Seoul Journal of Korean Studies

In the introduction, editor Hwansoo Kim states that this book is a sequel to Makers of Modern Korean Buddhism, published in 2010. That book has served as a foundational work for many scholars, like me, who began their academic study of modern Korean Buddhism in the last decade. I believe this new work can serve the same purpose for the next generation of scholars, while also being a must-read for senior scholars in the field. Wonderfully detailed but still accessible, it covers a broad range of topics, importantly building off, and occasionally overcoming, the themes of “colonialism, nationalism, and modernity” that have dominated scholarship on modern Korean Buddhism. Turning their focus to “contemporary religious practice, gender issues, ethical concerns about clerical marriage and scandals, and engagement with secular society,” the authors’ works reflect the changing dynamics of the field. Indeed, many of the authors have also published their own seminal books in the field in recent years.

In Part I, Jin Y. Park and Mark A. Nathan look at two important figures in modern Korean Buddhism: Hyeam Sŏnggwan [Hyeam Seonggwan] (1920–2001) and Paek Yongsŏng [Baek Yongseong] (1864–1940). Hyeam is a “relatively unknown figure in English-language scholarship,” but his life and teachings reflect both the institutional and philosophical changes in Korean Buddhism during the twentieth century. Park attempts to relate Hyeam’s core Zen Buddhist beliefs, such as “freedom” and “doubt,” as well as his steadfast hwadu meditation practice, to the lives of ordinary laypeople. Although Park’s [End Page 353] chapter occasionally reads like a dharma talk in which she interprets Korean Zen concepts for a lay audience, her emphasis on understanding Hyeam’s “personal philosophy,” without judging it based on existing frameworks (nationalism, modernization, etc.), is the key takeaway. Nathan’s chapter looks at Paek Yongsŏng in a similar vein. Moving beyond the nationalist/collaborator binary that has dominated studies on Paek, Nathan centers Paek’s propagation work and his unrelenting drive to bring Korean Buddhism to lay audiences. Nathan compellingly evaluates religion as a network of individuals comprised of small and large-scale “systems” in order to deconstruct longstanding tropes and grand narratives in the study of modern Korean Buddhism.

In part II, Hwansoo Kim and Eunsu Cho contribute to the burgeoning academic discourse on women in Korean Buddhism. They center the lives of Lady Ch’ŏn [Jeon] (1848–1934?) and nun Chŏng Suok [Jeong Suok] (1902–1966). These chapters are women’s histories; they highlight important women’s stories that have previously been muted in the male-centered telling of modern Korean Buddhism’s history. Kim shows how Lady Ch’ŏn is representative of the many former Yi Royal Household court ladies who had an outsized impact on Korean Buddhism. From reading Kim’s chapter, I am convinced that much more research needs to be done on the relationship between court ladies and Buddhism in the late Chosŏn [Joseon] and Japanese colonial periods.

The issue of clerical celibacy has always been connected to Japanese influence on colonized Korean Buddhism and often judged strictly through the nationalist/collaborator lens. In part III, however, Jeongeun Park and Su Jung Kim take a different tack, tracing the history of clerical marriage from late Chosŏn-period monastic regulations to contemporary public debates. Park explains how Korean and Japanese Buddhists, as well as the colonial Japanese government, created the oxymoronic “married bhiksu” status of Korean monks, reflecting “weakness” in Chosŏn Buddhism’s “ordination tradition” and the colonial government’s strong influence on monastic rules. Like many of the best recent works on late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Korean Buddhism, Park’s chapter shows how all parties involved in the clerical marriage issue had agency and approached it from a diverse range of perspectives. Kim’s insights into the “secret wife” and monastic scandals reveal some of the most pressing issues in contemporary Korean Buddhism. Though Kim...