This study seeks to explain the origin and development of premillennial eschatology in the evangelical Korean church. It begins with an examination of the traditional religions of Korea, including Shamanism, Buddhism, and Confucianism. All these disposed the Korean Christian mind toward premillennialism at a time of distress.
The second major influence on Korean Christianity was the theology of the American missionaries who came to Korea in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. They brought not only the gospel, but also a strong sense of national independence, which seeped into Korean life, both inside and outside the church. Premillennialism was assumed to be the only view of the end times that an evangelical Christian, believing in biblical inerrancy and thus in literal interpretation, could possibly hold to.
The third major influence on Korean Christian eschatology was the horrific experience of Japanese occupation, which lasted from 1910 to 1945, when almost anything that was expressly Korean was purposefully extinguished. During this time of constant persecution, Koreans (like so many other Christians experiencing oppression) began to look to a future golden age discontinuous with the age in which they were living, in which Korea would be independent and Christ would reign in all his majesty.
Moving from general influences to specific examples, this study examines the enforcement of Shinto shrine worship under Japanese imperial rule--when both the best and the worst manifested themselves in Korean Christianity. By tenaciously holding to dispensational premillennialism, and anticipating the imminent return of Christ and the dawning of the millennium, many Christians were strengthened to resist the imposition of Shintoism.
The study also explains the place of premillennialism in the Christian life, discussing the problems, as well as the merits, of premillennial eschatology in the Korean Christian life.
In conclusion, the premillennial experience in Korean Christianity is evaluated. While premillennialism has been helpful in Korean history, especially in times of suffering, it has had its problems as well. The whole question of eschatology should now be reexamined; amillennialism may be the answer to the problems with premillennialism.
