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<div>_Living Dangerously in Korea: The Western Experience 1900-1950_
by Donald N. Clark, 2003. Norwalk: CT: EastBridge. 453 pages. (ISBN
1-891936-11-5)<br>
<br>
reviewed by Don Baker<br>
University of British Columbia<br>
dbaker@interchange.ubc.ca<br>
<br>
<br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>In his title, Don Clark advertises this book as
an account of the Western missionary experience in Korea over the
first half of the twentieth century. He is too modest. This book is
much more than that. Because he writes about how the missionaries
responded to the various situations they found themselves witnessing,
and sometimes caught up in, he has actually provided a history of
Korea from 1900-1950, albeit one filtered through the eyes of Western
residents.<br>
<br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>The son and
grandson of missionaries, Clark avoids the sin committed by many who
write about their own parents and grandparents. He does not make them
the prime movers and shakers of the times in which they lived, nor
does he even make them the axis around which their world revolved.
Instead, he lets them, and their missionary colleagues, serve as the
eyes and ears through which we can observe what life was like in Korea
back then, and how both they and their Korean converts and friends
were affected by the many tumultuous events of that half-century.<br>
</div>
<div><x-tab> </x-tab>He
begins with the arrival of his grandfather, Charlie Clark, in Korea in
1902. That provides him an excuse to sketch the cultural and political
environment on the peninsula on the eve of annexation. He also
explores the cross-cultural barriers the missionaries faced in trying
to convert Koreans not just to Christianity but to the particularly
rigid form of Christianity they preached, which demanded that Koreans
give up such time-honored customs as smoking, polygamy, social
drinking, and most difficult, the ritual honoring of ancestors. In
addition, he discusses the problems preaching in Korean posed for
those English-speaking missionaries. As someone who vividly remembers
the many mistakes I made when I first began speaking Korean in Korea,
I particularly enjoyed the story about the sermon on<i> ddam</i>
(sweat) when the missionary actually intended to warn his congregation
against the sin of<i> t'am</i> (envy).<br>
<br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>Since
Western missionaries, including Charlie Clark, remained in Korea after
the annexation of 1910, Clark is able to provide a different view of
Japanese rule than is usually found in Korean accounts. First of all,
he points out that most of the missionaries (with the
conspicuous exceptions of Hulbert and Allen) were at first ambivalent
about the Japanese takeover, hoping that a colonial government more
modern than the Confucian government it replaced would open up more
space for missionary activity. However, they soon found out that the
Japanese were not enthusiastic about the spread of Christianity in
Korea and in fact raised barriers to it. Japanese demands that medical
missionaries pass qualifying exams in Japanese and that the curriculum
in missionary schools be redesigned to conform to the curriculum in
secular schools run by the Japanese government (which meant that
religion could not be taught in those schools) soured the missionaries
on Japanese rule. However, Clark makes clear that, despite such
disappointments during the first decade of colonial rule, the vast
majority of the missionaries were not prepared to support uprisings
against the Japanese, even after March 1, 1919 showed how unpopular
Japanese rule had become. Instead, the missionaries welcomed the
appointment of a more liberal governor-general near the end of 1919,
since Admiral Saito rolled back some of the restrictions which had
been placed on their schools a decade earlier.<br>
<br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>A more serious
problem for the missionaries in the 1920s was the rise of resentment
by some Korean Christians of the missionary domination of Korean
Christianity. Koreans wanted control of Christian schools such
as the Chosen Christian College (now Yonsei University) to be turned
over to them faster than the missionaries wanted to relinquish
control. Clark tells us that such prominent Korean Christians as Paek
Nakchun and Yun Ch'iho resented what they considered "missionary
paternalism" in this and other matters. However, such disputes
paled in comparison with the issue that confronted both the
missionaries and Korean Christians in the 1930s. When the
Japanese demanded that Christian schools permit their students to
participate in Shinto rituals, both the missionary community and the
Korean Christian community were split over how to render unto Caesar
the things that are Caesar's while remaining faithful to the laws of
God. The issue was soon rendered moot for the missionaries by the rise
of tension between the US and Japan which led to the expulsion of most
of the missionaries in 1940. Korean Christians were left behind to
resolve that moral dilemma for themselves.</div>
<div><br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>As Clark
tells the tale, that expulsion of the missionaries and their five-year
absence from Korea led to renewed strains between missionaries and
Korean Christians in 1945. During the war years, Koreans took charge
of their own churches and schools and were not ready to return control
to the missionaries when those missionaries returned after the war was
over. However, just as in the 1930s, an external threat to
Christianity in Korea brought both missionaries and Korean Christians
closer together again. That threat was, of course, the North Korean
invasion of 1950. Clark ends his book with a moving account of what
life was like for both Catholic and Protestant missionaries, as well
as Korean Christians, caught up in that horrendous civil war.<br>
<br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>While guiding us through
the turbulent waters of Korean history from the final years of the
Joseon dynasty to the Korean war, Clark manages to take us on some
interesting side trips as well. He devotes a chapter to pre-Communist
Pyongyang, when it was known as the Jerusalem of the East, and another
chapter to the White Russians who were stranded in Korea after the
victory of the communist revolution in their homeland. He also
has an entire chapter on life for Koreans and missionaries alike in
Manchuria in the 1920s and 1930. However, the chapter that will
probably attract the most interest is the one he titles "Western
Women in the Land of the Morning Calm." Despite that title, he
spends almost as much time in that chapter on Korean women as he does
on missionary women. By doing so, he sheds light on an aspect of
modern Korean history often overlooked in standard textbook surveys.
Another chapter that will attract interest is "Soldiers of
Freedom," an account of the birth of a South Korean army and
government and the subsequent uprisings in both Cheju and Sunch'on.
Clark's comments on Park Chung-hee's role in that latter rebellion is
the clearest account I have seen in English of how Park managed to
become involved with that incident, and how he managed to extricate
himself.<br>
<br>
<x-tab> </x-tab>In summary, don't be
misled by title of this book. It is a fascinating and informative read
for anyone interested in modern Korean history and is not just for
those interested in missionary history or the history of Korean
Christianity. In fact, this book would make a good supplementary text
for a class on the history of Korea in the twentieth century.<br>
<br>
<x-tab> </x-tab><br>
Citation:<br>
Baker, Don 2004<br>
_Living Dangerously in Korea: The Western Experience 1900-1950_ by
Donald N. Clark (2003)<br>
_Korean Studies Review_ 2004, no. 14</div>
<div>Electronic file: http://koreaweb.ws/ks/ksr/ksr04-14.htm</div>
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