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Hualin International Journal of Buddhist Studies 7.1 (2024): 117–143; https://dx.doi.org/10.15239/hijbs.07.01.04
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Buddhism and Science, Transmission of Buddhism: Locality and Globality)
Persistence of Sino-centric Ideologies in Korean Buddhism: The Rhetoric of Sino-centrism in the Chosŏn Period Buddhist Apologetic Literature
Sung-Eun T. KIM
Dongguk University
Abstract: The notion of chunghwa 中華, an ideology that points to China as the place of cultural origin, was commonly adopted by both the Confucian scholar-officials and Buddhist monks during Chosŏn Korea (1392–1910). It was supported by the ‘doctrine of the civilized and barbarian’, or hwai ron 華夷論, a Sino-centric worldview that positioned China as the centre of the civilized world. Sino-centric ideologies and their varied forms adopted by the Korean monastics can be found in the Chosŏn Buddhist apologetic literature, where Chosŏn Buddhism is portrayed differently through the transition of time.
This paper argues that the formulation and establishment of its identity by the mainstream Buddhist community in the seventeenth century was heavily based on the notions of the Sino-centrism such as the ‘doctrine of the civilized and barbarian’. However, this increased adoption of Sino-centric ideology needs to be contextualized within the rhetorical use of hwai ron and not simply as a wholesale and unnuanced acceptance of chunghwa ideology by the Chosŏn monastics. This paper will bring to light the uses of the chunghwa ideology by prominent literati monastics of the Chosŏn period by examining the arguments laid out in the Chosŏn period Buddhist apologetic literature.
Keywords: Sino-centric identity, doctrine of the civilized and barbarian, Sino-centrism, Buddhist apologetics, late-Chosŏn period
About the Author: Sung-Eun Thomas KIM is an assistant professor at the Academy of Buddhist Studies, Dongguk University, and an assistant editor for the International Journal of Buddhist Thought and Culture. He received his Ph.D. from the Department of Religious Studies at Seoul National University. Previously, he has held research posts at the University of British Columbia and Leiden University. His academic interests lie in the social history of Korean Buddhism during the Chosŏn dynasty period (1392–1910). In particular he is currently working on a project on the rise and formation of Korean Buddhism during the early seventeenth century from the perspective of institutional developments such as monastic education, system of cultivation, and socio-cultural foundations of support (funded by the Academy of Korean Studies). Some of his representative publications include an annotated translation, Buddhist Apologetics in Early Modern Korea: Treaties and Memorials by Joseon Period Monks (2020); ‘Taming the Tiger of Hwadu Absolutism: Kanhwa Sŏn/Chan Practices Understood From the Perspective of Ritual Practice and Experience’ (2021); and ‘Korean Buddhist Adoption of Shamanic Religious Ethos: Healing, Fortune Seeking, and the Afterlife’ (2018).
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
