Abstract
The period from the Treaty of Kanghwa (1876) until the fall of the Korean Empire (1897–1910) is commonly characterized as a period of kaehwa—Enlightenment—in which the Chosŏn state strived to reform and modernize. This article complicates the notion of Enlightenment in the late Chosŏn context, arguging that it was a hybrid term concurrently connoting modernization and religious awakening. In particular, this article sheds light on spirit-written texts—so called ‘morality books’—employed by civil and military elites to participate in Enlightenment discourse. By the mid-nineteenth century, Guandi—the apotheosized version of the warrior Guan Yu—had emerged as one of the most popular spirit-writing deities in Qing dynasty China. This article explores the Korean faith and practice of spirit-writing centered on Thearch Kwan (Ch. Guandi) at shrines in Seoul. The King Kwan Shrines (Kwanwang myo) were the sites of production and publication of morality books during a critical period on the eve of modernization of Korea. Surprisingly, these texts were published with the sanction of King Kojong (reigned 1863–1907), the reformer who founded the new country. Kojong and his confidant servants were fully aware of the spirit-written texts and published them as the “Corpus of Enlightenment.” The corpus unintentionally emphasized the key term of modernization in their eschatology, urging enlightenment—conceived of as religio-ethical values—in order to resolve contemporary ills and bring about a new era of peace. This research will dissolve the sharp demarcation between premodern and modern in late nineteenth and early twentieth-century Korea by illuminating the polyphony of Enlightenment ideas, comflicting and competing between the old and new.
Highlights
The period from the Opening of Ports (1876) until the fall of Great Han Empire (Taehan cheguk 大韓帝國, 1897–1910) is often characterized as a period of Enlightenment in which the Chosŏn state strived to modernize its social system
“Enlightenment of the World Civilizations” (Yo no bunmei kaika 世ノ文明開化) published in 1867, Fukuzawa stated: “If we review history, human life was unenlightened at the beginning, and gradually progressed toward enlightenment and civilization.”6 Since the Meiji Restoration of 1868, bunmei kaika in the Japanese context implied by and large Enlightenment by embracing Western civilization
31 Besides, the Formless Altar has been influenced by the Altar of Awakening Origin (Jueyuandan 覺源壇), the early the early ninteenth-century spirit-writing altar of Qing elite literati, that contributed to the compilation of ninteenth-century spirit-writing altar of Qing elite literati, that contributed to the compilation of Essentials of Daoist Canon (Daozang Jiyao 道藏輯要) in the 1810s
Summary
The period from the Opening of Ports (kaehang 開港) (1876) until the fall of Great Han Empire (Taehan cheguk 大韓帝國, 1897–1910) is often characterized as a period of Enlightenment Religions 2020, 11, 273 it entered modern Korean via the Japanese translation (kaika) of “Enlightenment,” the term kaehwa deliberately invoked the values and ideas of the European Enlightenment that began in the seventeenth century: emphasis on human reason and the disenchantment and secularization of the world. The King Kwan Shrines (Kwanwang-myo 關王廟) were the sites of production of morality books during a critical period on the eve of the modernization of Korea These texts were published under the explicit intention of Kojong (reigned 1863–1907), the last king of Chosŏn who pursued. The corpus emphasized “Enlightenment”—the key term of modernization, but conceived of by them as ethical values—in their eschatology, deeming it the proper way to resolve disasters such as epidemics and military crises and bring about a new era of peace. This inqury problematizes a binary conception of the modernization process in East Asia that draws a line between modern and pre-modern
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