hankyoreh

Participants in a memorial marking the 109th anniversary of the birth of Park Chung-hee on Nov. 14, 2019, bow to portraits of Park and his wife at the memorial located at Park’s birthplace in Gumi, North Gyeongsang Province. (courtesy of Gumi)

The Park Chung-hee faith is one of the unfortunate legacies of 20th-century South Korean political culture.

When I use the word “faith,” I don’t mean it as a form of satire or mockery. For scholars of religion like myself, it is an objective term referring to the things people believe, imagine, and practice with regard to someone or something that they view as sacred.

At one time, the Park Chung-hee faith operated popularly as a civil religion, treating South Korea’s achievements in industrialization and economic development as the work of one person. Even in the post-democratization years of the 21st century, multiple opinion polls show Park to be the president most respected by South Koreans.

To be sure, the quasi-religious veneration of a past dictator is by no means a phenomenon unique to South Korea. It appears mainly across a wide range of regions that lived under monarchies until relatively recently, and that have been slow to develop politically since the modern era.

A monarchy is a political system sustained by mythology and rituals that relate to the ruler and their family. The originators of royal houses are viewed as heroic figures born into a divine destiny, with an authority that is passed down through their bloodline.

Obviously, no objective indicator is going to show the ruler’s family to be particularly “better” than any other political group. This necessitates an educational process to instill people with a mythology that deifies the “great leader’s” family, as well as a lifetime of rituals in which people swear their loyalty.

In South Korea’s case, a dynasty that had lasted for over 500 years remained in place through the early 20th century. For several decades after that, we experienced rule by a colonial empire with a relatively classical monarchical tradition.

A monarchy is a form of structure, and structures exist to fill voids. As someone who had taken Japan and Manchukuo as models of the modern state during World War II, Park Chung-hee filled the void left by the Japanese emperor and polity with the notions of the “fatherland” and (ethnic) “nation.”

This was definitely a less overt approach than the one adopted by regimes such as North Korea’s, which simply transplanted the monarchical model of bloodline worship into the modern state. But for a generation educated in the colonial era, things like the National Education Charter or flag-raising ceremonies would have been quite familiar substitutes for the imperial subjects’ oath or the bow to the rising sun.

From a religious history perspective, one interesting aspect of the Park Chung-hee faith is the way these religious feelings of veneration have only intensified since the institutional underpinnings were weakened in the wake of democratization.

As a dictator, Park met his end not through a popular uprising but by assassination. The result was a mythology of tragic heroism that became overlaid on the narrative of a leader who brought prosperity and abundance to his country.

We’ve seen politicians enjoy popularity while overtly imitating Park’s appearance, speaking style, and slogans. During the 21st century, one politician even got elected president while emphasizing her bloodline connection to Park Chung-hee.

While it is not widely known, there has actually been a “theological” study written about the Park Chung-hee faith. The book, titled “The President Who Became a God,” was written by Park’s own son-in-law, Shin Dong-wook.

It consists of examples of cults of personality in various religious traditions; the enshrinement of Park and his wife Yuk Young-soo’s funeral portraits in temples across South Korea, as well as the associated rituals; and summaries of debates on gods from a religious studies perspective.

While most of the “theoretical” parts of the book appear to be more or less cut and pasted from online and elsewhere, the parts that relate to the author’s own explorations are quite illuminating. According to him, Park and Yuk continue to receive offerings from believers at various Buddhist temples, afterworld halls, divine guardian altars, and shrines to the dead.

But while Park Geun-hye was her father’s heir under this religious tradition, she — like so many other children of religious sect leaders — failed in her strategy to carry on his charisma.

Her own personal beliefs, which came under scrutiny during the presidential election and her eventual impeachment, may have consisted of a cosmology strongly influenced by the family of Choi Tae-min, along with some distinctive ideas about the spiritual world.

Since this was so far removed from the Park Chung-hee part of the faith her supporters subscribed to, it not only failed to win their sympathies but contributed in some way toward her political downfall.

If anything, this form of faith led to the widespread perception in political culture today that it is dangerous for a top leader to be surrounded by “anything suspicious that is similar to a religion.”

Recently, the Park Chung-hee faith has been drawing newfound attention amid news of plans by the city of Gumi in North Gyeongsang Province to expand and construct a large-scale memorial center at Park’s birthplace to serve as a setting for ceremonies.

While civic groups were voicing stern opposition, President Yoon Suk-yeol threw his support behind the venture during a Feb. 1 visit, arguing that the existing memorial for Park is “too cramped.”

We’re at a moment now when South Korean society must decide whether this bizarre religious phenomenon and relic of the past century should be left to naturally dwindle away — or returned to the public realm.

Please direct questions or comments to [english@hani.co.kr]