This course will be an overview of a development of the theological methods in relation to Korea’s cultural context. Completing the course, the learners can understand cultural influences on the dynamic development of Korean churches and indigenous theology; they can also gain an insight into their own image of God and theological imagination in their own cultural context.
How 'God as Spirit' Transforms Us
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Del curso dictado por Yonsei University
Re-imaging God in Korean Context
17 calificaciones
De la lección
God as Spirit: Where Pentecostal Spirituality and Liberationist Spirituality Meet
The last module will first examine how shamanistic beliefs affected the healing ministry of Christianity through the Pentecostal movement in Korea. The module will show that both the Korean Pentecostal group and the liberationist group can commonly interpret God as Spirit to be a fundamental base for their theological imagination.
Conoce a los instructores
Soo-Young KwonProfessor
College of Theology
Let me turn to the shamanic performance of Dr Chung.
Perhaps she is taking the position of Minjung theologians.
She understands that Han is an important bedrock for
recognizing the existence of the holy spirit.
Meanwhile, Chung seemed to practice a shamanic ritual
within a Christian setting.
Chung is of course, not a member of the Pentecostal Church.
This can be appreciated positively as the power of
God as the spirit that transforms preexistent faith.
On the other hand, one can view it negatively as religious syncretism.
In both Pentecostal Christianity and Shamanism,
human responsibility is limited to discovering what one
can do to live in God's grace or in harmony with the spirits.
Descent of the Holy Spirit in Christianity,
the sense of the Pentecostals, and possession by ancestral and
other spirits in Shamanism enable individuals
to transcend their personal limitations.
Both traditions advocate conservative, conforming, acquiescent social behavior.
Yet Harvey Cox shows us his interest in possibility of
a convergence between Pentecostalism and Minjung theology in Korea.
He reminds us that second generation theologians such as Hyun Kyung Chung
can develop a style of Christianity in Korea that combines the primal
energy of shamanism with the vigor of the Pentecostal
evangelism and the passion for justice of Minjung theology.
Here we should take up Cox's basic idea that it begins a formulation
of 21st century theology with the issue of primal spirituality.
So for Koreans, it is essential that we seek a common denominator for
Pentecostal spirituality and Liberationist spirituality.
In this module, this is why I have discussed the healing for
the Han based on the Korean traditional understanding of the spirit,
that is wandering spirits.
Ancestral spirits and benevolent and evil spirits and so forth.
Of course, the differences between Korean Shamanism and
Pentecostal Christianity lie mainly in the sources and manner of their seeking.
However, their basic similarities arise from the common needs
of Christian Minjung, especially women, and Minjung who patronize Shamans.
These needs are their biological, mental, spiritual, social Han.
What Chung is doing in her provocative ritual is to heal
the Han of the departed ones.
Her focus on invoking the departed souls seems to resemble a shamanic healing.
However, her original aim for the ritual was a new recognition of Han.
Recognition is an important prescription in the process of psychotherapy.
In his article, Cruelty is Not Destiny, Abraham and
the psychodynamics of childhood.
Micheal Lerner suggests a new understanding of recognition
in the field of psychotherapy.
Quote, recognition is a fundamental human need.
Human beings are fundamentally in need of other human beings.
Much of the recent work in psychoanalytic object relation theory
has shown that human beings form their own sense of self in relationship to others.
My own conception of recognition goes beyond this tradition.
The tradition of psychoanalytic object relation theory, to encompass the human
need to be recognized by God and to recognize the God within each other.
And to be recognized by others as an embodiment of God.
Potentially capable of joining in partnership with God
to transform the world to a state of deeper self-consciousness,
love, mutual involvement, freedom and consciousness, end of quote.
In a Shaman like ritual, a group psychotherapy,
Chung demonstrates the need to be recognized by the Han embodied God.
And to recognize God, especially the Holy Spirit,
the feminine image of Jesus, within each other.
And to be recognized by others as a Han bearer.
In Chung's Shamanic ritual,
the divine healing first that makes it possible to be freed from the chain of
violence, injustice and that is the first she calls Han.
It is at a moment of recognition that we feel the Holy Spirit.
This is also when real healing and liberation take place.
Neither the Pentecostal nor Liberationists can be excluded since God's spirit,
enables them to feel, recognize the Han.
The metrics of comprehensive suffering in which they are all implicated.
That is the very condition for their entry into new forms of relationships.
In the final part of this MOOC course, we're entitled to conclude that
God's revelation has been reconstructed by the creative work of theology.
That interprets the Bible and the symbol, Christ, God,
and the Spirit in relation to contemporary
problems of human existence in the context of Korea.
That is, the religious, cultural, social, and political context of Korea.
Revelation is ceaselessly reinterpreted by the image of God which reflects
various experiences in multiple human contexts of the historical process.
In this sense, the theological work based on imagination
should be communicative and dialogical.
As a symbol, Heaven is culturally rooted in Koreans'
illusionistic world, especially the world of religion.
I have examined the cultural complexity in the understanding of Heaven.
And then I have proposed especially that two opposite cultural meanings,
transcendent and immanent, have been working for the Christian symbol of God.
I think that this is hard to demonstrate, but it is a very useful postulation.
Through which I can diagnose the developmental
history of Korean Protestantism and Korean theology.
In his essay, Christian Redemption Between Colonial Dualism and Pluralism theologian,
Francis Schissler Florenza proposes that Christian redemption and
salvation should be transformative praxis of Christian vision.
A vision that is to be put into practice and communicate.
Florenza Portrays truthfully the radical plurality
that is containing religious, cultural, social and
political context of our contemporary situation.
By posing dialectically the two issues of pluralism,
religio-cultural orientation and colonialism,
socio-political dimension.
The practical communicative and transformative nature of redemption
should also be requisite of all creative constructions for theology.
I would very much like to demonstrate that Korean Christian leaders and
theologians have interpreted the Christian faith and
commitment to the gospel of Jesus Christ.
In order to understand the Christian faith, and
to communicate that faith in a manner that evokes an active
response such as liberation and healing that is praxis.
Francis Fiorenza states,
dialogue aims not merely at the acknowledgement of other positions, but
also at a transformative practice for one's self and for others.
As such, dialogical imagination of Minjung theology,
exactly aims at a transformative praxis.
We are still left with the problems of our imaginative world for future reflection.
However as Fiorenza puts it, the answer
is left to a future praxis and to a future and
greater judge than human reason and criteria.
Re-imaging for our theological construction goes on.
And yet, we should critically reconstruct the image and/or concept of God.
And manifest faith and praxis of faith through the radically
pluralistic understanding of the revelation of the one true God.
Finally, I'm going to ask some crucial questions that you can meditate on deeply.
Read the following dialogue.
The child, aged 5, woke up in the middle of the night with a slight temperature.
He watched as the soluble aspirin dissolved in the fizzing water and
then drank it.
He lay down and got ready for sleep.
Child says, why do adults have two aspirin but children only have a half?
Parents says, it's related to the size of your body.
How?
The bigger your body is, the more you can take.
If your body is very big, like the body of an adult, then two aspirins dissolve and
spread around the whole body rather thinly.
But if your body is rather small, like that of a child,
then it only has to be half an aspirin to spread around the little body.
And my body is bigger than Lizzie's.
Lizzie is his younger sister.
Yes, and Lizzie's body is big compared to Gabriel's.
Gabriel is a little brother.
After a pause.
And Gabriel's body is big to God's.
Is God's body very small then?
Well, it's small in a way when it goes into something,
but when it comes out and goes into everything, then it's the whole world.
Yes, God's body is very big because in a way it is the whole world.
Hm, what is God's body then,
is it small or is it large?
Child says both.
How would you assess the child's imagination of God?
How does his image of God differ from yours?
It seems that the child in the dialogue imagines God as immanent.
Do you have any example that young children see this kind of God
present in their midst?
We are often told that people say, I'm not religious, but spiritual!
How would you respond to their claim?
Can you imagine how they imagine God?
As the subtitle of Harvey Cox's Book on worldwide Pentecostalism suggests,
do you agree that the Pentecostal church is reshaping
the religion of the 21st century in your own culture?
If not, how would you revise his argument?
Although interest in spirituality has been intensifying in many disciplines,
there is no general consensus about how to define spirituality.
What is your own definition of spirituality?
When defining the concept of spirituality,
one always needs to include contextual meanings of spirituality.
Even in a religious context, we need to understand and
recognize the differences from historical, societal, and cultural perspectives.
Rather than assume the universal view of spirituality.
Examine your concept of spirituality in terms of
your own historical, societal, and cultural perspectives.
What could you learn from the Korean shamanistic belief and
practices as an underlying,
primal spirituality working for Christians in this module?
How does it affect the way you explore your own primal
spirituality in your cultural context?
Unfortunately, I do not have enough time to explain the history and ministry of
the Korean Pentecostal churches, such as Yoido Full Gospel Church.
Lee Young-hoon is the senior pastor of Yoido Full Gospel Church.
And he is a proud graduate from the College of Theology of Yonsei University.
He has published a very detailed guide book on the Pentecostal movement in Korea.
If you are eager to know its historical and
theological development then his book might be the first option.
In the last module and this module, I have highlighted the concept of Han.
Which is the keynote issue, not only for socially oriented Christians seeking
liberation, but also for Pentecostal Christians seeking healing ministry.
I already mentioned Andrew Sung Park's book, Wounded Heart of God in this module.
I would strongly recommend his book, for
those who seek to further explore the Korean collected mind and
ethos in relation to Korean theological imaginations.
I hope you have enjoyed listening to this module and my entire MOOC course.
Thank you so much for your time and interest.
May God be with you in your endeavor to explore and emerge in God.
Goodbye everyone, God bless you all.
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