This article deals with the ideological fundament of the support to the Japanese war efforts rendered by the institutionalized monastic Buddhism in Korea in 1937‐1945, during the Pacific War. In the beginning, I discuss the main institutional frameworks for colonial Buddhism in Korea, as provided by the Japanese Government‐General’s laws and regulations, particularly the Temple Law (1911). I attempt to show that, while having essentially become an organic part of the colonial administrative apparatus, institutional Buddhism was rewarded by a privileged position on the colonial religious market, and showed a robust modern development (in terms of the opening of new missionary stations, schools etc.) during the colonial age. However, its cohesive relationship with the Japanese authorities prevented it from acquiring modern nationalist credentials of the sort partly obtained by Protestant Christianity, and small groups of nationalist and liberal dissidents－best represented by Han Yongun (1879‐1944)－remained to all intents and purposes a rather powerless minority in the Buddhist monastic ranks. While active participation of Korean monastic Buddhists in the mass propagandist campaigns of the colonial administration began already in the early 1930s, the start of the Pacific War (1937) saw a dramatic strengthening of Buddhist collaboration with Japanese governmental policies. Monastic Buddhists provided the most essential wartime ritual services (their memorial rites for the dead soldiers were important in inculcating the idea of the “honourable” and “karmically salubrious” nature of the battlefield death) and concomitantly were serving the Japanese Empire as war donations collectors, Japanese language teachers, propagandists etc. On the ideological level, those activities were legitimized by the belief in the Japanese Empire as a “Buddhist state” waging a “dharmic war” against “Christian enemies” for the sake of unifying the whole world under its aegis. The Mahayana ideas of all‐inclusive totality were described as the philosophical grounds for the wartime “totalitarian statehood” (the term was used approvingly), and the battlefield experience was explained in the terms of Buddhist “self‐cultivation” and Bodhisattva‐like self‐sacrifice. While much of the war‐approving ideology of the wartime colonial Buddhism was undoubtedly borrowed from the contemporaneous Japanese sources, it looks as if the leading figures of the Korean Buddhist establishment had hopes and plans of their own, envisioning great enhancement of their position both domestically and internationally in case of the ultimate victory for the Japanese. The belief in desirability of the cooperation with the state war efforts became deeply ingrained into the minds of the Korean Buddhist leaders as a result of their experiences during the Pacific War. Their willing cooperation with the South Korean state and its army has been continuing after the end of the colonialism and shows no signs of weakening so far.

This article deals with the ideological fundament of the support to the Japanese war efforts rendered by the institutionalized monastic Buddhism in Korea in 1937‐1945, during the Pacific War. In the beginning, I discuss the main institutional frameworks for colonial Buddhism in Korea, as provided by the Japanese Government‐General’s laws and regulations, particularly the Temple Law (1911). I attempt to show that, while having essentially become an organic part of the colonial administrative apparatus, institutional Buddhism was rewarded by a privileged position on the colonial religious market, and showed a robust modern development (in terms of the opening of new missionary stations, schools etc.) during the colonial age. However, its cohesive relationship with the Japanese authorities prevented it from acquiring modern nationalist credentials of the sort partly obtained by Protestant Christianity, and small groups of nationalist and liberal dissidents－best represented by Han Yongun (1879‐1944)－remained to all intents and purposes a rather powerless minority in the Buddhist monastic ranks. While active participation of Korean monastic Buddhists in the mass propagandist campaigns of the colonial administration began already in the early 1930s, the start of the Pacific War (1937) saw a dramatic strengthening of Buddhist collaboration with Japanese governmental policies. Monastic Buddhists provided the most essential wartime ritual services (their memorial rites for the dead soldiers were important in inculcating the idea of the “honourable” and “karmically salubrious” nature of the battlefield death) and concomitantly were serving the Japanese Empire as war donations collectors, Japanese language teachers, propagandists etc. On the ideological level, those activities were legitimized by the belief in the Japanese Empire as a “Buddhist state” waging a “dharmic war” against “Christian enemies” for the sake of unifying the whole world under its aegis. The Mahayana ideas of all‐inclusive totality were described as the philosophical grounds for the wartime “totalitarian statehood” (the term was used approvingly), and the battlefield experience was explained in the terms of Buddhist “self‐cultivation” and Bodhisattva‐like self‐sacrifice. While much of the war‐approving ideology of the wartime colonial Buddhism was undoubtedly borrowed from the contemporaneous Japanese sources, it looks as if the leading figures of the Korean Buddhist establishment had hopes and plans of their own, envisioning great enhancement of their position both domestically and internationally in case of the ultimate victory for the Japanese. The belief in desirability of the cooperation with the state war efforts became deeply ingrained into the minds of the Korean Buddhist leaders as a result of their experiences during the Pacific War. Their willing cooperation with the South Korean state and its army has been continuing after the end of the colonialism and shows no signs of weakening so far.

본 논문은 태평양 전쟁 시기의 한국 제도권 불교의 전쟁협력의 이념적 기반을 주된 주제로 다룬다. 모두(冒頭) 부분에서는 식민지 불교의 제도적 틀을 먼저 고찰하여 특히 사찰령(1911년) 등 총독부의 각종 법률에 주목한다. 이 고찰의 결론은, 불교가 사실상 식민지 행정체계의 일부분으로 체제에 편입된 대가로 식민지의 “종교 시장”에서의 나름의 특권적 입장을 굳혔으며 포교소와 근대적 학교의 점차적 증설 등 양적, 물적 차원에서의 “근대화”를 이루게 됐다는 것이다. 단, 총독부와의 유착으로 근대 민족주의적 명분 쌓기에 실패했으며, 그 속에서는 한용운 (1879~1944) 등으로 대표됐던 극소수의 민족주의적 내지 자유주의적 반대파가 철저히 고립돼 무력화됐다. 이미 1930년대 초반부터 총독부의 각종 대중동원 켐페인에 적극적으로 참여한 제도권 불교는, 태평양 전쟁 발발(1937년)로 그 대(對)정부 협력을 더욱더 가중시켰다. 사찰 승려들은 전시의 가장 근본적인 “의례적 서비스”(전장에서의 전몰을 “명예롭고 정토왕생에 이로운” 것으로 만들려는 전몰 군속 위령제 등)를 제공했으며 전쟁헌금 모금자 내지 일본어 교사, 선전 요원 등의 역할로 일본제국을 섬겼다. 이념적으로는 이와 같은 대(對)국가 봉사는 일제를 “기독교적 적국”들을 상대로 “법전(法戰)”, “성전(聖戰)”을 벌여 결국 전세계를 의롭게 통일시키려는 불교국가로 보는 시각에 의해서 정당화됐다. 대승불교의 “일즉다 다즉일(一卽多 多卽一)” 등 전체 및 개체 사이의 관계론들이 일제의 전체주의(전시 일본에서 이 용어가 긍정적 의미로 쓰였다)의 철학적 기반으로 이해됐으며, 전장 체험은 “육바라밀 실행”, “보살다운 자기헌신” 등으로 설명되어졌다. 이와 같은 태평양전쟁 긍정론의 골자는 물론 당대 일본의 우파 내지 어용 이념가로부터 차용된 것임에 틀림없지만 식민지 조선 제도권 불교의 지도자들은 태평양 전쟁에서의 승리의 경우에는 한국 불교의 대내외적 위상이 제고되리라고 확신하는 등 전쟁에 대한 자기 나름의 자율적인 기대와 계획들을 보유하고 있었던 것으로 보이기도 한다. 태평양 전쟁 시의 전시 협력으로 한국의 제도권 불교에서 대(對)국가 전시협력, 또한 군대 당국과의 협조 관계와 국가가 벌이는 전쟁에 대한 무조건 긍정 등이 당당하게 착근됐으며, 이와 같은 국가, 군대와의 협력은 1945년의 일제 패망 이후, 대한민국 시절에도 계속 지속돼 현재까지도 그 어떤 약화의 기미도 전혀 보이지 않는다.

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식민지 불교, 군사주의, 전시 협력, 근대 불교사상, 호국불교, 한국 민족주의, 황도 불교, 태평양전쟁