율곡의 性理學과 禪學의 만남에 대한 小考

Abstract

Yulgok(1536-1584) with his mother Saimdang’s prenatal education, was born with bright and genius quality but also with beautiful human nature. For example, he learnedto speak and read at the age of 3 and became well known as a good son when he became 5. At the age of 6 he learned from his mother about 4 Books of Confucianism and next year he wrote the Story of Jinbok-chang to criticize the behavior of powerful Jin in Chinese. It was an evidence of him to achieve justice from his learning of Confucius and Mencius’ teaching. At the age of 16 his mother passed away. After completing funeral ritual in the Confucian manner, he decided to go to Bongeun Temple in Seoul after experiencing the agony of losing his mother. For the meaningless value of life or death, he started to read Buddhist books and when to Geumgang mountain at the age of 19. There, Yulgok communicated with many Buddhist monks while maintaining the Confucius manners. He talked about Buddhist manuscripts and learn about zen. His learning of Zen started from the filial piety, it became philosophical ambition to learn about zen when he went Geumgang Mountain. Yulgok became Buddhist in a short period of time withstrong criticism from the Confucian scholars, he learned to see the world not compete or ignore, but unify. It was an influence of Buddhism and as a result, Yulgok’s thought became profound and became one of the greatest thinkers in Korea.