조성기의 기독교 소설 연구

Abstract

A Study on Cho, Seong Gi's Christian Novels

Jang, Yeo Ok Advisor : Prof. Kim, Hyoung Joong, Ph.D. Department of Korean Language and Literature, Graduate School of Chosun University

This study aims to highlight projection methods of theological doctrines in religious in the perspective of religious growth novel on texts considered to have great deals of meaning as Christian novels in works of Cho, Seong Gi. And, next, in the perspective of religious social condition novel, the political condition in Korean society and the condition of Korean Christianity in his works are searched and analyzed. The meaning according to religious growth novels is found to propose symptomatic answers on various theological issues that the Korean modern Christianity has been and will be confronted. Also, in the narration of growth novels, social and political incidents (from 4.19 to 5.18) and religious conditions (doctrines and behaviors of various religions and religious orders) are illustrated. Literally speaking, Cho, Seong Gi’s novels can be classified as ‘Christian growth novels’ as well as ‘Christian social condition novels’. This study aims to increase of the understanding on the overall literatures of Cho, Seong Gi. First, to confirm Cho, Seong GI’s position in the history of Korean Christian literature, the development process of Korean Christian literature and the changes in the concept of ‘Christian literature’ are checked. Korean Christian literature shows changes in three large phases. In the first, Korean Christian literature took the role of enlightening literature (from the time of enlightenment to 1920s). In the second, Korean Christian literature shows the trend that the bible and the Christianity are utilized as literature subjects, but employed only as in the level of inserted or descriptive tools while failed to be incarnated correctly. Works created in this era (1930s ~ 70s) shows characteristics considering the presence of god in the level of shamanistic presence in the mixture of the traditional shamanism culture and the Christian culture. In the third, the era when the Christianity is settled above the culture of shamanism, the indigenous religion, the Christianity which has been stayed in the level off material is shown to reach to the theological and metaphysical work creation asking the nature of God. In this era, the Christian literature shows the trend to fictionalize motives of bibles in the daily area. Based on the Christianity, works are structured with the method ether focusing on the human existence and the private religious life or showing the intention to follow the nature of the Christianity. Also, the Korean society is under the era when various social issues such as the instability of social structure, the increase of social pathology and the collapse of the community are raising. Such social atmosphere causes rising of the people theology and the people literary theory. The formation period is relevant to the third phase. However, even in several flows in the third phase, Cho, Seong Gi's literature is exception. He shows a world of works covering multiple flows. His works in 1980s gained with such result directly face issues of the society and the race with motives of the bible and search for alternatives. And, based on the changing reality of society, his works show examples of the social religion literature by combining the writer's awareness on the literature's role for the era and the situation and the self-consciousness on the nature of the Christianity. Cho, Seong Gi's works are religious growth novels having the autobiographic uniqueness and religious experience novels entirely reflecting the religious doctrine the writer experienced. This study reviews how Wesley's doctrines (Regeneration, Sanctification, Healing) are described. With the description of regeneration (salvation), the intellectual salvation and the behavioral salvation are identified. Therefore, it is shown that the intellectual savior employs the direct quote through the sermon and the bible as the media of salvation and the behavioral savior takes the indirect testimony and the confessional format through experience. In Cho, Seong Gi’s literatures, courses of the sanctification and the healing after the regeneration are also symbolized in complex forms so that the work analysis is performed following Wesley’s four-fold gospel. From the aspect of social condition novel, “Fire Sword of Eden” is analyzed. The novel is separated in two large categories including the religious condition and the political condition in Korea of the era. A characteristic of Cho, Seong Gi’s novels is on that works show the aspect of religious social condition novel with the appearance of social conditional novelistic illustration in the description of the religious growth. And, this can be called an overlapping structure of the growth novel and the social condition novel because the course of growth entirely becomes the course of the social condition’s description. The analysis shows that many religious denominations in Korea of the era and major political incidents in the modern Korean history act as important backgrounds and media in the development of description. After all, “Fire Sword of Eden” is a religious growth novel and a religious social condition novel in an exceptional large scale in the Korean literature history. And, an overall approach to Cho, Seong Gi’s literature becomes possible only when the characteristics from the both is eliminated. Cho, Seong Gi is a writer searching for open causes allowing readers’ own determinations on the fundamental absurdity that derived from community while the writer is escaping from the biased world and considering the motive of the bible as the original form of his own literatures, but searching for the issue of the human existence in the process and being based on the theological nature. Considering the situation that researches on Cho, Seong Gi’s literature have been fragmented and partial until now, the meaning of this study is found here. However, this study has also many limits. First of all, this study requires the comparative research with works of other writers having the Christianity for their subjects. Since this study aims the overall understanding on Cho, Seong Gi's Christian literatures, the limit remains as being relatively insufficient for the comparative research with other writers and Cho, Seong Gi's position in the entire Korean Christian literature history.