The Internal Mission: Complete Salvation, The Family Federation for World Peace and Unification.

MARRIAGE WITH GOD

Shamanistic Rite of the

Kirsti L. Nevalainen To my family

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, re- cording or by any information storage and retrieval system now known or here- after invented, without the prior written permission of the author.

Marriage With God © Kirsti L. Nevalainen Layout: R. Penttinen Publisher: Mediapinta, 2009 ISBN 978-952-235-083-1 Print-On-Demand Contents

1. INTRODUCTION...... 7 1.1. Aims and Methods of the Research...... 7 1.2. The Messiah has arrived...... 12 1.3. Earlier Research about the Unification Church...... 39

2. KOREAN SHAMANESS - WEDDED TO GOD...... 46 2.1. Main Tenets of Shamanism...... 46 2.2. Naerim Kut - Initiation Rite...... 60

3. CHANGE OF BLOOD LINEAGE...... 70 3.1. Engrafting of into the Blood Lineage of God...... 70 3.2. Ritual Sex in the Jesus Church...... 87

4. THE BLESSING OF MARRIAGE...... 105 4.1. The Holy Wine Ceremony...... 112 4.2. The Holy Blessing Ceremony...... 118 4.3. The Three Day Ceremony...... 121

5. PARALLELS TO THE SACRED ...... 132 MARRIAGE RITE IN THE ...... 132 ANCIENT NEAR EAST...... 132 5.1. Divine Rule on Earth...... 132 5.2. The Fall Story...... 145

6. CONCLUSIONS...... 153

7. BIBLIOGRAPHY...... 156

5 6 1. INTRODUCTION

1.1. Aims and Methods of the Research

I was a member of the Unification Church for eight years, from May 1971 until May 1979. I joined the Unification Church in Bremen, Germany, and stayed in Germany until January 1972. During that time I translated The Di- vine Principle, A Study Guide by Young Oon into Finnish1. In January 1972 I started a missionary work in Finland together with a German member Ms. Ellen van Kampen2. We did only religious missionary work and were not active on the political arena. I worked in Finland until August 1977 when I left for the USA and I stayed there until Christmas 1978. Soon after that I left the Unification Church in May 1979. The main reason why I left the church was Rev. Moon’s fierce Anti-Com- munism. I could not accept his interpretation of Commu- nism as Satan incarnate. Rev. Moon had founded several anti-communist political organizations and it was sup- posed that every Unification Church member was will- ing to work against Communism. During my stay in the

1 Jumalalliset Prinsiipit, Opinto-opas, saksasta kääntänyt Kirsti Laaninen, Gesellschaft zur Vereinigung des Weltchristentums e.V., Essen, 1971. 2 Her birth name was Ellen Kocher.

7 USA in 1977-1978 I was able to witness the socalled Koreagate scandal.This was an affair relating to the lob- bying and corruption of US Congress representatives in favor of the political and economic interests of . For instance Rev. Moon was accused of bribing American congressmen in order to keep the US troops in South Korea. I decided to leave the Unification Church because I did not want to participate in Rev. Moon’s anti- communist political activities in the Cold War. Because of my membership in the Unification Church for eight years I came to know the movement quite well both in Europe and the USA.3

This book is a Religious Studies research and it belongs to the discipline of Religionsgeschichte or the history of religion. I examine the early history of the Unifica- tion Church in North and South Korea and Sun Myung’s Moon’s connections with Jesukyo the ‘Jesus Church’. Rev. Moon was a member of this church during 1938- 1947 and he adopted the doctrines and practices from the Jesus Church. The most important sacrament of the Uni- fication Church is The Blessing of Marriage. Through this ceremony fallen people are cut off from their sa- tanic blood lineage and engrafted into the blood lineage of God and the Messiah, Sun Myung Moon and his wife Hak Ja Han. I examine in this research what was the his- toric development of this sacrament into its present form in 1962.

3 See more about the history of the Unification Church in Fin- land: History of The Unification Movement in Finland, Helsinki, March 2006. http://www.euro-tongil.org/finnish/finnish_history.htm

8 My main thesis is the following: The Blessing of Mar- riage of the Unification Church is directly derivative from the pigarum or yongch’e ceremony of Korean mes- sianic groups from the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s. A pi- garum ceremony means ‘change of blood lineage’ and a yongch’e ceremony means ‘receiving a new spiritual body’. Even though there were two names in use in Ko- rea they had the same meaning, uniting a human being with God and Goddess in spirit and body. And this took place through ritual sex. A male spiritual leader united sexually with his female disciples and a female spiritual leader had ritual sex with her male followers. It was be- lieved that through this process God and Goddess be- came incarnated in human form. But before a spiritual leader could transfer his or her divinity to the followers he or she had first to unite sexually with God or God- dess through a spiritual sexual union. So he or she was able to receive a new spiritual body directly from God or Goddess. The Unification Church practiced the pi- garum or yongch’e ceremony from the 1940s through the 1950s until 1962 when The Holy Wine Ceremony and The Three Day Ceremony replaced this original sexual ritual. Both of these ceremonies are integral parts of The Blessing of Marriage.

My second thesis is that the yongch’e or pigarum cer- emony of Korean messianic groups is similar to the initiation rite of a Korean shaman or shamaness. It is called Naerim kut or Gangsin kut. In this initiation rite a shaman or shamaness is officially married with God or Goddess and has a spiritual sexual relationship with Him or Her. God or Goddess takes a permanent abode in a

9 shaman’s or shamaness’ body. So they become incarna- tions of God or Goddess. Korean Shamanism believes in the immanence of God. God is able to live concretely in human beings and so He or She can be in contact with human society through His or Her mediators, the sha- mans or shamanesses. The shaman or shamaness can be married to an earthly husband or wife, too. This earthly marriage can take place either before or after the initia- tion rite Naerim kut or Gangsin kut.

My third thesis is that the Sacred Marriage Rite in the ancient Near East is identical with the yongch’e or pi- garum ceremony of Korean messianic groups. This rite’s structure and theological meaning is the same as the yongch’e or pigarum ceremony. The Sacred Mar- riage Rite was the theological and political basis of ancient theocratic city states in the ancient Near East. Through this sexual rite God and Goddess became in- carnated in the King and Queen and they became di- vinities in human flesh. Only after going through this Sacred Marriage Rite the King and Queen of the theo- cratic city state had legitimacy in the eyes of people. The Fall account in Gen. 3 was authored by a Yahwist theologian and it represents a theological and political attack against the Sacred Marriage Rite of Canaanite people. It is important to understand the political and cultural background for the Fall story in Gen. 3 because Rev. Moon takes the Fall literally, as a historical fact. The main premise of his theology is that people are fallen and are coming from the satanic blood lineage. Therefore the Messiah must come again and cut them off from their satanic blood lineage and engraft them

10 into the blood lineage of God.

In order to support my theses I am going to examine first the initiation rite Naerim kut or Gangsin kut in Korean Shamanism. It means a shaman or shamaness becomes possessed by God or Goddess and has a spiritual mar- riage with God or Goddess. Through this spiritual mar- riage and spiritual sexual relations with God or Goddess they become divine beings in flesh. Next I will examine the ritual sex practices called yongch’e or pigarum cer- emonies of the Jesus Church. It was the female spiritual leaders who were possessed by God or Jesus and had sexual relations with them and through these unions they became divinities in flesh. The female spiritual leaders acted like shamanesses Mudang. After their spiritual marriage with God or Jesus they transferred a new spiri- tual body yongch’e to their male followers who in turn shared it to their female followers. And finally I will examine the Sacred Marriage Rite in the Ancient Near East and seek parallels between it and the yongch’e cer- emony.

The first chapter serves as a general introduction to Rev. Moon’s world view, his theology and political ideology which can not be separated. The Unification Church is essentially a political church. The second chapter deals first with Shamanism in general and then particularly with Korean characteristics of Shamanism and the Naer- im kut initiation rite of a shaman or shamaness. The third chapter deals with the yongch’e or pigarum ceremony of Korean messianic groups, inluding the Unification Church. And it examines also how Rev. Moon participat-

11 ed in the yongch’e ceremonies in North Korea and later in South Korea. The fourth chapter deals with The Holy Wine Ceremony, The Holy Blessing Ceremony and The Three Day Ceremony of the Unification Church which replaced the original yongch’e or pigarum ceremony in 1962. And finally the fifth chapter examines the Sacred Marriage Rite in the ancient Near East and highlights the parallels between it and the yongch’e or pigarum cer- emony. And it deals also with the Fall story in Gen. 3 as a critique against the Sacred Marriage Rites at Canaanite temples.

1.2. The Messiah has arrived

The Unification Church is a new religion. By a new religion it is meant a religious movement centered on a new doctrine, a new sacrament, and a new community established through these two factors. The new doctrine of the Unification Church is expressed in The Divine Principle4 and Rev. Moon’s speeches called Hoon Dok Hae5. The new sacrament of the Unification Church is The Blessing of Marriage. And a new community is the “Family of Love”, centered on the True Parents of hu- mankind, Rev. and Mrs. Moon. They understand them-

4 Exposition Of The Divine Principle, The Holy Spirit Associa- tion For The Unification Of World Christianity, Second Printing, New York, 1998. 5 HOON DOK HAE, The Gathering for Reading and Learning Words Of Rev. Sun Myung Moon. http://www.unification.org/ucbooks/HDH/index.html

12 selves as the new divine family in God’s direct blood lineage.6

The Unification Church or The Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity was born in North-Korea at the end of the 1940s. Officially the Uni- fication Church was founded by the Rev. Sun Myung Moon7 in 1954 in , South Korea. The teaching of the Unification Church is uniquely Korean. It is a syn- thesis of Korean old religions Shamanism, Confucian- ism, Buddhism and Taoism. In addition to these eastern religions the Unification Church doctrine has adopted Christian teachings. It is a typically eastern practice of pursuing several religious traditions simultaneously. In Korea a religious seeker can be attached to many reli- gions at the same time. Rev. Moon’s family converted to the Presbyterian Church when he was ten years old and so he became influenced by the Christian doctrine. Rev. Moon began to preach and attract followers in North-Korea in 1947. Mainstream Christians rejected Rev. Moon and therefore he began to associate himself with some new Korean Christian sects on the fringes of Christianity. These groups were highly spiritualistic, they were prophesying, speaking in tongues, receiving visions, sinking in trances and consulting with spirits. At

6 Flasche, Rainer, The Unification Church in the Context of East-Asian Religious Traditions in Acta Comparanda II, Antwerp: Faculteit voor vergleijkende Godsdienstwetenschappen, 1987, p. 27. 7 Sun Myung Moon’s original name was Mun Yong-myung. Yong means “Dragon”. He was born in a village called Sangsa-ri near a small town Jeong-ju in North Korea on 6 January 1920 as a son of the farming family.

13 the same time they were rejecting the traditional Chris- tian doctrine of the Second Coming: instead of Jesus re- turning on the clouds of heaven they were expecting a new Messiah, a Lord of the Second Advent, to be born in Korea. These spiritual groups had also new teachings and interpretations about the Fall of man and how to re- store fallen men back to God. Rev. Moon adopted the teachings and rituals of these spiritualists into his own doctrine and Church practice and began to spread his new message.8

The various religious traditions of Korea had been con- stantly influencing each other and it was inevitable that when Christianity arrived it would become part of the amalgam of the Korean religions. Numerous small re- ligious groups arose in Korea which were strongly in- fluenced by the indigenous Korean faiths, but claimed Christian identity which was vigorously challenged by the mainstream Christian churches. It is estimated that there were at least 170 such groups which emerged in Korea after the Second World War. In the minds of many Koreans Christianity and Shamanism were ba- sically identical. Christian missionary activity enabled the propagation of Shamanism in Christian guise. Many Koreans who supposedly embraced the Christian faith did not actually understand the differences between Christianity and Shamanism. Teachings and practices varied from group to group, but their main features were

8 Chryssides, George D., The Advent of Sun Myung Moon, The Origins, Beliefs and Practices of the Unification Church, Macmil- lan Professional and Academic Ltd., Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 2XS and London, 1991, pp. 46-107.

14 that they were syncretistic and had messianic expecta- tions, laid emphasis on communication with the spirit world, practiced healing and prophecy and were trying to transform the existing socio-political system. These Christian-related spiritual groups were messianic, that is, they believed the Messiah was already among them or at least his arrival as a physical man was imminent. In common with many new Korean religions the Unifi- cation Church proclaims a ‘this-worldly’ goal, centred on a messiah who emerges from Korea to unify and save the world.9

The basic ingredients of the doctrines of the new reli- gions are: syncretism, the advent of a future world, para- dise on earth, faith in a savior, the notion of Koreans as a chosen people, faith in the Chonggamnok and shaman- istic faith.10 The Korean people, the Third Israel, have believed in the prophecy that the Righteous King will appear and found a glorious and everlasting kingdom in their land. This messianic idea among the Korean peo- ple was revealed through the Chonggamnok, a book of prophecy written in the fourteenth century at the begin- ning of the Yi dynasty. The hoped-for Righteous King foretold in the Chonggamnok has the appellation Chong- doryong (the one who comes with the true Word of God). This is a Korean prophecy of the Christ who is to return

9 Chryssides, George D., The Advent of Sun Myung Moon, The Origins, Beliefs and Practices of the Unification Church, Macmil- lan Professional and Academic Ltd., Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 2XS and London, 1991, pp. 79, 88. 10 Moon, Sang-hee, Fundamental doctrines of the new religions in Korea in Korea Journal, Vol. 11, 1971, p. 23.

15 to Korea.11 Unification Church came into existence in 1947 in North Korea. When Moon was in Pyongyang before the Korean War, his messianic group had such names as Kwang-ya Kyohoe (the “Wilderness Church”) or Chaegun Kyohoe (the “Second Root Church”). Its formal name, Segye Kidokkyo T’ongil Sillyong Hyo- phoe, was decided on in May 1954. It can be translated into English as the “Godly-and-Spiritual Association for Unification of World Christianity”. The wordsillyong as a noun means “god-and-spirit”.12

On June 21, 1977, the Commission on Faith and Order of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. (the NCC) released to the press and other inter- ested persons a “Critique of the Theology of the Uni- fication Church as Set Forth in Divine Principle”. The conclusion of the Critique is that the Unification Church is not a Christian Church, and that its claims to Christian identity cannot be recognized. The Critique concludes: A. The Unification Church is not a Christian Church. 1. Its doctrine of the nature of the triune God is erroneous. 2. Its Christology is incompatible with Christian teach- ing and belief. 3. Its teaching on salvation and the means of grace is inadequate and faulty. B. The claims of the Unification Church to Christian identity cannot be rec- ognized. 1. The role and authority of Scripture are com-

11 Exposition Of The Divine Principle, The Holy Spirit Associa- tion For The Unification Of World Christianity, Second Printing, New York, 1998, pp. 404, 405. 12 Choe, Joong-hyun, The Korean War and messianic groups: Two cases in contrast, Dissertation, Syracuse University, 1993, p. 94.

16 promised in the teachings of the Unification Church. 2. Revelations are invoked as divine and normative in Di- vine Principle, which contradict basic elements of Chris- tian faith. 3. A ‘new, ultimate, final truth’ is presented to complete and supplant all previously recognized re- ligious teachings, including those of Christianity. So the Critique judges the Unification Church to be non-Chris- tian in four doctrinal areas: trinity, christology, salvation, and scripture.13

The Unification Church is not a Christian church be- cause it does not accept Jesus of Nazareth as the Christ. The life, death and resurrection of Jesus are the ground and means of the salvation of persons and of the whole creation. Every church which calls itself Christian must adhere to the success and continued messiahship of Je- sus Christ. Unificationism has departed so much from Christian orthodoxy that it can not be categorised as a Christian Church.14 According to the teachings of the Unification Church Jesus failed miserably in his mission because he was not able to have a family. He failed to leave descendants through whom he could transmit pure blood to humankind. Jesus could not create the physical or political Kingdom of God on Earth. This is the Mes- siah’s primary purpose when he comes to the earth as

13 Wells, Jonathan, Theological Witch-Hunt: The NCC Critique of the Unification Church, Journal of Unification Studies, 1997. http://www.tparents.org/library/unification/talks/wells/Wells- 97000.htm 14 Lewis, Sarah M., Unification, Christianity and the messianic claims of Sun Myung Moon, Doctoral thesis, University of Wales, Lampeter, 1996, pp. ii, 378.

17 the Son of God. The qualification of the Messiah is that he must be able to defeat the evil and erect the Heaven on Earth. This Son of God on earth must find a divine Bride for himself, marry Her and have children with Her. In this case their children are born without original sin. Their family is the first True Family of God on earth and a perfect family, tribe, society, nation and world will be born out of this nuclear True Family. The Messiah and his divine Bride become the True Parents of the new sin- less humankind.15

According to The Divine Principle Christ at the Second Advent, who is to come as the center of Christianity, is at the same time the person of the Maitreya Buddha who is to return according to the teachings of Buddhism, the True Man Jin-In who is awaited in the Chinese religious tradition, and the Chongdoryong for whom many Kore- ans yearn. He is the central figure whose advent is ex- pected in other religions as well. The Jews would then agree that Christ at the Second Coming was the long awaited Messiah, the Hindus would accept him as Kalki (Vishnu’s incarnation in the future age), the Muslims as the hidden Imam and the Baha’is as the messenger of the new age. All religions will find the fulfillment of their

15 Moon, Sun Myung, God’s Will and the World, The New Future of Christianity, September 18, 1974, New York. http://www.unification.net/gww/gww-17.html Exposition Of The Divine Principle, The Holy Spirit Association For The Unification Of World Christianity, Second Printing, New York, 1998, p. 112.

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