History of Korea - Part Seventeen

In 1948 Pyongyang was the capital of North Korea. Kim Il-sung and the communists supported by the Soviet Union were tightening their hold on the city and country. Pyongyang was, at the same time, known as the Jerusalem of the East due to its number of Churches and fervent believers. The Christian churches were a big obstacle to the communists consolidating power. When Moon Son-myung arrived he was intent on building a Christian foundation that would recognize him as the second coming of Christ. He targeted the orthodox churches that had the foundation of 2,000 years of Christianity. At the same time he made relationships with the branches of the Jesus Church that were already preparing for the Lord. A talented preacher, teacher, and recruiter he was able to build a congregation by taking what he thought were the best and brightest young people out of the churches. Of course this didn’t make him popular with the church leaders.

At the same time he was building a different foundation with Ho Bin-hu and the inside the belly church. It has been reported that he was building the foundation using pekeraum techniques. This did not make him popular with some husbands. When the hammer fell it was the communist local police who arrested and interrogated him. He was charged with disturbing society which could cover a lot of actual offensives. He was beaten almost to death, sentenced and upon release thrown onto the street a bloody mess. His heroic determination to survive and start his mission again was testimony to his iron will and absolute belief that he was the one who would liberate God. After recovering his health he began again to glean the best from the orthodox Christian foundation. Simultaneously he began the seduction of the leader of the wilderness church, Park Wol-yong, often called the wife of God. She was also convinced that she was the Lord and practiced pekeraum to further her claim to the title. He was arrested again for marrying a woman who was already married after hearing a revelation from a loyal follower. They were both convicted of bigamy and sentenced to prison, he for five years at the Hungnam fertilizer works and she for 18 months locally.

The 5 year sentence was for all intents and purposes a death sentence. The heavy labor, lack of food, and cold weather would insure that. Again Moon was intent on surviving and starting again. Displaying the iron will and heroics that he became famous for he began his sentence comforting God. He became a model prisoner respected by both guards and other prisoners. He ate half of his rice ration and gave the other half to fellow prisoners. Later when he ate the full ration he was filled and satisfied. When relatives brought him rice powder he gave it to others. He was on the way to surviving the death sentence when the Korean War broke out on June 25th 1950. By October the UN forces spearheaded by the First Marine Division were driving up the east coast heading for Hungnam. The guards in a panic began to execute prisoners but Moon learned about it ahead of time through a dream of another prisoner, and broke free of the prison. He walked back to Pyongyang to find his followers but all except two had scattered. With these two in tow, just ahead of the red Chinese army, he began the long journey south. Often relying on dreams and visions to locate food, clothing, and routes forward the three traversed the bitter cold and wartime conditions. Arriving at the extremes of poverty and chaos in the City of Busan, he began his mission again.

In ten years the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity had been incorporated, a book outlining the theology, the Divine Principle, had been penned and published and missionaries had been dispatched to Japan and America. In 1960, Moon took the 15 year old daughter of a household cook as wife. Her mother was a former member of the inside the belly church and as a single mother was surely a participant in the change of blood lineage rituals.

As True Parents, the organization they headed made steady strides forward in the realms of business, theology, and the consolidation of the Christian foundation that might recognize Moon as the second coming of Christ. But of course it was not all smooth sailing. Another jail sentence followed scandal in Korea. After initial success in America as a revival of Christianity campaign, the press, many Orthodox churches, and finally the general population turned against the movement leveling charges of brainwashing, heresy, and the wicked word, cult, against Moon and the church. Indicted for tax evasion, Moon returned from Korea, which had no extradition treaty with the US, and stood trial, was convicted by a jury and sentenced to do three years. Moon did the time standing on his head as the saying goes and began to build a coalition of mostly African American clergy who understood the unfairness of the conviction and resonated with a fellow man of color persecuted by the establishment.

Meanwhile Korea was producing an astounding number of claimants to the title Lord of the Second Advent. Kim Baek-moon was probably the most well known. After splitting the blanket with Moon Son-

myung Kim never met with him again and continued down his own path. He had a small congregation of followers that believed he was the Lord and he published several books outlining his theology and his claim to the title. He never attracted enough followers to rival Moon and never left Korea. He died in Seoul in 1989.

Others who received revelations that they were the one, made small splashes in the small pond that was Korea. Park Tae son, an up by the bootstraps Presbyterian born in 1915 in North Korea became a healer in South Korea in 1954. He was suspected of heresy by the Presbyterian church and expelled in 1955. He became a popular faith healer, evangelist, and founder of his own church. By the early 1960s his Olive Tree movement had established its own theology with Park at its pinnacle and began establishing its own towns for believers with government, schools, hospitals, and businesses to employ the membership. Olive Tree eventually had three towns with 2,000 to 6,000 residents/members. In 1980 Park revised the theology to proclaim that he was not only the Messiah but God himself. Such radical claims, legal controversies, and corruption turned off many of the followers and the Olive Tree began a rapid decline. Park himself suffered from diabetes and tuberculosis and died in 1990. His remaining followers split into two competing groups, one continuing to believe that Park was God the father and was still with them.

Lee Man-hee, the founder of Sinjeongji, another messianic pekeraum group, was a member of both the Temple Tabernacle an offshoot of Olive Tree, and Olive Tree itself. According to him, he found them both to be corrupt beyond redemption. He started Sinjeongji in 1980 and received continued revelation about his place according to the Bible. As the absolute authority in Sinjeongji he had contact with many young female adherents. He is being sued for coercing young vulnerable women into sexual relationships.

When the COVID 19 pandemic struck Korea. Sinjeongji saw government regulations to restrict large meetings as the work of the devil. More than 40% of South Korean cases of COVID-19 were traced to Sinjeongji members. Labeled as a super spreader they received the wrath of the South Korean people. Lee Man-hee was indicted for embezzlement and is currently on probation.

The World Mission Society of God is a group founded in 1964 by Ahn Sahng-hong. WMSCOG believes that Zahng Gil-jah, an elderly woman from South Korea, is God the Mother, a female image of God. She is referred to as Dae Mo Nim (대모님 great mother) The church believes in God the Father and God the Mother, and it emphasizes the New Covenant established by Jesus, including the Passover. It has attempted to spread to Australia, America and other South East Asian nations but has been labeled a cult and growth has greatly slowed down.

The most successful of the new religions that developed from the outpouring of revelation in Korea during the 1920s, 1930s, 1940s and into the 50s and 60s is the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity, for a long time known as the Unification Church. Nowadays it is most often referred to as the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification or simply the Moonies. Moon Son- myung began to make his dream come true early, as early as 1945 shortly after liberation. He faced death, torture, and imprisonment from both the communist government of North Korea and the authorities of South Korea. Early on, while still building a movement in South Korea, he sent missionaries to Japan and the United States. The movement in Japan allied with the right wing groups and fought a communist take over of Japan.

They also allied with an esoteric Buddhist/shamanistic group that was waiting for the return of Buddha. Of course they recognized Moon as the one. Japan became a fundraising powerhouse under writing projects in Korea, America, and around the world. In the mid sixties Moon began touring the world. His vision was much bigger than just Korea. Wherever he faced opposition he never gave up. Building an empire of newspapers, shipbuilding and fishing, jewelry, ginseng, and real estate. His biggest dream was the Unification of North and South Korea. Although he traveled to North Korea in 1991 to meet with Kim Il-sung nothing except a moral victory, akin to Jacob’s winning over of his murderous brother Esau, ever came of it. By 1991 Kim Il-sung had already been pushed out of the leadership role by his son, Kim Jong- il. His death at the ripe old age of 92 highlighted issues that could no longer be addressed by the founder.

All the new religions received similar revelations and so faced similar problems. Those who practiced pekeraum had a big problem. They had to lie. No matter how necessary the lie was, it always came back to haunt. Once you attempt to alter the fabric of reality by telling the lie, it always leads to more lies. In an organization it leads to a policy of lies. When the lie has to do with unorthodox sex, someone in the family is going to be unhappy about it and will try to reconcile it. This is clearly the issue that divided the so-called true family and then the church.

The thing about pekeraum is that it didn’t work. The theory was we are of a fallen blood lineage. The fall was an illicit sexual relationship. The only way to cleanse the fallen blood lineage was to reverse the action of the fall. This could only be accomplished through prescribed ritual sex. The pure blood lineage is passed down to the acolyte, man or woman. The recipient of the pure blood could pass it on or conceive and give birth to children without (sin) the fallen blood lineage of the fall. The Christ figure was obligated

to have ritual sex with as many people of the opposite sex as possible. But it just didn’t work. No one became sinless by practicing pekeraum or participating in a three day ceremony. The human race’s bad behavior is more likely the result of certain factors in one’s psychological make-up, not the result of blood lineage. The necessity of the lie has resulted in the severe division of Moon Son-myung’s movement.

The real question is, why did so many Koreans receive such similar and radical revelations like the second coming of Jesus to Korea, the sexual nature of the human fall, and the need for the practice of ritual sex? Carl Jung theorized that there is a vast collective unconscious that contains uncountable ideas and concepts held in common by all humans including the heroic savior archetype. Under certain conditions and times of great stress many of those ideas come down as dreams, visions, and revelations. Under the extreme pressures of the Japanese occupation many people, DongHaks, Christians, and Shamans were pushed together and synchronized varied religious ideas and practices. When the collective unconscious began to pour down dreams, visions, and revelations they took the form of these synchronized new religious concepts.

Once someone receives a revelation they believe it is important to them, and they assume it is important to the family, society, and nation when it may be a revelation for the individual alone. If someone receives the revelation that they are the Lord, the return of Jesus, and in fact God himself when the revelation only meant that the individual had restored him or her self to the level of Adam and Eve before the fall. Such individuals would find themselves as rivals with and in conflict with others who had received a similar revelation. Psychological inflation is when a person feels a sense of exaggerated self- worth, believing they’re larger or more significant than they really are. This often leads to an inflated ego. Those who received the revelation that they were in fact the long awaited one were clearly susceptible to this phenomenon. Ego inflation, a state where one’s sense of self is overly inflated and often disconnected from reality, manifests in various behaviors and attitudes. Symptoms include a grandiose sense of self- importance, a constant need for admiration, a lack of empathy, and a tendency to exploit others. Individuals with inflated egos may also be arrogant, boastful, and struggle with criticism.

All this being said, the kind of revelations that the Korean people received could be beneficial to a people and nation under severe oppression. The occupation and colonization of the nation by Japan was surely such oppression. The important thing is to have a sense of discernment. Easy to say but difficult to tell the difference between good and bad. Pray for discernment.