Korea's Great Buddhist-Confucian Debate is the fifth volume in this series of translations of influential classics in Korea's religious tradition. Sponsored by the Academy of Korean Studies and funded by the Department of Education of South Korea, ten leading Korean studies scholars have each translated a major work, with publication commencing in 2013. The book reviewed here, translated by Charles Muller, contains an extensive introduction and three treatises from the founding period of the Chosŏn dynasty (1392–1910): two refutations of Buddhism and Daoism by the Confucian scholar Chŏng Tojŏn (1342–98) and a rebuttal of both treatises by the Buddhist monk Hamhŏ Tŭkt'ong (henceforth Kihwa, 1376–1433).

This book is fascinating, engaging, and fun to read. Muller has done a superb job translating highly abstract ideas and abstruse terms into language accessible to a general readership, and his introduction provides a clear and comprehensive history of the debate. By framing it in a broader East Asian philosophical and religious context, Muller provides a useful analysis of the worldview and assumptions underlying Confucian-Buddhist polemics. Of particular value, Muller traces Chŏng's and Kihwa's arguments back to those developed over the preceding centuries. Chŏng, for example, inherited critiques of Buddhism from Chinese Confucian intellectuals such as Han Yu (768–824), the Cheng brothers (Cheng Hao, 1032–85, and Cheng Yi, 1033–1107), and Zhu Xi (1130–1200), while Kihwa followed in the footsteps of earlier Chinese Buddhists, such as Zongmi (780–841) and Qisong (1007–72). As such, it matters less whether Kihwa, who outlived Chŏng by thirty-five years, composed his rebuttal in direct response to Chŏng's diatribes; the debate of this volume is not person-to-person but rather tradition-to-tradition.

That being said, Muller maintains that Chŏng and Kihwa were not merely parroting their intellectual forefathers’ rhetoric. Muller characterizes Chŏng as “a first-class scholar, a clever rhetorician, and a skilled writer” (p. 14). So too was Kihwa, educated as he was at Sŏnggyun'gwan, the highest neo-Confucian academy in the country. As such, Muller presents this debate as one of the most systematic and refined disputations in defense of the orthodoxy of both traditions—one “not previously seen in China” (p. 12). These Korean treatises are thus distinctive and merit special attention.

While Chŏng and Kihwa possessed their own intellectual authority, one might consider also the impact of the national Buddhist preceptor Muhak Chach'o (1327–1405), Chŏng's contemporary and Kihwa's master. As key advisors to Chosŏn's founder, King T'aejo (r. 1392–98), Muhak and Chŏng vied to persuade him to move the capital city to their respective preferred locations, which deepened the animosity between them. More detail on the relationships among such additional figures thus can further illuminate the historical context that informed these texts.

Muller's introduction provides several interdependent dualisms at the core of the East Asian worldview at the time: essence–function, roots–branches, principle–phenomena, emptiness–form, macrocosm–microcosm, and several others. These concepts become the locus from which Chŏng argues for Confucianism's superiority, presented vigorously in Simgiri p'yŏn (On mind, material force, and principle), the book's first chapter. Chŏng denounces Buddhism for misconstruing the mind as the essence and Daoism for mistaking the material forces as the principle. He therefore rebukes Buddhism and Daoism for incorrectly favoring the secondary elements over the principle that generated them. Yet the shared Weltanschauung between Buddhism and Confucianism meant that Buddhists could make the same argument about Confucianism. For example, the Buddhist Unbong Taeji (1601?–90?) employed similar logic in arguing that Confucianism mistakes the function for the essence.Footnote ¹

Chŏng lays out a more compelling argument against Buddhism in Pulssi chappyŏn (An array of critiques of Buddhism), the book's second chapter. Attacking Buddhism's doctrinal and ethical failures, Chŏng points to flaws in the notions of transmigration, karma, and hell. He accuses Buddhist monastics of abandoning fundamental social obligations such as filial piety, loyalty to the ruler, and economic participation. Alluding to the fate of previous dynasties in China and Korea due to Buddhist influence, Chŏng declares that Buddhism deluded people, drained state coffers, invited calamities, and shortened the reigns of rulers. Subtly warning current and future kings about the dangers of Buddhism, Chŏng ends his treatise by urging that “this [abandoning of Buddhism] is what I desire to see from our rulers” (p. 80).

Kihwa's writing offers a formidable response to Chŏng's treatises. Hyŏnjŏng non (Exposition on orthodoxy), the third and final chapter of Muller's book, is not a direct riposte to Chŏng's treatises per se, but more likely a response to the overall anti-Buddhist discourse prevalent among Confucian ideologues. As such, Kihwa adopts a question-and-answer format, posing questions from the Confucian perspective and answering from the Buddhist. He seems to believe that the most persuasive defense against the philosophical, religious, ethical, political, and economic challenges that Buddhism faced at the time would be to reiterate the inseparability of Buddhism, Confucianism, and Daoism. He writes that the three great teachings “fit together like the pieces of the same tally” (p. 110), and that Buddhism therefore should not be rejected (p. 86), an argument prefiguring later Buddhist writings such as those by Sŏsan Hyujŏng (1520–1604), Unbong Taeji, and Paegok Ch’ŏnŭng (1631–1700). Yet, Kihwa maintains that Buddhism is superior to Confucianism. He observes that Confucianism teaches people “not through the example of virtuous action but through laws and punishment” (p. 85). Ruling merely through the legal system, he argues, is “superficial” and is therefore bound to fail in changing “the inner minds of people.” In contrast, the Buddhist teachings of karma and transmigration encourage virtue and morality, and thus are ultimately beneficial to the health of society and country. Rather than trying to prove the veracity of the doctrines, Kihwa resorts to Pascal's wager-like argument, emphasizing the practicality of belief in karma and rebirth for people's moral development. Thus, for leading people onto the right path, he asserts, “it is Buddhism that works best” (p. 110).

However, the arguments of Kihwa and other monks could not alter the perception, popular among elites at the time, that Buddhism was heterodox, deleterious to society, and responsible for the Koryŏ dynasty's (918–1392) collapse. Under the neo-Confucian hegemony of the succeeding Chosŏn kingdom, such anti-Buddhist sentiment came to prevail, as shown already in the three treatises in Muller's book. Korean Buddhists remained marginalized until the Chosŏn dynasty disintegrated in the early twentieth century. And when the tables turned under Japanese colonial rule (1910–45), Korean Buddhists lambasted the corruption of the neo-Confucian literati and accused them of being responsible for the demise of the Chosŏn dynasty.

The three texts Muller has brought together will be a great resource for scholars and students interested in the rich history of religious debate in East Asia. Starting when Buddhism was implanted in Chinese soil, the three major traditions (Taoism, Confucianism, and Buddhism) jockeyed for political and economic power. Cognizant of this competition, East Asian rulers often provided platforms for public debate, in part to increase their legitimacy and to prevent conflict.Footnote ² Nevertheless, relations among the three religions were precarious, varying with historical circumstances and at times breaking into outright feuding. Muller's book shows this scenario being played out during the founding period of Chosŏn Korea.