The Barthian Predominance in Korean Theology: Its Origins and Problems

This study examines the origins, early history, and theological problems of the Barthian and Germanic predominance in Korean Protestant theology. The originators and most influential promoters of the predominance were Rev. Chai-choon Kim (1901–1987) and Dr Jong-sung Rhee (1922–2011), the theological and denominational leaders of the more or less liberalist Korean Presbyterian churches. Both of them went almost the same theological way: After getting to know Karl Barth and his dominance in Japan and deepening their knowledge of Barthian theology in the USA, they fought against the Korean Presbyterian churches’ conservative, Old Princeton theology on the basis of Barthian theology. Having witnessed the notorious conflicts and schisms of the Presbyterian Church of Korea (PCK), both Kim and Rhee presupposed that the principal culprit of the conflicts and schisms was the conservative, Old Princeton (Reformed Orthodox) theology that the American Presbyterian Korea missionaries had successfully planted in Korean Presbyterian churches. So in order to attack the missionaries’ theology as well as to justify their liberalist theology, both Kim and Rhee profoundly accepted the Barthian triumph frame: the Reformed Orthodoxy of the 17th and 18th centuries was defeated by the liberalism of the 19th century, which was, in turn, overcome by the Barthian Neo-Orthodoxy of the 20th century. Although the frame itself has recently been proved to be unfounded, both Kim and Rhee blindly accepted it and led their numerous followers to throw out both the missionaries and their Old Princeton theology. Nevertheless, Kim and Rhee ‘threw the baby out with the bathwater’; they led the next generation to be deprived of its own Reformed history, whose living legacy has been the missionaries’ Reformed Orthodoxy and Old Princeton theology. On the other hand, having accepted Barthian theology enthusiastically, both Kim and Rhee exploited it mainly to condemn the missionaries’ theology, ending up failing to integrate it into their own theologies.