Should People Blame Sangje for Evil and Suffering?—Dasan Jeong Yakyong’s Reformulation of the Confucian Problem of Evil through His Re-interpretation of the Poem Tang

I. Introduction

Dasan Jeong Yakyong 茶山 丁若鏞 (1762-1836) is regarded as one of the greatest philosophers in the Joseon dynasty (1392-1897). Being dissatisfied with the official Jujahak ("school of Zhu Xi"), as a major figure of the Silhak ("school of practical studies"), Dasan re-interpreted Four Books and Five Classics with the help of Qing dynasty Chinese philology, Classic studies, Western thoughts, and even Catholicism. The inclusiveness and progressiveness of his philosophy contrast with the conservative Jujahak scholars at that time, making Dasan a unique philosopher.

Dasan's emphasis on the concept of Sangje 上帝 as a personal God and moral judge in his re-interpretations of Four Books and Five Classics, evidenced by his analysis of Tang from the Book of Odes, outstood his philosophy among mainline Confucian interpreters. Zhu Xi regarded Di 帝 (synonym of Sangje) merely as a metaphor for Heaven, a principle but not a personal God: "The Book of Odes seems to claim that there is a person [in Heaven] above, e.g. 'Di is angry.' But it only means there is a principle. All under Heaven revere the principle, so it is named Di."¹ Similarly, Kong suggested that Sangje in Tang² is merely a metaphor for the monarch, as we shall see in this paper (Kong 1999, 17.4:1144).³ Since Korean Confucians were influenced by both Kong's and Zhu's traditions, as we shall see in the following, the mainline Korean interpreters also rarely interpreted Sangje as a personal God.

The trend of not regarding Sangje as a personal God among Chinese (and also Korean) Confucians may be explained by Mou Zong-san. In his Xinti yu Xingti 心體與性體 (Mind Substance and Nature Substance), Mou argued that from Mengzi onward Confucians intentionally shifted their emphasis from religion to metaphysics. As Mou said:

Di 帝 and Tian 天 in the Book of Odes and the Book of Documents were all encountered transcendently, as both referred to a personal God. But they are transformed into a moral and metaphysical substance through Kongzi’s Ren 仁 and Mengzi’s mind nature. From then on, the transcendent Heaven and the immanent mind nature are unified. Both Di, Tian, and the mind nature become the jigan zhenji 寂感真機 (“silent moment of mystical experience”) of the creation of the universe or morality. From this perspective, the “transcendent encounter of Heaven” (duiyue zaitian 對越在天) becomes an immanent encounter (naizai didui 內在地對), which is known as the manifestation through the observing subject (Ditichengdang 覿體承當). (Mou 2003, 26)

While Mou acknowledged the religious aspects of the Book of Odes and the Book of Documents, he highlighted that from Kongzi and Mengzi onwards, Confucians “de-religionize” the texts by re-interpreting Ti and Dian as metaphysical foundations of morality, because they intentionally “de-religionize” and “philosophilize” the texts. Nevertheless, the religious aspects of both classics were rediscovered by Jesuit missionaries in the sixteenth century. In Joachim Bouvet’s (1656–1730) Gujin Jingtianjian 古今敬天鑒, Bouvet listed several citations from Four Books and Five Classics, including Tang, arguing that ancient Confucians also believed in a monotheistic and personal God and therefore Catholicism is consistent with Confucianism. Bouvet argued that “if the people who are created and governed by Heaven are rational and spiritual, how can the creating and governing Heaven not be rational and spiritual?”⁴ From this perspective, one may argue that missionaries and Confucians influenced by Catholicism (including Dasan) “re-religionize” Tang by rediscovering its religious dimension which had been disregarded by former Confucian interpreters.

Owing to his Catholic family background, Dasan had already studied Western thoughts in his teenage. The clan of Jeong was powerful during King Jeongjo’s 正祖 (1752–1800) reign (1776–1800) when Dasan’s father Jeong Jaewon 丁載遠 (1730-1792) had a strong link with the powerful minister and the leader of the Sipa 時派 sect Chae Jegong 蔡濟恭 (1720-1799). Dasan’s brother Jeong Yakjong 丁若鍾 (1760-1801) was the leader of the first Catholic community in Korea and a good friend of Yi Byeok 李蘗 (1754-1786), who introduced Western thoughts and Catholicism from Jesuits in China to Korea. Besides, Dasan was also influenced by the Western studies of Udam Jeong Sihan 愚潭 丁時翰 (1625-1707, of the same clan) and Seongho Yi Ik 星湖 李瀷 (1681-1763) whose teaching was taught by Dasan’s father (Keum 2000, 186).

Yet following the sudden death of King Jeongjo in 1800, Sipa 時派 lost power while the Byeokpa 辟派⁵ seized power and launched the Sinyu Persecution in 1801. Three hundred Catholics were executed, including Dasan’s brother Jeong Yakjong, and others were exiled. Dasan began his 18 years of exile when most of his poems and books were written. Owing to his traumatic experience and safety concerns, Dasan never explicitly confessed or even discussed Christian faith in his surviving writings. As a result, how “Catholic” is Dasan’s philosophy becomes a controversial issue. Some scholars like Don Baker (2004) and Tsai Cheng-Feng (2012) insist that Dasan is not a Catholic and merely rediscovered the religiousness of Confucianism by re-interpreting Four Books and Five Classics with the help of philology. Others like Kevin Cawley (2014), Lin Yueh-hui (2022), and Gim Gyeol (2020) argue that Dasan’s re-interpretations of Four Books and Five Classics are largely inspired by Catholicism, remarkably his concept of Sangje as a personal, creator and monotheistic God, largely influenced by Matteo Ricci’s Tianzhu shiyi, as we shall see below.

Considering the Catholic background of Dasan’s family, this paper adopts a Catholic/Christian reading of Dasan’s philosophy and argues that Dasan’s Confucian-Christian re-interpretation of the poem Tang from the Book of Documents where he discusses the people’s resentment against Sangje (上帝, God) provides a solution to the problem of evil and suffering, although such a re-interpretation contradicts the context of the Book of Odes. Below is the argument flow of this paper:

• 1. Dasan regarded people’s resentment against Sangje expressed in Tang as a religious problem of evil and suffering rather than merely a political analogy.
• 2. Influenced by Catholicism, Dasan argued that according to Tang these people’s resentment is unjustified as disasters result from these people’s wrongdoings.
• 3. The context of the Decade of Tang from the Book of Odes justifies people’s resentment against Sangje and blames Sangje for causing evil and suffering.
• 4. Statement (2) contradicts statement (3).
• 5. Therefore, Dasan’s re-interpretation of Tang as a solution to the problem of evil and suffering implies a criticism of the Decade of Tang from the Book of Odes.

By investigating Dasan’s re-religionization of the poem Tang in light of recent research on the relationship between Catholicism and Dasan’s philosophy, this paper reveals the uniqueness of Dasan’s interpretation of the text: although the perfect good of Sangje was also acknowledged by other interpreters, they rarely acknowledge Sangje as a perfectly good judge but merely the fundamental moral principle. As mentioned above, Zhu Xi argued that Sangje is not a personal God but just a synonym of Heaven (天) and principle (理). By contrast, inspired and influenced by Catholicism, Dasan understood Sangje in terms of a personal God and argued that the author of Tang denounced people’s resentment against Sangje because Sangje was not responsible for evil and suffering. In the following section, I will explain why this paper advocates a Catholic interpretation of Dasan’s philosophy.

II. Literature Review

To understand Dasan’s philosophy, one must understand the academic tradition of Silhak in advance. According to Keum Jang-tae:

Although orthodox Dohak 道學 ["the studies of the Way"] Neo-Confucianism continued to be the thought that dominated society, people began to become deeply aware of its abuses and criticized its conservative and rigid stance. Intellectual unrest arose in many quarters of society and, through this, a reform theory was developed together with a movement to accept Qing China’s more developed civilization. During this time factional powers appeared, rejecting not only metaphysics but also basic Confucian concepts. The conflict between orthodox Confucianism, which considered metaphysical theory as its basic principle, and Western thought became one of the problems of the time. (Keum 2000, 184)

Keum identified two Korean intellectual sources of Dasan’s philosophy: the Bukhak school (北學派) and the Seongho school (星湖學派). The Bukhak school, or the "school of utilisation and welfare" (利用厚生派) (Keum 2000, 140), was led by Hong Daeyong 洪大容 (1731-1783), Bak Jiwon 朴趾源 (1737-1805), and Bak Jega 朴齊家 (1750-1815), who had all participated in diplomatic visits to the Manchurian Qing dynasty and were amazed by the Manchurian civilization and Western thoughts and therefore challenged the official Cheng Zhu school (particularly Jujahak). Hong Daeyong refuted Yingyan Wuxin 陰陽五行 cosmology and a China-centred worldview, while Bak Jiwon and Bak Jega criticized the idealistic moral ideology of the scholars of Jujahak scholars and called for promoting utility and social welfare for the improvement of people’s living standards (Keum 2000, 140). While their emphasis on improving people’s living influenced Dasan’s major work Mongmin Simseo 牧民心書 (The Chief Minister's Instructions), unlike Dasan, philosophers of the Bukhak school respected yet did not accept Catholicism.

By contrast, scholars of the Seongho school were divided on whether to accept Catholicism. Yi Ik, the founder of the school, seems to be compassionate to Catholicism. Since Yi Ik was interested in Western thoughts and read Matteo Ricci’s Tianzhu Shiyi 天主實義. As Keum notes, “While recognizing Western superiority in the field of astronomy and calendrical science and finding areas of mutual agreement between Catholicism and Confucianism on matters of ethics, Yi Ik rejected the idea of heaven and hell, choosing instead to keep the Confucian position” (Keum 2000, 186). While Yi Ik’s appreciation of Catholicism was condemned by his conservative student and the well-known historian An Jeongbok 安鼎福 (1712–1791), the majority of Yi Ik’s followers, including Yi Byeok and Jeong Yakjong, were converted to Catholicism (Cawley 2012). Influenced by his father, uncles, and brothers, Dasan studied Yi Ik’s writings early in his teenage and was influenced by Yi Ik’s studies of the Book of Odes. In Dasan’s later writings, he often appreciated Yi Ik’s philosophy and had written a poem praising Yi Ik titled Bakhak 博學 (erudition) (Jeong 1963, I-2:63). As Kim Sugyeong indicated, like Yi Ik, Dasan did not merely criticize or appreciate Zhu Xi or Kong Yingda’s commentaries but highlighted comparative studies of texts to verify which interpretations are more consistent (Kim 2012, 228). This is one of the reasons why Dasan’s understanding of Tang is more similar to Zhu Xi’s than Kong Yingda’s, as we shall see in the following.

Nevertheless, being influenced by advances in philology in seventeenth-century China, both the Seongho school and the Bukhak school challenged the Neo-Confucian (remarkably Zhu Xi’s) interpretations of Four Books and Five Classics. The Qian-Jia school (乾嘉學派) in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries employed philological methods to re-interpret Confucian texts. They argued that one should investigate the etymology of every character of the text to reconstruct the original meanings. The methodology of the Qian-Jia school was appreciated by Bak Jega and adopted by Kim Jeonghui 金正喜 (1786–1856) (Keum 2000, 144) and Dasan (Keum 2000, 183). Yet as we shall see, Dasan did not follow the Qian-Jia interpretation of Tang but presented a Christian and Western studies-inspired reformulation of the text.

Dasan’s emphasis on the concept of Sangje in his interpretations of Four Books and Five Classics is often regarded as evidence that Dasan was a Catholic. Yet some scholars disagree that Dasan was a Catholic. Baker argues that Sangje was just a term for the ruler of the universe in the Book of Documents. “Tasan [Dasan] called God the ruler of the cosmos, not the creator . . . . His God was solely a moral force. That was what made him a Confucian God” (Baker 2004, 174). Likewise, Tsai Chen-Feng argues that Sangje in Dasan’s context is very different from the Christian God, for Sangje was not a final judge but is merely a source of human good nature (Tsai 2012, 145). Tsai also argues that Dasan highlighted the concept of Sangje for three reasons: re-emphasising sacrifices to Heaven in Five Classics, re-interpreting the ritual of sacrifice as an essential moral practice, and grounding a “settling point of eternity or transcendence” so that one may find peace and comfort (Tsai 2012, 152). Nevertheless, while Tsai’s observation aligns with Mou’s argument that the concept of a personal God was embedded in Confucian classics (yet intentionally rejected by Mengzi), Tsai failed to explain why Dasan would “rediscover” and “reassert” the idea of Sangje if Dasan was not inspired by Catholicism.

This paper rejects the non-Catholic interpretations above and is in favor of a Catholic interpretation for severaln reasons. Firstly, as Kevin Cawley quotes from Dasan, Baker’s argument contradicts Dasan’s writings where Dasan acknowledges Sangje as creator: “Who is Sangje? Sangje is a being that creates [造化; K. johwa], governs [宰制; K. chaeje] and sustains [安養; K. anyang] heaven, earth, spirits, humans and all things, but also transcends them” (Cawley 2014, 309).⁶ It should be noticed that Johwa 造化 and Anyang 安養 are both terms used by Ricci when explaining the concept of a creator God. The first chapter of Tianzhu Shiyi was titled as “Tianzhu began to institute, manipulate and sustain Heaven, the earth and all beings” (Ricci n.d., I:1).⁷ In the same dialogue, the Chinese scholar also used the term Johwa when he asked that “what are the evidence for the institution and creation of all beings in the beginning [of the universe]?” (Ricci n.d., I:4).⁸ Considering the Catholic background of Dasan’s family, it is likely that Dasan adopted the terms Johwa⁹ and Anyang from Christianity but attributed them to Sangje rather than Tianzhu.

Secondly, contrary to Tsai’s belief, Dasan acknowledged Sangje as a moral judge. As Dasan nclaimed when interpreting the Book of Document, “rewards are known as Heavenly command while punishments are known as Heavenly penalty.”¹⁰ As demonstrated in this article, in Dasan’s writings, Heaven is equivalent to Sangje. Since the concepts of God as creator and moral judge were emphasized by Matteo Ricci’s writings which Dasan was familiar with, Dasan’s concept of Sangje as creator and moral judge is likely inspired by Christianity rather than merely from interpretations of the Four Books and the Five Classics.

Finally, Dasan’s acknowledgement of Sangje as a personal and monotheistic God clearly suggests that his philosophy is strongly influenced by Catholicism. When Dasan interpreted Mencius 7A.1, “by exhausting one’s mind, one knows one’s nature. Knowing one’s nature, one knows Heaven,” in terms of the concept of Sangje, he explicitly claimed that Sangje is a personal and monotheistic God. Dasan challenged Cheng Yi’s (1033–1107) interpretation that “the mind, the nature and Heaven are one principle (li 理),” because “The principle has no love or hatred. The principle has no joy or anger. It is empty and silent with no name and no substance. If we received our nature from such a principle, it can hardly manifest the way to us.”¹¹ Here Dasan argued that if human nature is received from Heaven, there must be one acting subject who assigns human nature to all human beings. Such a subject can only be Sangje, as Dasan continued, “The Lord of Heaven is Sangje. Sangje is named Heaven just as a monarch is named as a nation.”¹² Therefore, it is appropriate to regard Dasan as a Catholic-inspired interpreter of Confucian classics.

However, while Dasan’s concept of Sangje is inspired by Catholicism, there are differences between Dasan’s Sangje and God in Catholic doctrines, which are not mentioned by Cawley but discussed by Lin. As Lin argued, Dasan seems to only accept the concept of natural revelation but not the supernatural revelation in Catholicism.

Jeong should be familiar with and accept the natural revelation which understands Shangdi [Sangje] through reason. But Jeong cannot easily accept the historical revelation revealed by supernatural revelation in Catholicism, including the final judgement by Shangdi, teaching on heaven and hell, Jesus’ incarnation and death on the cross. In this sense, there are still differences between “Shangdi” in Western studies and the Confucian “Shangdi” emphasized by Jeong. (Lin 2020, 17)

As Ivanhoe indicated, “There is no doubt that this tradition [i.e. Catholicism] influenced his thinking, but it is mistaken to regard him as imposing Catholic views onto Confucianism. He was inspired by Catholicism, but he drew upon and his thought very much follows the trajectory of the early Confucian tradition” (Ivanhoe 2016, 234). Therefore, this paper suggests that Dasan’s re-interpretation of Sangje is inspired and influenced by Catholic and Western studies and acknowledged the differences between Dasan’s Sangje and God in Catholicism.

Based upon the evidence above, this paper adopts Cawley’s argument that Dasan’s writings are influenced by Ricci’s Tianzhu Shiyi and Sangje in Dasan’s context refers to a monotheistic and personal God “who replaces Neo-Confucian metaphysical concepts.” The following section analyses how Dasan’s Catholic understanding of Sangje influences his re-religionization of the poem Tang and distinguishes him from other interpreters.

III. Traditional Interpretations of the Concept of Sangje in Tang

This section summarizes the traditional concept and Korean interpretations of Sangje in Tang and argues that none of them have ever discussed the text in light of the problem of evil and suffering which assumed the existence of an omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent personal God. Chinese philologists from the Han dynasty (202 BCE–9 CE, 25–220 CE) and the Tang dynasty (618–907) argued that Sangje in Tang is a metaphor for the emperor and therefore the poem is not religious but political. By contrast, Zhu Xi identified Tang as a “poem of blaming Heaven” (怨天之辭) and argued that people were angry with Sangje just because they failed to keep the Heavenly command and therefore suffered from their wrongdoings. Zhu Xi’s interpretation was adopted by the Korean Neo-Confucian interpreters from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries. In other words, people’s resentment against Sangje for disasters was unjustified from Zhu Xi’s perspective.

Tang 蕩 is a poem from the decade of Tang, the section of the Greater Odes (大雅 Daya), the Book of Odes. The Greater Odes is a collection of poems written by noblemen during the Western Zhou dynasty (1045–771 BCE). According to Kong Yingda’s 孔穎達 (574–648) Maoshi Zhengyi (毛詩正義), the Chinese word ya 雅 refers to “correction. It means that the currently corrected will be the examples for future generations.”¹³ In other words, for Kong, the main ideas of poems from the Greater Odes are about political or moral teachings: poets thought there was something wrong in the nation that needed to be “corrected.” As a result, when Qian-Jia philologists from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries restored the Han dynasty (202 BCE–9 CE, 25–220 CE) tradition of interpretations, they were inclined to regard Tang solely as a political analogy rather than a religious poem, even though the text itself looks religious. Below is the text of the poem Tang:

Grand is God on high (Sangje), he is the ruler of the people below;
Terrible is God on high, his charge has many rules.
Heaven gives birth to the multitudinous people,
But its charge is not to be relied on;
There is nobody who has not a beginning, but few can have a (normal) end. (Karlgren 1974, 214)¹⁴

According to Kong’s commentary, this poem is a poem where Duke Mu of Zhao (召穆公, ?–?) satirized the tyranny and the lawlessness of the reign of the King Li of Zhou (周厲王, ?–828 BCE). Kong underscores:

This poem means that the one who destroyed laws was the king of Sangje who was lawless and became the ruler of the people below. It also means that the king implemented lawless commands, heavy taxation and cruel punishment. Such a person is the king of Sangje and the commands of his governance are evil [邪僻 xiepi]. . . . Heaven desired people to be faithful, yet the king taught people to be evil and people lost their faithfulness. All people had their original minds inclining to the Way of goodness yet a few of them remained virtuous in the end. Now they all follow the evil fashion . . . .¹⁵

But why did the poet use the term “Sangje” if he aimed to criticize the king, not Heaven? Kong explained:

Sangje is another name for Heaven. Heaven never turns wicked and cannot be used in the poem Tang, therefore Sangje is known as a metaphor for the king. This suggests that the poet dared not to condemn the king and used Sangje as a metaphor.¹⁶

Here Kong agreed with Dasan that Sangje and Heaven are synonyms. Yet Kong’s argument is inconsistent: if Sangje and Heaven are synonyms and yet the term Heaven is not appropriate for the poem Tang, why would Sangje only be an appropriate term? Did Kong suggest that Sangje could turn wicked, but Heaven could not?

Being not aware of such an inconsistency, Kong continued to justify his argument that Sangje is the metaphor for the king by quoting Mao Heng’s 毛亨 (? –?) commentary on the poem Pan 板 that “Sangje refers to the name of the king. . . . Using Heaven and Sangje as metaphors for the king is a common practice in the Book of Odes.”¹⁷

Even though Kong’s interpretation of Tang is inconsistent, his authoritative commentary was accepted by Qian-Jia philologists. For instance, Chen Qiyuan’s 陳啟源 (?–1683/1689) An Exegesis on Mao’s Poems (毛詩稽古編卷) argued that “Sangje refers to the King Li and this poem mocked his lawlessness.”¹⁸ Wang Xianqian’s 王先謙 (1842–1917) Collected Commentaries on Book of Odes by Three Traditions (詩三家義集疏) also agreed that the poem is a satire of King Li’s tyranny: “According to the tradition of Lu, Tang is the same as Pi (evil) . . . ‘Terrible is Sangje, his charge has many rules’ refers to unjust [governance].”¹⁹ None of them acknowledge Tang as a poem blaming Heaven or Sangje.

Like Qian-Jia philologists, some Korean interpreters also agreed with Kong’s interpretations. According to Kim, unlike conservative scholars, Seong Haeeung 成海應 (1760–1839) argued that to have a comprehensive understanding of Confucian texts, one should not only study commentaries written in Song dynasty but also commentaries written in Han dynasty (Kim 2012, 182). Kim said:

“Grand is Sangje, he is the ruler of the people below.” This refers to the Way of the monarch should be great. But why is now Sangje terrible, and why does his charge have many rules? Because the Heavenly command is not constant and only enacts the moral. Someone received the enactment initially but lost his initial goodness and lost his enactment in the end. So it is said that “few can have a (normal) end.” (Seong 2006, 3:4)²⁰

When replying to King Jeongjo’s questions, Choe Byeok 崔壁 (1762–1813) also replied: “This poem was written to mock King Li.”²¹ Dasan may have heard of these commentaries on Tang written by Seong and Choe, for Seong was a senior to Dasan while Choe is Dasan’s junior working in the royal library (Gyujanggak 奎章閣). Yet, unlike Seong and Choe, Dasan did not read Tang merely as a political analogy.

By contrast, although Zhu Xi agreed that the poem Tang is a political metaphor, he disagreed with Kong’s interpretation and identified Tang as “words of blaming Heaven” (怨天之辭). Zhu Xi said:

Tang means “great appearance” while Pi means the king. “Terrible” refers to tyranny. “Many rules” means many evil things in which the common people truly believed. This means that such a great Sangje was the ruler of the people below. Now such a tyrannic Sangje had many evil commands. Why? When Heaven gave birth to all people, some Heavenly commands were not believed by the people. In the beginning, when commands are enacted, everyone was good, yet a few could complete the way of goodness in the end. Hence, chaos was caused. In the end, Heavenly commands faded and looked as if they were terrible and evil. This poem began with “words of blaming Heaven” and concluded with a self-reflection. As the Duke Kang of Liu (劉康公, ?-544) said, “That people receiving lives between Heaven and earth is called command [命 ming]; those who can nurture commands are blessed, yet those who cannot are failed and in disasters.”²²

Zhu Xi argued that there is a turn within the first paragraph of Tang: in the beginning, people blamed Sangje for evil and suffering, yet in the end the poet said evil and suffering are caused by people themselves. While Kong regarded Tang as a poem satirising the king, Zhu regarded Tang as a poem criticising the people.

As Jujahak was the official philosophy in the Joseon dynasty, several Korean interpreters were in favor of Zhu’s interpretation. For instance, Kim Gwiju (金龜柱 1740–1786) argued that Tang criticized both the King and the people for not keeping the Heavenly command continuously. Kim said: “'Grand is Sangje' indicates that commands enacted by Heaven are also morally good. Then the poem states that prosperity depends on efforts. So disasters did not come from Heaven. Human beings deserve what they have earned.”²³

Despite the disagreement between Kong and Zhu, both agreed that Tang is a political analogy and not a religious poem. Kong regarded Tang as a criticism of King Li of Zhou while Zhu regarded Tang as a criticism of the people. In the following, we shall see while Dasan agreed with Zhu Xi that Tang criticized the people, Dasan re-religionized the poem as a discourse on the problem of evil.

IV. Dasan’s Re-religionization of Sangje in Tang

Although Dasan agreed with Zhu that Sangje should not be blamed for disasters and misfortune and criticized people’s unjustified resentment against Sangje, Dasan refused to label Tang as “words of blaming Heaven.” Dasan also disagreed with Kong and his supporters who read Dasan as a political poem satirising the King because Dasan regarded the poem as a religious poem and “Heavenly enactment” was the main theme of the decade of Tang. While Zhu and Kong only regarded Tang as a political poem, this section highlights how Dasan religionized Tang.

Dasan explicitly claimed that the main idea of Tang is not to blame Sangje but expresses people’s fear of Sangje’s judgment. The concept of Sangje as the judge is related to Dasan’s understanding of Sangje as a personal God according to his re-interpretation of the Doctrine of the Mean and the Great Learning. Dasan further argued that according to the Book of Odes, natural disasters result from Sangje’s punishment for vicious tyrants and therefore are justified.

Dasan’s discussion began with King Jeongjo’s question on the rhetorical structure of the poem Tang. As mentioned above, the first paragraph of Tang which begins with “Great is Sangje” is rhetorically peculiar, because all other paragraphs begin with “Wen Wan said: ‘Alas! Alas, you Yin-Shang!’” King Jeongjo realized such a problem and asked his ministers why. Jeongjo’s intellectual discussions with his ministers were recorded in Gyeongsa Gangui 經史講義 (Lectures on Classics and Historical Accounts) from King Jeongjo’s diary Hongjae Jeonseo 弘齋全書 (Complete Collection of Hongjae) in detail because Jeongjo was strongly interested in philosophy.

Gyeongsa Gangui was a series of lectures on Confucian canons and histories when Jeongjo gathered learned officers for academic discussions on different Confucian canons. According to the Joseon Wangjo Sillok 朝鮮王朝實錄, Gyeongsa Gangui was proposed by Seong Yudang (成柳戇, ?–?) on the twenty-second day of the first lunar month in 1777. Seong was worried about the quality of officers and students studying at Hongmungwan 弘文館 (literally meaning “School of Magnifying Literature”) and argued that the King could organize seminars asking students to present and debate academically. (Joseon Wangjo Sillok, Jeongjo year 2, month 1, day 22). Jeongjo agreed with Seong and selected learned officers and students (whom Jeongjo appointed as chogye munsin 抄啓文臣, literally meaning “reporters”) under 37-year-old to give lectures on Four Books and Five Classics (Chiou 2017, 194). In 1776, Jeongjo reformed the Gyujanggak (奎章閣, the royal library of the Joseon dynasty) and appointed young scholars as chogye munsin working there from 1781 onwards (Kim 2012, 68). Their main tasks were to give lectures based on questions asked by Jeongjo related to Confucian classics (Chiou 2017, 52). Remarkably, Gyeongsa Gangui was part of the Gyeongsa Gangui consisting of five seminars on the Book of Odes from 1781 to 1790 involving 49 chogye munsin. Unsurprisingly, Dasan, who was well known for his knowledge and was favored by Jeongjo, was a regular speaker in Gyeongsa Gangui. According to Kim Sugyeongs research, in 1789 Dasan answered Jeongjo’s questions 117 times (Kim 2012, 68), making him the second person who answered Jeongjo the most.²⁴ Jeongjo summarized the intention of these seminars as such:

Fu Guan 輔廣 (?–?) was a pure Confucian, yet his Questions Asked by Child 童子問 merely recited the questions from Zhu Xi’s commentaries. On the other hand, modern Confucians defamed previous sages and created their new teaching with insufficient verification. All questions asked in these seminars were based on Zhu Xi’s commentaries and referred to all kinds of interpretations. [Discussions on] names and objects only seek positive verification, while [those on] characters and sentences only follow the literal context. This aims to condemn the trend of studies on the Book of Odes which inclined to exaggerations and grotesque.²⁵

Here Jeongjo expressed his dissatisfaction with all Chinese and Korean interpreters in the quotation above and asked his officers to provide new perspectives. Jeongjo also clarified that he was a follower of Jujahak, but he believed that Jujahak needs to be assessed critically. For this reason, Jeongjo frequently quoted Mao Qiling’s 毛奇齡 (1623–1716) commentaries who was a famous critique of Jujahak, as Kim Sugyeong observed (Kim 2012, 73). From this perspective, Gyeongsa Gangui was a significant academic event when scholars were invited to criticize not only the “new teaching” of the Qian-Jia school but also the official Jujahak, showing Jeongjo’s tolerance of academic freedom and diversity. Dasan’s innovative re-interpretation of Tang was proposed under this historical context: Dasan and other scholars were allowed to challenge Zhu Xi’s interpretations of the Book of Odes in Gyeongsa Gangui because of Jeongjo’s tolerance (Kim 2012, 72).

Nevertheless, different from Kim, Tsai Chih-Che questioned the extent of the so-called academic freedom under Jeonjo’s reign and argued that Jeonjo’s ultimate aim was to reveal and defend an authentic Jujahak. Since Jeonjo believed that only through the principle of “seeking the common ground among differences” (異中求同) (Tsai 2021, 81), one can rediscover the “true face” of Jujahak (Tsai 2021, 88). For this reason, Tsai suggested that Jeongjo’s tolerance is limited. For example, Jeonjo asked diplomats to purchase books in South China to avoid the “influence of Yangmingism” (Tsai 2021, 88). Tsai even argued that Jeongjo adopted the moderate strategy of “excluding heresies and empowering orthodoxies” (闢異端、扶正道) to restore Jujahak and resist the influence from Western studies and Catholicism which inspired Silhak (Tsai 2021, 92). Tsai also argued that Jeonjo believed that Korean Confucians were “the successors of the Dao Tong in the post-Zhu Xi era” and “defend Jujahak apologetically” (2019, 73). From this perspective, Gyeongsa Gangui should be regarded as Jeongjo’s moderate strategy to resist “heretical” teachings rather than tolerance to non-Zhu Xi thoughts, so Dasan and other contemporaneous scholars were required to reconcile their teaching with Jujahak in Gyeongsa Gangui rather than challenging his teaching.²⁶

While an analysis of Jeongjo’s real intention behind this cultural policy is out of the main theme of this article, one should acknowledge that there is no contradiction between Kim’s and Tsai’s²⁷ different interpretations of Jeongjo’s intentions: Jeongjo allowed Dasan and other scholars to express viewpoints different from Zhu Xi’s orthodox teaching so that he could reveal Zhu Xi’s true teaching by comparing and assessing different perspectives, which gave Dasan and other philosophers from this time the room to express their alternative interpretations within Jeongjo’s framework. Chiou summarized Jeongjo’s framework of discussions on the Book of Odes in Gyeongsa Gangui into three principles as follows:

• 1. Good readers of the Book of Odes should infer meanings beyond poems.²⁸
• 2. The Book of Odes is difficult to read because of its appreciation and satires.²⁹
• 3. Discussion on the Book of Odes is preceded by clarifications of ancient and modern debates.³⁰ (Chiou 2017, 196–99)

Chiou’s observations concur with Kim who argued that Jeongjo’s Gyeongsa Gangui was fundamentally different from lectures called by the former king Yeongjo 英祖 (1694–1776), as Jeongjo emphasized on literal interpretations over dogmatic and moral applications (Kim 2012, 67). Furthermore, the third principle is remarkably important as Jeongjo highlighted the necessities to study the Book of Odes from different perspectives, including the Qian-Jia school and other Korean Confucians (Kim 2012, 86). For this reason, as underscored below, Dasan and other scholars frequently referred to different Chinese and Korean commentators when answering Jeongjo’s questions. Besides, as shown below, Dasan’s interpretations of Tang addressed Jeongjo’s second principle, that satires in the Book of Odes were difficult to interpret, by arguing that Tang is not a satire.

When Jeongjo asked why the first paragraph of Tang began with “Great is Sangje” but not “Wen Wan said: ‘Alas! Alas, you Yin-Shang!’” as other paragraphs did, different ministers proposed their answers. For instance, Seo Yugu answered that it was because the first paragraph was a summary of the whole chapter (Jeongjo [1814] 2001, 92:9). While Dasan’s answer was not recorded for unknown reasons, in Dasan’s own book Lectures on the Book of Odes 詩經講義, he recorded his answer to the same question asked by Jeongjo:

I answer his majesty: the first paragraph is the main theme of the whole chapter. “Heavenly charge is not to be relied on” is the main idea. “There is nobody who has not a beginning, but few can have a (normal) end.” This refers to the rise and fall of the Shang Dynasty and does not necessarily mean that human nature begins with good and ends with evil.

Also, according to Honfan 洪範 [a chapter of the Book of Documents], Tang means “no one-sidedness,” which contrasts with “his charge has many rules.” One may also refer to the quotation in the chapter Zikong 至公 of the book Shuo Yuan 說苑.³¹

Here Dasan still acknowledged that Tang was a moral criticism of the Shang dynasty and did not exclude the possibility that it may also refer to the problem of human nature (i.e. if human nature is essentially good, why would there be moral evil?) as Zhu Xi indicated. But then Dasan moved on to discuss the role of Heaven or Sangje as a moral judge, which “religionized” the original discussion:

I have further reflected: the men of superior [君子] in ancient time served [God] reverently and dared not to blame Heaven. Hence, it is unreasonable for them to accuse Sangje [上帝] as a tyrannic Sangje.

I said: Terrible means fear. It means that one should hastily revere virtues as if people of the lower fear Sangje. Sangje’s commands are all righteous and reasonable, but why are there extremes and evils? It is because people only keep virtues in the beginning but not in the end. As a result, Sangje changes his enactment accordingly. Great [Tang] is the most righteous virtue. If [Sangje] is great and bright, how can it be blamed for being tyrannic and evil? This is the main theme of the poem: to learn a lesson from the Shang dynasty which was destroyed by Heaven. How can one say that Heavenly commands are evil?³²

Here Dasan referred to Sangje as an omni-righteous God rather than a sovereign or a monarch, because the latter’s commands are not “all righteous and reasonable” (其命皆出公理). In fact, Dasan consistently highlighted the idea of Sangje and Noumenon as a personal God and a moral judge in his interpretations of the Four Books and the Five Classics (Kim 2012, 145). For example:

The Lord of Heaven is Sangje. Sangje is named Heaven just as a monarch is named as a nation. We dare not speak disrespectfully. That vast and visible Heaven is nothing more than the roof and shelter of houses; its status is no higher than the earth, water and fire. How could it be the foundation of human nature and morality? . . . [Therefore,] the Book of Odes said “those who feared the majesty of Heaven is therefore blessed,” and “those who revered the anger of Heaven dared not to seek pleasures.”³³

Dasan even distinguished Heaven from Sangje for even Heaven is created by Sangje, and criticized Confucians for confusing Heaven with Sangje, drawing on ideas from Matteo Ricci’s text:

The major mistake in both ancient and modern times is misunderstanding Heaven as Sangje. Even Yao, Shun, Zhou, and Confucius made the same mistake. Therefore, interpreting ancient classics with modern horizons often leads to many errors all stemming from this. Who is Sangje? Sangje is a being that creates, governs and sustains heaven, earth, spirits, humans, and all things, but also transcends them.³⁴

Gim argued that according to Dasan, Sangje is a passionate, intelligent and creative God (G. Gim 2020, 140). Because Sangje is a transcendent moral judge, Dasan further highlighted that the sage-kings taught people to fear God’s judgement and to act morally, because Sangje judges not only monarchs but also the people.³⁵ In other words, for Dasan, the poem Tang is an example of how Sangje as a moral judge punished the evil Shang dynasty, which is consistent with Dasan’s interpretation of Sangje in other Confucian texts. Here Sangje is not merely a moral principle (Heavenly Command) but a transcendent acting subject that rewards the good and punishes the evil.

Although Dasan agreed with Zhu Xi that Tang depicted the people’s resentment against Sangje as unjustified, Dasan disagreed with Zhu Xi in the following aspects:

• 1. Zhu Xi described Tang as words of blaming Heavend while Dasan did not.
• 2. Zhu Xi read Tang merely as a political poem while Dasan religionized Tang.
• 3. Zhu Xi regarded the problem of human nature as the main theme of Tang while Dasan regarded Sangje’s punishment of the people as the main theme instead.

Yet the disagreement (1) could be solved by clarifying Zhu Xi’s wording. When Zhu Xi indicated Tang as “words of blaming Heaven,” he added that at the end the author of Tang also denounced people’s words of blaming Heaven. In this sense, Zhu Xi and Dasan agreed with each other, thus disagreement (1) ceases to exist.

Yet disagreements (2) and (3) are unsolved. While Zhu Xi imposed his framework of human nature on the text, Dasan placed the text in the context of his religious philosophy: that Sangje is a moral judge. Dasan’s religionization of the text is clearly missing in Zhu Xi’s interfepretation.

Unlike his contemporaries who were in favor of Kong’s interpreftation owing to the influence of the Qian-Jia school, Dasan disagreed with Kong’s reading of Tang solely as a political analogy. Dasan’s criticism of Kong is recorded in his dialogue with Jeongjo:

[The King said:] “An old interpretation claimed that this poem satirized the King Li of Zhou, yet investigations revealed that the poem was not written in the time during King Li’s reign. Another interpretation is that this poem traced back to a historical figure and staired him, yet Zhu Xi denied it. Since Zhu Xi had already made a conclusion, one should not bother. Now, what if we regard the poem as a moral self-examination [28d] and read it repeatedly . . . we ought to read the poem in this way. What do you think?”

Dasan answered: “Duke Wu 武公 [a typo of Duke Mu of Zhao 召穆公] was born in the late period during the reign of King Xuan, while such a poem was written after Duke Wu had died. One may refer to Zuo’s Commentary on Spring and Autumn and the Discourses of the States. Hence it is clear that the poem is for self-examination rather than satirising King Li. Yet self-experience is precious in reading poems. Hence, as the sages teach, whether this poem is satiric or self-examining needs not to be discussed.” (Jeongjo [1814] 2001, vol. 92, bk. 29)³⁶

As mentioned above, Jeongjo pointed out that satires in the Book of Odes were difficult to be understood. Yet here Dasan simply suggested that Tang was not a satire.³⁷ Here both Dasan and Jeongjo implicitly rejected Kong’s interpretation even though they claimed that they “suspended” the debate on whether the poem is satiric or self-examining because both mentioned historical evidence against Kong’s interpretation (that the poem could not be written during King Li’s reign).

While the above dialogue was recorded in both Jeongjo’s diary and Dasan’s Lectures on the Book of Odes, Dasan’s answer in the latter expressed his criticism of Kong more directly:

I answered his majesty: Duke Wu was born in the late period during the reign of King Xuan, yet this poem was written at the end of Duke Wu’s life. There are references in Zuo’s Commentary on Spring and Autumn and the Discourses of the States. So, one should read the poem as a self-examination. While there seem to be many words satirizing King Li in the poem, the meanings of these words are suspicious. Yet the way of reading poems is about self-experience. As the sages teach, one should not bother with textual criticism [gogeo 考據, the philological school].³⁸

Here Dasan claimed that both the poems Tang and Yi could not be about political satires about King Li by using the method of textual criticism, yet at the same time, he highlighted that detailed “textual criticism” should not be used when reading poems. While there seem to be conflicts between Dasan’s arguments and practices regarding the applicability of the method of textual criticism on reading poems, one may argue that Dasan did not fully deny the role of textual criticism and simply highlighted both textual criticism and experiential interpretation could complement each other.³⁹

Alternatively, such a contradiction is avoided if here the word gogeo 考據 refers to the “philological school” rather than “textual criticism,” namely, the Qian-Jia school, which was popular among other scholars, especially Bak Jega and Kim Jeonghui. Here the difference between Dasan and his contemporary scholars is highlighted: although Dasan adopted certain methodologies of the Qian-Jia school, he did not entirely follow their academic tradition. As mentioned above, Dasan seems to integrate both textual criticism and experiential interpretation when discussing Tang and Yi. Yet such a methodology is against the practice of Qian-Jia School. In Ruan Yuan’s 阮元 (1764-1849) preface for Wang Yin-zhi’s 王引之 (1766-1834) Jingyi Shuwen 經義述聞, he defined the ultimate aim of the Qian-Jia School as follows:

Whatever ancient Confucians misinterpreted should be verified with circumstantial evidence and analogized indirectly to reveal original meanings, so when the ancient sages see our argument they would laugh and say: “Your words are correct! Thousands of years of misinterpretations are finally clarified.”⁴⁰

As Yang Chin-fu explained, “to reveal original meanings” (得其本意所在) means an in-depth investigation of sources of texts (Yang 2009, 64). The ideas of “self-examination” highlighted by Dasan is contrary to the methods of the Qian-Jia school because the Qian-Jia school was only interested in the original meaning of the texts in themselves and the elimination of personal prejudices. However, Dasan’s adaptation of self-examination shows that he was not limited to the Qian-Jia philological methodologies when interpreting Tang and Yi.

Furthermore, Dasan’s highlight of “self-examination” aligns with Zhu Xi’s understanding of the Book of Odes, who also referred to Discourses of the States to justify his view:

In fact, the prefaces of the Book of Odes are not trustworthy . . . by contrast, the claim in Discourses of the States that [Tang] is Duke Wu’s poem for self-examination is trustworthy. Generally speaking, the ancients and the modern scholars write poems in the same way: they have their perceptions and feelings and express their emotions and temper. When do they satirize others? If one only regards the prefaces as standards and interprets every poem as appreciations or satires, one is destroying the meanings expressed by poets.⁴¹

Therefore, although Dasan may disagree with Zhu Xi’s philosophy in other aspects, in the case of interpreting Tang, Dasan agreed with Zhu Xi rather than the Qian-Jia philologists: instead of investigating whom Duke Wu aimed to satire in the poems as the philologists did, Dasan and Zhu Xi merely regarded the text as Duke Wu’s self-examination.

Yet self-examination in Dasan’s context also has a religious sense which is not found in Zhu Xi’s commentaries. Dasan’s emphasis on “self-examination” when reading Tang is also highly associated with his philosophy of religion, where self-examination or self-reflection is discussed in terms of Sangje or Heaven. As Dasan claimed when interpreting the teaching of sindok 愼獨 (“alert when being alone”) in the Doctrine of the Mean:

Someone’s wrongdoings were concealed and never revealed throughout their lives. Men of inferiority are used to lying to the people below and the monarch above. How can they believe in empty words like “the concealed must be seen and the tiny must be manifested” proclaimed by men of superiority? If one does not believe in the presence of a supervisor, there is no alert when being alone.⁴²

In other words, self-examination is triggered by a transcendent supervisor, namely Sangje, as Dasan continued:

The splendidness of Heaven is directly communicated with humans' minds. Nothing concealed is unseen. Nothing tiny is not shined. When He shines in this room, the Sun supervises here. When humans know that, even the audacious can only be alert and terrified.⁴³

Dasan suggests the origin of self-examination: Sangje presents and supervises → nothing is unknown to Him → humans are alert and terrified → humans examine themselves even when being alone. Here Sangje is assumed to be not only omnibenevolent but also omniscient because nothing is unknown to Him. It is likely that Dasan’s concept of the omniscient God comes from Christianity as the concept of omniscience is rarely mentioned by Confucians.

However, the concept of omnipotence seems to be missing in Dasan’s philosophy. The traditional Western formulation of the problem of evil of suffering is that: if God is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent, how could there be evil and suffering in the human world? But Dasan’s version is that: if Sangje is omniscient and omnibenevolent, how could there be evil and suffering in the human world? Since Sangje is not omnipotent, one may reply that there was evil and suffering because Sangje could not stop them.

Yet Dasan’s solution to the problem of evil still follows the traditional Christian solution: all evils and sufferings are caused by humans' free will (as we shall see in the discussion of Ricci’s Tianzhu Shiyi below). As Dasan indicated:

The ancient served Heaven and Gods with substantial minds. Movement and stillness are where a will [illyeom 一念] arises. [It can be] either sincere or insincere, and either good or evil. They warned: “The Sun supervises here.” Hence being alert and terrified is essentially being distinct and serious.⁴⁴

Besides illyeom, Dasan also used the term gwon 權 (“power”) to refer to the concept of free will when interpreting Mencius:

Heaven grants autonomy to human beings, so that they may desire good and do good, and desire evil and do evil. There are fluctuations and indefiniteness because gwon 權 belongs to the self, unlike beasts of which minds are fixed [jeongsim 定心]. Therefore, goods are the merits of the self, while moral evils are the sins of the self. This is owing to the gwon of the mind but not the nature.⁴⁵

Based on the text above, Fang Xu-dang suggested that Dasan explained the problem of evil in terms of free will: although human nature is good, it only implies an inclination to moral good, while human beings can freely choose to do good or evil (Fang 2015, 113). Fang argued that there are three principles of the soul in Dasan’s philosophy: Seong 性 (nature), Gwonhyeong 權衡 (weighing) and Haengsa 行事 (acts, or Gu 具, instruments) in the early period but Seong 性, Jae 才 (talent) and Se 勢 (trend) in the late period. Yet both gwonhyeong and jae refer to “can be good or evil” (可善而可惡) while Haengsa, gu, and se refer to “difficult to be good but easy to be evil” (難善易惡) (Fang 2015, 112). While Huang Chun-chieh ruled out the possibility that Dasan’s concept of Gwonhyeong and Jae is inspired by Catholicism and insisted that these concepts solely come from Mencius without providing evidence ruling out Catholic influence (Huang 2019, 142), Fang pointed out that Dasan’s terminology is inconsistent with Mencius and suggested that these may be owing to Catholic influence because Jae in Mencius is necessarily good although Fang did not further investigate Christian legacy in Dasan’s philosophy (Fang 2015, 112). Possible influences by the Catholic notion of free will will be discussed below.

Nonetheless, unlike Fang, based on the same quotation above, Kim Woo-hyung argued that free will has no place in Dasan’s philosophy. According to Kim, Dasan “viewed weighing [gwonhyeong] as the essential basis for distinguishing good from evil and merit from sin might be justified” but “makes it clear in the passage just cited that the fundamental difference between humans and animals like in human’s preference of and disposition to goodness, not in weighing” (Kim 2014, 61). However, compared to Fang’s thesis, Kim’s argument is unconvincing. Based on Kim’s mistranslation of jeongsim 定心 to “fixed direction” rather than “fixed mind,” Kim argued that in Dasan’s philosophy of mind, humans are distinguished from animals by their inclinations to goodness, and therefore Dasan’s “notion of weighing, whose function is secondary to the inclination for the pursuit of goodness (virtue), does not carry any insinuation of free will or autonomous authority to make a choice” (Kim 2014, 64). Yet even if weighing is merely a secondary function in Dasan’s philosophy, it does not imply that the freedom of making choice is unimportant in Dasan’s ethics. Furthermore, if animals only have “fixed minds” or “fixed directions” and therefore different from humans, without emphasising humans’ free will but merely highlighting humans’ fixed inclination to goodness, humans’ minds would also be “fixed.”⁴⁶ Here Fang’s reformulation of Dasan’s philosophy of mind is more plausible: Fang highlighted three layers in Dasan’s metaethics: there is a natural inclination to goodness, but one chooses to be good and evil, and it is “difficult to be good but easy to be evil” when one is confused by bodily desires. Based on this three principles theory — seong 性 (“original nature”), gwonhyeong 勸形 (“external conditions”), and haengsa 行事 (“human actions”), or alternatively seong 性, jae 才, and se 偲, Dasan criticized Gaozi and Yang Xiong for only acknowledging gwonhyeong or jae and Xunzi for only acknowledging haengsa (which can be either good or evil) or se (which is inclined to evil), and disregarding the original good human nature highlighted by Mengzi.⁴⁷ Although human nature is good, human’s free will may choose evil and bring suffering, and human is vulnerable to temptations. Therefore, one should not blame Sangje for evil and suffering but should blame oneself for choosing wrong or not manifesting moral goodness. As Dasan highlighted, one should act morally and fear Sangje who is the moral judge because “The Heavenly way manifests the principle of sufferings and blessings.”⁴⁸

Owing to Dasan’s Catholic background and the fact that the free will argument was a classic Catholic response to the problem of evil, several scholars suggested that Dasan’s concept of free will is inspired by Matteo Ricci Tianzhu Shiyi 天主實義. For example, Baek Ming-Jeong argued that “Dasan understood the human heart with the concept of spiritual character or spiritual clarity, considered this as the common link between God and man, and saw there is in the human heart a free will to choose good have all been judged be perspectives resulting from the impact of Western learning” (Baek 2012, 259). Interestingly, in Matteo Ricci’s Tianzhu Shiyi, free will was also translated as nyeom:

When one encounters a state of affairs, at the same time there are two contradictory wills [nyeom 念]. For example, when I am enticed by wine and sex, I am immediately inclined to follow, but then I realize it is not right. The former is the mind of beasts when one has no difference from beasts. The latter is the mind of humans which is equivalent to the Heavenly spirit.⁴⁹

The notion of “two contradictory wills” is also found in Dasan’s writings, as he claimed:

Humans always have two contrary but co-existing wills [ji 志]. When unrighteous offerings are presented, there is a desire to receive and a desire not to receive. When there are troubles to achieve humaneness, there is a desire to avoid and a desire not to avoid. The desire to receive and avoid is a bodily desire, while the desire not to receive and not to avoid is the righteous desire.⁵⁰

Accordingly, both Ricci and Dasan proposed that evil and suffering result from humans’ wills. People’s resentment against Sangje mentioned in Tang is unjustified. Yet one may still challenge why there were occasions when the just suffered yet the wicked were happy. Ricci’s reply was straightforward: in God’s final judgement, the wicked will be condemned to hell while the just will ascend to Heaven (Ricci n.d., I-2:26). Yet heaven and hell are missing in Dasan’s philosophy. Dasan was reluctant to discuss the afterlife, as he argued: “Men of superiority do not pay attention to the place after death.”⁵¹ It is unclear whether it was because Dasan regarded discussion on Catholic concepts of heaven and hell would be politically dangerous, or because Dasan agreed with Kongzi that “You do not yet understand life—how could you possibly understand death?” (Analects 11.12; See Slingerland 2003, 115), or, more than likely, both reasons count. In any case, Sangje’s judgement in Dasan’s philosophy never refers to the afterlife but to this life. In the case of Tang, people were immediately punished by Sangje when they failed to keep Heavenly commandments.

V. Problem: Inconsistency with the Context of the Decade of Tang

While Zhu Xi criticized that the people’s resentment against Sangje expressed in Tang is unjustified, to solve the problem of evil, Dasan argued that Tang not only criticized people’s resentment against Sangje but also asserted people’s fear for the righteous judgement of Sangje. I previously argued that Dasan misinterpreted the text because affirming rather than criticizing people’s resentment against Sangje or Heaven is the main theme of poems in the Decade of Tang. In the Decade of Tang, the poem Tang was followed by Yi, where the poet explicitly blamed Heaven for not listening to people’s voices and justified the people’s resentment against Sangje.

The previous section illustrates how Dasan presented his reformulation of the problem of evil and suffering via the re-religionization of Tang in the light of Catholic doctrines of God and free will, making his interpretation different from Zhu Xi’s and Kong’s. Yet whether Dasan’s unique interpretation of Tang agrees with its contexts is debatable.

While Dasan isolated Tang in his re-interpretation of the text yet claimed it represented the “main idea” of the Decade of Tang, the poem should be read in the context of the Decade of Tang, which contains eleven poems: Tang, Yi, Sang Rou, Yun Han, Song Gao, Zheng Min, Han Yi, Jiang Han, Chang Wu, Zhang Yang, and Shao Min. While Heaven and Sangje are also presented as objects to be resented by the people in these poems, the people’s resentment seems to be justified. For example, in the second last paragraph of the poem of Yi:

• • Great Heaven is very (bright =) enlightened, but I am living without joy;
• • When I see you so (darkened =) unenlightened, my heart is very sad.
• • I instruct you inculcatingly, but you listen to me with (slighting =) contempt;
• • you do not use (my words) for taking instructions from them, on the contrary, you use them for making cruel jests;
• • you allege that I do not understand, and yet I am an octogenarian.⁵²
• (Karlgren 1974, 218-19)

If one follows Kong’s reading of the decade of Tang as a collection of political satires, the quotation above could be interpreted as a minister blaming the monarch for not listening to his advice. As Kong claimed, “the advisors’ words failed to enter the king’s mind and hence his words were not accepted” (Kong 1999, 18.1:1155).⁵³ Yet if one follows Dasan’s religionization of the passage, the text is difficult to comprehend. Why would an omniscient and omni-benevolent Sangje reject good advice and make cruel jests?

“Yi” (夷) is followed by another poem “San Jou” (商頌) which directly blamed Sangje for causing natural disasters:

• • Heaven sends down death and disorder, it destroys our appointed king;
• • sends down these nocuous insects (on the grain), the husbandry is utterly suffering;
• • lamentable and pained is the central kingdom, all things together are utterly (waste = ) ruined;
• • I have no strength, and so I think of the Vaulted Blue.⁵⁴
• (Karlgren 1974, 222)

Here Heaven can hardly refer to the king because even the king was destroyed by Heaven in the quotation above. A king is impossible to cause natural disasters. A similar accusation is also found in Yun Han when people blamed Sangje for droughts:

• • The drought is excessive, with all our force we loathe and (try to) eliminate it;
• • why does one (sc. Heaven) make us suffer by drought—we do not know the cause of it;
• • our prayers for the (year =) harvest have been very (early =) betimes, the sacrifice to the (four) Quarters and the Soil have not been late;
• • but Great Heaven, not (think about =) consider us;
• • we have been reverent to the bright Spirits, there ought to be no grudge or anger. ⁵⁵
• (Karlgren 1974, 225-26)

Nonetheless, “San Jou” and Yun Han did not challenge Dasan’s interpretation, because the resentment against Heaven expressed in “San Jou” can be solved by adopting Kong’s interpretation that this poem merely described Heaven’s punishment of the tyrannic king and did not blame Heaven (Kong 1999, 18.1:1154).⁵⁶ By contrast, Dasan could hardly explain Yi which explicitly blames Heaven for not answering people’s prayers, unless Dasan regarded Yi as merely a political analogy as Kong suggested.

Dasan strangely overlooked all these passages in his Lectures on the Book of Odes, possibly because he was aware of the inconsistency between these passages and his re-interpretation of Tang. Dasan’s only reply is found in Jeongjo’s diary, where he claimed that the poem Tang is different from other poems in the Book of Odes in terms of rhetoric strategies:

There were many satiric poems during King Li’s time, including “Min Lao,” “Ban,” “Tang,” and “San Jou.” “Min Lao” is remarkably deep in meaning, while the words of Tang are sincere . . . all these suggest that while humans share similar feelings, their expressions are slightly different, yet their loyalty and loves are the same. (Jeongjo [1814] 2001, vol. 92, bk. 29)⁵⁷

Accordingly, one may defend Dasan by declaring that only Tang is a religious poem while other poems in the decade of Tang are political satires. Nevertheless, instead of defending Dasan’s argument, the quotation incites more inconsistencies in Dasan’s philosophy. In the same dialogue, Dasan agreed with Jeongjo that Tang should not be regarded a satiric poem, yet here Dasan seems to suggest that Tang is just a satiric poem in a different style. This conflicts with Dasan’s claim that one should not read Tang as a satiric poem. Moreover, Dasan failed to demonstrate that Tang had a religious theme that is essentially different from other poems in the decade of Tang but merely claimed that the style of Tang was different. Furthermore, even if Dasan successfully demonstrated the essential difference between Tang and other poems in the decade of Tang, he could hardly explain why Tang as a religious poem is put in the same chapter as other political poems.

VI. Conclusion

Although Dasan’s re-religionization of Tang is inconsistent with the context of the decade of Tang and even seems to impose his philosophy of religion on the text, one should sympathize with the limitation of Dasan’s age where religious persecution was widespread, claiming many of his friends and members of his own family. The hostility of the Joseon dynasty against Catholicism during Dasan’s time means that Dasan could not develop his Catholic-influenced philosophy of religion independently: he had to cunningly conceal his own philosophy of religion in his interpretations of the Five Classics, especially the Book of Odes where Sangje was frequently mentioned.

Yet Dasan’s creative interpretation also exposed the weakness of the interpretations of Kong, Zhu Xi, and their followers: the majority of them assume Tang merely as a political satiric poem and disregarded its religious elements. Dasan revealed the religiousness of Tang, yet his reading is one-sided because he selected texts that were consistent with his reformulation of the problem of evil—if Sangje was omniscient and omni-benevolent, how could there be evil and suffering?—and his solution to itthat evil and suffering are caused by people’s wrongdoings and therefore their resentment against Sangje was unjustified. Dasan avoided materials from the Book of Odes that supported the resentment against Sangje simply because they contradicted the premise of Dasan’s philosophy of religion.

For this reason, Dasan’s re-religionization of Tang distinguishes him from the majority of interpreters. He did not read Tang as a political poem criticising the monarch (as Kong claimed). Although Dasan agreed with Zhu Xi that the poem denounced the people, Dasan did not read the text in terms of Zhu Xi’s theory on human nature but in terms of the problem of evil, because Dasan acknowledged Sangje as an omniscient and omni-benevolent personal God who judges, supervises and monitors human beings rather than merely a moral principle (li) (as Kong or Zhu Xi understood it). This makes Dasan look very different from other contemporaneous scholars who generally preferred Kong’s interpretation to Zhu Xi’s.

One may argue that Dasan could avoid the inconsistency between his re-religionization of Tang and the context of the decade of Tang by modifying Zhu Xi’s interpretation: to acknowledge Tang and even other poems as resentment against Sangje and condemn these texts from a Confucian-Catholic position. Yet even Zhu Xi insisted that Tang did not aim to criticize Sangje but denounce people’s resentment against Sangje, and questioning the main theme of poems in the Book of Odes could have meant political and legal consequences for Dasan. Considering the historical reality of his time, Dasan’s re-interpretation of Tang was inevitably restrained due to political persecutions of Catholics, meaning even his life was at risk. Future research on Dasan should sympathize with Dasan’s limitations and reveal the implicit impacts of Catholicism on Dasan’s re-interpretation of Five Classics and Four Books instead of simply pointing out the inconsistency between Dasan’s analysis and the contexts of Five Classics.

Acknowledgments

Thanks to Jingyi Jenny Zhao and Davide Andrea Zappulli for helpful discussions on the interpretations of the Classical Chinese manuscripts.

This paper is based upon the conference paper presented at the Global Philosophy of Religion: The Problem of Evil (April 21–23, 2023), which is sponsored by the John Templeton Foundation and co-organized by the University of Birmingham and Waseda University.

References

• Baek, Min-Jeong 백민정. 2012. “Mateo Richi-wa Dasan Jeong Yakyong cheolhak-ui geori: Dasan-ui jijeok baegyeong-eul tonghaeseo bon ‘Cheonju Silui’-ui jaengjeomdeul” 마테오 리치와 다산 정약용 철학의 거리: 다산의 지적 배경을 통해서 본 《천주실의》의 쟁점들 (The Distance between the Philosophies of Matteo Ricci and Jeong Yak-yong: Issues of The True Meaning of the Lord of Heaven) as Seen through the Intellectual Background of Dasan). In Gyohoesa yeongu 교회사연구 (Studies of Church History) 39: 207–59.
• Baker, Don. 2004. “Tasan Between Catholicism and Confucianism: A Decade Under Suspicion, 1791–1801.” Tasanhak (Dasan Studies) 5: 55–86.
• Cawley, Kevin N. 2012. “Deconstructing Hegemony: Catholics Texts in Choson’s Neo-Confucian Context.” Acta Koreana 15 (1): 15–42. [https://doi.org/10.18399/acta.2012.15.1.002]
• Cawley, Kevin N. 2014. “Dis-assembling Traditions: Deconstructing Tasan via Matteo Ricci.” Journal of Royal Asiatic Society 3 (24): 297–313. [https://doi.org/10.1017/S1356186313000783]
• Chen, Qiyuan 陳啟源. n.d. Maoshi jigu bianjuan 毛詩稽古編卷. In Zhejiang University Library Collection.
• Chiou, Hui-Fen 邱惠芬. 2017a. “Chaoxian Zhengzu Shijing Jiangyi wenda neihan yanjiu” 朝鮮正祖《詩經講義》問答內涵研究 (The Research of Joseon Jeongjo’s Shijing Lectures to Questions and Answers). Zhanggeng Renwen Shehui Xuebao 長庚人文社會學報 (Chang Gung Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences) 10: 191–231.
• Chiou, Hui-Fen 邱惠芬. 2017b. “Mao qi ling Shijing xueyu wai chuanbo yanjiu de fansi yi Chaoxian Zhengzu Shijing Jiangyi wei li” 毛奇齡《詩經》學域外傳播研究的反思──以朝鮮正祖《詩經講義》為例 (Reflection of Mao Qiling’s Shijing Studies Outside of China: Joseon Jeongjo’s Book of Shi Jing Jiang Yi as an Example). Taiwan Journal of East Asian Studies 14 (2): 47–90.
• Choe, Byeok 崔壁. 1930. Jiramjip 質菴集. In Hanguk Munjip Chonggan 韓國文集叢刊 (Complete Series of Korean Literary Collections), edited by Minjok Munhwa Chujinhoe. Seoul: Minjok Munhwa Chujinhoe. Accessed 22 April 2024. http://db.mkstudy.com/zh-cn/mksdb/e/korean-literary-collection/book/9344/, .
• Fang, Xu-dong 方旭東. 2015. “Renxing yu shihao Chaoxian ruzhe cha shan Ding Ruo Yong xing shihao shuo xilun” 人性與嗜好—朝鮮儒者茶山丁若鏞 「性嗜好說」 析論 (Human Nature and Inclination—Korean Confucian Jeong Yakyong’s Analysis of “Natural Inclination to Good”). In Dongfang Zhexue 東方哲學 (Eastern Philosophy) 3: 110–19.
• Gim, Gyoel 金玟. 2020. “Ding ruoyong zhexue bentilun yanjiu dangdai Xinrujia yu Tianzhujiao sixiang zhi bijiao wei zhongxin” 丁若鏞哲學本體論研究：當代新儒家與天主教思想之比較為中心 (A Study on the Ontology of Jeong Yakyong: A Focus on the Comparative Study of Neo-Confucianism and Catholicism). In Universitas: Monthly Review of Philosophy and Culture 47(5): 131–45.
• Huang, Chun-chieh 王俊傑. 2019. “Cong dongya shiyu lun Ding Cha Shan dui Mengzi Xingshan lun de jieshi ji qi sixiangshi dingwei” 從東亞視域論丁茶山對孟子性善論的解釋及其思想史定位 (Jeong Yak-yong’s Interpretation of Mencius’s Theory of Human Nature and Its Place in the History of East Asian Confucianism). In Zhongguo Wenzhe Yanjiu Jikan 中國文哲研究集刊 (Bulletin of the Institute of Chinese Literature and Philosophy) 55: 137–71.
• Ivanhoe, Philip J. 2016. “Jeong Dasan’s Interpretation of Mengzi: Heaven, Way, Human Nature, and the Heart-Mind.” European Journal for Philosophy of Religion 8 (1): 215–37. [https://doi.org/10.24204/ejpr.v8i1.76]
• Jeong, Yakyong 丁若鏞. 1936. Yeoyodang Jeonseo 與猶堂全書. In Hanguk Munjip Chonggan 韓國文集叢刊, edited by Minjok Munhwa Chujinhoe. Seoul: Minjok Munhwa Chujinhoe. Accessed 22 April 2024. http://db.mkstudy.com/zh-cn/mksdb/e/korean-literary-collection/book/8793/, .
• Joseon Wangjo Sillok 朝鮮王朝實錄. In Scripta Sinica, Academia Sinica. Assessed 28 April 2024. http://hanchi.ihp.sinica.edu.tw, .
• Karlgren, Bernhard, trans. 1974. The Book of Odes: Chinese Text, Transcription and Translation. Stockholm: Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities.
• Keum, Jang-tae 琴章泰. 2000. Confucianism and Korean Thoughts. Seoul: Jimoondang Publishing Company.
• Kim, Gwiju 金龜柱. n.d. Gaam Yugo 可庵遺稿 (Posthumous Writings of Gaam). In Hanguk Munjip Chonggan 韓國文集叢刊 (Korean Collected Works Series), edited by Minjok Munhwa Chujinhoe. Seoul: Minjok Munhwa Chujinhoe.
• Kim, Sugyeong 金秀炅. 2012. Hanguo Chaoxian Shiqi Shijing Xue Yanjiu 韓國朝鮮時期《詩經》學研究 (Joseon Dynasty Korean Studies of the Book of Odes). Taipei: Wanjuan Book Company.
• Kim, Woohyung 金祐瑩. 2014. “Moral Agent and Practical Function in Cheong Yagyong's Theory of Mind.” Journal of Confucian Philosophy and Culture 22: 49–66.
• Kong, Yingda 孔穎達. 1999. Maoshi Zhengyi 毛詩正義, Vols. 1–3. In Shisanjing-zhushu 十三經注疏, edited by Li Xue-qin. Beijing: Peking University Press.
• Lin, Yueh-hui 林月惠. 2020. “Li Gui Dun yu Ding Ruo Yong dui Xixue de xina” 黎貴惇與丁若鏞對西學的吸納 (The Adoption of Western Studies by Lê Quý Dôn and Jeong Yakyong). In Xixue Dongjian Yanjiu 西學東漸研究 (Studies on the Spread of the Western Studies to the East) 9: 1–18.
• Lin, Yueh-hui 林月惠. 2022. “Ding chashan de Xinxing sixiang—cong Xixue linghun lun zhi geyi tanqi” 丁茶山的心性思想—從西學靈魂論之格義談起 (Dasan’s Thoughts on Mind Nature: A Discussion Beginning with the Clarification of the Theory of Soul in Western Philosophy). Lecture at the Institute of Chinese Literature and Philosophy, Taipei, Taiwan, August 2.
• Mou, Zong-san 牟宗三. 2003. Xinti yu Xingti 心體與性體 (Mind Substance and Nature Substance). Taipei: Linking Book Company.
• Ricci, Matteo 利馬竇. n.d. Tianzhu Shiyi 天主實義. In Peking University Library Collection.
• Seong, Haeeung 成海應. n.d. Yeongyeonjae Jeonjip 硏經齋全集. In Hanguk Munjip Chonggan 韓國文集叢刊, edited by Minjok Munhwa Chujinhoe. Seoul: Minjok Munhwa Chujinhoe. Assessed 28 April 2024. http://db.mkstudy.com/zh-tw/mksdb/e/korean-literary-collection/book/reader/8790/, .
• Tsai, Cheng-Feng 蔡振豐. 2012. Chaoxian ru zhe Ding Ruo Yong de Sishu xue yi Dongya wei shiye de taolun 朝鮮儒者丁若鏞的四書學: 以東亞為視野的討論 (The Korean Confucian Chong Yakyong’s Studies of Four Books: A Discourse from the Perspective of East Asia). Taipei: National Taiwan University Press.
• Tsai, Chih-Tse 蔡至哲. 2019. “Wu dao zhi dong Chaoxian ruzhe dui hou Zhuzi shidai daotong xipu de jiangou” 吾道之東—朝鮮儒者對 「後朱子時代」 道統系譜的建構 (Eastward Spread of Our Dao: The Impact of the Genealogy Construction of Korean Confucian Orthodoxy (Dao Tong) on the History of East Asian Thought). In Taiwan Journal of East Asian Studies 16: 43–85.
• Tsai, Chih-Tse 蔡至哲. 2021. “Kangxi yu Chaoxian Zhengzu dui Zhuzi xue Quanshi de Bijiao” 康熙與朝鮮正祖對朱子學詮釋的比較 (A Comparative Study of Kangxi and Joseon Jeonjo’s Interpretation of Chu Hsi’s Thought). In Siyuyan 思與言 (Thoughts and Words) 59: 53-106.
• Wang, Xianqian 王先謙. n.d. Shisanjia Yijishu 詩三家義集疏, Vols. 1–12. In Peking University Library Collection.
• Wang, Yin-zhi 王引之. n.d. Jingyi Shuwen 經義述聞 (Accounts on the Meaning of the Classics), Vols. 1–21. In Peking University Library Collection.
• Yang, Chin-fu 楊錦富. 2009. “Gaoyou Wang Nian Sun Wang Yin Zhi fuzi zhixue fangfa xilun” 高郵王念孫、王引之父子治學方法析論 (An Analysis of Kaoyu Niensun Wang and Yin-chi Wang's Research Methods). Meihe Jishu Xueyuan Xuebao 美和技術學院學報 (Journal of Meiho Institute of Technology) 28: 49–68.
• Yang, Rur-bin 楊儒賓. 2009. “Lixue de renshuo yizhong xin shengming zhexue de dansheng” 理學的仁說:一種新生命哲學的誕生 (The Ren Theory in Neo-Confucianism: The Birth of a New Philosophy of Life). Taiwan Journal of East Asian Studies 6 (1): 29–63.
• Zeng, Ande 鄭安德, ed. 2003. Mingmo Qingchu Yesuhui sixiang wenxian hui 明末清初耶穌會思想文獻匯 (An Expository Collection of the Christian Philosophical Works of Ming-Qing China), Vol. 18. Beijing: Peking University Press.
• Zhu, Xi 朱熹. 1958. Shiji Chuan 詩集傳 (Collected Poems). Beijing: Chung Hwa Book Company.
• Zhu, Xi 朱熹. n.d. Vol. 4 of Zhuji Yulei 朱子語類 (Classified Conversations of Master Zhu). In the Zhejiang University Library Collection.
• Zhu, Xi 朱熹. n.d. Vol. 80 of Zhuji Yulei 朱子語類 (Classified Conversations of Master Zhu). In the Zhejiang University Library Collection.
• Jeongjo 正祖. (1814) 2001. Hongjae Jeonseo 弘齋全書 (The Complete Works of Hongjae). In Hanguk Munjip Chonggan 韓國文集叢刊 (Collected Works of Korea Series), edited by Minjok Munhwa Chujinhoe. Seoul: Minjok Munhwa Chujinhoe. Accessed 22 April 2024. http://db.mkstudy.com/zhcn/mksdb/e/korean-literary-collection/book/8780/.