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ASIAN CHRISTIANITY IN THE DIASPORA
Religious Experience
in Trauma
Koreans’ Collective Complex
of Inferiority and the
Korean Protestant Church
KwangYu Lee
Asian Christianity in the Diaspora
Series Editors
Grace Ji-Sun Kim
Earlham School of Religion
Richmond, IN, USA
Joseph Cheah
University of Saint Joseph
West Hartford, CT, USA
Asian American theology is still at its nascent stage. It began in the 1980’s
with just a handful of scholars who were recent immigrants to the United
States. Now with the rise in Asian American population and the rise of
Asian American theologians, this new community is an ever-important
voice within theological discourse and Asian American cultural studies.
This new series seeks to bring to the forefront some of the important,
provocative new voices within Asian American Theology. The series aims
to provide Asian American theological responses to the complex process
of migration and resettlement process of Asian immigrants and refugees.
We will address theoretical works on the meaning of diaspora, exile, and
social memory, and the foundational works concerning the ways in which
displaced communities remember and narrate their experiences. Such an
interdisciplinary approach entails intersectional analysis between Asian
American contextual theology and one other factor; be it sexuality, gen-
der, race/ethnicity, and/or cultural studies. This series also addresses
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ine the identity and internal coherence of the Christian faith in its encoun-
ters with different Asian cultures, with Asian people, the majority of whom
are poor, and with non-Christian religions that predominate the landscape
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engaging voices of Asian and Asian American theologians.
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KwangYu Lee
Religious Experience
in Trauma
Koreans’ Collective Complex of Inferiority
and the Korean Protestant Church
KwangYu Lee
Pastoral Care Program
Blanton Peale Institute
New York, NY, USA
Asian Christianity in the Diaspora

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Acknowledgments
When I began writing this book, I hoped that I could make a BIG contri-
bution to studies of Korean Christianity and the future of Korean
Protestantism. While thinking of what to say in Acknowledgments, how-
ever, one Bible verse keeps chasing after me: “What has been will be again,
what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the
sun” (NIV, Ecclesiastes 1:9). Though different from what the author
really meant with it, the verse helped me realize that there are a number of
people I should appreciate sincerely. Throughout the process of writing,
what, I thought, was my own thought was unexceptionally someone’s and
what, I believed, was new to me was already old to others. To complete
this book, I relied on countless scholars and used their original thoughts
and insights whenever necessary—yes, truthfully there is nothing new in
this book. Nevertheless, among them, there are people I must explicitly
say thank you for their invaluable help throughout the process.
First, I would like to thank my wife Hyun-Min Lee, my guardian angel
and lifelong companion. She came to me out of nowhere twelve years ago
when I constantly wandered in one of the darkest mazes of life where I was
stuck, with the inability to find an exit. She was with me genuinely, letting
me realize, by trial and error, that wandering is part of life and that every-
thing has its own beginning and end. Without her sense of stability, trust,
love, humor, and vitality, I don’t think that I could be what I am now.
There is an old story in Korea that puts stress on the significance of having
a good wife—no connection at all to any sort of patriarchy! It says that a
wife can change the destiny of her husband. When I reflect on my life after
my marriage to Hyun-Min, the story always holds true.
v
vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Second, I would like to thank my parents. Without them, I could not

have had such a wonderful life, living and experiencing the two worlds,
S. Korea and the U.S., simultaneously. Writing this book gave me a time
to objectively look back on my life unfolded under the wings of their lives.
Both of them were born in 1944 one year before Korea regained sover-
eignty from Japan. They are two of the survivors of the modern history of
S. Korea, full of tragedies. Obviously some scars of their traumatic experi-
ences still exist in me. Nevertheless, their resilience that survived the last
century also obviously exists in me. Part of it was socially or biologically
inherited to me via Korean Protestantism. For them, Korean Protestantism
is far more than a religion, providing them with a new sacred foundation
of living. Mom and Dad, my hat is off for you.
Third, I would like to thank my two sons, Jinu (12) and Minu (8). As
a first-generation Korean immigrant in the U.S., from the very moment
when they came to me, calling me “Abba,” occasionally I ponder over
what I can turn over to them when the time comes. Each time I came to
the same conclusion that I want to be a good example for them to observe
in deciding what makes life meaningful and worthwhile. Watching them in
peaceful sleep was—is and will be—the reliable recharger of my consis-
tency and endurance in the process of writing this book. Now I am a little
bit relieved with a self-made certificate in hand.
Fourth, I would like to thank my teachers I met at Drew Theological
School, New Jersey—Dr. Angella Son, Dr. Robert. S. Corrington, and Dr.
Christopher Anderson. While Dr. Son’s objective and sharp insights
helped me stay focused on the topic of this book, Dr. Corrington’s philo-
sophical reading of it encouraged me to bravely connect theories of trauma
to the growth of Korean Protestantism in the framework of Jung’s analytic
psychology. Dr. Anderson’s historical perspective and advice helped me to
find my own voice in my hesitations between historical facts and truths,
constructively asking me where my psychoanalytic analysis is anchored for
the sake of historical validation.
Fifth and last, but not the least, I would like to thank Palgrave Macmillan
Publisher. Although this book was impregnated in my mind, it is through
Palgrave Macmillan that my efforts became materialized, coming into
being in the shape of a book.
Contents
1 Introduction: The Korean Protestant Church at Present

and the Necessity of a Psychohistorical Approach to Its
History 1
1.1 The Declining Korean Protestant Church 1
1.1.1 The Korean Protestant Church’s Individualism 2
1.1.2 The Korean Protestant Church’s Materialism 3
1.1.3 The Korean Protestant Church’s Exclusivism 6
1.2 The Necessity of a Psychohistorical Approach to the History of
the Korean Protestant Church 8
1.3 Methodology: Jungian Psychohistory 11
1.4 The Scope and Discussion of the Research 14
References 20
2 A Historical Sketch of the Growth of the Korean

Protestant Church in the Twentieth Century 23
2.1 The Miraculous Growth of Korean Christianity 24
2.1.1 The Fall of Joseon, Korea’s Last Dynasty, and
Christianity (1882–1910) 24
2.1.2 The Japanese Colonial Era (1910–1945) 28
2.1.3 Since the Liberation of 1945 31
vii
viii Contents
2.2 The Three Main Reasons for the Rapid Growth 34

2.2.1 Protestantism: New Perspectives on Life 34
2.2.2 Rapid Social Changes: A Seedbed for Evangelism 37
2.2.3 Korean Protestantism: A Synthesis of Korean
Shamanism and Western Protestantism 40
2.3 The Miraculous Growth of the Korean Protestant Church:
Gradual or Sudden? 43
2.4 Conclusion 44
References 55
3 A Jungian Psychohistorical Theory: An Interpretive Tool

for History 59
3.1 Psychohistory: Its Origin and Evolution 60
3.1.1 The Emergence of Psychohistory 60
3.1.2 Erik H. Erikson and Young Man Luther 60
3.1.3 Psychohistory: From Individuals to Groups 62
3.2 Psychohistory’s Strengths, Weaknesses, and Contributions to
Historical Studies 63
3.2.1 Freudian Psychology at the Heart of Psychohistory 63
3.2.2 Psychohistory’s Strengths: The Unconscious and a
Psychotherapeutical Approach to History 64
3.2.3 Psychohistory’s Weaknesses: Psychologization,
Reductionism, Arbitrariness, and Determinism 66
3.2.4 Psychohistory’s Contributions to Historical Studies 68
3.3 Jung’s Analytical Psychology: The Basics 69
3.3.1 The Collective Unconscious 69
3.3.2 Psychopathology 71
3.3.3 Dreams and Archetypes 72
3.3.4 Complex Theory 74
3.4 A Jungian Psychohistory: Cultural (Collective) Complex 76
3.4.1 The Cultural Unconscious 77
3.4.2 Cultural (Collective) Complex 78
3.4.3 Projection: The Central Element of Complex 80
3.4.4 Two Examples of the Jungian Psychohistorical
Analysis: Frantz Fanon and Jacqueline Gerson 82
3.5 Conclusion 88
References 95
Contents ix
4 The Traumatic Twentieth Century of Korea: Japanese

Imperialism, the Korean War, and the Korean Military
Governments 99
4.1 Japanese Imperialism and the Loss of Old Korea100
4.2 S. Korea’s Anticommunism and the Korean War: A Series
of Massacres102
4.2.1 The Rhee Government’s Anticommunism103
4.2.2 The National Bodo League: An Example of the Rhee
Government’s Massacres for the Birth of
Anticommunism105
4.2.3 The U.S. Armed Forces and Their Military
“Operational” Massacres108
4.3 The Korean Governments with the Politics of Terror and
Anxiety111
4.3.1 Syngman Rhee and the National Security Law for
Anticommunism112
4.3.2 Park Chung-Hee and the Korean Central
Intelligence Agency (KCIA)114
4.3.3 Chun Doo-Hwan and His Brutal Discipline of
S. Koreans117
4.4 Conclusion121
References128
5 The Growth of the Korean Protestant Church from a

Jungian Psychohistorical Perspective: Trauma, Cultural
Complex, the Theology of Prosperity/Bliss, and the
Governmental Support133
5.1 The “Traumatized” Psychological States of S. Koreans134
5.2 S. Koreans’ Cultural Complex: Collective Inferiority136
5.2.1 Cultural (Collective) Complex of Inferiority: Its
Meaning and Characteristics136
5.2.2 The Psychological Origins of S. Koreans’ Cultural
Complex of Inferiority137
5.2.3 The U.S. Military Government and S. Koreans’
Desire to Be Like Americans140
5.2.4 The Korean War and Its Aftermath: The
Exacerbation of S. Koreans’ Cultural Complex of
Inferiority142
x Contents
5.3 The Growth of the Korean Protestant Church and the

Cultural Complex144
5.3.1 Koreans’ General Understanding of Protestantism
in Japan’s Colonial Era145
5.3.2 The Reciprocal Relationship Between Protestantism
and the Korean Military Governments146
5.3.3 Syngman Rhee’s Favoritism Toward the Korean
Protestant Church147
5.3.4 The Korean Protestant Church’s Support of the
Korean Military Governments148
5.3.5 The Theology of Prosperity/Bliss: Its Psychological
Dynamics151
5.4 A Psychohistorical Analysis of the Korean Protestant
Church’s Growth in the Past Century152
5.5 Conclusion157
References164
6 Conclusion: The Korean Protestant Church and the

Cultural Complex of Inferiority171
6.1 Summary171
6.2 Four Takeaways173
6.3 The Next Step for S. Koreans and the KPC?175
References178
References181
Index195
CHAPTER 1
Introduction: The Korean Protestant Church

at Present and the Necessity
of a Psychohistorical Approach to Its History
1.1 The Declining Korean Protestant Church1

For decades, the Korean Protestant Church (KPC) has been a symbol for
the second heyday of Christianity. It is said that after its missionaries from
the U.S. and other countries landed Korea, the KPC explosively grew
within a century to the extent that, out of the twenty-five largest churches
in the world, fifteen are in South Korea (hereafter S. Korea). From the
1960s to the 2000s, the number of Protestant churches dramatically
increased, roughly speaking, from 5000 to 60,000. In parallel, the total
number of Protestants also increased from about 600,000 to 8,760,300.2
At present, there is no country that annually sends more missionaries than
S. Korea, except for the U.S.
However, the KPC is facing its downfall. Korean scholars reported that
from 1991 to 1994, its growth stagnated.3 From 1995 to 2005, for the
first time since the 1960s its believers decreased from 8,760,300 to
8,616,000.4 In 2010, Won Gue Lee, a Korean sociologist of religion spec-
ulated that its decrease was mainly caused by two factors—one is external
and the other is internal.5 First, the emergence of leisure industries that is
quickly replacing Protestantism as an alternative religion and the democ-
ratization of S. Korea bolstered by an improved public welfare system are
weakening South Koreans’ (hereafter S. Koreans) need for religion.
Second, more and more S. Koreans are turning their backs on the KPC
because they no longer consider it as an ideal to look up to let alone trust
it. Three years later, the 2013 Global Research reported an analysis of the
© The Author(s) 2020 1

K. Lee, Religious Experience in Trauma, Asian Christianity in the
Diaspora, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-53583-4_1
2 K. LEE
results of a survey on S. Koreans’ concerns about the KPC, presenting

three main causes of the decline—church-individualism, materialism, and
exclusivism.6 The three causes are helpful in understanding how and why
S. Koreans came to turn their backs on it.
1.1.1 The Korean Protestant Church’s Individualism

Gil-Soo Han, an associate professor of Monash University, and his col-
leagues, Korean sociologists, coined the term church-individualism to
explain one general tendency among Korean Protestant churches that
each is only concerned about its own growth and well-being.7 The 2013
Global Research proved the observation right with various statistics,
including that, in 2012, about 84 percent of Korean Protestants thought
that their tithes should be used only for their own church; 55 percent
expected to use their offerings only for their churches’ sake.8 To trace
where such focus on a pastor’s own church originates, Han and his col-
leagues draw attention to the Nevius Mission Plan—a missionary plan
designed by John Livingstone Nevius, a pioneering American Protestant
missionary in China.9
Initially, the Nevius’ missionary plan aimed at fostering self-sufficient,
self-propagating, and self-governmental local churches in China.10 While
missionaries in China were reluctant about the plan, missionaries in Korea
lost no time in applying it to their local churches as soon as they heard it
from Nevius. Introducing it to Korean Protestants, they urged them to
take material offering as a religious duty to ensure the survival and vitality
of their churches.11 Given that Confucianism considered making money as
inferior to learning, the plan’s validation of making money as a religious
behavior drew attention from commoners like merchants and farmers. It
encouraged them to make more money in order to take care of their
churches, giving a sense of autonomy and independence and at the same
time a new perspective on money—money is not a contemptuous work as
Confucianism claimed. The plan affirmed that making money and con-
tributing it to the church is part of Protestants’ participation in
God’s work.12
Later when the Japanese imperial government began meddling and
step-by-step suppressing their missionary work, the missionaries more
actively planned for Korean local churches to become self-sufficient. While
urging them to actively engage in commercial activities, however, they
strongly recommended them to remain apolitical, with stress on the
1 INTRODUCTION: THE KOREAN PROTESTANT CHURCH AT PRESENT… 3
spiritual rather than the worldly. Moreover, they urged them to obey the
government in power. Han and his colleagues argue that the plan is self-
contradictory, noting that while it planted in Korean Protestants a sense of
independence and autonomy, it also injected a strong sense of individual-
ism, leaving churches’ social concerns and actions for justice out of consid-
eration. In a word, the plan worked like a two-edged sword for the
KPC. On the one hand, it helped local Korean Protestant churches to
become self-sufficient, self-propagating, and self-governmental. On the
other hand, it became the root of the KPC’s individualistic propensity.
1.1.2 The Korean Protestant Church’s Materialism

When Korean scholars criticize the KPC with the term materialism, they
highlight its “preoccupation with or stress upon material rather than intel-
lectual or spiritual things.”13 To weigh how much the KPC is materialized,
there are two things to take into consideration—the churches’ hereditary
succession and the founding pastors’ handling of church property as their
personal property.
First, one of the most frequently mentioned manifestations of material-
ism in the KPC is the hereditary succession of a church from a founding
pastor to his son—mostly in the cases of large or mega churches. Koreans
generally take a negative view on the phenomenon because it reminds
them of the Korean chaebols’ hereditary successions such as Hyundai,
Samsung, and so on. Considering the moral, social, and economic power
of those churches in S. Korea, they are likely to identify the inheritance of
those churches from the founding pastors to their sons with that of the
chaebols.14 On July 15, 2007, Christian Times, a web magazine of the
Korean Methodist Church, reported the result of a survey by the Christian
Broadcasting System (CBS) of how Christians—both Catholics and
Protestants—viewed the church’s hereditary succession. Sixty-four per-
cent of all the respondents answered that they had an objection to it; 17.1
percent said that if it happened to their church, they would find another
church.15 In July 2013, Gaesingyo Yeonhabdanche Gyohoeseseub
Bandaeundong [the Protestant Federation for the Anti-movement to the
Church Hereditary Succession] reported that, from 1977 when the found-
ing pastor Chang-In Kim of Choonhyun Presbyterian Church handed
over the senior pastorship of the church to his son Sung-Kwang Kim for
the first time up to 2013, sixty-two churches in metropolitan areas had
been handed over from the founding pastors to one of their sons and
4 K. LEE
twenty-two churches were in the process.16 On November 12, 2017, the

founding pastor Sam-Whan Kim of Myungsung Presbyterian Church, one
of the largest Presbyterian churches in the world, appointed his son Hana
Kim as his successor.17 Although the church stressed that the inheritance
was decided by a reasonable and legal calling committee, Koreans,
Christians as well as non-Christians, criticized that the process was identi-
cal with other mega churches’ hereditary succession. The controversy is
still underway as of August 2020.
Andrew Eungi Kim and others view the hereditary succession as a clear
sign of the corporatization and commercialization of the KPC like chae-
bols—Korean family-owned conglomerates.18 For example, in the Korean
Methodist Church, there are three mega churches—Gwanglim, Geumlan,
and Immanuel—that three brothers founded and grew each. They all
bequeathed their senior pastorship to their own sons. Gwanglim com-
pleted the hereditary succession in 2001, Geumlan in 2006, and Immanuel
in 2013. Moreover, Incheon Sungui Methodist Church made a landmark
in the KPC’s history of the hereditary succession, completing a third-
generation succession from the founding pastor, through his son, and
then to his grandson in May 2008.19
In fact, the hereditary succession of a church is not unusual in the his-
tory of the Korean Protestant Church. Won Gue Lee, however, explains
why the succession at present became a target of criticism in three points
which is closely related to materialism manifested in the KPC. First, the
churches that went through that process are mostly large or mega churches
that have significant social influence in S. Korea with their various social
welfare and cultural activities that draw attention from people of all social
strata. Second, for the most part, successors of the large or mega churches
contributed nothing to their birth and growth. Owing to that reason,
people are likely to consider them as “free riders.” Of course, there are
groups of people arguing that the hereditary succession is legally possible,
based on the fact that there is no social law to prevent the hereditary suc-
cession of a church in S. Korea. There are also large or mega churches
succeeded by pastors with no connection to the churches or their found-
ing pastors.20 Nonetheless, what is important to remember is that, even in
those cases, the founding pastors continue to wield strong influence over
the search committees for their successors. Third, the hereditary succes-
sion tends to work as a political tool for the founding pastors to keep their
invincible authority over the churches’ domestic affairs, even after
retirement.21
Second, large and mega church leaders’ unethical financial-handlings of

church funds are also frequently mentioned as a yardstick to measure how
much the KPC is saturated with materialism. For example, take two pas-
tors of the worldly well-known mega churches. First, on August 14, 2003,
the Eastern Branch of the Seoul District Public Prosecutors’ Office placed
in court custody Rev. Hong-Do Kim, the former Bishop of the Korean
Methodist Church and the founder and former senior pastor of Guemlan
Korean Methodist Church—the largest Methodist Church in the world—
on the charges of malpractice and embezzlement of church funds. The
prosecution reported that he used about $2,700,000 in total for the set-
tlement with a woman with whom he had an unethical sexual relationship,
for the purchase of a vacation home in his wife’s name, for the construc-
tion of a building for a church where his son worked as the lead pastor,
and for the preparation of another civil case against him.22 On April 28,
2006, he was found guilty for all those cases.23 Second, on August 21,
2014, the Seoul Central District Court sentenced Rev. David Yonggi Jo,
who was prosecuted without detention for embezzlement of the property
of the Yoido Full Gospel Church (YFGC), to two and a half years’ impris-
onment with four years of probation. When Jo bought 250,000 stocks
from his son’s company in 2002 with the church funds, he paid four times
more their worth than the reasonable price of $21.62 per share, causing a
significant loss of about $12 million.24 To make matters worse, on February
26, 2016, thirty elders of the church reported him to the police for another
embezzlement of $72 million. They also argued that from 2004 to 2009,
he spent $54 million of the church budget for personal use and his retire-
ment allowance of $18 million was unreasonably appropriated.25
In 2018, Angella Son, a professor of Psychology and Religion at Drew
University, claimed that the “moral failures of Christians”26 in S. Korea,
represented by inconsistencies between their words and actions, should be
considered as one important reason for the decline, along with secular-
ism.27 Because church leaders’ unethical and corrupt behaviors have been
too often exposed to the public, S. Koreans are likely to consider those
issues part of the nature of the KPC. Her psychoanalysis of the KPC on
decline is that, although Korean Protestants astonishingly grew in num-
bers during the past century, they did not grow morally and psychologi-
cally in harmony with the numerical growth. Considering the growing
concern from Heinz Kohut’s self-psychological perspective, Jung Eun
Jang, a professor of Ewha Womans University, argued that the decline
began when the KPC could no longer play, for Korean Protestants, the
6 K. LEE
role of selfobject—a psychologically ideal object that not only soothes their
inner pains but also guides their psychological development through mir-
roring, idealizing, and twinship/we-ness experience.28 Put it another way,
when the KPC no longer could meet the psychological needs of Korean
Protestants to find a psychological object to idealize, imitate, and internal-
ize for psychological stability in the last part of the twentieth century, the
KPC began to decline.
In fact, since the late 1990s, various agencies of public opinion in
S. Korea have been openly criticizing the hereditary successions and priva-
tization of churches through editorials and comments. On July 3, 2000,
the editorial of Hankyoreh newspaper keenly described the negative effects
of the hereditary succession and privatization in Protestant churches in
Korea: “The unprecedented hypertrophy and corporatization of the KPC
as a necessity resulted in the privatization of the Church. The hereditary
succession was nothing other than a mere signal of it. If the hereditary
succession and privatization accelerates the secularization of the Church,
Koreans can only understand the Church and its pastors in a more secular
way.”29 Their criticisms on the KPC’s hereditary succession and privatiza-
tion reveal that what really matters to the KPC is no longer its ongoing
growth; but instead, how it handles its achieved growth in a way that
S. Koreans view positively. Unfortunately, it falls short of doing that.
1.1.3 The Korean Protestant Church’s Exclusivism

One common theme among anti-Christian campaigns in S. Korea is the
exclusive attitude of Protestants toward other religions—the unshakable
fundamental faith in God that other faiths even with slight differences are
all considered as evil and satanic.30 After researching a number of anti-
Christian campaign websites, Jin-Gu Lee, a visiting professor of religion at
Honam Theological University and Seminary, Korea, presented a list of
the exclusive characteristics of the KPC: vandalism of other religions’
properties such as Dangun statue—the legendary founding father of
Korea—and statues of the Buddha, curse of other religions with the
famous slogan, reading “Jesus, Heaven and all others, Hell!” collective
slander and defamation of the evolutionary theory asserted, for instance,
by the Korean Association for Creation Research, negation of the tradi-
tional Korean culture, and condemnation as “pseudo-Christians”31 of pro-
gressive Protestants and Catholics, who are open-minded to embrace
other religions and to mutually interact with them—to name a few. The
2013 GidokgyoYunrisilcheonungdong [the Korean Christian Ethics

Movement] Report on the social reliability of Korean Protestantism states
that one out of five respondents pick out its exclusivism as the reason why
they cannot trust it.32
Furthermore, Korean Protestants’ exclusivism gradually became tied to
the political conservatism that radically opposes progressive and anti-
democratic movements in the Korean society.33 Kyuhoon Cho, a researcher
at Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore, brings into
focus that the Protestant leaders tend to stand at the head of the conserva-
tive movements, blaming progressive and democratic politicians and social
activists like Kim Dae-jung (1998–2003) and Roh Moo-hyun (2003–2008)
as communists or Satan’s pawns in religious language. For example, Rev.
Kim Hong-Do, the former senior pastor of Kumnan Methodist Church,
delivered an “interesting” sermon entitled “What If Reunification Is
Achieved Under Communism?” on July 8, 2007, five months before the
seventeenth presidential election of S. Korea:
Do you know how many Reds are there in the National Assembly and
among the cabinet members? [The Roh Moo-hyun government] has
awarded medals and paid compensation to the spies and commies. … The
presidential election at the end of this year is the moment to decide the fate
of this country. We have to pray that the lefties of the pro-communist, pro-
North Korea and the anti-USA [factions] will not re-seize power. … After
standing against God and attempting to usurp the throne of God, the Red
Dragon, Satan, is damned and thrown out of heaven to earth.34
With the sermon, Kim urged the congregation to vote for the conser-
vative candidate Lee Myung-bak, associating Lee’s possible loss of the
election with the victory of Satan over God. To make matters worse, his
political conservatism did not remain inside the church. He also organized
or supported a series of conservative political rallies, along with other lead-
ers of mega churches like David Yonggi Cho. Luckily for them, their polit-
ical activities accomplished their objectives, helping Lee to be elected as
the fourteenth president of S. Korea. Because the KPC’s conservative atti-
tude toward progressive and democratic movements and obstinate exclu-
sivism against Korea’s traditional religions have received much publicity
from the press, now S. Koreans are likely to regard it as the way things are.
One interesting fact to point out is that the more people are leaving the
church, the more adamant its leaders—mainly from large or mega
8 K. LEE
churches—seem to hold on to their conservative and exclusive religious

doctrine. Now it is not an exaggeration to say that whether or not the
KPC changes that attitude is closely related to its continuous growth in
the future.
1.2 The Necessity of a Psychohistorical Approach

to the History of the Korean Protestant Church
Given that church-individualism, materialism, and exclusivism are the

three main causes of the KPC’s current decline, it is necessary to ask if
there is a possible thread that intertwines them together. The author
argues that to find the thread, a psychoanalytical reading of the KPC’s his-
tory is necessary. While researching to find psychologically feasible answers,
one story captured the author’s attention. It is about David Yonggi Cho
and his church, the history of which is usually considered as a miniature of
that of the KPC. Cho built the church with five members in 1958. Within
three decades, the church became the world’s largest church in 1992—
with more than 750,000 members.35 In search of the church’s dramatic
growth, scholars frequently mention, as the most important cause, Cho’s
contextual theology of prosperity/bliss. Introducing a new deity that is
more than ready to bless its believers materialistically, physically, and spiri-
tually, the Korean contextual theology tugged at the heartstrings of
S. Koreans suffering from the aftermath of the Korean War nationwide.
The theology introduced to them the Christian God who is eager to bless
His/Her sons and daughters—materially (money), physically (health),
and spiritually (eternal life). How to become God’s sons and daughters is
simple and easy—confessing God as the Lord from the heart. In doing so,
a person can be reborn as a Christian, leaving behind one’s past misery-
stricken life and beginning a blissful life full of God’s miracles. However,
when it comes to how to experience God’s blessings, Cho’s explanation
becomes problematic to some degree.
In an autobiographical record of his ministry entitled The Fourth
Dimension Vol. I (1987), Cho offers an exemplary story of how he experi-
enced God’s miracle by living and doing in the Christian way. When the
Korean government, led by Syngman Rhee, planned to transform Yoido,
an island of Seoul, into something like New York’s Manhattan in the mid-
1960s, it decided to pick one church to be built there and called for appli-
cations. Almost all religious organizations in S. Korea—Protestants,
Roman Catholics, Buddhists, and even Confucianists—applied for that

special opportunity. Cho joined them and submitted his application. Soon
after he knew that his application has been denied. Yet, the news did not
quench his burning desire to take possession of the land—remember that
Cho considered a burning desire as a sign of strong faith. In accordance
with his insistence on faith that real faith requires actions to make a dream
come true, he lost no time in putting a strategy for that into action. First,
knowing that the mother-in-law of the city’s vice-mayor in charge of the
land project was a Protestant, he approached her and made her a member
of his church. When she became a devout member, he asked her to bring
her daughter to the church. Soon the vice-mayor’s wife also became a
member of the church. A little while later, Cho asked the vice-mayor’s
wife to bring her husband to the church. Eventually, the vice-mayor also
became a member. One day the vice-mayor, who heard that his church was
struggling to find a place to build a new church, came to Cho and said that
he could be a help in finding a place for their new church. Soon the gov-
ernment arrived at a conclusion about which church would be built on the
island and it was Cho who got the permission from the government. Cho
concluded the story, noting that the entire process was a miracle under
God’s control for him and his church.
At first glance, Cho’s testimony seems to be about his strong faith in
God, implicitly stating that when people convert to Protestantism, they all
experience the same miracle—the completion of what they desire.
However, Cho missed one point that he intentionally and systematically—
perhaps illegally—intervened the government’s decision-making process
for his favor. In explaining how Christians can actualize and experience
God’s bliss, he justifies what he did to make his dream come true. In this
case, it is obvious that the end justified the means. His religious logic that
lies underneath the justification is likely that as long as a desire is strong
enough and a believer is determined to make it happen, how to do it is not
as important as what to accomplish. With the logic, Cho’s theology of
bliss/prosperity affirms, upholding human desires and considering them
as a way to prove one’s faith in God, that an outcome justifying its process
or an end is more important than its means. This is not to say that all
Korean Protestants believe Cho’s conviction to be true. However, it is still
possible to assume that a majority, who strongly desired to have a new and
better life during the aftermath, were attracted by the theology to a great
degree.36 Taking for granted that Cho’s contextual theology of prosper-
ity/bliss fit well with what a majority of S. Koreans desired in the past
10 K. LEE
century, a following question would be: What are the origins of the
S. Koreans’ desires in the form of a “materialistic” faith? It is not too much
to say that everyone desires to be financially stable and socially powerful in
the aftermath. However, as far as the massive conversion of S. Koreans to
Protestantism that took place intensively between the 1960s and 1980s is
concerned, it is important to note that it needs to be considered as a mass
phenomenon. Taken that once at least up to 24.3 percent of S. Koreans
wanted to become Christians, is it too much to assume that many of them
desired that faith to be actualized in their lives, averting their eyes from the
fact that the faith only concentrated on its end to justify its means?
In conjunction with the paradox in the belief system of Korean
Protestantism, Si-Min Rhyu, a Korean economist and journalist, presents
an interesting opinion on how S. Koreans achieved the “Miracle on the
Han River”—S. Korea’s miraculously rapid economic development.
Basing S. Korea’s economic developmental trajectory on Abraham
Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, Rhyu argues that S. Koreans, who suffered
the after-effects of a series of traumatic events in the past, desperately
desired to satisfy their physiological needs (homeostasis, food, water, sex,
etc.) and safety needs (security of body, family, resources, etc.) more than
any other needs (love, esteem, and self-actualization).37 After the Korean
War, the first and foremost important matter to them was how to remain
alive. Strengthened by a sense of inferiority that was brought about by
their miserable life, they were obsessed about their country’s economic
development. How strongly they desired it was, Rhyu claims, explained by
that they willingly accepted their military dictatorships who promised a
better future. His argument of what caused S. Korea’s economic develop-
ment is unique as compared to others because he presents S. Koreans’
unstable psychological state to the fore as the central cause of it. In the
past century, the psychological state of S. Koreans, stricken by those trau-
matic events that took place in succession, was so fragile that they could
not think of any other needs except for physiological and safety needs,
according to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.
Taking Rhyu’s insight as a springboard, in the following chapters, the
author will gradually investigate significant psychological causes behind the
KPC’s rapid growth in the past century, particularly focusing on S. Koreans’
traumas-stricken psychological state. A psychoanalytic interpretation of his-
tory—particularly some important events, both positive and negative—
mainly focuses on the workings of unconsciousness over consciousness or
feelings over thoughts. As a research method of history for interpreting
historical materials from the viewpoints of psychoanalytic theories, psycho-

history studies how individuals’ or groups’ unconsciousness affects con-
sciousness, causing them to “change” the flow of history under the
influences of unconscious conflicts, even if those unconscious conflicts are
usually covered well by their determined conscious decisions or acts.
The main argument of this book is that the cultural (or collective) com-
plex of inferiority a majority of S. Koreans suffered in the past century—a
collective complex that a group or people unconsciously suffer without
knowing that their thoughts and acts are in the complex’s control—is one
of the major forces behind their massive conversion to Protestantism. To
be more specific, undergoing the past century tainted with a series of trag-
edies such as the collapse of their last dynasty Joseon, followed by Japanese
imperialism, the Korean War, the U.S. military government in Korea, and
the Korean military governments that spearheaded the country’s nation-
wide industrialization and urbanization, S. Koreans had to suppress vari-
ous unresolved internal pains such as anger, humiliation, helplessness,
hopelessness, and haplessness for the sake of survival. Those suppressed
feelings became a collective complex of inferiority as an autonomous psy-
chic entity in their collective unconsciousness that affected their healthy
adaptation to the rapidly changing circumstances. Oscillating between
self-humiliation and excessive idealization of their colonizers, S. Koreans
unconsciously desired to find a way to disconnect themselves from their
miserable past and to become one of their colonizers on a collective level.
Protestantism, introduced by Westerners, satisfied those desires. In an
innumerable number of revivals from the mid-1960s to 1990s, its empha-
sis on the rebirth of Jesus Christ temporarily appeased their internal pains.
Meanwhile, its close connection to the U.S., along with the Korean mili-
tary governments’ active support of it to gain favor from the U.S. govern-
ment, which controlled S. Korea behind the curtain, and the Korean
contextual theology of prosperity/bliss strengthened the imaginary tie
between becoming Protestants and becoming Americanized. To know
where this analysis comes from, it is necessary to delve into, to some
extent, psychohistory.
1.3 Methodology: Jungian Psychohistory

William Langer, an American historian and the president of the American
Historical Association in 1957, was the first person to officially stress the
importance of psychohistory that applies psychoanalytic insights to
12 K. LEE
interpreting historical records. Taking for granted the remarkable advance

of archeology in 1950s, in his 1957 presidential address, Langer demanded
that psychoanalytic theories be utilized in historical studies in order to
deepen and diversify interpretations of historical materials.38 He believed
that the application of psychoanalytic theories to history would cast new
light on causes of historically important events created by humans whose
internal conflicts might be under the influence of the defensive mecha-
nisms such as repression, identification, acting-out, projection, replace-
ment, and so forth.39
One year after Langer affirmed the usefulness of psychoanalytic theo-
ries in historical studies, Erik H. Erikson published a groundbreaking
book entitled Young Martin Luther (1958)—the first psychohistorical
analysis of an important individual’s internal life history. Psychoanalytically
interpreting a variety of historical materials about Martin Luther, the fore-
runner of the Reformation—particularly his private life in its relation to his
great achievements, Erikson reconstructed a lifelong history of his psycho-
logical life tainted with internal conflicts, which was believed to be origi-
nally triggered by his tragic relationship with his father. After the
publication of the book, psychoanalysts began reading historical materials
psychoanalytically and historians began utilizing psychoanalytic theories in
reviewing the lives of historically important figures. In doing so, they
gradually extended their subjects from individuals to groups, and to social
events such as revolutions, wars, epidemics, and so forth.40
The main subject of this research is the psychological state on a collec-
tive level of S. Koreans, shaken by tragic events in succession in the past
century, on the premise that S. Koreans’ unstable psychological states
might be closely related to their massive conversion to Protestantism from
1960s to 1980s. When it comes to religion and its psychological effects on
humans, the Freudian model does not look like a useful interpretive tool,
owing to its pessimistic and somewhat negative view on religion and its
psychological role for humans. Its criticism of religion boils down to the
point that religious feelings are a repetition of the dependence of the psy-
chologically not-fully developed children on their parents—mainly father
figures—to (re)gain a sense of comfort and stability. Though not firmly
rejecting the beneficial role of religion for the psychological health of
humans, Freud anticipated that when humans psychologically fully mature,
they no longer need religion. Based on the perspective, the massive con-
version of S. Koreans to Protestantism in the past century is simply inter-
preted as their collective regressive behavior. Nonetheless, granted that,
before Christianity was introduced, they already had more than four tradi-
tional religions—shamanism, Daoism, Buddhism, and Confucianism—
that harmoniously coexisted in their minds, that simplistic analysis cannot
avoid a dead road. For that perspective does not explain why they flocked
toward Protestantism, turning their backs on their traditional religions.
To probe why Protestantism drew more attention from S. Koreans than
any other religions in the past century, the author chooses a Jungian psy-
chohistorical perspective, developed out of C. G. Jung’s analytic psychol-
ogy, as the main method for the research for two reasons. The first reason
is that Jung is different from Freud in understanding religion. Jung quite
positively views religion as a psychological tool to (re)integrate conscious-
ness with unconsciousness. Note that the Latin term religio, from which
the term religion comes, literally means “reconnect” or “retie.” For Jung,
religion is not a passive and regressive behavior. It is an active and progres-
sive behavior to pursue psychological wholeness through overcoming
dichotomies between consciousness and the unconscious. The second rea-
son is that in order to delve into the unstable psychological state of
S. Koreans in the past century and how it caused them to massively con-
vert to Protestantism on a collective level, Jung’s concepts of the collective
unconscious and complex are methodologically helpful. Jung defined the
collective unconscious as “a second psychic system of a collective, univer-
sal, and impersonal nature which is identical in all individuals … in addi-
tion to our immediate consciousness, which is of a thoroughly personal
nature and which we believe to be the only empirical psyche.”41 Simply
put, the collective unconscious can be viewed as something like the most
fundamental psychical structure all humans biologically share to a degree.
Later, Joseph L. Henderson, a Jungian psychoanalyst, developed, out of
the collective unconscious, a new concept called the cultural unconscious
that is assumed to exist somewhere between the personal unconscious and
the collective unconscious and represents common psychological charac-
teristics of a group or nation. When it comes to Koreans, the concept helps
focus on figuring out their psychological characteristics and how they
changed while undergoing tragic historical events in the twentieth century.
The second reason is that Jung’s concept of complex as an autonomous
psychic entity existing in unconsciousness sheds new light on their massive
conversion to Protestantism. June Singer, another Jungian psychoanalyst,
defined a complex as “a certain constellation [in unconsciousness] of psy-
chic elements (ideas, opinions, convictions, etc.) that are grouped around
emotionally sensitive areas.”42 When we are confronted with distressing
14 K. LEE
events the psychological impact of which is far beyond our ability to pro-
cess them, we avoid facing them by repressing them into unconsciousness.
Our repressed psychological pains, caused by those tragic experiences,
constitute a psychological entity. Jung calls such a psychological entity a
complex. Constructed in the unconscious, a complex plays the role of a
barrier between what we will and what we act, constantly bothering our
intellectual ability to think objectively and neutrally. To explain the cul-
tural unconscious of a people or nation, severely shocked by a complex on
a collective level, Thomas Singer and Samuel L. Kimbles coined the term
cultural complex. They defined it as “an emotionally charged aggregate of
historical memories, emotions, ideas, images, and behaviors that tend to
cluster around an archetypal core that lives in the psyche of a group and is
shared by individuals within that identified collective.”43 Like a personal
complex, a cultural complex is also transmitted from generation to genera-
tion through the functions of “schools, communities, media, and all the
other forms of cultural and group life.”44 Moreover, remaining uncon-
scious like a personal complex, it causes highly charged emotional or affec-
tive reactions to what reminds them of the psychological impacts bringing
about the complex among the members of a group in its grip. A cultural
complex tends to reconstruct the life of a people or nation around itself
and alter their collective identity. Those two concepts will help investigate
the collective psychological state of S. Koreans and how it changed in the
midst of a series of tragedies in the past century. In Chaps. 3 and 4, how a
cultural complex took shape in the cultural unconsciousness of S. Koreans
and how it forced them to convert to Protestantism, giving up their tradi-
tional religions, will be explained in detail.
1.4 The Scope and Discussion of the Research

To support the main argument that one of the main forces that pushed up
to 24.3 percent of S. Koreans to turn to Protestantism in the past century
was their cultural complex of inferiority, the author takes four steps. In
Chap. 2, first, the author attempts to provide a basic knowledge of Korean
Protestantism from its beginning to the present that is a strong theoretical
foundation for this research by doing three things. First, the brief histori-
cal sketch of its history will be made, dividing the time frame into three
categories—the fall of Joseon, the Japanese colonial era, and since the
liberation to the 1990s. Second, the three frequently mentioned causes of
Korean Protestantism’s rapid growth will be explained—Korean
Protestantism as a new outlook for Koreans, S. Korea’s rapid social changes

as a seedbed for evangelism, and Korean Protestantism as a synthetic reli-
gion of Korean Shamanism and Western Protestantism. Last, with statisti-
cal data about when the KPC extensively grew, the author will suggest that
its growth was not continuous throughout the past century; instead, its
explosive growth concentrated on a certain period from the 1960s
to 1990s.
In Chap. 3, a Jungian psychohistorical perspective applicable to the case
of the KPC in four steps will be introduced. First, general information
about psychohistory as a historical discipline is provided, along with its
origin and evolution. Second, the psychohistorical method’s strengths,
weaknesses, and contributions to historical studies are explained. Third, to
make a theoretical bridge between psychohistory and Jungian psychology,
the basic concepts of the psychology—the collective unconsciousness, psy-
chopathology, dreaming and archetypes, and complex theory—are
explained. Last, the theory of cultural complex—an extension of Jung’s
theory of the individual complex to a collective extent that a trauma
befallen on a group can cause a collective complex in its cultural or collec-
tive unconsciousness—is introduced.
In Chap. 4, the author examines Korea’s three important historical
events in the past century—Japanese imperialism, the Korean War, and the
three Korean military governments—that dramatically changed S. Koreans’
psychological reality on a collective level, with a focus on how tragic they
were and how S. Koreans’ psychological pains turned into a cultural com-
plex of inferiority. For doing so, first, how Japanese imperialism psycho-
logically influenced them is explained, paying attention to the psychological
relationship between Koreans and the Japanese and how the relationship
changed the national character of Koreans through implanting a collective
sense of inferiority in them. Second, the psychological impacts of the
Korean War on S. Koreans on a collective level are explored, along with
the emergence of S. Korea’s anticommunism backed by the U.S. military
government in Korea. Last, how the three Korean military governments—
Syngman Rhee, Park Chung-hee, and Chun Doo-hwan—controlled
S. Koreans both bodily and psychologically with the use of the anticom-
munism law in order to solidify their power.
In Chap. 5, the author explains how the cultural complex of inferiority
in S. Koreans motivated them to convert to Protestantism from a Jungian
psychohistorical perspective in four steps. First, whether or not those his-
torical events could be collectively traumatic to S. Koreans is examined,
16 K. LEE
relying on collective trauma theorists. Second, a Jungian psychohistorical

perspective, developed in Chap. 3, is applied to S. Korea’s traumatic events
in the past century to see how the complex took shape and exacerbated in
their minds as the traumatic events befell upon them in series. Third, the
long hidden interdependent relationship between the Korean Protestant
Church and the Korean military governments, in which the KPC reli-
giously supported the governments in exchange for the various opportu-
nities, provided by the governments, for it to grow rapidly, is explained.
Lastly, taken all together, a Jungian psychohistorical analysis assembles all
the theoretical pieces into one feasible interpretation of the KPC’s
growth—the cultural complex of inferiority lay at the heart of the uncon-
sciousness of S. Koreans who made the KPC’s unexpected growth possible.
Notes
1. By “the Korean Protestant Church,” the author means all Protestant
churches and Protestants in S. Korea (Korea from now on); the term does
not include the Roman Catholic Church in Korea. For the sake of brevity
and readability, the Korean Protestant Church is sometimes shortened into
“the KPC.” Additionally, by “Korean Christianity,” the author refers
to both Protestant churches and Roman Catholic churches in Korea.
2. Won Gue Lee, Jonggyuesahoihakjeok Kwanjeomeseo Bon Hanguk Gyoheoiui
Uigiwa Heemang [The Crisis and Hope of the Korean Protestant Church:
from a sociological perspective of religion] (Seoul: Korean Methodist
Church Publishing, 2010), 127.
3. Sung-Ho Kim, “Rapid Modernisation and the Future of Korean
Christianity,” Religion 32 (2002): 27.
4. Byung Joon Chung, “A Reflection on the Growth and Decline of the
Korean Protestant Church,” International Review of Mission 103, no. 2
(2014): 328; Gil-Soo Han, Joy J. Han, and Andrew Eungi Kim, “‘Serving
Two Masters’: Protestant Churches in Korea and Money,” International
Journal for the Study of the Christian Church (2009): 334; Donald Baker,
“Sibling Rivalry in Twentieth-Century Korea: Comparative Growth Rates
of Catholic and Protestant Communities” in Christianity in Korea, ed.
Robert E. Buswell Jr. and Timothy S. Lee (Honolulu: University of
Hawai’i Press, 2007), 283–285.
5. Lee, Jonggyuesahoihakjeok Kwanjeomeseo Bon Hanguk Gyoheoiui Uigiwa
Heemang [The Crisis and Hope of the Korean Protestant Church: from a
sociological perspective of religion], 118.
6. Global Research, Hanguk Gidokgyo Bunseok Report: Igongilsam
Hangukinui Jonggyosaenghwalgwa Uisikjosa Bogoseo [An Analytical Report
on Korean Christianity: Religious Life and Consciousness of Koreans in

2013] (Seoul: UDR Press), 434, 440.
7. Gill-Soo Han, Joy J. Han and Andrew Eungi Kim, “‘Serving Two Masters’:
Protestant Churches in Korea and Money,” International Journal for the
Study of the Christian Church 9:4 (2009): 341. The authors define church-
individualism as “an approach or policy whereby an individual congrega-
tion sets its own goals and undertakes its own missions; and invests human
and material resources in order to maintain and expand the individual con-
gregation as an organization” (p. 341).
8. Global Research, Hanguk Gidokgyo Bunseok Report: Igongilsam
Hangukinui Jonggyosaenghwalgwa Uisikjosa Bogoseo, 105–108.
9. Along with the Nevius Mission Plan, Han et al. present two more historical
roots of the church-individualism in the KPC: Korea’s traditional life-
style—static, agricultural, and patriarchal—and the KPC’s bureaucratiza-
tion that each church is likely to consider maximizing its own profits the
most important purpose for its existence. For more information about
them, read Han et al.’s “‘Serving Two Masters’: Protestant Churches in
Korea and Money”; Global Research, Hanguk Gidokgyo Bunseok Report
[An Analytical Report on Korean Christianity], 363.
10. Han and et al., “Serving Two Masters,” 342.
11. Albert L. Park, “A Sacred Economy of Value and Production: Capitalism
and Protestantism in Early Modern Korea (1885–1919)” in Ed. Albert
L. Park and David Y. Yoo, Encountering Modernity: Christianity in East
Asia and Asian America (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press,
2014), 19.
12. Ibid.
13. Merriam-Webster English Dictionary, “materialism.” accessed on
November 5, 2018. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/
materialism?utm_campaign=sd&utm_medium=serp&utm_source=jsonld
14. The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines the term Chaebol as “a family-
controlled industrial conglomerate in South Korea.” Accessed on Oct. 30,
2018, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/chaebol
15. Won Gue Lee, Himnaera, Hangukgyohoe! [Cheer Up, Korean Church!],
(Seoul: Dong-Yeon Publishers, 2009), 45.
16. Jun-Bong Shin, “Sudokown Daehyeonggyohoe Poham 62 Got Gyoheo Seseub
[The 62 Churches including Large and Mega Churches in the Metropolitan
Area Were succeeded Hereditarily],” The JoongAng Ilbo, July 4, 2013,
http://news.joins.com/article/11977218, accessed on February
12, 2017.
17. Byeong-Wang Lee, “MyungSung Church, Beongaetbure Kong Guwo
Meokdeut Seseum Wallyo [MyungSung Church Completed Its Transmission
by Heredity in an Instant],” Dang Dang News, Nov. 14, 2017, http://
18 K. LEE
www.dangdangnews.com/news/articleView.html?idxno=29328; Hyeon
Jo, “MyungSung Church Damimmoksae Kimhana Moksa chwiim: ‘Buja
seseup’ Wangyeol [MyungSung Church’s New Senior Pastor Is Hana Kim:
the Completion of Its Transmission by Heredity],” Hankyoreh Shinmun, Nov.
13, 2017, http://www.hani.co.kr/arti/society/religious/818733.html
18. Han et al., “‘Serving Two Masters’: Protestant Churches in Korea and
Money,” 349.
19. Ibid.
20. Newsnjoy, “Beautiful Examples of Passing Down Churches,” Newsnjoy,
April 2, 2001, http://www.newsnjoy.or.kr/news/articleView.
html?idxno=1547, accessed on February 12, 2017.
21. Lee, Himnaera, Hangukgyohoe! [Cheer Up, Korean Church!], 46–48.
22. Gi-Yeong Eom and Jong-Myeong Wang, “Rev. Hong-Do Kim Is Placed
under Arrest for His Embezzlement of 2,700,000 Dollars from the Church
Funds,” MBCNEWS, August 14, 2003, http://imnews.imbc.
com/20dbnews/history/2003/1907642_19578.html, accessed on
February 27, 2017.
23. OhmyNews, “Rev. Hong-Do Kim Convicted of the Embezzlement,”
OhmyNews, May 8, 2006, http://www.ohmynews.com/NWS_Web/
view/at_pg.aspx?CNTN_CD=A0000329504, accessed on February 27,
2017; Newnjoy, “Hong-Do Kim, Guilty in the Court and Not-Guilty in
the Church Court,” Newsnjoy, December 22, 2006, http://www.newsn-
joy.or.kr/news/articleView.html?idxno=19572, accessed on February
27, 2017.
24. Hee-Young Kim, “Rev. David Yonggi Jo’s Embezzlement of $11,790,000
Ended in Probation,” Hanguk Gija Hyeobhoe [Journalists Association of
Korea], February 20, 2014, http://www.journalist.or.kr/news/article.
html?no=32966, accessed on February 10, 2017; Hyeon-Ho Yeo, Rev.
Yonggi Jo and His Son Convicted,” Hani Newspaper, May 17, 2017,
http://www.hani.co.kr/arti/society/society_general/795060.html,
accessed on June 10, 2017.
25. Hong-Bae Kim, “Rev. David Yonggi Jo of the Yoido Full Gospel Church:
Can We Winnow Truth from Falsehood about His Embezzlement of 72
million dollars,” Sisa Plus, March 15, 2016, http://www.sisaplusnews.
com/news/articleView.html?idxno=12383, accessed on February
10, 2017.
26. Angella Son, “Crisis of Church Decline in and Revitalization of Korean
Churches,” Pastoral Psychology 67 (2018): 573.
27. Ibid., 574.
28. Jung Eun Jang, Religious Experience and Self-Psychology: Korean
Christianity and the 1907 Revival Movement (New York: Palgrave
Macmillan, 2016), 121–124. In addition, by “mirroring” Kohut means
others’ affirmation of one’s existence to satisfy one’s narcissistic desire; by

“idealizing” he means others’ proper role to become an object for one to
imitate and idealize; by “twinship/we-ness” he means a psychological state
in which one feels oneness with others.
29. Ibid., 50.
30. Jin-Gu Lee, “Korean Protestantism as Viewed by Netizens: A Focus on
Recent Activities of Anti-Christian Sites,” Korean Journal 44 (2004): 233.
31. Ibid., 233–234.
32. Yeol Jang, “Gidokgyo Yunri Silcheon Undong: Hangukgyohoe Sahoejeok
Sinroido Yeoron Josa [Korean Christian Ethics Movement: A Survey of
Public Opinion about the Social Reliability of the Korean Protestant
Church],” Korea Daily, February 11, 2004, http://www.koreadaily.com/
news/read.asp?art_id=2318714, accessed on October 30, 2018.
33. Kyuhoon Cho, “Another Christian Right?: The Politicization of Korean
Protestantism in Contemporary Global Society,” Social Compass 6
(2014): 310.
34. Ibid., 311.
35. Wonsuk Ma, “David Yonggi Cho’s Theology of Blessing: Basis, Legitimacy,
and Limitations,” Evangelical Review of Theology 35 (2011): 142.
36. Andrew Eungi Kim, “Christianity, Shamanism, and Modernization in
South Korea,” Crosscurrents 50 (2000): 117.
37. Si-Min Rhyu, Naui Hanguk Hyeondaesa: 1959–2014, Osip Onyeon Girok
[My Modern History of Korea: a Record of 55 years from 1959 to 2014]
(Seoul: Dolbegae Publisher, 2014), 52–64.
38. William L. Langer, “The Next Assignment,” The American Historical
Review 63 (1958): 284.
39. Ibid., 287–288.
40. Jacques Szaluta, Psychohistory: Theory and Practice (New York: Peter Lang,
1999), 188.
41. C. G. Jung, The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious, trans.
R. F. C. Hull, vol. 9 of The Collected Works of C. G. Jung (London:
Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1959), 43.
42. June Singer, Boundaries of the Soul: The Practice of Jung’s Psychology (New
York: Anchor Books, 1994), 43.
43. Thomas Singer, “Introduction” in Listening to Latin America: Exploring
Cultural Complexes in Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, Uruguay, and
Venezuela, ed. Pilar Amezaga et al. (New Orleans: Spring Journal Books,
2012), 1.
44. Thomas Singer and Samuel L. Kimbles, “Introduction,” in The Cultural
Complex: Contemporary Jungian Perspectives on Psyche and Society, ed.
Thomas Singer and Samuel L. Kimbles (New York: Brunner-Routledge,
2004), 4.
20 K. LEE
References
Buswell, Robert E., Jr., and Timothy S. Lee. 2007. Christianity in Korea.
Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press.
Cho, Kyuhoon. 2014. Another Christian Right?: The Politicization of Korean
Protestantism in Contemporary Global Society. Social Compass 61 (3): 310–327.
Chung, Byung Joon. 2014. A Reflection on the Growth and Decline of the Korean
Protestant Church. International Review of Mission 103 (2): 319–333.
Eom, Gi-Yeong, and Jong-Myeong Wang. 2003. Rev. Hong-Do Kim Is Placed
Under Arrest for His Embezzlement of 27,000,000 Dollars from His Church
Funds. August 14. http://imnews.imbc.com/20dbnews/his-
tory/2003/1907642_19578.html. Accessed 27 Feb 2017.
Global Research. 2013. Hanguk Gidokgyo Bunseok Report: Igongilsam Hangukinui
Jonggyosaenghwalgwa Uisikjosa Bogoseo [An Analytical Report on Korean
Christianity: Religious Life and Consciousness of Koreans in 2013]. Seoul:
UDR Press.
Han, Gil-Soo, Joy J. Han, and Andrew Eungi Kim. 2009. ‘Serving Two Masters’:
Protestant Churches in Korea and Money. International Journal for the Study
of the Christian Church 9 (4): 333–360.
Jang, Jung Eun. 2016. Religious Experience and Self-Psychology: Korean Christianity
and the 1907 Revival Movement. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Jang, Yeol. 2004. Gidokgyo Yunri Silcheon Undong: Hangukgyohoe Sahoejeok
Sinroido Yeoron Josa [Korean Christian Ethics Movement: A Survey of Public
Opinion about the Social Reliability of the Korean Protestant Church]. February
11. http://www.koreadaily.com/news/read.asp?art_id=2318714. Accessed
30 Oct 2018.
Jo, Hyeon. 2017. MyungSung Church Damimmoksae Kimhana Moksa chwiim:
‘Buja seseup’ Wangyeol [MyungSung Church’s New Senior Pastor Is Hana
Kim: The Completion of Its Transmission by Heredity]. Hankyoreh Shinmun.
November 13. http://www.hani.co.kr/arti/society/religious/818733.html.
Accessed 19 Oct 2018.
Jung, C.G. 1959. The Collected Works of C. G. Jung: The Archetypes and the
Collective Unconscious, ed. Herbert Read. Trans. R.F.C. Hull. Vol. IX (Part 1).
XX vols. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
Kim, Andrew Eungi. 2000. Christianity, Shamanism, and Modernization in South
Korea. CrossCurrents 50 (1/2): 112–119.
Kim, Hee-Young. 2014. Rev. David Yonggi Jo’s Embezzlement of $11,790,000
Ended in Probation. February 20. http://www.journalist.or.kr/news/article.
html?no=32966. Accessed 10 Feb 2017.
Kim, Hong-Bae. 2016. Rev. David Yonggi Jo of the Yoido Full Gospel Church: Can
We Winnow Truth from Falsehood About His Embezzlement of 72 Million Dollars.
March 15. http://www.sisaplusnews.com/news/articleView.

html?idxno=12383. Accessed 10 Feb 2017.
Kim, Sung-Ho. 2002. Rapid Modernisation and the Future of Korean Christianity.
Religion 32 (1): 27–37.
Langer, William L. 1958. The Next Assignment. The American Historical Review
63 (2): 283–304.
Lee, Byeong-Wang. 2017. MyungSung Church, Beongaetbure Kong Guwo
Meokdeut Seseum Wallyo [MyungSung Church Completed Its Transmission
by Heredity in an Instant]. Dang Dang News. November 14. dangdangnews.
com/news/articleView.html?idxno=29328. Accessed 3 Nov 2018.
Lee, Jin-Gu. 2004. Korean Protestantism as Viewed by Netizens: A Focus on
Recent Activities of Anti-Christian Sites. Korean Journal 44 (4): 223–245.
Lee, Won Gue. 2009. Himnaera, Hangukgyohoe! [Cheer Up, Korean Church!].
Seoul: Dong-Yeon Publishers.
———. 2010. Jonggyuesahoihakjeok Kwanjeomeseo Bon Hanguk Gyoheoiui Uigiwa
Heemang [The Crisis and Hope of the Korean Protestant Church: From a
Sociological Perspective of Religion]. Seoul: Korean Methodist Church
Publishing.
Ma, Wonsuk. 2011. David Yonggi Cho’s Theology of Blessing: Basis, Legitimacy,
and Limitations. Evangelical Review of Theology 35 (2): 140–159.
Newsnjoy. 2001. Beautiful Examples of Passing Down Churches. Newsnjoy. April
2. http://www.newnjoy.or.kr/news/articleView.html?idxno=1547. Accessed
21 June 2017.
———. 2006. Hong-Do Kim, Guilty in the Court, Yet Not-Guilty in the Church
Court. December 22. http://www.newsnjoy.or.kr/news/articleView.
html?idxno=19572. Accessed 27 Feb 2017.
OhmyNews. 2006. Rev. Hong-Do Kim Convicted of the Embezzlement. May 8.
http://www.ohmynews.com/NWS_Web/view/at_pg.aspx?CNTN_
CD=A0000329504. Accessed 27 Feb 2017.
Park, Albert L. 2014. A Sacred Economy of Value and Production: Capitalism and
Protestantism in Early Modern Korea (1885–1919). In Encountering
Modernity: Christianity in East Asia and Asian America, ed. Albert L. Park and
David Y. Yoo, 19–46. Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press.
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[My Modern History of Korea: A Record of 55 Years from 1959 to 2014]. Seoul:
Dolbegae Publisher.
Shin, Jun-Bong. 2013. Sudokown Daehyeonggyohoe Poham 62 Got Gyoheo Seseub
[The 62 Churches Including Large and Mega Churches in the Metropolitan Area
Were succeeded Hereditarily]. July 4. http://news.joins.com/article/11977218.
Accessed 12 Feb 2017.
Singer, June. 1994. Boundaries of the Soul: The Practice of Jung’s Psychology.
New York: Anchor Books.
22 K. LEE
Singer, Thomas. 2012. Introduction. In Listening to Latin America: Exploring

Cultural Complexes in Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, Uruguay, and Venezuela,
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Denise Ramos, 1–13. New Orleans: Spring Journal Books.
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Complex: Contemporary Jungian Perspectives on Psyche and Society, ed. Thomas
Singer and Samuel L. Kimbles, 1–9. New York: Brunner-Routledge.
Son, Angella. 2018. Crisis of Church Decline in and Revitalization of Korean
Churches. Pastoral Psychology 67 (5): 569–577.
Szaluta, Jacques. 1999. Psychohistory: Theory and Practice. New York: Peter Lang.
Yeo, Hyeon-Ho. 2017. Rev. Yonggi Jo and His Son Convicted. May 17. http://
www.hani.co.kr/arti/society/society_general/795060.html. Accessed 10
June 2017.
CHAPTER 2
A Historical Sketch of the Growth

of the Korean Protestant Church
in the Twentieth Century
Referring to the 1982 Korea Gallup Institute Report, the former Executive
Secretary of the Asia Theological Association Bong-Rin Ro said, “[T]he
Christian population in South Korea has increased to twenty percent
including four percent Roman Catholics. Among the young adults
(between age 18 to 24), thirty percent, including six percent Roman
Catholics, claim to be Christians.”1 Merely 35,759 Christians (0.6 percent
of the total population of 5,928,802) in 1904 grew to 20.15 million (41.4
percent of the total population of 50,423,955) in 2005.2 The phenome-
non of Korean Christianity is considered as one of the most useful exam-
ples to counter the secularization theory that, as a society develops through
industrialization and urbanization, its religion loses its influence on human
life.3 A number of Western scholars have focused on the history of Korean
Christianity to find what made such a de-secularization process and its
rapid growth possible within a century from various perspectives. However,
they did not consider that, since 1995, the growth rate of the Korean
Protestant Church (KPC) has been gradually slowed down. In 2005, it
was reported that the total number of its members decreased from
8,760,300 to 8,616,000.4
This chapter aims to provide a general overview of the history of the
Korean Protestant Church in the past century, presenting a summary of
what has been examined and discussed about the miraculous growth of
the KPC. To accomplish that goal, first, the author describes how
Protestantism came to Korea and grew from a historical perspective.
© The Author(s) 2020 23

K. Lee, Religious Experience in Trauma, Asian Christianity in the
Diaspora, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-53583-4_2
24 K. LEE
Second, three major interpretations—philosophical, sociological, and reli-

gious—about what caused the growth are explained. And then, the neces-
sity of a psychohistorical interpretation of the growth is presented.
2.1 The Miraculous Growth

of Korean Christianity
In “HanGuk Gyohoeui Seongjanggwa Geu Dunhwa Hyeonsangeui

Gyohoeuisajeok Gochal [A Church-Historical Investigation of the Growth
of the Korean Protestant Church and Its Slow-Down]” (1997), Man-yôl
Yi, a Korean historian, points out that the Korean Protestant Church’s
miraculous growth took place as Koreans underwent a series of traumatic
crises such as the Japanese colonial rule from 1910 to 1945, the Korean
War from 1950 to 1953, and Korean military governments from 1945 to
1987—along with those governments-led nationwide radical industrial-
ization and urbanization from 1962 onward. To explore how it happened,
paying attention to what Korean Christianity did for Koreans, Yi divides
the history into three periods: the closing period of the Joseon Dynasty
(1882–1910), the Japanese colonial rule (1910–1945), and on and after
the liberation (1945–present). For the sake of summarization, the author
takes Yi’s historical division as a basic framework on which the history of
Korean Protestantism is examined because it helps navigate Korea’s sig-
nificant historical events and how Protestantism reacted to them.
2.1.1 The Fall of Joseon, Korea’s Last Dynasty, and Christianity

(1882–1910)
Korean (church) historians generally agree that Koreans encountered
Christianity for the first time approximately between the thirteenth and
mid-sixteenth centuries because China had accepted Christianity in the
thirteenth century and there were already some 3000 Christians in Japan
in the mid-sixteenth century.5 Official documents of the Joseon Dynasty,
written in the early seventeenth century, report that Kwang-jong Yi, a
Joseon Dynasty emissary to Beijing, brought to Korea a world atlas by
Matteo Ricci, a Catholic missionary in Beijing, and that Justice Minister
Mong-in Yu wrote a critique of Ricci’s De Deo Verax Disputatio [A True
Disputation Concerning God; Cheonjusilui read in Korean].6 In 1795,
there were some 4000 Christians in Korea and the number increased to
2 A HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE GROWTH OF THE KOREAN PROTESTANT… 25
about 10,000 by 1800.7 In the beginning, Koreans accepted Christianity

as a source of learning, not as a religion.8 For that reason, Christianity was
known as Seohak [Western Learning]. It is the liberal Confucianism schol-
ars of that time who first showed a great interest in Christianity, Western
science, and technology they encountered through missionaries. In par-
ticular, they were attracted by the Christian belief that God systematically
created the universe so that the universe is observable, analyzable, and
predictable. That view on the universe was dramatically different from
their Confucian worldview that the universe is constantly in change and
transition under the influence of the yin/yang principle.
As far as who laid the first foundation for Korean Christianity is con-
cerned, John Ross of the United Presbyterian Church of Scotland’s
Manchurian mission is remembered as the first Protestant missionary who
was the forerunner of evangelizing Koreans. With the belief that the best
method of evangelization is not by foreign missionaries but by converted
natives, Ross began translating the Gospels of Luke and John with a group
of Korean merchants working in Manchuria and its neighboring areas and
completed it in 1882 and the entire New Testament as a single volume in
1887.9 His belief was right. Within a couple of years, first Korean Christian
communities—mostly the people of the lower classes—had been estab-
lished in Manchuria.10
While Ross was working on the Bible translation, Horace N. Allen, the
first Presbyterian missionary in Korea from the Northern Presbyterian
Church in the U.S., arrived at a central part of Korea in 1884. In the fol-
lowing year, the first Methodist missionary Henry G. Appenzeller from
the Methodist Episcopal Church and Horace G. Underwood from the
Northern Presbyterian Church in the U.S. came to Korea, immediately
followed by several other missionaries. They began their mission work
with medical care and education. By the end of the 1880s, a few modern
Christian institutions came into existence in Korea such as the Paichai
Boy’s School11 and Ewha Girl’s School.12 According to Samuel H. Moffett’s
report, the number of Korean Protestants in Korea in 1890 was “17,577.”13
Considering that Korea’s total population of 1890 was 6,608,000,14 it is
not difficult to see how small influence Korean Protestants had on Korea
back. In 1890, Korean Protestants occupied less than 0.3 percent of the
total population.
When Koreans established Christian communities—first in Manchuria
in the middle of the 1880s and then in the northern areas of Korea in the
latter part of the 1880s—the Joseon Dynasty was sharply collapsing for
26 K. LEE
three reasons. The first reason was the pressure of foreign powers such as
the U.S., Japan, France, and Germany that were trying to nullify the
dynasty’s seclusion policy in order to colonize it. The second reason was
the corruption of the ruling class who bought and sold their governmental
positions for personal interests with no regard to the falling of their coun-
try. The third and last reason was that Korean Confucianism—the ruling
ideology of the dynasty for the previous five years—came to lose its place
as a religion-like national philosophy because of the armchair philosophiz-
ing of Confucian scholars who emphasized abstract ideals rather than real-
istic and practical.
Historians, who pay attention to the social context of the falling Joseon,
generally agree that the first-generation Korean Protestants accepted
Christianity as a new way of living, owing to its connection with Western
civilization. The concepts of equality, freedom, and nationality of
Christianity, emphasized by Western missionaries, left a strong impression
on Koreans through their warm treatment of the lowest class people of
Koreans. Touched, they gave those missionaries a nickname Nobles or
Gentlemen—the Confucian term to refer to idealistic humans who have
achieved the identity between their words and actions.15 Nonetheless, it is
important to keep in mind that because of the positive impression, Korean
Protestants could not see Protestantism as a tool for Western imperialism.
Faced with the imminent invasion of Japan, they thought imperialism only
had something to do with Japan.
By the 1890s, missionaries began publishing Christian books and mag-
azines in Korean such as Korean language textbooks in 1889, a Korean/
English dictionary in 1890, The Korean Repository in 1892, Korean
Hymnals in 1893, and Pilgrim’s Progress in 1894. Those books helped
many Koreans indirectly encounter the advance of Western civilization
and Christianity. In that decade, however, the missionaries faced financial
difficulties and conflicts with other missionaries who belonged to different
denominations. To resolve the problems, all the missionaries in Korea got
together for a discussion and came up with three solutions. First, they
agreed to find a way to make churches in Korea financially independent,
based on a mission plan proposed by a Presbyterian missionary in Shantung,
China, John L. Nevius—later known the Nevius Mission Plan—that
sought self-supporting, self-propagating or self-extending, and self-
governing churches.16 Second, to prevent unnecessary competitions and
conflicts among the missionaries, they decided to divide the peninsula into
several mission spheres so that one denomination continued its missionary
work in an assigned area—with the exception of the Holy Church

Anglicans that objected the solution. Third and last, they agreed to create
one United Church of Christ in Korea. Yet, the plan also became useless
because North American denominations opposed it.
In that social context, from 1900 to the annexation of Korea by Japan
in 1910, the number of Protestants in Korea gradually increased. One of
the most important historical events for that growth was the 1908 Great
Revival in Pyongyang, the spiritual influence of which was said to have
swept through the peninsula, breathing self-confidence into the minds of
Koreans. Some church historians like Man-yôl Yi go so far as to argue that
the religious experience eventually stimulated Koreans to plan and execute
the March First Independence Movement of 1919, stressing that sixteen
out of the thirty-three people, who had made the Declaration, were
Protestants.17 However, scholars are not slow to criticize that the revival
pushed Korean Protestants to turn away from this worldly issue—Japan’s
aggressive colonization of Korea—and to overly concentrate on spiritual
issues such as salvation and heavenly blessings. Particularly, the missionar-
ies, who planned the revival, taught Korean Protestants the importance of
the separation between state and church when they were threatened to
comply with the Japanese colonial government. Taken together, it is a
paradox that although the missionaries passed the Christian concepts of
freedom, equality, and nationality on to Koreans, they did not want
Korean Protestants to practice and live with them in the face of the
Japanese government.
Nevertheless, it is undeniable that the Great Revival was a foundational
event for Protestants to more actively begin evangelizing their people.
Deok-Ju Rhee, a historian of Korean Christianity, contends that the revival
helped Protestants recognize Christianity as a new ethical system that
could replace their old Confucianism. In the revival meetings, Koreans
confessed their traditional behaviors such as smoking, concubinage, slav-
ery, ancestral rites, and incantation as sinful and converted to Protestantism,
hoping a new life in Christ.18 Now Christianity became a symbol for a
break with the past.19 The revival’s influence is easily seen in a remarkable
increase in numbers of Korean Protestants from 31,356 in 1903 to
118,246 in 1909 and to 157,633 in 1919.20
Scholars like Chung-Shin Park, however, point out the social context of
Korea in the 1900s as a more important cause of the increase. Park claims
that, during the Sino-Japanese War (1894–1895) and the Russo-Japanese
War (1904–1905), the role of Protestant churches to offer Koreans a safe
28 K. LEE
place could more directly contribute to that increase. During the wars,
both Japan and Russia did not attack and invade Protestant churches in
Korea to avoid any conflicts with the U.S. largely because those churches
belonged to missionaries were the U.S.’s properties. By staying at
Protestant churches, Koreans could save their lives under the wing of the
missionaries when their country could not save them. That experience led
to the thought that the U.S. was stronger than China, Japan, and Russia.
In this respect, Park and other scholars argue that, during that period,
Koreans were likely to turn to Protestantism for physical safety rather than
religious reasons.
In summary, while Joseon—the last dynasty of Korea—was declining
by the tornado of colonialism, Christianity—mainly American
Protestantism—was introduced to Koreans. At first, the ruling class of
Joseon—mostly Confucian scholars—received Christianity not as a reli-
gion but as a way of learning. However, ordinary Koreans gradually turned
to and spread it as a religion while undergoing the two tragic wars.
2.1.2
The Japanese Colonial Era (1910–1945)
The Empire of Japan took three steps to annex the Joseon Dynasty as a
colony. On February 26, 1876, Japan forced Joseon to sign the Japan-
Korea Treaty of 1876 (also known as the Treaty of Ganghwa Island) with
the bombardment of the Japanese gunboat Un’yō at Ganghwa Island. The
treaty brought to an end Joseon’s isolationist policy, instituted by
Heungseon Daewongun (1820–1899) in the late 1860s, of closing doors
to other countries except for China. Opening three ports of Korea to
Japanese trade, it also defined Joseon as a free nation, attempting to break
its traditional tributary relationship with China, and which was one major
cause of the First Sino(Chino)-Japanese War (1894–1895) that proved the
failure of the Qing dynasty’s military modernization, shifting regional
dominance from China to Japan. Due to the treaty, Joseon gradually
became vulnerable to the influence of not only Japan but also other impe-
rialistic powers. Following the victory in the Russo-Japanese War of 1905,
Japan entered into the Japan-Korea Treaty of 1905 (also known as the
Eulsa Treaty or Japan-Korea Protectorate Treaty) on November 17, 1905.
The treaty allowed Japan to take full responsibility for Joseon’s diplomatic
issues and made Joseon a protectorate of Japan. Soon after the treaty was
signed, Japan sent Itō Hirobumi to be the first Resident-General of Japan
to Korea. Lastly, on August 22, 1910, the Japan-Korea Treaty of 1910
(also known as the Japan-Korea Annexation Treaty)—the final treaty that

degenerated Joseon into a colony of the Japanese Empire—was com-
pleted. The first article of the Treaty reads, “His Majesty the Emperor of
Korea makes the complete and permanent cession to His Majesty the
Emperor of Japan of all rights of sovereignty over the whole of Korea.”21
During the Japanese colonial era, the number of Christians in Korea
continued to increase. In 1914, there were 196,000 Christians that occu-
pied 1.1 percent of the total population. By the end of the Japanese rule
in 1945, the number increased to 740,000 that occupied over 3 percent
of the population.22 To the question of how the increase was made possi-
ble, church historians answer that the involvement of Christian churches
in social and political activities against Japanese imperialism drew attention
from Koreans. To know the specifics, it is necessary to examine the four
important events that might have changed Koreans’ perception of
Christianity from being apolitical to being political as well as patriotic: the
conspiracy trial of 1912, Japan’s systematic religious-oppression aimed at
Christian churches, the March First Movement of 1919, and the Shinto
Shrine Controversy of 1925–1945.
First, in 1912, the Japanese colonial government made a false trial to
suppress Protestants and their political acts against it. Right after the
annexation, the colonial government dispersed all political and social
organizations or groups in Korea by force. However, they could not dis-
solve Christian churches in order to avoid unnecessary conflicts with the
U.S. Soon, churches became the only safe place for Korean independence
activists. In October 1911, the government arrested, without notice,
about 600 Koreans and accused 123, whose majority were Christians, of
attempting to assassinate the Japanese general, Terauchi Masatake
(1852–1919). Among those accused, core members of Sinminhoe—a
Korean independence movement—such as Kim Gu, Cha Yi-Seok, and
Yang Jeon-baek were included. On September 28, 1912, the government
sentenced 105 Christians guilty, inhumanly torturing them to get a con-
fession.23 Considering that, during the Japanese colonial era, more and
more Protestants got involved in independence movements against Japan,
Korean church historians mostly think that the 1912 trial implanted in the
minds of Koreans a link between Korean nationalism and Protestantism.
Second, in 1911, the Japanese colonial government announced the
First Educational Rules to legalize Japanese as the only national language
to be used in all public institutions with the aim of accelerating the process
of Japanizing Koreans. To suppress Korean Protestant churches, it
30 K. LEE
prohibited Christian worship in missionary-built schools such as Sungsil

College (Union Christian College) in Pyongyang, Ewha Woman’s College,
and Yonhui College (Chosen Christian College) in Seoul. To make
Koreans remain uncivilized, it gradually deprived Koreans of all opportu-
nities for higher education, which resulted in that “From 1911 to 1945,
the literacy rate of Koreans almost reached 80%.”24 Deok-Ju Rhee argues
that Korean Protestants perceived Japan’s assimilation policy of Korea into
Japan as not only a national suffering but also a religious persecution.25
Thus, needless to say, the policy caused more Korean Protestants to par-
ticipate in independent movements.
Third, on March 1, 1919, an event considered to be the birthplace of
the nationhood of modern Korea took place in the form of a nationwide
independence movement—later called the March First Movement of
1919. Initially, the movement was designed by a group of thirty-three
people as a private nonviolence activity, which was supposed to cite
together the Declaration of Independence they wrote with a group and
voluntarily surrender to the Japanese police. However, their symbolic act
ignited the desire of Koreans who truly longed for independence. Soon a
series of independence movements by regional groups took place. The
Japanese police brutally suppressed each of them with the use of armed
forces despite that the participants were unarmed. Although the Japanese
police strictly prohibited its inhumane treatments of Koreans from being
known to other countries, a few missionaries rushed to China and cabled
what they saw in Korea to their mission boards.26 Most foreign Christians
officially took the side of the Korean people and condemned the Japanese
oppression and cruelties. In retrospect, the Movement became a chance to
consolidate the perception among Koreans that Protestants, along with
Roman Catholics, were patriotic supporters of Korean nationalism and
anti-imperialists in opposition to the Japan Empire.
Lastly, the Shinto Shrine Controversy from 1925 to 1945—the term
Shinto literally means “ways of the gods”—contributed to the increase of
Korean Protestants in the opposite way the Japanese government origi-
nally planned. Shintoism is a Japanese traditional religion that worships a
variety of Japanese traditional gods and spirits, including the past emper-
ors. As part of the assimilation policy of Korea into Japan, the Japanese
government built a shrine of their religion in Korea in 1925, requiring all
officials and students to attend Shinto worship on a daily basis.27 In
1935, the government required all churches to conduct Shinto rites and
visit shrines as part of their activities,28 and from 1942, every church
building was demanded to install a kamidana (meaning “god-shelf”)—a

miniature household altar—for the Shinto religion in its sanctuary. Placing
the national flag of Japan in the sanctuary of every church, later it also
ordered Christians to bow to the flag as well as the direction of the
Japanese royal place29 and to have a Shinto ceremony and a pledge to the
emperor before any religious worship or meeting.30
The majority of Korean Protestants considered those orders as idola-
trous acts and rejected them. To make them obey, in 1938, the Japanese
government coerced the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church to
pass a resolution that the shrine worship had nothing to do with their
Christian faith. Shortly thereafter, all other denominations followed the
same step, except for a minority of Presbyterians.31 Meanwhile, to efface
missionaries’ opposition, it deported all missionaries in Korea and changed
forms of Christian liturgies by prohibiting the reading of the Old Testament
and the Book of Revelation, which contain prophecies of God’s condem-
nation of the powers. To make matters worse, in July 1945, it dissolved all
Korean denominations and combined them into one union, the Joseon
Denomination of the Japanese Union Church. Owing to the govern-
ment’s anti-religious measures, from 1939 to 1942, 1200 of 5000
churches were closed and the number of the baptized decreased from
134,000 in 1939 to 110,002 in 1942. Nevertheless, interestingly enough,
the total number of Christians during the Japanese colonial continued to
increase from 177,692 in 1910 to 245,000 in 1942.32
In summary, the Japanese colonial era played the role of fertile soil for
Korean Protestantism to prepare a springboard for its rapid growth from
the 1945 liberation onward. The Japanese cultural and religious suppres-
sion of Koreans to eliminate their national and cultural identity ironically
strengthened their perception about a link between Protestantism and
patriotism. Under Japanese rule, Christianity—mainly Protestantism—
transformed from a foreign religion to a national, patriotic, and liberative
religion.
2.1.3 Since the Liberation of 1945

After Korea regained liberation from the Empire of Japan, Protestant
churches in S. Korea faced two historical questions. The first was about
whether or not to continue the Japanese-created unified church and the
second was how to deal with pastors who submitted to the Shinto wor-
ship.33 In late 1945, a group of Methodists decided to redesign the Korean
32 K. LEE
Methodist Church structure. Shortly after, other denominations took the

same step. However, conflicts over attendance at the Shinto rituals were
not easy to resolve because most of the pastors did it. In 1946, a group of
Presbyterians, who had been in prison due to their bold resistance to
Shinto rituals, formed a denomination named the Koryo Group in order
to emphasize their religious purity and legitimacy—without knowing that
the decision was later recorded as the origin of the unending schism in the
Korean Protestant Church by church historians. In spite of the religious
conflicts, however, the number of Protestants in S. Korea kept increasing
at a moderate rate because of the inflow into S. Korea of a number of
Protestants in North Korea (hereafter N. Korea) who fled from the perse-
cution of Christians by N. Korea’s communist government. Unfortunately,
the moderate growth was stopped by the Korean War in 1950.
The Korean War is an “unended” and still continuing war. The war did
not bring about any victorious countries, but only many defeated coun-
tries.34 Even though more than sixteen countries participated in the first
but last war, ignited by the ideological conflicts between capitalism and
communism, more often than none, the war is called a civil war between
two Koreas.35 Nevertheless, there is one unchangeable truth: Koreans suf-
fered—and are still suffering—from the war. It caused “a total of more
than four million casualties, of which at least two million were civilians—a
higher percentage than in World War II or Vietnam,”36 causing 200,000
widows, 100,000 orphans, and 2 million separated families.37 It damaged
or destroyed approximately 80 percent of industrial facilities, 75 percent
of governmental buildings, and more than half an inhabitable area of
Korea.38
It is not difficult to suppose that the survivors were greatly traumatized
and suffered extreme psychological pains throughout their lifetimes. A
group of Korean scholars and journalists argue that, for S. Koreans, the
trauma of the war is still being inherited from generation to generation as
their internalized reflex-terror of N. Koreans—a group of Korean sociolo-
gists named it Red Complex.39 Jung-Seok Seo and other historians claim
that the S. Korean military governments employed the terror to suppress
those who stood against them by labeling them communists—meaning
national betrayers—and calling their brutal treatments of those betrayers
as patriotic acts.40 With this background knowledge of the social context
of S. Korea in the 1950s, now let us turn to the Korean Protestant Church
in the aftermath of the war—particularly its growth during that time.
To recover from the tragic ruin of the nation by the Korean War,
S. Korea had no other option but to solely rely on economic aid from
foreign countries. Among various social organizations from other coun-
tries, churches and church-related aid organizations took the lead, provid-
ing Koreans with housing, clothing, food, transportation, and emergency
medical aid. S. Korea’s war-stricken circumstances obviously helped vari-
ous Protestant denominations across the world come to S. Korea and
began their missionary work with little sanctions from the Korean govern-
ment.41 For example, the Assembly of God arrived in 1953; Churches of
Christ, Church of the Nazarene, and the Bible Baptist Church in 1954;
the Lutheran Church in 1958; and the Pentecostal Church, Church of
God, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, and Jehovah’s
Witnesses in 1965. Yi points out that such a rapid influx of diverse
Protestant denominations established a foothold for a very competitive
market of religion to emerge since the 1960s.42 Nonetheless, it is impor-
tant to make clear that even though the KPC continued to grow in num-
bers after the war, the percentage of Protestants remained at fewer than 3
percent of the total population in the late 1950s.43
The KPC’s explosive growth began from the mid-1960s. The num-
ber of its churches significantly increased from 5011 in 1960 to
33,897 in 1996.44 The number of its members also suddenly escalated
from 623,072 in 1960 to 8,760,000 in 199545 to the degree that, in
1995, Korean Christians represented almost 26 percent of the total
population—Protestants (19.7 percent) and Catholics (6.6 percent).46
Between the late 1960s and the early 1990s, nearly 400 large churches
and the 15 largest mega churches of the world were built in S. Korea.47
As soon as the KPC became financially independent in 1980s, it quickly
turned to overseas mission work and began sending missionaries abroad.
In 1998, the KPC sent nearly 8000 missionaries abroad—4700 ordained
ministers and 3200 lay evangelists, which was the third highest repre-
sentation in the world,48 making a strong statement that the KPC is one
of the most successful and dynamic Christianities in the world in the
twentieth century.
34 K. LEE
2.2 The Three Main Reasons

for the Rapid Growth
As to how the Korean Protestant Church could accomplish the seemingly

impossible growth in a century, scholars generally agree with three plau-
sible explanations. The first is that Protestantism offered S. Koreans a new
outlook that could replace their traditional ones failing to explain the
meanings of their country’s modern history. The second is that S. Korea’s
rapid social changes were a seedbed for the explosive growth of the
KPC. The third and last is that S. Koreans transformed Western Christianity
into a Koreanized, or Shamanized, Christianity that fit well with both their
traditional religious consciousness and their desires after the Korean War.
Let us examine the three explanations in detail.
2.2.1 Protestantism: New Perspectives on Life

Since its introduction to Korea, Protestantism transformed Koreans’ per-
ceptions about themselves and their country. Granted that Korea was reli-
giously a pluralistic society long before Protestantism was introduced,
how Protestantism could secure a main position in Korea in the past cen-
tury arises as a question. Andrew Eungi Kim, a sociology professor of
Korean University, argues that one of the key reasons for the rapid growth
of the KPC in the past century is that the religious worldview and value
system of Protestantism was able to make sense of Koreans’ harsh realities
while their traditional religions such as Shamanism and Buddhism were
unable.49 To capture the roles of Protestantism for Koreans, it is necessary
to look into what perspectives on life it offered to them. To do so, the
author first divides the twentieth century of Korea into four categories—
the early years of Christianity in Korea (before 1910), Japanese imperial
era (1910–1945), the aftermath of the Korean War (1953–1960), and the
massive industrialization and urbanization era (1968–1990)—and then
will focus attention to what Koreans learned from Protestantism.
First, when Protestantism was introduced to Koreans, it brought, along
with the Word of God, a set of Western social ethics such as freedom,
equality, and human rights. Don Baker, a historian of Asian Christianity,
points out that Protestantism considerably changed Korea’s family- and
community-oriented traditional ethics based on its traditional religions.50
While Korea’s traditional religions largely emphasized patriarchal collec-
tivism, Protestantism stressed individualism anchored in its theology
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18

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Religious Experience in Trauma:

Koreans’ Collective Complex of

More information about this series at

Asian Christianity in the Diaspora

Cover illustration: Images from around the world / Getty Images

Second, I would like to thank my parents. Without them, I could not

1 Introduction: The Korean Protestant Church at Present

2 A Historical Sketch of the Growth of the Korean

2.2 The Three Main Reasons for the Rapid Growth 34

3 A Jungian Psychohistorical Theory: An Interpretive Tool

4 The Traumatic Twentieth Century of Korea: Japanese

5 The Growth of the Korean Protestant Church from a

5.3 The Growth of the Korean Protestant Church and the

6 Conclusion: The Korean Protestant Church and the

Introduction: The Korean Protestant Church

1.1 The Declining Korean Protestant Church1

© The Author(s) 2020 1

results of a survey on S. Koreans’ concerns about the KPC, presenting

1.1.1 The Korean Protestant Church’s Individualism

1.1.2 The Korean Protestant Church’s Materialism

twenty-two churches were in the process.16 On November 12, 2017, the

Second, large and mega church leaders’ unethical financial-handlings of

1.1.3 The Korean Protestant Church’s Exclusivism

2013 GidokgyoYunrisilcheonungdong [the Korean Christian Ethics

churches—seem to hold on to their conservative and exclusive religious

1.2 The Necessity of a Psychohistorical Approach

Given that church-individualism, materialism, and exclusivism are the

Roman Catholics, Buddhists, and even Confucianists—applied for that

historical materials from the viewpoints of psychoanalytic theories, psycho-

1.3 Methodology: Jungian Psychohistory

interpreting historical records. Taking for granted the remarkable advance

1.4 The Scope and Discussion of the Research

Protestantism as a new outlook for Koreans, S. Korea’s rapid social changes

relying on collective trauma theorists. Second, a Jungian psychohistorical

on Korean Christianity: Religious Life and Consciousness of Koreans in

others’ affirmation of one’s existence to satisfy one’s narcissistic desire; by

March 15. http://www.sisaplusnews.com/news/articleView.

Singer, Thomas. 2012. Introduction. In Listening to Latin America: Exploring

A Historical Sketch of the Growth

© The Author(s) 2020 23

Second, three major interpretations—philosophical, sociological, and reli-

2.1 The Miraculous Growth

In “HanGuk Gyohoeui Seongjanggwa Geu Dunhwa Hyeonsangeui

2.1.1 The Fall of Joseon, Korea’s Last Dynasty, and Christianity

about 10,000 by 1800.7 In the beginning, Koreans accepted Christianity

work in an assigned area—with the exception of the Holy Church

(also known as the Japan-Korea Annexation Treaty)—the final treaty that

prohibited Christian worship in missionary-built schools such as Sungsil

building was demanded to install a kamidana (meaning “god-shelf”)—a

2.1.3 Since the Liberation of 1945

Methodist Church structure. Shortly after, other denominations took the

2.2 The Three Main Reasons

As to how the Korean Protestant Church could accomplish the seemingly

2.2.1 Protestantism: New Perspectives on Life

You might also like

1 Introduction: The Korean Protestant Church at Present

2 A Historical Sketch of the Growth of the Korean

2.2 The Three Main Reasons for the Rapid Growth 34

3 A Jungian Psychohistorical Theory: An Interpretive Tool

4 The Traumatic Twentieth Century of Korea: Japanese

5 The Growth of the Korean Protestant Church from a

5.3 The Growth of the Korean Protestant Church and the

6 Conclusion: The Korean Protestant Church and the