신채호의 민족에 대한 상상과 영웅 양성 -『독사신론』과 영웅론을 중심으로-

Abstract

This article is aimed to examine Shin Chae-ho's imagination style of Korean nation and what human figure he wanted to cultivate. Of course, Shin would have recognized the community of our nation as an real thing rather than an imaginary thing. However, following Benedict Anderson's argument, this article assumes that Shin Chae-ho would have re-conceptualized the community of our nation according to his own needs. And this article explores Shin's imagination(or reconstruction) of our nation and his educational human figure. Shin insisted that the protagonist of our nation was the Buyeo tribe(扶餘族), the origin of Dangun(檀君), and that Goguryeo(高句麗), Silla(新羅), Baekje(百濟), Balhae(渤海), Goryeo(高麗), and Joseon(朝鮮) were all set as the same descendants of the Buyeo tribe in in A New Discourse on Reading of History(讀史新論). In addition, he established the Dangun era as a "super-civilized country," and Kija(箕子) as a servant of the Buyeo tribe and foreigner who cannot be included in the Korean history. Therefore, he broke away from sino-centrism and prepared a discourse that could refute the Korean nation's dependency theory. Secondly, Shin set up a discourse that could dispel a peninsular historical perspective by defining the Dangun era as a nation with vast territories. Next, he took a strategy of denigrate the Japanese as a tribe that had been little to do with the Korean history. He also set up Japan as an inferior nation that has inherited our nation's advanced culture and claimed that Korean people have occupied Japan. And, he argued against 'the common ancestry of Japanese and Koreans', making a historical setting that the large ethnic group of Japanese was Baekje people. Finally, Shin presented the numerous heroes in Goguryeo who led the nation's prosperity on their own power without relying on foreigners. Through the stories of the heroes, Shin sought to revive the spirit of worshiping heroes and re-perceive the territory handed down by his ancestors. Shin sought to find a solution to overcome losing his country not from the sages of Confucianism, but from the heroes of the Korean nation, based on the theory of social evolution. He wrote hero biographical novels to pray for the emergence of heroes who would save our nation. Heroes he suggested set as a patriot who puts the interests of the nation and its people at the top of the list, rather than morality. However, Such heroes could be a weakness to justify the imperialism of territorial expansion that Japan implemented at the time. It can be preseumed that Shin's change from nationalist to a people-based anarchist after his asylum has something to do with this weakness.