¹Spirit Teaching was the original root of numerous religions, and its dao lineage has endured unbroken throughout the long history of the Korean people of the East. ²Choe Chi-won once said, “Within our country resides a mysterious and profound dao called Pungnyu.... Indeed, this dao, encompassing the Three Teachings, reaches out to all people to inspire and edify them.”

³However, during the period when Joseon and other Eastern countries were in danger of sinking under the oppression of Western imperial powers, Spirit Teaching also lost its luster and authority, and its lineage waned. ⁴It was during this period that heaven called upon an unknown seeker of dao in this Eastern land to perpetuate the dao lineage of Spirit Teaching and proclaim the dawning of a new world that would unfold through the Later Heaven Gaebyeok. ⁵This seeker was Sacred Venerable Choe Su-un, the founder and head of Eastern Learning.

⁶Su-un was an illegitimate son of a noble family in decline. Aspiring to seek dao from youth, he experienced the world in a wide variety of ways and completely devoted himself to meditation so that he might understand the will of God. ⁷During this time, Neo-Confucian scholar Yi Un-gyu said to Su-un, “You are the one who will perpetuate the dao of Immortalism.”

⁸In October 1859 (BDG 12), Su-un strengthened his convictions and entered Yongdamjeong Pavilion, where he vowed to himself, “I will not again go forth into the world until I have beheld the Lord of Heaven.” Su-un then ardently devoted himself to prayer.

⁹The following year, 1860 (BDG 11), when Su-un was thirty-seven years old, the Holy Spirit of the Lord of Heaven came to him on April 5 and declared, “Do not fear, and do not be alarmed. I am the one whom people call Sangje—why do you not know Sangje?” ¹⁰He then proclaimed:

I grant you the eternal and boundless dao, with which you must cultivate and steel yourself through meditation, compose writings and teach people, and rightly raise my truth and proclaim it across the world. If you do so, I will bestow upon you everlasting life and exaltation by all the world.

¹¹Through this proclamation, Su-un received from Sangjenim a heavenly mandate and spirit teaching to herald the coming new world, and attained enlightenment. This event marked the beginning of the “Dialogues with the Lord of Heaven,” which ushered in a new cosmic era.

¹²Sangjenim during this period commanded of Su-un, “Receive this mantra,” and Su-un eventually composed the thirteen words of the main mantra and the eight words of a second mantra for receiving the inspiration of the holy spirits:

¹³侍天主造化定 永世不忘萬事知
시천주조화정 영세불망만사지
Si-cheon-ju Jo-hwa-jeong Yeong-se-bul-mang-man-sa-ji

至氣今至願爲大降
지기금지원위대강
Ji-gi-geum-ji-won-wi-dae-gang

¹⁴In upholding his heavenly mandate and spirit teaching, Su-un founded and proclaimed Eastern Learning; within a short time, it spread across all of Gyeongsang-do Province. ¹⁵Alarmed by its rapid propagation, the Joseon royal court decreed Eastern Learning to be a subversive cult and arrested Su-un. ¹⁶In February 1864 (BDG 7), Su-un was brought to the Daegu Military Grounds for execution. He offered a bowl of cheongsu and prayed to Sangjenim, then was beheaded. Su-un was forty-one years of age.

¹⁷Su-un prepared in the Eastern land the path of life that leads to the Father, the Lord of Heaven, and declared that the era of serving the Lord of Heaven, who would incarnate as a human, would soon dawn. ¹⁸He proclaimed to all of humanity that the Supreme Dao of Mugeuk, the dao of the Father who would bring forth the world of the Later Heaven, would emerge in the land of Joseon.

¹⁹Though he was unable to completely fulfill the heavenly mandate bestowed upon him by Sangjenim, Su-un for five years proclaimed to the world that the Lord of Heaven would incarnate in Joseon and that a world of new life would come to pass through the Later Heaven Gaebyeok. The following were Su-un’s solemn proclamations concerning the deliverance of humanity:

²⁰The Lord of Heaven sent me to preserve the destiny of this country.

²¹How could you possibly know Sangjenim of Heaven’s Golden Palace?

²²The unprecedented Supreme Dao of Mugeuk will emerge in this world. Youth, before long, you will hear countless people sing a jubilant song of peace and prosperity. Will this world not be of the Supreme Dao of Mugeuk that will flourish throughout the ages?

²³People of the world, can you not fathom that the Destiny of Mugeuk is upon us?

²⁴If you chant the thirteen words with utmost devotion, what need will you have of ten thousand scriptures?

²⁵Cultivate and purify yourself with the Supreme Dao of Mugeuk and the destiny of the next fifty thousand years will be yours.

²⁶The fate of the mysterious disease spreading across the entire world—is this not once again gaebyeok?