Constructing Korea’s Won Buddhism as a New Religion:
Self-differentiation and Inter-religious Dialogue
Don Baker
University of British Columbia
Published in International Journal for the Study of New Religions 3:1 (2012), pp. 47-70.
(Image courtesy of Won Buddhist Headquarters)
Abstract: Won Buddhism is one of the largest and most respected of Korea’s new religions, yet it still encounters difficulties in wining recognition as a new religion because of the use of Buddhism in its name and some Buddhist elements in its doctrines. To strengthen its claim to independent religious status, Won Buddhism makes sure its worship halls, its rituals, and its clerical wear are quite different from what is seen in traditional Korean Buddhism. It also emphasizes elements in its teachings that differ from those of traditional Buddhism. In addition, over the last few decades, it has become one of the most active promoters of inter-religious dialogue in Korea. Acting as an independent partner in inter-religious dialogue strengthens Won Buddhism’s claim that it is not simply another Buddhist denomination but is a separate and distinct religion in its own right.
Key Words: Won Buddhism, Sot’aesan, Ilwŏnsang, Chŏngsan, Ethics of Triple Identity
Won Buddhism is one of the oldest, largest, and most respected members of what are called “the native religions of the Korean people” (minjok chonggyo). (Yoon, Kim, Yook, and Park. 2005) Koreans use that term to refer to organized religions that emerged in Korea, distinguishing them from religions such as Buddhism, Confucianism, and Christianity that were imported onto the peninsula. Outsiders usually refer to the 14 religious organizations that are members of the Association of Korean Native Religions (Han’guk minjok chonggyo hyŏbŭihoe), as well as many other new Korean religious movements such as the Unification Church, as new religions. Some of the members of that association, such as Taejonggyo [the Religion of the Grand Progenitor], reject that label, insisting that they are not new religions. Instead, they are revivals of the original religion of the Korean people. Won Buddhism, however, does not shy away from being described as new. In fact, it proudly proclaims that it is “a new religion for a new age.” The founder himself stated he had founded what he considered to be a new religious movement. (Won Buddhism website b)
There are some among the leadership of Korea’s mainstream Buddhist community, however, who dispute Won Buddhism’s claim that it is a new religion. They are joined by a few scholars who agree with them that Won Buddhism is more Buddhist than new. (Kim Bokin 2000, 12) In fact, a recent book on Buddhism in the twentieth century included Won Buddhism as an example of the “renovation and reformation of Buddhist faith and practice.” (Heine and Prebish 2003, 7) Such mainstream Buddhists and scholars do not deny that the religious movement known today as Won Buddhism traces its origins to a group brought together in the second decade of the twentieth century by Park Chungbin (1891-1943), usually referred to by his sobriquet as Sot’aesan. However, they insist that Won Buddhism is nothing but another Buddhist denomination and therefore is quite different from the other “native religions of the Korean people,” those which worship Korean gods such as Tan’gun (worshipped by Taejonggyo) or Kang Chŭngsan (worshipped by Daesoon Jinrihoe and several other new religious groups).
Park Chungbin (Image courtesy of Won Buddhist Headquarters)
To understand the relationship of Won Buddhism to mainstream Korean Buddhism as well as to Korea’s community of new religions, it is necessary to examine briefly the religious environment in the Republic of Korea. (Won Buddhism has no presence in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, on the northern side of the demilitarized zone that divides the Korean peninsula.) Korea differs from most countries in that it has no single dominant religious community. According to the last government census, taken in 2005, almost 23% of South Koreans said they were Buddhists, around 18% said they were Protestant Christians, and almost 11% said they were Roman Catholics. 47% said they had no religious affiliation at all. That leaves very few left to check the “Won Buddhist” box on the government census form. Only 129,907 did so, out of a total South Korean population of 47,041,434 at that time. (T’onggyero sesang pogi website) It is likely that there are more Won Buddhists than that, since, even twenty years ago when census takers found less that 90,000 people affirming that they were Won Buddhists, there were already at least 500 Won Buddhist ritual halls in Korea and over 7,500 Won Buddhist clergy. Won Buddhist officials claimed at that time that their religious community numbered over 1,175,000. (Han’guk Chonggyo sahoe yŏn’guso 1993, 1084) The actual figure of active Won Buddhists was probably somewhere in between the census figures and what Won Buddhist headquarters claimed. Nevertheless, it is clear that the Won Buddhism community is much smaller than the Protestant, Catholic, and mainstream Buddhist communities and therefore Won Buddhist leaders have to work hard to make sure their organization is not overlooked.
Attracting attention as a new Korean religion is made more difficult for Won Buddhists by two features of Korean Buddhism today: the dominance of the Jogye order and the large number of small Buddhist denominations. The Jogye order dominates the image of Korean Buddhism among both Koreans themselves and among non-Koreans who study Korean Buddhism today. The Jogye order is a Mahayana order founded in the aftermath of Korea’s liberation from Japanese colonial rule in 1945. It claims to be the legitimate successor to a long tradition of Buddhism in Korea because of its promotion of traditional meditative practices and also because it is run by celibate monks. Most monks during the 35 years of Japanese colonial rule were married, following the example set by modern Japanese Buddhism. After 1945, successive nationalistic governments in South Korea favored the celibate monks over married monks, seeing them as free of any taint of contamination from Japanese Buddhism. The government even took major temples away from married monks and gave them to the Jogye order. (Sørensen 1999) As a result, the Jogye order is the richest and most powerful Buddhist order in Korea today. On its websites, it even portrays itself as simply Korean Buddhism, rather than one of many denominations of Buddhism in Korea. (Jogye order website)
However, the Jogye order is not the only Buddhist organization in Korea today. In fact, besides the Jogye order, there are 26 other Korean Buddhist orders enrolled in the Association of Korean Buddhist Orders, ranging from the large T’aego order of married clerics and the esoteric-ritual oriented Ch’ŏnt’ae order, which is large enough to operate its own university, to many smaller orders, such as the Korean Maitreya order and the Korean Pure Land order, that are much smaller than Won Buddhism is. (Association of Korean Buddhist Orders website)
Won Buddhism is not a member of that association of Korean Buddhist denominations, though there was an attempt to convince Won Buddhism to join several years ago. Actually, that was an attempt, in 1999, to convince the Won Buddhist authorities to rejoin that association, since Won Buddhism had been among the original members but had left in the 1980s to protect its properties from disputes within the mainstream Buddhism community over the ownership of religious assets. (Pulgyo chongbo sent’ŏ website) Instead of joining that umbrella Korean Buddhist organization, Won Buddhists authorities strive to maintain their order’s autonomy as a separate and distinct indigenous Korean religion, even though it differs significantly from other indigenous Korean religions in that its worship services are not centered on worship of a Korean god.
Not only does Won Buddhism not promote the worship of a Korean god, it does not promote the worship of any God at all. Instead, its practitioners direct their spiritual gaze at an empty circle. Some might question, therefore, whether it is a religion at all. There are at least two other new spiritual movements emerging from modern Korea that do not promote worship of any particular God: Dahn World and Maum Meditation. (Dahn World website, Maum Meditation website) Both, because of their promises of spiritual enlightenment, their reliance on prescribed rituals, and their use of terminology similar to that used by Daoism and Buddhism respectively, appear to some outside observers to be new religions. However, both Dahn World and Maum Meditation insist that they are not religions at all. Won Buddhism does not share their aversion to the “religion” label. Instead, as already noted, despite the fact that it is more anthropocentric than theocentric, it insists that it is a real religion. After all, if Zen Buddhism can be called a religion, why can’t Won Buddhism be likewise?
If we accept self-definition as sufficient, then Won Buddhism is without a doubt a new religion. However, just as some groups that say they are not religious have the religion label pinned on them by outside observers, it is possible that outsiders may not agree with the self-labeling of Won Buddhism as a new religion, separate and distinct from “old Buddhism.” We therefore should examine its origins, its doctrines, its scriptures, its rituals, and its distinctive practices to see whether, in fact, it is truly a new religion or is merely one more occupant of the big tent that is Buddhism. We should also examine how Won Buddhist authorities have tried to convince others that Won Buddhism should be treated as a distinct religious organization rather than as a minor member of the broader Korean Buddhist community. If we engage in such an examination, we will discover that Won Buddhism has established itself as a new religion in two ways: first of all, it has distinguished itself internally by developing not only its own scriptures and rituals but even its own architecture and terminology, and, second, it has gained recognition externally that it constitutes as separate and distinct religious community in its own right through ecumenical interaction with other religious communities.
The non-Buddhist origins of Won Buddhism
There is already enough English-language scholarship on the teachings and practices of Won Buddhism that I do not need to go into much detail here. (Chung, 1984; Pye 2002) Instead, I will focus on aspects the leaders of Won Buddhism have emphasized in order to promote an image of Won Buddhism in which its distinctiveness is highlighted.
There are two reasons often cited for declaring Won Buddhism a new religion rather than just another Buddhist denomination. First of all, when Sot’aesan has his enlightenment experience on April 28, 1916, he had not received any Buddhist training or been directed in his search for enlightenment by a Buddhist master. (Kim Pokin 2000, 3-4, Yang 2008, 81) In fact, he claimed that he didn’t even realize that his insight into the interconnectedness of all phenomena, and that behind all those interconnected phenomena lay one unified cosmic Thusness, was similar to what the Buddha had taught 2,500 years earlier until he read the Diamond Sutra. (Park Kwangsoo 2003, 170) Since he reached his insight independently, Won Buddhists say, it is accurate to say that his insight is similar to that of the Buddha but is not a Buddhist insight.
Secondly, Won Buddhism emerged out of a series of non-Buddhist changes to Korea’s religious culture in the late eighteenth and into the nineteenth century, before Won Buddhism itself was formed. The first non-Buddhist alteration to Korea’s traditional religious culture in modern times came from the introduction of Christianity, in the form of Roman Catholicism, in the last quarter of the 18th century. Catholicism introduced a radical new idea to Korea--monotheism. Traditionally Koreans, when they believed in gods, believed in many gods. They may have believed that some of those gods were more powerful than the other gods, but they never singled out one God and one God only for worship. (Baker 2002) Even Buddhists in Korea worshipped many different manifestations of Buddha and never used the sort of exclusivist language we associate with monotheism (There was no equivalent of Japan’s Nichiren Buddhism in pre-modern Korean). However, Catholics insisted that there was only one God and no other spirits should be worshipped.
The first modern Korean new religion, Tonghak, which emerged in the 1860s, accepted this Catholic notion of monotheism. Although it did not teach worship of the Catholic God, it focused its spiritual gaze on a single supernatural presence called Sangje (C. Shangdi), Ch’ŏnju (the Lord of Heaven, the Catholic word for God in Korea), or Hannullim (a variant vernacular version of the Lord of Heaven) and did not talk about or try to interact with other supernatural personalities. Early in the 20th century, another new religion appeared which then fragmented into a cluster of new religious organizations focused on the worship of Kang Chŭngsan (1871-1909), whom they call Sangjenim, the Lord of High. Though the Kang Chŭngsan religions are not strictly monotheistic, since they preach the existence of many powerful supernatural personalities, their emphasis on Sangjenim as the incarnation on earth of the supreme lord on high and the most powerful by far of all the gods shows that they, too, have been influenced by the monotheism Catholicism introduced to Korea. Won Buddhism emerged after Tonghak had been preaching its theology for over half a century, and a decade after Kang Chŭngsan left this earth. However, Won Buddhists didn’t adopt the God of Catholicism, of Tonghak, or of the Chŭngsan religions. Instead, they promoted what may be called a mono-devotional rather than a monotheistic approach. Influenced by the new trend away from polytheism, Won Buddhists have excluded from their worship halls the many statues found in traditional Korean Buddhist temples. In their place, they have a circle, called Ilwŏnsang, which they use to represent the undifferentiated thusness of ultimate reality. (In a bow to the Buddhist elements in Won Buddhist teachings, they also call that circle the Dharmakaya Buddha). (Chung, 1987)
Directing the spiritual gaze at the Ilwŏnsang (Photo courtesy of Won Buddhist Headquarters)
Moreover, Won Buddhism shows in its scriptures that it picked up some key ideas from earlier non-Buddhist Korean new religions. A very important idea in Won Buddhism is that Korea is undergoing a great transformation (Kaebyŏk) that will create a paradise on this earth. This is an idea that had been earlier promoted by Tonghak as well as by Kang Chŭngsan. The Won Buddhist notion of Kaebyŏk is a little different from theirs. In Won Buddhism, Kaebyŏk does not refer to an actual physical cosmic cataclysm out of which the new world will emerge. Instead, it is used in a more metaphorical sense to refer to the dramatic changes science and technology are bringing to the modern world, and the spiritual transformation that should accompany that transformation in the material world. This is not a Buddhist notion, yet it is core to the teachings of Won Buddhism. Won Buddhism also reflects some influence from the “there is a spark of the divine in every human being” teaching of the Tonghak religion as well as some influence from the assertion of Kang Chŭngsan that the problems of the world today arise from the competitive nature of the human community and that those problems can be overcome if we learn to work together for mutual benefit rather than against each other for individual benefit. (Chung, 2003b) These are not traditional Buddhist ideas either. Yet they are core to the Won Buddhism worldview. Nor are the similarities between Won Buddhist ideas and those of Tonghak and the Chŭngsan religions simply a coincidence. Both Sot’aesan and his most important immediate disciple, Song Kyu, better known today as Chŏngsan (1900-1962), had contact with the ideas of Tonghak and Kang Chŭngsan before the founding of Won Buddhism as a separate religious tradition. (Chung 2003b)
Buddhist elements in Won Buddhism
Won Buddhist leaders do not claim, however, that there are no traditional Buddhist elements in Won Buddhism. Won Buddhists do not hide the fact that they believe in karma and reincarnation. For example, Sot’aesan is quoted as saying, in support of belief in karma and reincarnation,
"A person who upsets someone deeply by making false insinuations will suffer from heartburn in his next life. A person who enjoys furtively probing into or eavesdropping on others’ secrets will suffer humiliation and embarrassment in his next life by being born as a bastard, and so forth. A person who readily exposes others’ secrets and readily embarrasses them in front of other people so that they blush with shame will, in his next life, have some ugly marks or scars on his face that will hamper him all his life." (Committee for the Authorized Translation of Won-Buddhist Scriptures 2006, 241)
Won Buddhists also believe that the problems we see in the world around us are caused by our own minds and can be cured when we become enlightened. Won Buddhism is similar to traditional Buddhism in its assertion that we do not need to rely on a divine being to help us overcome our problems. Instead, we only need to look within to discover the strength that lies within our own true nature. Moreover, Won Buddhist publications promote sitting meditation as one approach to discovering our own true nature. Though it is not as central in Won Buddhist practice as it is in the monasteries of Korea’s dominant Jogye order, many Won Buddhists find it a favored spiritual practice. (Ch’a 2003) Most of these traditional Buddhist ideas are not as prominent in Won Buddhism as they are in mainstream Buddhism in Korea. In addition, they are often overshadowed by Won Buddhist teachings that are quite different from what is taught in Buddhist temples and in Mahayana sutras.
One traditional Buddhist idea that is prominent in Won Buddhism appears in the founder’s statement of why he founded this new religious movement: “our founding motive is to lead all sentient beings, who are drowning in the turbulent sea of suffering, to a vast and immeasurable paradise by expanding spiritual power and conquering material power.” (Committee for the Authorized Translation of Won-Buddhist Scriptures 2006, 1) However, the Won Buddhist approach to saving all sentient beings from suffering differs in many significant aspects from traditional Buddhist approaches.
The Unique Appearance of Won Buddhism
After Won Buddhism gained formal recognition as an independent religious body separate and distinct from mainstream Buddhist organizations in Korea in 1948, it took steps to reduce its use of traditional Buddhist terminology in order to highlight its distinctiveness. Won Buddhists still refer to their meditation practices as sŏn, the Korean pronunciation for the Chinese character Japanese pronounce Zen. They also refer to chanting the Buddha’s name as “yŏmbul,” the same term used in Jogye and other mainstream Korean Buddhist temples for that practice. However, in 1963, when they issued a new edition of their scriptures, they distanced themselves from mainstream Buddhism by dropping from those scriptures some technical Buddhist terms that had not become part of everyday Korean Buddhist discourse.
For example, in the doctrinal chart in which Won Buddhism displays what it considers its most important tenets and practices, there is a significant difference between what is seen in the 1962 edition from what was seen in the 1943 edition. The current version of that chart has near the top a box in which is written “The Threefold Study: Cultivating the Spirit, Inquiry into Human Affairs and Universal Principles, Choice in Action.” That box replaces a box in which had been written “Threefold Practice: Mindful karmic action (sīla —follow the nature), Spiritual Cultivation (samādhi —nourish nature), Inquiry into facts and principles ( prajñā—see into the Nature).” (Compare Chung 2003a, 116, with Committee for the Authorized Translation of Won-Buddhist Scriptures 2006, viii-ix.) It is obvious that Won Buddhist authorities have tried to expunge from their scriptures terms that Koreans would see as imported Buddhist terms rather than original Korean terms.
The official explanation for this change appear in the History of Won Buddhism, where it is explained that “the parts that underwent partial revision and reprinting in Won Buddhist year 34 (1949), the parts that could be interpreted as if Sot’aesan’s original purpose had been confined to a certain region or a certain religious denomination, were rectified to follow his real intention.” (Department of International Affairs 2010, 108) In other words, they did not want Sot’aesan to appear as if he were tailoring his message to the followers of a “certain religious denomination,” meaning traditional Buddhism. However, in the eyes of one scholar of Won Buddhism, “During the redaction process some tenets crucial to the integrity of the doctrine were altered with the effect that the light of the original writer’s wisdom was significantly dimmed.” (Chung 2003a, xiv)
That same scholar is also unhappy with the shift within Won Buddhism away from a focus on Ilwŏn, the Buddha-body perceived as the ultimate undifferentiated ground of reality, to a focus on the Ilwŏnsang, an actual circle drawn to represent Ilwŏn. Bongkil Chung writes, “Beings of lower capacity might mistake Ilwŏnsang, the circular symbol, for Dharmakâya Buddha just as they mistake the finger for the moon when the moon is behind the clouds.” He changes the line in the official scriptures today from “ to know one's own mind which as perfect, complete, utterly fair as impartial as Irwŏnsang” to what he says is the original wording: “ to know one's own mind which as perfect, complete, utterly fair as impartial as Irwŏn, namely prajñā-wisdom.” (Chung 2003a, 81)
Won-Buddhism is not only moving away from some traditional Buddhist terminology, its leaders have also taken steps to make it look quite different from traditional Korean Buddhism. Not only have Won Buddhists coined their own terminology, Won Buddhists also wear distinctive clerical clothing, and conduct their distinctive weekly rituals in buildings with their own distinctive architecture. Won Buddhist clerics, both men and women, are called “kyomunim,” which literally means “someone devoted to the teachings.” Mainstream Buddhist clerics in Korea are called “sŭnim” instead. Moreover, the majority of Won Buddhist clerics are women (1,300 Won Buddhist clerics are women compared to only 700 men) and wear a modified version of the traditional Korean women’s clothing rather than the traditional Buddhist nun’s robes. They also do not shave their head like traditional nuns do. Instead, they wear their hair up in the bun worn traditionally by married Korean women. Despite their hairstyle, like mainstream Buddhist nuns Won Buddhist nuns are celibate. However, male Won Buddhist clerics tend to be married. Moreover, except when they are performing some ritual function, male Won Buddhist clerics dress like any other Korean man living a white-collar life style. They do not shave their head or wear monk’s robes. The clothing styles and hair styles for Won Buddhist clerics are not used just to distinguish them from traditional Buddhist monks and nuns. Instead, they dress the way they do to emphasize that Won Buddhism is a Buddhism that is integrated into everyday urban life, not a Buddhism of remote mountain monasteries. (According to Won Buddhists, as well as many scholars of the history of Korean Buddhism, under government pressure mainstream Buddhism during the Chosŏn dynasty (1392-1910) withdrew from society into isolated temples in the foothills of Korea’s many mountains.)
From left to right, a Won Buddhist nun, a mainstream Buddhist nun, and a Catholic nun.
(Photo courtesy of Won Buddhist headquarters)
Similarly, Won Buddhist temples, both inside and outside, tend to look more like the Christian churches so common in Korean cities than like traditional Korean temples found in mountain valleys. They call their temples “kyodang,” which means “a place for teaching,” and do not use the mainstream Korean Buddhist terms “sach’al” or “chŏl.” Moreover, you enter a typical Won Buddhist parish temple through a foyer, where you can pick up a copy of the weekly parish bulletin. On a Sunday morning, you then normally sit in pews during a service that one prominent contemporary Won Buddhist admits, “is similar to that of a Protestant service. The ceremony is held on Sundays, and includes meditation, hymns, and preaching.” (Yang 2008, 87) I have found some newer Won Buddhist temples that have pushed the pews to the sides of the main worship hall to leave room in the middle for cushions for the use of those who prefer the traditional Buddhist practice of sitting on the floor during rituals. Nevertheless, no one familiar with traditional Korean temples would mistake a Won Buddhist temple for a typical Korean Buddhist temple or a Won Buddhist ritual for a traditional Korean Buddhist ritual. Someone who walked into a Won Buddhist temple expecting the usual display of multiple Buddhist statues would be particularly struck by the lack of such statues. In their place, prominently displayed on the front wall, in front of an altar, is a large circle, the Ilwŏnsang. It is toward that circle, rather than Buddhist statues, that Won Buddhists direct their devotions.
A typical Won Buddhist urban temple. (Photo by author)
A typical Sunday service (Photo courtesy of Won Buddhist Headquarters)
Unique aspects of Won Buddhist Teachings
The central role of the Ilwŏnsang is just one feature of Won Buddhist ritual that Won Buddhist leaders point to as evidence that the differences between Won Buddhism and mainstream Korean Buddhism are more than matters of appearance. Significant doctrinal and philosophical differences can also be found. For example, little is said in Won Buddhist scriptures or Won Buddhist sermons about the world being “unreal” or about a need to cultivate detachment from the phenomenal world of constant change. Nor are Won Buddhists told to still all their desires. Instead, they are told that they need to make sure that their actions are informed by correct knowledge and appropriate desires.
Though Won Buddhists agree with mainstream Buddhists that everything in the world is connected to everything else, for Won Buddhists, as it was for Korea’s Neo-Confucians, those interconnections do not subtract from the reality of the world of experience. Instead, they constitute reality. Won Buddhists are encouraged to understand the network of interconnections so that they can act in accordance with it. They are not encouraged to try to rise above it.
Similarly, though Won Buddhists sound at first like mainstream Buddhists when they describe the original human mind as “empty,” they do not use that term to focus on the mind as originally undifferentiated thusness. Instead, their discussions of the human mind resonate with Neo-Confucian descriptions of the fundamental human mind as empty of biases and partiality. In other words, an empty mind is not a mind empty of all specific content. Rather, it is a mind that is calm and clear and therefore is able to perceive the world around it as that world really is, in all its complexity and diversity. Just as in mainstream Buddhism, one goal of Won Buddhist cultivation is cognitive clarity. However, in mainstream Buddhism cognitive clarity is a tool for gaining release from this world of suffering by seeing clearly the illusory nature of the things of this world. In Won Buddhism, on the other hand, cognitive clarity is presented as an important pre-condition for the sort of appropriate action that will bring an end of human suffering by making this world a better place. Even when Won Buddhists engage in the quiet sitting-meditation that is a hallmark of Buddhism, they do not do so simply to cultivate an awareness of the true nature of the universe. Their main objective is to calm the mind so that it can show them how to act appropriately. (Chong 1997, 19) As Sot’aesan explained,
"The reason a person cultivating the Way endeavors to see the nature is to know the original realm of the nature and, by using one’s mind and body without fault like that realm, to achieve perfect buddhahood. If one only tries to see one’s nature but not to achieve Buddhahood, this would be of little use, like an axe that is well crafted, but made of lead." (Committee for the Authorized Translation of Won-Buddhist Scriptures 2006, 285)
In other words, enlightenment is not true enlightenment if the insight enlightenment has provided is not realized in action.
Another way to promote recognition that Won Buddhism is very different from mainstream Buddism is to point to the originality of the Won Buddhist solution to the problems of human suffering. According to Won Buddhist texts, ignorance of the illusory nature of the world of everyday experience is not the primary reason we suffer. Nor do we suffer primarily because we look for permanence in an impermanent world. According to those texts, those traditional Buddhist explanations are too vague to serve as useful guides for how to overcome suffering. Won Buddhism focuses instead on four specific reasons it identifies for unhappiness and suffering. They are 1) our inability to rely on our own resources, which causes us to be financially dependent on others who may not be able to provide us what we need; 2) the lack of wisdom in our leaders, who therefore mislead us into acting against our own best self-interest and the best interest of our community; 3) the lack of universal education, which keeps us from learning how to better our lives, and 4) selfishness, which leads us to act in ways that in the long run hurt us more than they help us. (Chung 1984, 24)
Won Buddhists often draw outside observers’ attention to the fact that, according to Won Buddhist doctrine, the most effective way to relieve human suffering is not to encourage detachment from the things of this world but instead to promote more appropriate ways of interacting with this world. That includes promoting universal education in all sorts of subjects, no just religion, since universal education allows everyone to gain the education they need to become economically self-reliant. Won Buddhist texts also encourage helping people recognize which potential leaders are wise and which are not, and encouraging them to follow those who are wise rather than those who are not (though Won Buddhism, as an organization, does not endorse any particular political leaders). And Won Buddhists, both clergy and laity, engage in various public service and charitable activities in order to counteract selfish tendencies.
These are not just abstract prescriptions. One of the first things Sot’aesan did after his enlightenment experience was lead his followers in a project to reclaim some coastal wasteland for farming. (Chong 1997, 5, Adams 2009, 5) The Won Buddhist organization has also built schools, including Wonkwang University, which includes one of Korea’s best medical schools teaching traditional (Chinese-style) medicine. And the Won Buddhist organization runs orphanages and social welfare centers in Korea and also dispatches medical missionaries overseas. (Won Buddhism website b)
Won Buddhist leaders try to direct our attention to the fact that Sot’aesan taught that appropriate action in this world to reduce and eventually eliminate human suffering should be based on the assumption that we suffer because we do not realize what the interconnectedness of all things means to us personally and therefore we do not let our connections to everything around us direct our actions. In other words, we suffer because we do not realize how dependent we are on others, and how much we owe to others, and as a consequence we end up acting inappropriately, acting in ways that are contrary to both our own long-term self-interest as well as the best interest of our community.
In another striking departure from traditional Buddhist teachings Won Buddhist leaders like to point out, according to Won Buddhist publications it is more important to cultivate an attitude of gratitude than an attitude of detachment. In particular, according to Won Buddhist teachings, there are four things we need to be grateful for. These “four graces,” as Won Buddhist texts call them, are “heaven and earth” (nature), for providing us with the air we need to breathe, the water we need to drink, and the earth we need to stand on and cultivate crops in; our parents, for giving us our lives; our fellow human beings, for providing us with such things as houses, roads, machines, medical care, and all other things we cannot provide for ourselves acting alone; and, finally, law, by which Won Buddhists mean the rules and regulations that make a safe, orderly, and predictable society possible. (Committee for the Authorized Translation of Won-Buddhist Scriptures 2006, 9-22, Chung 1988, 437-38)
Sot’aesan was not the first to talk about the need to cultivate an attitude of gratitude. In Japan several centuries earlier Nichiren (1222-1282) has also preached about four things to be grateful for. However, Nichiren taught the need to be grateful for those things that had made it possible for him to live as a boddhisattva on this earth. Sot’aesan was more down to earth. He taught that we need to cultivate an attitude of gratitude toward nature, our parents, our fellow human beings, and our laws in order to work together more effectively with others to reduce and eventually eliminate the causes of suffering in this world. (McCormick 1997)
Interfaith Dialogue and Independence of Won Buddhism
Differences in doctrine and practice are not the only features Won Buddhist leaders point to in order to argue that Won Buddhism is separate and distinct from mainstream Buddhism. Before 1945 the relationship between Won Buddhism and mainstream Korean Buddhism was somewhat blurred, although Won Buddhists already had established a distinct community marked off by differences in both doctrine and practice from other Buddhist groups in Korea at that time. However, the term Won Buddhism was not used. Instead, the group we now call “Won Buddhism” called itself the “Society for the study of the Buddhist Dharma.” It was only in 1948 that Won Buddhism formally became Won Buddhism. (Chong 1997, 34)
That raises the question of why Won Buddhist leaders waited until after 1945 to insist on a separate and distinct identity for their religious community. I would like to suggest a possible answer. Before 1945, Korea was under Japanese colonial rule, and the Japanese imperial government tried to bring all Buddhist organizations in Korea under Japanese rule. The main concern of Won Buddhists at that time was shared by other Korean Buddhist groups. They all wanted to maintain some autonomy within the parameters established by the Japanese colonial government. In 1945, the Japanese were sent home and were no longer a threat. However, Won Buddhist leaders wanted to disassociate themselves from the battle within mainstream Buddhism that broke out after the Japanese withdrew. As noted earlier, the Japanese had strongly encouraged monks to marry, as Japanese monks did. Most Korean monks in the 1920s and 1930s did so. The new government of the Republic of Korea (better known as South Korea), which emerged in 1948, viewed married monks as a legacy of the despised Japanese colonial rule. Married monks were treated as collaborators with the Japanese and therefore the anti-Japanese government of South Korea wanted to keep them from playing an important or respected role in post-colonial Korea. This led to a battle between married and celibate monks for control of temples and Buddhist institutions that lasted into the 1970s. (Sørensen 1999, Kim Kwangsik 2000)
Male clerics in Won Buddhism are more often married than not. However, Won Buddhists did not want to be associated with the married monks in mainstream Buddhism for fear of incurring the disfavor of the government. Nor did they want to join the government-favored organization of celibate monks, since that would have forced them to conform to mainstream Buddhist expectations of what Buddhist rituals, Buddhist scriptures, Buddhist clergy, and Buddhist temples should look like. In order to maintain the autonomy that allowed them to practice their unique approach to Buddhism, they resisted pressure to become a sub-denomination within the umbrella Jogye Order that dominates mainstream Korean Buddhism today.
Once Won Buddhism felt confident that the government recognized it as a new religious order (that recognition wasn’t official until the early 1960s) (Department of International Affairs of Won Buddhism 2010, 123-24), it began reaching out to other religious communities to try to gain their recognition as well. Interfaith dialogue became an important means for Won Buddhism to establish its distinctive identity. By convincing leaders and representatives of other religious organizations to meet with Won Buddhist leaders and representatives and treat them as worthy of dialogue in their own right, rather than as representatives of the Jogye order or other branches of mainstream Buddhism, Won Buddhism gained recognition as separate and distinct from mainstream Buddhism.
Inter-faith dialogue is particularly important in a country like South Korea, in which, as noted earlier, no one religion dominates. According to the most recent census, in 2005 53% of Koreans claimed a specific religious affiliation. (There are over 100,000 practicing shamans in Korea, but their clients do not appear on the census as “shamanists,” so it is likely that that actual percentage of the South Korean population engaging in religious practices is far above 53%.) Of those 53%, as noted earlier, 22.8% (10.7 million) said they were Buddhists, 18.3% (8.6 million) said they were Protestant Christians, 10.9% (5.1 million) said they were Roman Catholics, and only 0.03% said they were Won Buddhists. Such division of the religious community provides Won Buddhism room to maneuver for attention, since no one religious organization is so dominant that it can ignore the rest. Moreover, religious leaders in Korea have tried to create broad-based coalitions of religious leaders to ensure that they will not be ignored by the government, which otherwise might be inclined to dismiss individual religious organizations as representing only a minority of the population. Bringing Won Buddhism into such coalitions allows them to add one more person to their executive committees, making them appear even larger and more powerful. Won Buddhism has taken advantage of this situation and has become very active on the inter-faith front in Korea.
This is despite the fact that, officially, there are very few Won Buddhists. The number of Won Buddhists is surely higher than the 130,000 the government’s census takers found. There may be as many as half a million to one million Won Buddhists out of a South Korean population of 50 million today. Nevertheless, it is clear that Won Buddhism is a relatively small religion, when compared to the size of the mainstream Buddhist, Protestant, and Catholic communities. There is a real danger that Won Buddhism will be overlooked when religions in Korea are counted. To ensure that does not happen, Won Buddhism has actively participated in inter-faith dialogues with its larger partners.
Won Buddhist interest in inter-faith dialogue is not simply out of a desire to be recognized, however. There is an inter-faith element to the core teachings of Won Buddhism. That inter-faith element reaches all the way to the founder, Sot’aesan. We already pointed out that Sot’aesan reported that he reached enlightenment without going through the usual formal Buddhist training or guidance given those pursuing that goal. Moreover, after his original enlightenment experience, he read seminal books from a variety of religious traditions, including Confucianism, Daoism, Buddhism, and even Christianity (he read the Bible). Only then, he says, did he realize that the insights he gained from his enlightenment, insights into the nature of reality and how to overcome the suffering living in this world entails, were closer to those of the Buddha than to those of the founders of other religious traditions. (Department of International Affairs of Won Buddhism 2010, 16)
The Scriptures of Won Buddhism relate the story of a conversation between Sot’aesan and a Christian minister. Sot’aesan advises that minister to widen his perspective. He warns him that people who only pay attention to their own ways of doing things “fall into onesideness, producing gaps that become like mountains of silver and ramparts of iron. This is the reason for all the antagonism and conflicts between countries, churches, and individuals.” (Committee for the Authorized Translation of Won-Buddhist Scriptures 2006, 314) This particular anecdote is interpreted not as a criticism of Christianity –-Won Buddhist criticisms of other religions tend to be muted–-but as a call for his own disciples to be open to the insights of other religions. That interpretation is supported by another statement of Sot’aesan. He is quoted in the Scriptures as saying, “In all matters, I do not gain knowledge only by inquiring to myself, but I acquire knowledge for my use when meeting with various people….when I talk with adherents of other religions, I gain knowledge of those religions.” (Committee for the Authorized Translation of Won-Buddhist Scriptures2006, 166)
When Sot’aesan was alive (he died in 1943), he was too concerned with putting his order on a sound footing and maintaining its distinctive identity to devote much time or energy to dialogues with other religions. The same was true of his successor as head of Won Buddhism Song Kyu (1900-1962), known as Chŏngsan) for the first decade or so he was Head Dharma Master. However, in the last years of his life, Chŏngsan brought inter-faith dialogue to the fore with his proclamation in 1961 of the “Ethics of Triple Identity.”
There are three principles to the Ethics of Triple Identity. The first principle is the principle of Identical Origin. “This implies that all people of religion must harmonize with one another, with the knowledge that the fundamental origin of all religions and religious sects is one…. Although their doctrines are expressed in different names and forms, a careful inquiry into their fundamental sources will show that the fundamental tenets are not contrary to the truth of Ilwŏn. Therefore, all religions are generally of identical origin.” (Chung 2012, 217) The Won Buddhist belief that Ilwŏn means that ultimately everything is one, without any real differences among them, is utilized to support an attitude of respect for, and outreach toward, other religions.
The second principle of the Ethics of Triple Identity is the “bond of one vital force. This principle implies that all races and all sentient beings should be united in grand harmony by awakening to the truth that they are all fellow beings bonded together by the one vital force.” (Chung 2012, 217) This principle draws on the traditional Sino-Korean belief that everything in the universe is composed of ki (C. Qi), the matter-and-energy that both provides the material substance for everything in the material world and animates those entities that are animated. It also draws on the teachings in Tonghak (a new Korean religion which preceded Won Buddhism by half a century) that elevate ki into a new level of importance as the spark of the divine, the Creative Force in the Cosmos, that can be found within the heart-and-mind of every human being.
The third principle is the principle of “renewal with one aim. This implies that, being awakened to the truth that all enterprises and proposals help toward the renewal of the world, all should unite in grand harmony.” He wrote that there is a great variety of political and business projects. However, “their original aims, as an inquiry into their fundamental sources shows, are all to make this world a better place.” (Chung 2012, 218) This third principle reflects the beginnings of the Won Buddhist community in a project to make the world a better place by getting residents of some impoverished villages to work together in order to reclaim tidal land for agriculture. (Chong 1997, 13, Department of International Affairs of Won Buddhism 2010, 23-24)
The stress on the ultimate unity of all religions was continued by the next Head Dharma Master, Kim Daega (1914-1998), better known as Taesan. Taesan declared
“The doctrines and institutions advocated by each religion can be different. However, consider that there can be no difference when it comes to the ultimate goal aspired to by each religion, the ultimate goal being the salvation of mankind founded on truth and love. Consider that this world is one. If we consider these two things, we see that the truth which is fundamental to each religion can only be one…. “All religions must, without conditions and excuses, mutually open their doors, talk seriously and meet as brothers and sisters.” (Taesan 2005, 18-19)
He went to say that the tremendous advance in material civilization in the modern world is pulling human beings deeper and deeper into materialism and “the power of the human spirit is becoming weakened…. At this point, as we, without hesitation, earnestly appeal for all religions to unite harmoniously for the sake of happiness and peace, I present the establishment of United Religions…which will, from a position of equality with the United Nations, do the job of humanity’s spiritual mother.” (Taesa 2005, 20)
The official hymnal of Won Buddhism even includes a couple of hymns proclaiming that all religions are essentially the same. One of those hymns, “Song of the Principle of Nature,” goes as follows:
“So many different branches, such a myriad of leaves, so many brilliant colors spring out of only one root. All that exists we see as countless variations. Looking again, we see there is only one energy.”
The other hymn, “Song of Three Equal Morals,” provides an even more explicit statement of the Won Buddhist doctrine that all religions are really just variations on one religion: “Many churches, many priests, preaching of their many beliefs. Many ways to see the same thing, one source, one principle. We are just one household; we are one, just one, circle. We are all working for the same goal.” (Department of International Affairs of Won Buddhism 2003, 86-87)
Taesan hoped that his proposed United Religions would be a religious equivalent to the United Nations, with “special representatives of each nation's religion.” United Religions was not envisioned as a form for inter-faith dialogue only. Rather, he hoped it would provide an institutional foundation for various religions from around the world to
“make a combined effort performing all activities from a religious dimension and for the promotion of human prosperity: activities of communication and friendship between religions, activities of combined education for the sake of the salvation of the human spirit, activities of united service for the sake of wiping out the disease of human poverty and ignorance, activities for the sake of a solution to the moral problems of humanity, and religious activities for the sake of prevention of war.” (Taesam 2005, 21)
Won Buddhism was never able to realize its dream of a religious equivalent of the United Nations. Instead, it has had to settle for active involvement in a number of inter-religious organizations, including the United Religions Initiative, which originated in the United States but had a monk from Korea’s mainstream Jogye Order among its founding members. (United Religions Initiative website)
Won Buddhist clerics, Roman Catholics nuns, and Buddhist clerics from the Jogye order join hands to encircle the monument honoring Sot’aesan’s enlightenment. (Photo courtesy of Won Buddhist Headquarters)
Motivated by the “Ethics of Triple Identity,” Won Buddhism has asserted its distinctive character through participation in inter-faith organizations in three distinct ways. First of all, it is an active member of the Association of Native Korean Religions. This is a way to proclaim that it is an indigenous Korean religion, not an imported religion using scriptures of foreign origin like the Jogye order. Second, it participates as an independent organization in international Buddhist organizations such as the World Fellowship of Buddhists, both to strengthen its identity as Buddhist and to show on the world stage that it is a different religious organization from mainstream Korean Buddhism. Third, at home it is an active member of the Korean Council of Religious Leaders (which includes Catholic, Protestant, mainstream Buddhist, and Confucian representatives, as well as representatives from Won Buddhism and another new religion, Ch’ŏndogyo) and the Korean Conference of Religion for Peace (which also includes Muslim representatives). By placing its representatives alongside Jogye representatives in such Korean ecumenical organizations, Won Buddhist enhances its visibility as a separate and distinct religious community. It has done the same thing outside of Korea. It has joined the Asian Council of Religion for Peace as well as the World Conference on Religion and Peace. It also has an office at the United Nations as a recognized NGO. Won Buddhism is using its inter-faith activities to ensure that other religious organizations, both inside and outside of Korea, recognize Won Buddhism as a separate and distinct religion.
One more inter-faith activity deserves mention: Samsohoe, “The Association of Three Smiles,” established in 1988 to bring together Roman Catholic nuns, Jogye Buddhist nuns, and Won Buddhist nuns to present concerts of their respective sacred music together and to also travel around the world together, visiting the sacred sites of each others’ religions. (Joongang Daily 1997) Again, by standing alongside Jogye representatives, Won Buddhist clerics proudly proclaim their independent status. In this particular case, photos of the nuns from those three traditions standing together in their markedly different clerical clothing strengthens the image of Won Buddhism as just as distinct from mainstream Korean Buddhism as Roman Catholicism is.
Conclusion
Are the various differences we have noted between Won Buddhism and other forms of Buddhism in Korea sufficient to create a gap between Won Buddhism and mainstream Korean Buddhist organizations large enough to justify labeling Won Buddhism a new religion? Have the leaders of Won Buddhism managed to carve out a separate space for Won Buddhism on Korea’s diverse religious landscape? I agree with Won Buddhists as well as scholars such as Daniel J. Adams and Michael Pye that the answer is “yes,” particularly when we take into account the direction Won Buddhism has been moving in the last few decades.
Won Buddhism called itself an “association for the study of the Buddhist dharma” until 1947 when, taking advantage of the religious freedom that appeared on the Korean peninsula after the Japanese occupation of Korea ended with Japan’s defeat in World War II, Won Buddhism registered for the first time as a new religion and adopted the name Won Buddhism. (Chong 1997, 34) Moreover, as noted earlier, in 1962 Won Buddhism revised some of its earlier scriptures to minimize terminology that appeared too close to mainstream Buddhist terminology. (Chung 2003a, xiv, 353-356, Jin Park 2004) On top of that, rank-and-file Won Buddhists themselves appear to be becoming more conscious of themselves as Won Buddhists rather than as simply Buddhists. In the 2005 census in South Korea, as noted above, around 130,000 people declared that they were Won Buddhists, compared to only 86,000 ten years earlier, in the 1995 census. At noted earlier, there are probably more Won Buddhists than that in South Korea. Won Buddhist authorities recently claimed to have over a million members, attending over 550 temples in South Korea alone as well as over 50 temples outside of Korea. (Won Buddhism website b) The number of temples in Korea, as well as the size of the membership claimed by Won Buddhist headquarters, has stayed roughly the same over the last twenty years, though the number of Won Buddhist temples overseas has grown from 30 to 50 or so. Though that claim of over one million Won Buddhists may be somewhat exaggerated, still it is probably safe to assume that quite a few of the 10.7 million South Koreans who wrote on government census forms that they were Buddhists frequently attend services at Won Buddhist temples, which would make them Won Buddhists in the eyes of Won Buddhist authorities. Moreover, given the almost 46% increase in those declaring themselves Won Buddhists in 2005, compared to the 1995 census, it is also safe to assume that there is a growing trend among Won Buddhists to identify themselves specifically as such. In other words, the distinction between mainstream Buddhism and Won Buddhism, and the identity of Won Buddhism as a new religion, among the rank-and file appears to be strengthening.
Won Buddhism has also gained more visibility in the public arena. In 2009, when a state funeral was held for former president Kim Daejung, representatives for four different religious traditions were asked to participate in the funeral rites. Even though Kim was a devout Roman Catholic, those who watched that funeral on television could see that, in addition to Catholic clerics, there were also clerics representing Korea’s Protestant community, the Buddhist Jogye community, and Won Buddhism. (Adams 2009, 1) That was a sign that Won Buddhism had gained recognition as one of the four major religious communities on the Korean peninsula.
Ironically, while Won Buddhism appears to be winning the battle for independent recognition in Korea itself, it has found that, outside of Korea, it needs to emphasize its Buddhist roots. A recent newspaper article by a Won Buddhist missionary in the United States revealed that the Westerners most likely to show an interest in Won Buddhism are those who have grown tired of the highly defined religiosity of Christianity and are looking for a spiritual philosophy or what they might term “spirituality” instead. Often they are drawn to Buddhist philosophy and meditation practices. Won Buddhism, to attract such potential converts, needs to point to its similarities with Buddhism while at the same time distinguishing itself from its many other Buddhist competitors in the West by presented itself as a reformed Buddhism more appropriate for the modern world than traditional Buddhism. (Ha Sangŭi 2011)
That strategy is apparent on the home page of the Won Buddhism meditation center outside the city of Philadelphia in the US. There Won Buddhism is described as “a reformed Buddhism in that it embraces the original Buddha’s teachings and makes it relevant and suitable to contemporary society.” (Won Buddhist website c) Michael Pye, who observed Won Buddhism in Korea, argued that it should not be considered a reformed Buddhism because it has diverged too much from original Buddhism. However, if he had observed Won Buddhist missionaries in the West, he may have modified his conclusion. Won Buddhist missionaries define Won Buddhism as a reform of Buddhism, not in the sense of a “true or loyal form of an original tradition which had been overlaid or lost,” (Pye 2002, 132) but in the sense of an improvement on that original tradition to match changes in the world in which Buddhism must operate.
Won Buddhist leaders, both in Korea and abroad, will tell you that Won Buddhism is both a Buddhist religion and a new religion, since it is a new form of Buddhism for a new age. In other words, it is a new Buddhist religion, a conclusion Pye and I share. (Pye 2002, 141) Although Won Buddhism has enough Buddhist coloring that the use of Buddhism in its name is not unjustified, and Won Buddhism is not being disingenuous when it presents itself to potential Western converts as a from of Buddhism, its leaders have ensured that it is different enough from the many varieties of traditional Buddhism that it looks like a new religion and should be accepted as such. After all, if we can talk about Soka Gakkai as a new religion rather than as just another Buddhist denomination, surely we can grant Won Buddhism the same independent existence.
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