with title history
The Bible text we read today also speaks to the origin of the popular festival of Purim (the day of fate) of the people of Israel. In this way, the nation is a community that remembers and shares the experiences of a common destiny. This is the basis of historical consciousness.
Every year on Samiljeol, we read the Declaration of Independence as a reminder of the nation's liberation from Japanese oppression. The proclamation has 33 national representatives. Representatives are mainly religious leaders of Chondoism, Buddhism, and Christianity (Presbyterianism, Methodism). Among them, there are seven leaders from the Methodist Theological Seminary I serve. They are the pride and honor of the 118-year-old school. So I put their busts on the wall of the entrance hall of the graduate school like a hall of fame. This is the consideration of the school to pass on the historical lessons and pride of the Samil Movement in memory of these leaders.
If these leaders are summarized in the historical evaluation, they can be divided into three types of leaders. First, there is a person who was initially a central leader of the church and tried to liberate the nation, but gradually committed pro-Japanese acts and was condemned as an anti-national activist.
Second, there is a person whose bust is still filled with empty space because he actually participated as a representative of the Declaration of Independence and continued to participate in the independence movement, but because he developed a Marxist Christian movement and defected to North Korea.
Third, the type of person revered as an independence activist by continuing to practice the independence movement despite suffering indescribable suffering under the coercive rule of the Japanese imperialists, and to be crowned with the Order of Merit for National Founding after liberation and to be buried in the National Cemetery of Patriotic Seonyeol-yeol. There is.
Looking at the above three types of leaders, we need to think about what it means to live with history and what direction they give us a sense of history. In connection with the behavior of these leaders, I would like to consider three historical understandings.
The first is to understand the history of folding and unfolding. There is always the spirit of the times in the field of history. Historians classify history and organize the times according to certain criteria. As the spirit of a certain age goes down, the chapter of history can be thought of as being folded and organized. At the same time, when the dawn of a new era comes, a new chapter in history unfolds and the subject and protagonists of a new history appear. The protagonists of the folded history can never become the protagonists in the newly unfolded arena of history.
Even the leaders of the Japanese imperialist co-workers and the leaders who were later criticized for patriotism must have had their own existential conflicts and anguish except for some extreme figures. Or perhaps hesitating reluctantly and conforming to Japanese rule. However, their pro-Japanese behavior cannot be tolerated and forgotten. Their problems were sunk in the faulty era they were directing at the time. Before the difficult question of whether history advances or not, as all life evolves, history constantly reveals itself in spiraling changes even though it seems slow and circumventive. Those who do not see the evolutionary rhythm of the unfolding and folding history cannot read the signs of the new era, the new era of opening, so it seems to be facing a tragic movement.
Second, history from above and history from below. Historical philosophers point out that the historical perspective of the past was mainly the development of history from above. The symbolic languages of this understanding are: These are the rulers, the center, the male domination, the sky, the upper, the great powers, etc.
On the other hand, the historical development from the bottom up is the ruled, the periphery, women, grasslands, floor, land, etc. It's easy to see these languages as too arbitrary and artificial, but it's a fact.
The chronic understanding of history from above is holistic and is far from a holistic understanding of history, so it is easy to become fragmented. If the understanding of history from below is not supplemented, true understanding of history cannot be achieved, and it becomes an abstract understanding of ideological ideology.
Therefore, the Minjung theologian Seonam-dong, seeing that history arises from the confluence of streams, suggested that the waters of the minjung tradition should especially join and the people should become the subject of history. In order to properly view history, not only the view from above but also the view from below must be supplemented and restored to avoid the illusion of distorted understanding of history. The understanding of history that is not complemented by the history of the bottom people is a distorted and closed history. Our reality is to complement our understanding of history from below, like the empty space left for the attachment of a second leader's bust.
Third, understanding fateful history and emergent history. You can see the cooperation between religions by looking at the 33 representatives of the Declaration of Independence of the Samil Movement. It is a religious understanding and union of three religions: Chondoism, Buddhism, and Christianity.
A representative leader belonging to the third understanding of history was invited as the promoter of the Declaration of Independence and fell into a very difficult religious dilemma. It was because at the time, it was thought that it was impossible to communicate with other religions doctrinally. He said that it is a great sin to lose the strong soil for 4,000 years while praying, and the independence movement is a movement to escape this sin, and he received an answer to what the problem was. After that, he told the people who visited the prison that what he did was planting independence, and he quoted a Bible verse that said that unless a single grain of wheat does not rot, it cannot bear much fruit (John 11:24).
In our time today, the phenomena of conflict, confrontation and polarization are more acutely exposed than any other period. If you look at it from the perspective of the protagonist, it can be seen as a problem of mutual benefit and mutual prosperity. A greater direction should be sought for coexistence and opposites to overcome each other and harmonize together.
The process of ?쁶riting history?? ?쁶riting history?? and ?쁱ewriting??is a testimony through human historical sensitivity to the movement of all life. We must realize, know, and respond to the direction in which God operates all things. The lesson that can be learned through the Trinity Day worship service is to once again reflect on and remember the lessons of the leaders of the faith community who knew by faith the work of God who is above all things, who is in all things, and works through all things.