The Foresight of Dark Knowing : Chŏng Kam nok and Insurrectionary Prognostication in Pre-Modern Korea / John Jorgensen; edition by Robert E. Buswell.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Jørgensen, John J., author.

Contributor:

Buswell, Robert E., Jr., 1953- editor.

De Gruyter.

Series:

Korean classics library. Philosophy and religion

Korean Classics Library: Philosophy and Religion

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Divination--Korea.

Divination.

Prophecies (Occultism).

Korea.

Prophecies (Occultism)--Korea.

Genre:

Dictionaries.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (520 pages).

Contained In:

De Gruyter University Press Library.

Place of Publication:

Honolulu : University of Hawaii Press, [2018]

Language Note:

In English.

System Details:

Mode of access: Internet via World Wide Web.

text file PDF

Summary:

Korea has long had an underground insurrectionary literature. The best-known example of the genre is the Chŏng Kam nok, a collection of premodern texts predicting the overthrow of the Yi Dynasty (1392-1910) that in recent times has been invoked by a wide range of groups to support various causes and agendas: from leaders of Korea's new religious movements formed during and after the Japanese occupation to spin doctors in the South Korean elections of the 1990s to proponents of an aborted attempt to move the capital from Seoul in the early 2000s.Written to inspire uprisings and foment dissatisfaction, the Chŏng Kam nok texts are anonymous and undated. (Most were probably written between the seventeenth and late nineteenth centuries.) In his expansive introduction to this first English translation, John Jorgensen notes that the work employs forms or codes of political prediction (Ch. tuch'en; Kor. toch'am) allied with Chinese geomancy (fengshui) but in a combination unique to Korea. The two types of codes appear to deal with different subjects-the potency of geographical locations and political predictions derived from numerological cycles, omens, and symbols-but both emerge from a similar intellectual sphere of prognostication arts that includes divination, the Yijing (Book of Changes), physiognomy, and astrology in early China, and both share theoretical components, such as the fluctuation of ki (Ch. qi). In addition to ambiguous and obscure passages, allusion and indirection abound; many predictions are attributed to famous people in the distant past or made after the fact to lend the final outcome an air of authority. Jorgensen's invaluable introduction contains a wealth of background on the history and techniques of political prediction, augury, and geomancy from the first-century Han dynasty in China to the end of the nineteenth century in Korea, providing readers with a thorough account of East Asian geomancy based on original sources.This volume will be welcomed by students and scholars of premodern Korean history and beliefs and those with an interest in early, arcane sources of political disinformation that remain relevant in South Korea to this day.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Contents

Acknowledgments

Part I. Translator's Introduction

Historical Background

History of the Mantic Arts

Early Korea: From the Beginnings to the Advent of Koryŏ

Koryŏ

Chosŏn

Conclusion

Part II. Translation

Translator's Note

1. Predictions of Kam

2. Yin-Yang Predictions on the Central Palace

3. The Numbers of the Central Palace

4. Secret Records/Predictions of the Mountains and Forests of the Sam Han

5. Secret Predictions of Muhak

6. History Discussions of Five Hundred [Years]

7. Secret Record of the History of the Discussions of Five Hundred [Years]

8. Secret Record/Prediction of Tosŏn

9. Secret Predictions of Chŏng Pukch'ang

10. Secret Predictions of Nam Sago

11. The Ten Excellent Sites for Protection and Good Luck

12. Secret Predictions of Great Master Sŏsan

13. Secret Predictions of Du Shicong

14. Refuge Locations

15. Record of the Journey on Hwa'ak Road

16. Record of the Journey on the Road to Puktu

17. The Method of the Changing Numbers of the Nine Mansions

18. Predictions of Ongnyongja

19. Predictions Hidden in the House of Mr. Yi of Kyŏngju

20. The Poem of Samdobong

21. Untitled

22. Predictions Hidden in the House of Master Yi of Sŏ'gye

23. Hidden Predictions of T'ojŏng's Family

24. Secret Predictions of Yi T'ojŏng

25. Poem of the Summer Grains of Kap-o

26. The Predictions of Kam

27. Teachings of Master Yixing

28. The Foresight of Dark Knowing

29. Predictions of Chŏng Sun'ong

30. Predictions of the Grass Hermitage

31. Predictions of the Immortal Nang

32. Ongnyongja on Ch'ŏnghak-dong

Appendix: The Kap-Cha Cycle

Abbreviations

Notes

Works Cited

Index

Notes:

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 02. Mrz 2022)

ISBN:

9780824875503

OCLC:

1031468733

Access Restriction:

Restricted for use by site license.