한국 신종교의 신비주의와 불교

Abstract

If it is still true that mysticism deals with these acts of one personally experiencing some ultimate being, in other words, a religious object, and becoming united with the being, all the religions in the world definitely go for the argument. It goes the same with new religions in South Korea, and they are considered to pursue mysticism from the beginning of their foundations. In the light of what has been described, this study aims to discuss these questions as follows. First, are the Korean new religions found these days understood to be mysticism? As far as the researcher of this study believes, an answer to the question is ‘No’. The researcher looks into one of the new religions in South Korea, ‘The Family Federation for World Peace and Unification: FFWPU', and extract general opinions in connection with the topic, ‘Are the Korean new religions found these days understood to be mysticism?’ As for how to approach the topic, the researcher refers to a typology that basically focuses on the fulfillment of salvation by Max Weber as well as ethical attitudes. Second, are the Korean new religions discussing mysticism? The researcher answers ‘Yes’ to the question, because most of the founders of the new religions in South Korea are talking about their mysterious religious experiences, and add to that, as a matter of fact, the mysterious religious experiences are being inherited. In regards to the question, the researcher takes a look at a few new spontaneous religions of the Korean new religions such as Donghak, Chondokyo, Jeungsankyo, Won Buddhism, and FFWPU. As the last topic to be investigated in this study, the researcher examines the relation of mysticism in the Korean new religions to Buddhism. All the traditional pieces of mysticism in several religions run into ultimate mysterious experiences at the stage of the absence of ego, and they do testify for such experiences. Those are what other believers in the new religions also do, and consequently, it makes this absence of ego, one of the moments of Buddhist realization, feel very much similar to mysticism of the Korean new religions. In particular, such argument is considered even more reasonable in that the Korean new religions are likely to encounter Buddhism when they try to settle at the beginning.