The Founder’s Birth-fable of the New-religion and Religious Culture in Korea

ABSTRACT

This research will focus on the Founder’s ‘birth fable’ as a key point of the Korea’s religious base. Soo-Wooun, Jeung-San, and So-Tae-San, the so called Founders of the New-religion in Korea, shared the same world of 19th century. The near-end of Chouson dynasty. The life of these three people somewhat looks and sounds like a myth itself. Their life, starting from their birth to the founding of their religion, is filled with mysterious events and special happenings. However when closely examined, there exists an appropriateness to these mythical events, as it contains the shape of utopia which people of that time dreamt of, and trends of that time. We can see the fact that the desire of ordinary people at the time of 19th century, whom were ruled by a wrong system, and whom received a lot of suppression, was projected to these so called mythical birth-fable of the founders. Moreover as Korea was a colony of the Japanese empire at the time, it is plausible to say that a sense of democracy was added as well. Under these circumstance, the ordinary people wanted to overcome the chaos and wished to gain a new hope by using a religious method. The founders of New-religion of Korea, fully understood the role of the religion as an aid to relive the anguish of the ordinary people, and by using this and their own self-awakening, found a new religion. Therefore, in this article, I would like to show how the ordinary people’s will was projected by examining the birth-fable of the Founders