism under the oath of accepting the Japanese Supreme God Amaterasu. Some female Christian leaders encouraged the women to join the volunteer women labor corps 朝鮮女子勤勞挺身隊 for the glory of the sacred Emperor. [] And all those pastors and Christian leaders in the forefront of the collaboration with the Japanese were to make the political base of the Rhee Syngman government after 1948 and flourish as social leaders.
[] Especially the Pyong Yang Presbyterian Church officially endorsed the Shinto shrine bowing in 1938 against the protests of some pastors, who were arrested by the Japanese police. The Korean Presbyterian Church of Pyong Yang precinct, the biggest one for the denomination in Korea of the time, went as far as to deprieve the pastorship of those who refused to join the Shinto ceremony. If actions speak louder than words, their real faith seemed to be with Shinto while the Christianity was their business.
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<Left>Two fighter aircrafts were named Joseon
Presbyterian 朝鮮長老號and Methodist
Church 監理敎壇respectively in recognition of the contribution the
churches made. The United States was their enemy then. <right> Korean pastors in the Shinto baptism ceremony
called Misogi Barai 禊拂い dedicated to Amaterasu. To
be baptized in the name of the pagan god should be an undeniable apostasy from the viewpoint of
the Christianity. They had signed the oath of loyalty to the Japanese God
before the ceremony. They don’t look in distress. |