Critique de Korean Messiah par Josh

Korean Messiah is a fascinating account of Christianity in Korea and its influence on Kim Il Sung and the cult of personality built around him.

That cult is well known, but a few examples help illustrate its intensity: * Every North Korean household is required to display framed portraits of the Kim family in a place of honor, and residents are expected to dust them daily with a special cloth provided by the state. * State media regularly celebrates citizens who risk their lives to protect these images - one young girl was praised for running back into a burning building to save a portrait of the Dear Leader. * Citizens are expected to spend hours each day studying Juche, Kim’s ideological system; one party official suggested an ideal day consists of eight hours of sleep, eight of work, and eight of study. * Roughly half of primary school textbooks is directly about Kim Jong Un. * Thousands of study halls have been built for mandatory sessions on the Great Leader’s writings, often paired with self-criticism rituals in which citizens confess their ideological shortcomings. * All cultural institutions reflect this obsession: a visitor to the Pyongyang subway museum noted that it contained almost no information about the subway itself, instead focusing almost entirely on Kim, down to the pen he used to authorize its construction.

Kim’s cult began under Soviet influence, modeled on that of Joseph Stalin. But when Nikita Khrushchev later moved to dismantle Stalin’s cult and encouraged other Soviet-aligned states to follow suit, North Korea refused. Instead, the cult continued to expand until Kim came to be treated as something approaching a living god.

Much of Korean Messiah, however, focuses on an earlier period. The first two-thirds of the book traces the spread of Christianity in Korea from the late Joseon dynasty through the colonial era, despite sustained persecution.

The book’s central argument is that the deeply Christian milieu in which Kim was raised provided the structural template for his later cult of personality, with Kim effectively substituted for Christ. This helps explain both the intensity and durability of the regime, which has survived famine and multiple transfers of power in a way few other former Soviet client states have.

The late 19th century saw a surge in global missionary activity, driven in part by the belief that the Second Coming could not occur until Christianity had reached all peoples. Missionaries from the United States and Europe traveled widely across Africa and Asia, including to Joseon Korea - then known as the “Hermit Kingdom” for its isolation.

That isolation began to erode under external pressure, particularly from a rapidly modernizing Japan after the Meiji Restoration. Korea had long been a tributary state of China, but as China weakened following prolonged internal conflict, Japan displaced it as the dominant regional power. Both China and Korea were eventually forced into “open door” policies that allowed foreign trade and missionary activity.

Missionaries found Koreans, especially in the north, remarkably receptive. Churches spread rapidly, and by the early 20th century Pyongyang had become the center of Korean Christianity, earning the nickname “Jerusalem of the East.”

Among these northern Christians were Kim Hyong-jik and Kang Pan Sok, the parents of Kim Il Sung. Although Kim later downplayed this background, the book argues convincingly that he was well educated in Christian theology and deeply shaped by it.

Japan’s formal annexation of Korea in 1910 brought aggressive efforts at cultural assimilation. The colonial government promoted Shintoism, built shrines across the country, and required Koreans to participate in rituals affirming loyalty to the Japanese emperor. Many Christians resisted these policies, seeing them as attempts to erase Korean identity. Some were killed; others fled to Manchuria. As a result, Christianity became intertwined with Korean nationalism, recast not as a foreign import but as a persecuted, authentically Korean faith.

In 1931, when Kim Il Sung was nineteen, Japan invaded Manchuria, marking the beginning of World War II in Asia. Kim, whose family had relocated there, joined the Chinese Communist Party and became involved in guerrilla resistance against Japanese forces.

After Japan’s surrender in 1945, Korea was divided into American and Soviet zones. As plans for independence emerged, both powers sought Korean leaders with anti-Japanese credentials. The Americans backed Syngman Rhee, a devout Methodist who envisioned a Christian Korean state. Kim, by contrast, had largely abandoned Christianity in favor of Marxism.

Despite his reputation as a charismatic figure, Kim initially struggled; his first major speech under Soviet sponsorship reportedly fell flat. To bolster his legitimacy, the Soviets promoted exaggerated accounts of his wartime heroism, laying the groundwork for a personality cult modeled on Stalin’s.

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