Daesoon Thought from the Perspective of Indian Philosophy

인도철학의 관점에서 본 대순사상

There is no place in the scriptures of Daesoonjinrihoe(大巡眞理會) where Indian philosophy is directly discussed. The philosophies dealt with in Daesoon thought are mostly those of Christianity, Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism. Of course, the thoughts that are not widely known and those that are not considered to be worth comparing with the Daesoon thought must have been omitted. It seems that Indian philosophy and Daesoon thought have considerable similarity. First of all, the two philosophies are rooted in religion. True, there is no dearth of religious philosophies in the East, for instance, Confucianism and Taoism, and yet comparing Daesoon thought and Indian philosophy is significant because they both presuppose a theistic paradigm. At the core of the two perspectives, there is personal God, i.e., Isvara or Gucheon Sangje (九天上帝), upon whom human beings and the world absolutely depend as his creation. Unlike traditional Christian theology, the two philosophies are alike in being indifferent to proving the existence of the deity and focusing on his form and role. In this article, the author try to examine the meaning of the four tenets of Daesoonjinrihoe(Eumyanghapdeok 陰陽合德, Shininjohwa 神人調化, Haewonsangsaeng 解冤相生, Dotongjingyeong 道通眞境) from the perspective of Indian philosophy in general, Purusa-sukta of Rig-veda, theistic Upanisads, and Ramanuja's Visistadvaita(限定不二論) in particular. Before making up the main subject, the author inquires into the characteristics of Ultimate Reality in Daesoon thought and Indian philosophy.