Kim Beop-rin (金法麟, 27 September 1899 (lunar calendar 23 August) – 14 March 1964) was a Buddhist monk and independence activist during the Japanese colonial period, and a political appointee civil servant of South Korea.
Life
Early life
He was born in Yeongcheon, North Gyeongsang Province, and grew up in Dongnae, South Gyeongsang Province. He became a Buddhist monk and took the Dharma name Beomsan (梵山), and used the pen name Kim Cheol-a (金鐵啞). In 1914, at the age of 14, he entered the monkhood at Eunhaesa, and the following year completed the one-year course at the Myeongjeong School of Beomeosa, after which he finished the Sagyo course at the seminary there. He then entered Hwimoon Higher Common School in Seoul to study new learning, and in 1918 transferred to the Central Buddhist Institute.
Independence movement
During the March 1st Movement of 1919, in Gyeongseong Prefecture, he received the Declaration of Independence from Han Yong-un and led the independence demonstrations at Beomeosa in Dongnae. Shortly before the March 1st Movement broke out, he went up to Seoul as a representative of Beomeosa, and on 4 March, after witnessing the demonstrations in Seoul, he returned to Beomeosa and planned the demonstrations. Accordingly, on 18 March, on the market day of Dongnae-eup, he launched the demonstrations.
After the demonstrations, he evaded the police surveillance network and went into exile in Shanghai in April 1919. At that time he was dispatched as a representative of the Korean National Association Headquarters (韓國民團本部), which had been established within the Buddhist school, the Central Buddhist Institute. The Korean National Association Headquarters was an anti-Japanese secret society formed by several dozen monks from the Central Institute, centered on the monk Baek Cho-wol (白初月). It published the organ "Hyeoksin Gongbo" (革新公報) and carried out activities to collect funds for the independence cause. The Headquarters also dispatched members (部員) to the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea and to areas such as Manchuria, seeking to connect with overseas independence movements.
Dispatched to Shanghai on this mission, he joined the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea and, in the capacity of a representative dispatched to the homeland, re-entered Korea around May 1919. In June 1919, at the request of the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea, he collected and organized materials on Japanese aggression from 1884 to 1910, made copies, and delivered them to the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea. In Korea, in order to convey news of the overseas independence movement, including that of the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea in Shanghai, to the homeland, he published the "Hwashin Gongbo" (華新公報) and distributed it even to rural areas, carrying out propaganda activities. He also went over to Manchuria and published the independence movement organ Hyeoksin Gongbo, which he brought into the country. In Andong-hyeon (安東縣), at Liudaogou (六道溝) in Andong-hyeon, he established a base for the independence movement disguised as the Donggwang Store (東光商店), and while maintaining contact with Shin Sang-wan and Baek Seong-uk in Shanghai and with Kim Sang-heon (金尙憲) and others in Korea, he worked for the unity of monks.
Monastic activities
In 1920 he graduated from the Central Buddhist Institute, and together with Baek Seong-uk, Shin Sang-wan, Kim Dae-hong and others went to Shanghai. In early 1920 he planned the Volunteer Monk Army (義勇僧軍) and entered Korea, but because a fellow member was arrested in advance, he again went into exile in Shanghai. The Volunteer Monk Army plan was discovered beforehand and was not put into practice, but it had been designed to organize monks across the country into a military structure in order to carry out organized anti-Japanese activities.
Immediately after the Volunteer Monk Army plan was thwarted, in 1921 he left for study in France. Although it was not easy for a monk to go abroad for study, he set out to study overseas in order to encounter a broader world and seek the path to national independence within it. While enrolled in the philosophy department of the Faculty of Letters at the University of Paris in France, he also served as a Korean representative in the Congress of Oppressed Peoples (被壓迫民族大會), which was headquartered in Paris, and devoted himself to studying Western liberal thought. He graduated from the philosophy department in 1926, completed his study in France, and returned home in early 1928. In 1928, together with Baek Seong-uk and Kim Sang-ho and others, he sought to revive the Buddhist Youth Association, and in January 1929 he convened the Joseon Buddhism Seon-Gyo Monks' Assembly (朝鮮佛敎禪敎兩宗僧侶大會), devoting himself to the independence of Buddhism. In the spring of 1929 he participated as a preparatory committee member of the Korean Dictionary Compilation Committee sponsored by the Korean Language Society.
Alongside these public activities, he carried on the independence movement through a secret society, namely the association movement of the Manhdang (卍黨). The Manhdang was a strong anti-Japanese secret society organized in May 1930 by monks including Kim Beop-rin, Jo Eun-taek and Park Chang-du under the leadership of Han Yong-un, a leader of the national movement within the Buddhist community. The Manhdang rejected Japan's colonial policy, advocated separation of religion and government (政敎分離), the popularization of Buddhism, and the realization of the spirit of the Buddha, and carried out secret struggle with Dasol Temple (多率寺) in Sacheon, South Gyeongsang Province, as its base. The Manhdang established branches not only in the homeland but even in Tokyo, Japan. Kim Beop-rin, while in charge of the Tokyo branch in 1930, studied Buddhism at Komazawa University (駒澤大學), and in 1931 organized the Joseon Youth League (朝鮮靑年同盟) in Tokyo and carried out the independence movement. From 1933 onward, he lectured on doctrinal studies at Dasol Temple, Haeinsa, Beomeosa and elsewhere, while devoting effort to raising the spirit of independence.
However, because the organization of the Manhdang was discovered by Japanese police at the end of 1938, he was placed under a wanted order as a key figure, and in 1938 he was arrested and imprisoned in Jinju, South Gyeongsang Province.
Shortly after his release from prison, in October 1942 he was again arrested by the police, implicated in the Korean Language Society Incident. At that time, thirty-two members, including him, were arrested by the Japanese, and during the Japanese interrogations they endured for more than two years unspeakable torture, including "burning with fire," "hanging in the air and beating," and "airplane riding." On 16 January 1945, they received a sentence of two years in prison with a four-year suspended sentence from the Hamhung District Court.
After liberation
In the winter of 1945, when liberation came, he was elected as a member of the Buddhist Central General Committee, and met with then U.S. Military Government commander General John R. Hodge, requesting that the Buddhist order be allowed to take over the temples where Japanese monks had resided. When Kim Gu opposed the Moscow Conference of Foreign Ministers and vigorously promoted an anti-trusteeship movement, he became a member of the National Mobilization Committee for Opposition to Trusteeship, which was formed on 30 December.1
Afterward he became chairman of the board of Dongguk Academy, and in March 1948 was appointed by Major General Dean, commander of the U.S. Army Military Government, as a member of the Central Election Committee to administer the May 10 General Election. On 20 August 1949 he was elected as a standing committee member of the Committee for Strengthening the National Front (民族陣營强化委員會),2 and in 1952 he was appointed Minister of Education. In 1953 he became chairman of the Korean National Commission for UNESCO, and he took part in politics, including serving as a member of the National Assembly during the 3rd term. In 1959 he served as chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, and in 1963 he became president of Dongguk University, showing an unusual enthusiasm for fostering talent and education. However, he died in 1964 at the age of 66.
In addition, he served as a member of the Legislative Assembly, a member of the Korean National Inspection Committee, chairman of the Examination Committee, a professor at the Gyeongseong Buddhist Professional School, and vice-principal of the Beomeosa Buddhist Professional Seminary.
Posthumous recognition
- The Government of South Korea bestowed the Order of Independence (独立章) of the Order of Merit for National Foundation upon the deceased in 1995 in commemoration of his merits.
- In August 2008, in the second half issue (No. 43) of the academic journal "Korean History Citizen Lecture," in the special feature "The People Who Founded South Korea" for the 60th anniversary of the founding of South Korea, he was selected as one of the figures in the cultural, religious and press fields when 32 persons who laid the foundations of the nation were chosen.3
References
- Kim Beop-rin: Independence Patriot Merit Record - Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs
- Kim Beop-rin - Korean Constitutional Association
- Buddhapia
- Meiji Hyakunenshi Series (Kim Jeong-myeong), Vol. 1, Part 1, p. 398
- History of Japanese Aggression against Korea over 36 Years (National History Compilation Committee), Vol. 8, p. 704
- History of the Korean Independence Movement (Mun Il-min), pp. 97, 174
- History of the Independence Movement (Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs), Vol. 3, pp. 187, 189, 338, 883, 884
- History of the Independence Movement (Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs), Vol. 8, pp. 501, 869, 873–875, 880–882, 890, 892, 999, 1011, 1015
- History of the Independence Movement (Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs), Vol. 9, pp. 177, 262
- Dong-a Ilbo (16 January 1928, 23 March 1928)
Footnotes