Title: Spirituality of the New Era
During the suppression of the Jewish revolt of 64-70 BC, the Roman Empire demolished the walls of Jerusalem, forcibly expelled the Jews, and transformed the temple into a Roman temple. For a long time, they banned Jews from visiting and accessing Jerusalem, and named the country Palestine, after the Philistines, Israel's most hated place.
After that, the Jerusalem Temple, the Jewish religious stronghold, was destroyed, and a national tragedy occurred that was further scattered around the world. As history has progressed, anti-Semitic sentiment has persisted, leading to the 20th century tragedy of the Nazi Eischwitz Holocaust, where many Jews have suffered persecution and national humiliation.
So the Diaspora Jews celebrate the Passover every year, planting olive trees on the last day, and wishing they would meet in Jerusalem next year.
Jerusalem its name is the City of Peace. In the 10th century B.C., the city of David built by David with the purchase of manpower from the Jebusites was gradually enlarged to become Jerusalem.
On the day of their visit to Jerusalem, the City of Peace was a very tense moment for visitors as gunfire continued for about ten minutes between Arab Palestinian stoning resistance and Israeli garrison due to construction of a hill access road to the Wailing Wall west of Old Jerusalem, not fitting its name. But to the locals, it seemed to be felt as an ordinary, everyday event.
After the birth of Israel after 1945, a new tragedy that cannot be washed away has been born for Arabs and Bedouins who have been living in Palestine for over 2,000 years.
What I felt during this visit was that the relationship between Israel and the indigenous Palestinian people felt like an essential task for world peace, like our inter-Korean reunification issue, and sometimes even felt distant.
Although Israel is said to have returned the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt after the Six-Day War, as shown in the recent Lebanon riot Hezbollah, the road to peace is long and the fear of terrorism is becoming a daily life.
The artificial division of the concrete wall around Israeli settlements in the Palestinian Territory is becoming another insurmountable obstacle to peace. In this situation, just as the Anglican bishop of South Africa, Desmond Tutu, advocated overcoming the apartheid policy and devoted himself to peace, he visited Abuna Elias Chacour, Archbishop and peace activist of the Melkite Catholic Church in Galilee. I had a valuable opportunity to be daring during the time. There are 147,000 Christians in Israel, of which 78,000 are Palestinian Arab Christians. Thus, among Jews, Muslims, Drz, and Christians in Israeli society, Palestinian Arab Christians are truly a minority of the minority.
The spirit of this leader, Bishop Chakor, of the peace movement was based on the parable of the Last Judgment in Matthew 25 (verse 40: As you did it to one of the least of your brothers, you did it to me).
The Samil Manse Movement, which was widely spread throughout Samcheon-ri in 1919, eager for national independence and liberation, is now celebrating its 88th anniversary. As the Korean Joseon Dynasty took over the Japanese Empire, the Korean people lost their hope and became a colonial people living in exile in their own land. Let's take a look at the composition of the 33 representatives of the Declaration of Independence, which was proclaimed in this tragic situation of national despair. Their religious background consisted of leaders of Chondoism, Buddhism, and Christianity. This Declaration of Independence is the spiritual basis of the event in which the Joseon society, which had lasted for 500 years due to Confucian or Confucian rule, was destroyed, resisted the Japanese imperial rule, and cried out for national pride and declared independence. It is necessary to ask what this solidarity cooperation that transcends sects of the religious leaders of the time means for us Christians today.
First of all, from a Christian's point of view, the church leaders who participated in the Declaration of Independence go beyond Christian fundamentalism. They go beyond the idiomatic attitude that politics and religion are separated and politics is secular and religion is involved in spiritual matters, or that politics and religion are coalescing to defend existing ruling powers or claim specific vested interests. It goes beyond the position of exclusive Christianity, which rejects other religions and ignores them.
This spirit expresses the spirit of open practice and participation in solidarity with other religions for the independence, freedom, and liberation of our nation, which is a weak nation in which all religions are under God's justice. That's right. The true spirituality of Christianity is that we can work together for the common good in accordance with the spirit of the new age. This is the first lesson we can look at.
Next, a new spirituality is needed just as a new zeitgeist is needed for a new era. The Jesus movement is connected with various ideas in the Jewish society at the time. At the time of Jesus, there were Pharisees, Sadducees, Nationalist Zealots, and the devout Essenes. Jesus??disciples also came from a variety of backgrounds. Jesus critically accepted all these diverse ideological backgrounds. For example, I accepted John the Baptist's repentance movement and was baptized by John the Baptist. However, his movement was sublimated into a movement of love that went beyond the repentance movement of John the Baptist. This was the transition from the Jewish world of law to the Christian world of love. Christianity has to overcome the old age of the law and continuously pursue the transformation and change of the times like the Jesus movement, which opened the age of forgiveness and love.
The last possible horizon, as Paul asserted, is that the salvation of the nation lies in love. Our nation has been liberated. The preamble of our Constitution also speaks of the succession of the Samil Spirit. However, North and South Korea are still divided and confrontational. The Samil Spirit must be inherited so that the division of the nation can be overcome and reconciliation and reunification can be achieved. Samil Spirit urges our Christians to be open and humanely considerate. A new age calls for a new spirituality. A new spirituality is also required for the unification of the nation. Paul goes beyond the laws of the old age and speaks of the love of the new age. The essence of that love is the love shown by the Jesus movement and the Kingdom movement. The third lesson is to remember that the Christian leaders who participated in the Declaration of the Samil Independence Movement believed that only such spirituality could overcome the tragedy of the nation and formed solidarity with other religious leaders in love.
For the new age, the generation of national reunification, we need to practice love that goes beyond the law. This is also a lesson learned from Bishop Chakor of Palestine. It is in line with the concern that what he did for the least of the people in Matthew 25:40 he did his own peace movement to the Lord. This path is the core of the gospel of Jesus that Paul confessed.
Now, as we approach the 88th anniversary of the Samil Day, the Korean church must creatively converge the flowing Samil Spirit from the religious horizon.