Catholic Koreans in Choson Korea

2017 Words5 Pages

At the time that Catholicism by a Jesuit brand was initially introduced into Chosŏn Korea, the central government's policy towards the foreign religion had been tied to factional politics
(Rausch, p.47). If the governing regional authority or dominant political faction felt sympathetic or indifferent toward the western religion and its converts, its followers were pretty much left alone. Though there were some minor persecutions before the beginning of the 19th Century; after the authorities in the Neo-Confucian hegemony caught an individual Christian on the skipping of rituals and rites, it was not commonplace as it was for the next hundred years. Under the reign of King Sunjo however, Chosŏn Korean authorities went on the attack, stating followers of Catholicism to be heretics and initiated the Shinyu Persecution of 1801. This persecution The church went underground after the persecution and managed to steer clear of all conflicts with the royal court. In this paper I will show how the Silk Letter that had been written in the hopes to protect Chosŏn Korea Christians ultimately had made their struggle more difficult in the next century up until the Great Persecution in 1866. This essay will also explore how the exacerbation of the French military and missionaries not only increased awareness of the plight of the early Christians in Korea, but also may have had a hand in the Chosŏn leaders decision to lay down such hash penalties.
Local episodes of Catholic persecution broke out during the second decade of the nineteenth century in many different regions throughout the southern part of Chosŏn Korea. A great number of Catholic refugees from the Shinyu Persecution in 1801 fled to the remote mountainous regions of southern Kyongs...

... middle of paper ...

...rall to be a time period not unlike ours today, which is based off of ideological warfare.

Works Cited

- Don Baker, “The Korean Catholic Church’s First Hundred Years: Guest Editor’s Introduction,” Acta Koreana 15/1 (June 2012): 1-14.

- Kevin N. Cawley, “Deconstructing Hegemony: Catholic Texts in Chosŏn’s Neo-Confucian Context,” Acta Koreana 15/1 (June 2012): 15-42.

- Franklin Rausch, “Like Birds and Beasts: Justifying Violence Against Catholics in Late Chosŏn Korea,”Acta Koreana 15/1 (June 2012): 43-71.

- "An Overview of the Korean History Project." An Overview of the Korean History Project. Web. 11 May 2014.

- Jinwung, Kim.A History of Korea: From "Land of the Morning Calm" to States in Conflict

- Matsutani, Motokazu. "Church over Nation: Christian Missionaries and Korean Christians in Colonial Korea."Web. .

Open Document