소태산의 깨달음과 법신불신앙운동

Abstract

Won Buddhism has been set up and developed by So-tae-san, Bak Jyung-bin(1891-1943), who had realized Buddha's truth and devoted his whole life to the religious calling in turmoil and suffering in the Korean modern society from the end of 19th century to the mid 20th cent. As one of Buddhistic revolutionary activities, So-tae-san had gotten awakened spiritually and created Won-Buddhism, that was the movement of belief in Dharma-kāya Buddha. To Korean people who had been deprived of sovereignty and suppressed by the ruthless and colonial policy of Japan, this was an appearance of religious message of national salvage beyond an individual awakening or a movement of just one religion. So-tae-san proposed the following in his book Innovation of Chosun Buddhism. ① He criticized the falsehood of worship of Buddha's statue and irrational method of offerings toward Buddha, and suggested faith of Dharma-kāya Buddha and truthful method of offerings toward Buddha as alternatives. ② And he advocated harmonious practices by threefold training, (shīla, sāmadhi, prajṅā), for the way of completion of whole personality beyond deflection and adherence to any particular sectarian practice. ③ By emphasizing on modernization, popularization, and habituation, he encouraged the old traditional unworldly Buddhism to go into people's life and reborn as dynamic and energetic Buddhism that can contribute to the society and the history. In Won Buddhism, the symbol, ○(Ir-won sang), indicates the ultimate truth itself of the universe, and it means Buddha-Tathāgata as unification including essence and virtue and function of truth. Especially it is filled with not only truth but also wisdom and mercy. Won Buddhism considers Dharma-kāya Buddha(〇, Ir-won-sang) as the objects of faith, and the standards of practices. So the worship of Dharma-kāya Buddha in Won Buddhism, consists of two gates of faith and practice. These movements of belief in Dharma-kāya Buddha developed by So-tae-san, as the activity of Korean revolutional Buddhism, has significance and feature that cannot be overlooked in the history of development of Buddha-worship. On the other hand, there still remains some hermeneutic and practical tasks to be solved in order to establish an ideal faith of Dharma-kāya Buddha in the future.