Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-tf8b9 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-05T03:20:23.359Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Evangelization of Korea, c.1895–1910: Translation of the Gospel or Reinvention of the Church?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 May 2017

Kirsteen Kim
Kirsteen Kim*
Affiliation:
Leeds Trinity University
*
*Leeds Trinity University, Brownberrie Lane, Leeds, LS18 5HD. E-mail: [email protected].
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Several studies of the history of Protestant Christianity in South Korea have argued that the religion's rapid growth was chiefly because of the successful translation of the gospel into Korean language and thought. While agreeing that the foundation laid in this respect by early Western missionaries and Korean Christians was a necessary prerequisite for evangelization, this article challenges the use of a translation theory, such as has been developed by Lamin Sanneh, to describe the way that Christianity took root in Korea, both on the basis of conceptual discussions in the field of mission studies and also on historical grounds. It draws on research for A History of Korean Christianity (2014) to examine the years of initial rapid growth in Protestant churches in Korea – 1895 to 1910. Its findings suggest that rather than ‘translation of the gospel’ a more historically accurate description of what took place is ‘reinvention of the Church’.

Type
Research Article
Information
Studies in Church History , Volume 53: TRANSLATING CHRISTIANITY , June 2017 , pp. 359 - 375
Copyright
Copyright © Ecclesiastical History Society 2017 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 ‘Protestant’ in this period of Korean history refers to Presbyterian and Methodist denominations.

2 Latourette, Kenneth Scott, A History of the Expansion of Christianity, 7 vols (New York, 1937–45), 6: 428–30Google Scholar.

3 For the conference, see Stanley, Brian, The World Missionary Conference, Edinburgh 1910, Studies in the History of Christian Mission (Grand Rapids, MI, 2009)Google Scholar.

4 Note on transliteration: This article uses the McCune-Reischauer system of Romanization for Korean words. Korean names will appear in East Asian order (family name first). Alternative orders and spellings will be given in brackets.

5 Mott, John R., The Decisive Hour of Christian Missions (Edinburgh, 1910), 88Google Scholar.

6 World Missionary Conference, Report of Commission I (Edinburgh, 1910), 6Google Scholar.

7 Ibid. 36.

8 Ibid. 80.

9 Chung, Notably David, Syncretism: The Religious Context of Christian Beginnings in Korea (Albany, NY, 2001)Google Scholar; Oak, Sung-Deuk, The Making of Korean Christianity: Protestant Encounters with Korean Religions, 1876–1915 (Waco, TX, 2013)Google Scholar.

10 Sanneh, Lamin, Translating the Message: The Missionary Impact on Culture (Maryknoll, NY, 1989)Google Scholar.

11 Kim, Sebastian C. H. and Kim, Kirsteen, A History of Korean Christianity (Cambridge, 2014)Google Scholar, which offers greater detail and further indications of primary sources and secondary literature than can be given here.

12 Although Protestant translation activities had been going on since the 1870s, it was not until about 1895 that Protestant Church growth began to accelerate rapidly; after 1910 the rate of growth slowed. For figures, see Ryu, Dae Young, ‘The Origin and Characteristics of Evangelical Protestantism in Korea at the Turn of the Twentieth Century’, ChH 77 (2008), 371–98, at 397Google Scholar; Park, Chung-Shin, Protestantism and Politics in Korea (Seattle, WA, 2003), 16Google Scholar. Cf. the outlines of Paik, Lak-geoon George, The History of Protestant Missions in Korea 1832–1910, 2nd edn (Seoul, 1970)Google Scholar; Clark, Allen D., A History of the Church in Korea (Seoul, 1971)Google Scholar.

13 Use of the word ‘reinvention’ is inspired by Parratt, John, Reinventing Christianity (Grand Rapids, MI, 1995)Google Scholar.

14 Sanneh, Translating, 214–16.

15 Ibid. 9–49.

16 Ibid. 50–129.

17 Ibid. 130–56.

18 Luzbetak, Louis J., The Church and Cultures (Maryknoll, NY, 1988; first publ. 1963)Google Scholar.

19 Kraft, Charles H., Christianity in Culture (Maryknoll, NY, 1979)Google Scholar.

20 Bevans, Stephen B., Models of Contextual Theology, 2nd edn (Maryknoll, NY, 2002), 40–4Google Scholar.

21 Sanneh, Translating, 192–209.

22 E.g. Hall, Stuart, Representation (London, 1997)Google Scholar.

23 Such as the recovery of the early history of Christianity in Asia: Moffett, Samuel Hugh, A History of Christianity in Asia, 1: Beginnings to 1500 (Maryknoll, NY, 1988)Google Scholar.

24 Wright, N. T., The New Testament and the People of God (London, 1992), 341–5Google Scholar. I am indebted to Morwenna Ludlow for alerting me to this point.

25 See, for example, Burrows, William R., ‘A Seventh Paradigm? Catholics and Radical Inculturation’, in Saayman, Willem and Kritzinger, Klippies, eds, Mission in Bold Humility (Maryknoll, NY, 1996), 121–38Google Scholar.

26 Shorter, Aylward, Evangelization and Culture (London, 1994), 30Google Scholar. Sanneh is aware of this difficulty (Translating, 50–87), and argues for a vernacularizing effect of Catholic missions even before the Second Vatican Council encouraged translation of the liturgy and reading of the Bible by lay people: ibid. 88–129.

27 Sanneh, Translating, 88–129.

28 Ibid. 211–38.

29 Ibid. 212.

30 E.g. Sanneh, Lamin, The Crown and the Turban (Boulder, CO, 1997)Google Scholar.

31 Catholicism had been practised in Korea for almost a century by this date but had been largely suppressed by persecution.

32 Ross, John, Mission Methods in Manchuria (Edinburgh and London, 1903)Google Scholar. On Ross, see, in this volume, James H. Grayson, ‘John Ross and Cultural Encounter: Translating Christianity in an East Asian Context’, 338–58.

33 This was a script designed by King Sejong's scholars several hundred years before, specifically for the Korean language, but which was despised by the literati, who preferred to use Chinese characters.

34 Huntley, Martha, Caring, Growing, Changing: A History of the Protestant Mission in Korea (Cincinnati, OH, 1984), 28Google Scholar.

35 E.g. that ancient Koreans were monotheistic: Oak, Making, 63–83.

36 Ross, John, History of Corea, Ancient and Modern (London, 1891 edn), 355Google Scholar.

37 Baker, Don, ‘Hananim, Hanŭnim, Hanullim, and Hanŏllim’, Review of Korean Studies 5 (2002), 105–31Google Scholar; Bierne, Paul, Su-un and His World of Symbols (Farnham, 2009)Google Scholar.

38 Korean Catholics referred to God as ‘Chŏnju’, the Korean pronunciation of the Chinese term preferred by Matteo Ricci.

39 Huntley, Caring, 132–8.

40 Paik, History, 374.

41 The earliest history of Protestantism in Korea is Paik, History, which is a history of missions written in English and citing only English-language and missionary sources; cf. Clark, Charles Allen, The Korean Church and the Nevius Methods (New York, 1930)Google Scholar.

42 Notably Clark, History.

43 The leading church historians writing in Korean are Min Kyŏng-bae (Kyoung-bae Min) and Yi Man-yŏl (Mahn-yŏl Yi): see, for example, Kyŏng-bae, Min, Han'guk kidokkyo hoesa [A History of the Korean Church] (Seoul, 1982)Google Scholar; Han'guk minjok kyohoe hyŏngsŏngsa-ron [The Establishment of an Indigenous Korean Church] (Seoul, 2008); Man-yŏl, Yi, Han'guk kidok'kyo suyongsa yŏn'gu [Study on the Korean Reception of Christianity] Seoul, 1998)Google Scholar; Han'guk kidok'kyo-wa minjok t'ongil undong [Korean Christianity and the National Unification Movement] (Seoul, 2001).

44 Chung, Syncretism.

45 Oak, Making. Oak also included translation from Christian literature in China.

46 Nevius, John L., The Planting and Development of Missionary Churches (Shanghai, 1899)Google Scholar.

47 Clark, Charles Allen, The Nevius Plan for Mission Work in Korea (Seoul, 1937)Google Scholar.

48 Clark, History, 147–8; on Yun Chi-ho, see Ahn, Shin, ‘The International Religious Network of Yun Chi-ho (1865–1965): Mission or Dialogue?’’ in Gregory, Jeremy and McLeod, Hugh, eds, International Religious Networks, SCH S 14 (Woodbridge, 2012), 228–35Google Scholar.

49 Paik, History, 295–8; Choi, Hyaeweol, Gender and Mission Encounters in Korea (Berkeley, CA, 2009), 65–72Google Scholar.

50 Paik, History, 419–28.

51 Ryu, ‘Origin’, 398.

52 Mott, Decisive Hour, 5–7.

53 World Missionary Conference, Report I, 25.

54 Ibid. 71.

55 Palmer, Spencer J., Korea and Christianity (Seoul, 1967)Google Scholar. Palmer identifies 1895–1910 as the years of most rapid growth and connects this phenomenon with the social trauma of the period: ibid. 80–1, 91–4.

56 In Protestant historiography this was led especially by Mahn-yŏl Yi.

57 Grayson, James H., Early Buddhism and Christianity in Korea (Leiden, 1985)Google Scholar; idem, Korea: A Religious History, 2nd edn (Abingdon, 2002).

58 Yi, Mahn-yŏl, ‘The Birth of the National Spirit of the Christians in the Late Chosŏn Period’, in Yu, Chai-shin, ed., Korea and Christianity (Seoul, 2004), 39–72, at 40–3Google Scholar; Kim and Kim, History, 62–3.

59 Hunt, Everett N. Jr, Protestant Pioneers in Korea (Maryknoll, NY, 1980), 90–2Google Scholar.

60 Kang, Wi Jo, Christ and Caesar in Modern Korea (New York, 1997)Google Scholar.

61 Shin, Gi-Wook, Ethnic Nationalism in Korea (Stanford, CA, 2006), 21–57Google Scholar.

62 Eckert, Carter J. et al., Korea Old and New: A History (Cambridge, MA, 1990), 214–22Google Scholar.

63 Wells, Kenneth M., New God, New Nation: Protestants and Self-Reconstruction Nationalism in Korea, 1896–1937 (Honolulu, HI, 1990), 85–6Google Scholar.

64 Including undertakers and shamans.

65 Huntley, Caring, 66–80.

66 Nahm, Andrew C., Korea: Tradition and Transformation (Elizabeth, NJ, 1988), 179–81Google Scholar.

67 Paik, History, 234.

68 Wells, New God, 30–2.

69 Suh, David Kwang-Sun, ‘American Missionaries and a Hundred Years of Korean Protestantism’, IRM 74 (1986), 5–18, at 6–9Google Scholar.

70 Cf. Paik, History, 260–2, 356–8.

71 Huntley, Caring, 125.

72 Chandra, Vipan, Imperialism, Resistance, and Reform in Late Nineteenth-Century Korea (Berkeley, CA, 1988)Google Scholar.

73 Park, Protestantism, 127.

74 Wells, New God, 57.

75 Ibid.

76 Lim, Heekuk, ed., Christianity in Korea (Seoul, 2013), 73–84Google Scholar.

77 Yi, ‘Birth’.

78 Park, Protestantism, 123–6.

79 Pak, Jacqueline, ‘Cradle of the Covenant’, in Buswell, Robert E. Jr and Lee, Timothy S., eds, Christianity in Korea (Honolulu, HI, 2006), 116–48Google Scholar.

80 Don Baker, ‘Sibling Rivalry in Twentieth-Century Korea’, ibid. 283–308, at 289–96.

81 Choi, Young Keun, ‘The Great Revival in Korea, 1903–1907’, Korean Journal of Christian Studies 72 (2010), 129–49Google Scholar.

82 Ryu, ‘Origin’, 394.

83 Wells, New God.

84 Park, Protestantism, 30–6.

85 As in the independence movement of 1 March 1919: see In Kim, Soo, Protestants and the Formation of Modern Korean Nationalism, 1885–1920 (New York, 1996), 155–86Google Scholar.