TREATISE ON THE TONGHAK, OR ‘EASTERN LEARNING'

BACKGROUND
A dispossessed yangban studies a religious text given to him by an itinerant monk and soon has his
encounter with God (hanulnim) on April 5th, 1860, which heralded the beginning of a native
millenarian religion that would have massive repercussions upon late Joseon society.

The founder of the religion is commonly known by his pen name, Su-un, who was born as Choe Che-
sun to a yangban aristocrat household in Wolsong, in Kyungsang province. But being born from a
concubine, Che-sun was deprived of a privilege most yangban take for granted, that is, the right to
apply and take the higher civil service examinations, and chose to leave a life of wandering instead.
Choe Che-sun traveled throughout the country, and engaged in such activities as martial arts,
divination, fortune telling, and even peddling, but found none to his liking. It is probably safe to
assume that he was able to witness the life of the peasantry and commoners during his life on the
road, while also hearing of rumors of western incursions into Qing China and the possibility of their
appearance in Korea. Su-un apparently agonized over a solution for such dismal state of affairs,
expressed succinctly in the Propagation of Virtue.

Su-un then has his famous encounter with an itinerant monk in 1855, from whom receives a book
entitled `The Celestial Text'. His next few years were then spent in religious discipline in search of
God, during which he puts the last of his patrimonial land for sale for the sake of his quest. He is then
greeted by what is described as a revelation on April 5th, 1860, followed by a another year of religious
discipline, and formulation of his religious experience into a system he dubbed the 'Great and
Ultimate Way under the Heavens'. Choe Che-sun then changes his name to Che-u (meaning salvation
of the ignorant) and succeeds in building up a following of approximately several hundred followers.
However, failing to distinguish the term `The Lord of Heaven' from the Christian terminology
referring to God invited suspicion of his connection to Catholicism, and eventually led to his execution
in 1864.

The movement is then succeeded by his leading disciple Choe Shi-hyung, who succeeds in rebuilding
the organization, establishing official rites of worship, protecting the family of his Great Master, and
publishing the teaching of the founder from memory from his hideout in Yong-yang, in present North
Gyeongsang Province. The central tenet of Tonghak theology proclaiming that man is heaven, usually
interpreted as an expression of egalitarianism and humanism, is commonly attributed to Choe Shi-
hyung. His next enterprise was the redress of grievances and rehabilitation for Choe Che-u, who was
executed as a heretic. The rehabilitation movement provided the catalyst for transformation of
Tonghak into a political force, and the assembly at Bo-eun (in North Chungchong Province) made the
radical elements among the faithful realize the potential for a show of force, which eventually was
realized when the grievances of the peasants were combined with its millenarian theology and
exploded into a armed revolutionary movement known as the Tonghak Peasant War. The army of
peasants were initially successful in defeating government troops dispatched for its suppression and
establishing de-facto rule over the Jeolla region, but also precipitated intervention by Chinese and
Japanese forces, and the second uprising against the combination of reinforced government and
Japanese troops resulted in disastrous defeat in Gongju (South Chungchong Province). The leaders of
the uprising were arrested and executed, and Choe Shihyung was also arrested and hanged for
instigating the uprising. The Tonghak movement would survive under the leadership of Son Byung-
hee and would later be reborn as a modern religion under the banner of Chondogyo.

RELIGION OR REVOLUTION?
Any references to revolution or even social reform in the original Tonghak theology is abstract at best.
Though there maybe a few phrases or hymns here and there with references to a `coming world' or a
`world different', but there is no explicit calls for social reforms or to take up arms. Su-un may have
lamented about the dismal state of affairs in the Propagation of Virtue, but his solution to the ills
infecting the society and the populace lay not in struggle but in religious faith and individual
discipline. What troubled Su-un the most, however, were not tangible misery but that the people of his
age were ignorant of God. While his emphasis on the twin concepts of sincerity and reverence does
indicate a slight throwback to Confucianism, he proclaimed that all such words or concepts were
useless it had been merged with personal faith in God, in this case an anthropomorphic one.

I possess belief in nothing else,

but faith in God only.
I have him here within myself, do not seek wide and far,
but seek within.
<The Yongdam-yusa>

The God that Choe Su-un takes so much time in emphasizing, however, is not the holy figure of the
Christian kind (though he does use the same terminology), but the Lord of Heaven (hanulnim) of
Korean antiquity fused with concepts of omnipotence, omnipresence and omniscience. He believed
the Korean people have `labored without fruition' by neglecting a personal God, and he deemed his
calling building a native religious order that could rekindle faith in this celestial figure. Though this is
not to say that there was nothing that could be interpreted as revolutionary or reformist, and such
concepts will be discussed later.
For most Koreans, the first thing that comes to mind when they think of Tonghak is its egalitarianism

and humanism, most explicitly devised in the concept `man is heaven (人乃天: innaechon)'. But such
concept seems not have been clearly formulated during Su-un's lifetime, as he emphasized faith in an
anthropomorphic, almighty God. The Tonghak theology takes a turn for pantheism with Haewol and
the second generation of Tonghak leadership. Everything was imbued with what Haewol called
`Godhood', and for example, to grow and eat rice was to grow and eat a manifestation of God. The
human being was likewise possessed of the nature of God from birth, which was not contingent upon
social status, and this proved to be the focal point that drew many a commoner and disenfranchised
yangban into the ranks of the order. Such was also the notion the radical elements within Tonghak
could utilize to urge the commoners to take up arms against the corrupt yangban aristocracy.

Tonghak uprising of 1894-5 was first referred to as the `Tonghak Rebellion', then called the `Tonghak
revolution', and its name was again changed to `Kabo Peasant War'. The first terminology was an
attempt to discredit the movement as a mere agitation by a religious cult, while the last term tried to
focus on the social discontent that gave rise to the uprising. I would like to argue that both clearly
misses the main point, for Tonghak uprising not a simple religious movement but an armed
insurrection fueled by resentment the peasantry harbored toward overtaxation and other policies that
bordered on exploitation, and general hatred toward the entrenched yangban aristocracy. However,
without the charismatic leadership of the Tonghak leadership such as Chon Bongjun and a millenarian

ideology that spoke of a coming of an `Apocalypse for a Newer Era( 後天開闢: huchon kaebyuk)';
which meant creation of a world completely different from the one at present; to galvanize the
disgruntled peasants, the uprising would have gone much in the way of other peasant revolts - down
the road to failure and not a revolutionary movement that sought to `march to Hanyang and expel to
powerful who engage in sale of titles', or to strike the yangban aristocracy at its very heart. Last but
not least, without the Tonghak organization centered leaders of local chapters (jeopju), the movement
would never have had the organizational strength it needed to defeat two government armies and put
the entire Cholla region under de-facto Tonghak administration for one year.

NO FODDER FOR REVOLUTION?

However, scholar Susan Shin's argument which claims that early Tonghak theology was devoid of
explicit and that it had to be `reinterpreted' in order to formulate the calls for reform may be a hasty
conclusion, as some of the hymn that can be found in the Tonghak canon are quite explicit in that they
need no reinterpretation by radical elements.

Thus I beget my powers from God,

and utterly exterminate the enemy dogs in
one single night.
-From Yongdamyusa: Peace of Mind'

In addition, upon receiving suggestions for an armed uprising, Haewol (Choe Shi-hyung) merely
suggested that 'it was not the time', but took no steps to stop it outright. Choe Shi-hyung is also said to
have determined Chon Bong-jun and So Jang-ok to be 'traitors to the way' and offered no help for
Tonghak leaders in the south, but this is contradicted by the young Kim Ku (later independence
fighter and President of the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea), who was a leader of a
local Tonghak chapter in Hwanghae Province (now in North Korea) and who was visiting Choe
Shihyung personally at the time of the uprising:

The Master (Choe Shi-hyung) rose with clenched fists and said sternly, "We shall not simply sit and
await death while tigers and wolves prepare to beset us all. We shall go out and fight".
-Autobiography of Kim Ku-

Though I have only presented two pieces of evidence, there are numerous such examples in the
Chondogyo canon. While Choe Su-un and Choe Haewol may not have called for open revolution, it is
not wise to say that they had no mind for reform, and concerned themselves primarily with religious
salvation. They may not have had explicit plans for a revolution, but they did provide an atmosphere
and an ideology that was conducive to it, and were not entirely pacifist in their words or action. They
may not have acted to change the world outright, but there is no doubt that they were possessed of
vision and dreams for a better world.