Presbyterian Church of Korea

Presbyterian Church of Korea (PCK) was a Protestant denomination based in South Korea; it is currently separated to many branches.

The first Korean Presbyterian minister was Suh Sang-ryun, who founded a church in Hwanghae province in 1884.^[1] Shortly thereafter, several foreign Presbyterian missionaries arrived on the peninsula, including Horace Allen, Horace G. Underwood, and Henry Davies.

Like other Christian groups, the Korean Presbyterians were closely involved in the peaceful March 1st Movement for Korean independence in 1919.

By 1937, the Presbyterian churches were largely independent of financial support from the United States.^[2]

Presbyterianism in Korea was reconstructed after World War II in 1947. The church adopted the name the Reformed Church in Korea. In the 1950s, the church suffered tensions because of issues of theology, ecumenism, and worship. In 1959, the Presbyterian Church of Korea broke into two equal sections: the Presbyterian Church in Korea (TongHap) and The Presbyterian Church in Korea (HapDong).

In the 1950s, the PCK was cut off from believers in North Korea, and three schisms occurred. In the first of these, the Gosin group split off in 1952. In the second, the "Presbyterian Church of the Republic of Korea" separated from the PCK in 1953. In the third schism thus far, the Hapdong faction separated in 1959.

General assembly

See also

• Christianity in Korea
• Presbyterianism
• Presbyterianism in South Korea

References

Further reading

• Clark, Donald N. Christianity in Modern Korea (University Press of America, 1986)
• Grayson, James H. Korea—A Religious History (Routledge Curzon, 2002)
• Kang, Wi Jo. Christ and Caesar in Modern Korea: A History of Christianity and Politics ( State University of New York Press, 1997)
• Latourette, Kenneth Scott. Christianity in a Revolutionary Age: Vol. 5: The Twentieth century outside Europe (1962) pp 412–23
• Lee, Timothy S. "A Political Factor in the Rise of Protestantism in Korea: Protestantism and the 1919 March First Movement," Church History 2000. 69#1 pp 116–42. in JSTOR
• Mullins, Mark, and Richard Fox Young, eds. Perspectives on Christianity in Korea and Japan: The Gospel and Culture in East Asia (Edwin Mellen, 1995)
• Park, Chung-shin. Protestantism and Politics in Korea (U. of Washington Press, 2003)
• Harry Andrew Rhodes (1934). History of the Korea mission: Presbyterian church U. S. A., 1884-1934. Chosen mission Presbyterian church U. S. A. 
• Koon Sik Shim (2008). Rev. Sang-Dong Han, The Founder of the Presbyterian Church in Korea (Koshin): A Biography. The Hermit Kingdom Press. ISBN 978-1-59689-073-2. 

External links