亡國과 絶命, 동아시아 지식인의 忠義의 일면 - 조선의 黃玹과 유구의 林世功을 중심으로 -

Abstract

Taking a sharper look into correlations between national collapse and death, this study aimed to consider East Asian intellectuals who took their own lives in the wake of national collapse as an attempt to resist powers of the outer world or show the spirits of loyalty, and benevolence and righteousness towards their motherland or monarch. In particular, the research discussed Yugu's Yim Se-gong(林世功) and a poem that he wrote while dying or Sasesi(辭世詩) that have yet to be known to the academic circles of Korea, presuming that death in the aftermath of national collapse may be a reflection of loyalty that East Asian intellectuals had kept based on Confucianism. As a result, this study found East Asian figures discussed here who committed suicide after collapse of their nation had in common that all of them were under the very influence of Confucian ideas. For instance, Maecheon Hwang Hyeon said in his suicidal note that he would end his life by himself to practice things he had learned as a man of knowledge. Here, the things indicate Confucian studies. Similarly, Yim Se-gong had studied at Gukjagam in Beijing, China so that he was a learned man who had Confucianism deeply inside. Besides, Ching's Wang Yi-rong and Joseon's Min Yeong-hwan were unexceptional as Confucian thinkers. In conclusion, figures on which the study focused like Hwang Hyeon and Yim Se-gong, and even Wang Yi-rong and Min Yeong-hwan were all those who killed themselves when their own country perished in order to practice the spirits of loyalty, benevolence and righteousness that they had learned and mastered. Their deaths fueled the awareness of independence against powers from the outside and strongly wakened other intellectuals to become more responsible. And, main ideas that the figures pursued were those which Confucianism emphasizes such as observance of grand cause or Chunchudaeeui(春秋大義), the spirit of fidelity or that of Euri(義理), responsiveness as Confucian scholars or the spirit of being Seonbi, and Juyoksinsa(主辱臣死) which means the subject's death in retaliation for humiliation sustained by the monarch.