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The Meaning of Liberation between Minjung Theology and Latin American Theology

  • The Korean Journal of Chiristian Social Ethics
  • Abbr : 기사윤
  • 2012, (24), pp.125-150
  • Publisher : The Society Of Korean Christian Social Ethics
  • Research Area : Humanities > Christian Theology

박삼경 1

1서울신학대학교

Accredited

ABSTRACT

A theology reflects a particular situation. Emerging from a particular social reality, theology exposes the truth of a situation and then brings this concrete reality to bear on the Bible and all religious thought. Minjung theology emerged from the oppressed political and economic situation of the Korean people between 1970 and 1980, a different situation from which traditional Western faith-based theologies emerged. What defines minjung theology is the “minjung experience.” Minjung theology contends that the experience of han among the minjung has to be given epistemological privilege, and that the minjung are active agents engaged in achieving their own liberation. The experience of han is central to the ideology or worldview of the minjung. Han also serves as the key to understanding why minjung cannot be separated from a praxis for liberation. Minjung theology and Latin American theology are based on the self-awakening of the poor in Korea and Latin America as well as their struggles for survival. Both have their own voices and are based on specific and particular experiences. Both theologies refused to uncritically accept European-based theology. They emerge from political,economical, and religious-cultural situations different from those which constitute the basis for European and American theologies. Even though the content and method of minjung and Latin American Theologies are distinct, they share the goal of liberation and empowerment of those who have suffered for centuries in poverty and political oppression as a result of long periods of colonialism the minjung of Korea and the pueblo of Latin America. In this paper, I will explore the notion of liberation in Latin American theology, focusing specifically on the work of Gustavo Gutiérrez, the first theologian to elaborate a Latin America liberation theology. I will then examine the meaning of liberation in minjung theology, a 20th-century Korean liberation theology that emerged from the context of oppression and injustice during the Park regime in South Korea. The understanding of liberation in both these theologies is central to ethical-theological meanings and both link liberation to the Kingdom of God. In discussing the Kingdom of God, I will focus on the work of minjung theologians Ahn Byung Mu and Suh Nam Dong. These men all are first generation minjung theologians, the teachers from whom I personally heard the centrality of Kingdom of God through their vision of liberation for all Korean people. In conclusion, I seek to make clear how working for the implementation of the Kingdom of God is central to any elaboration of Korean Christian ethics the work of liberation in Korea. In doing so, I propose a liberation ethics of Kingdom of God.

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