Abstract

The world order, in which the modernity of the West constitutes what is universal, touted the advancement of civilization as the common law of nature to justify colonialism. Western scholarship poured into the vacuum of worldview formed by the disintegration of Sino-centrism. The response of modern Korean Confucian intellectuals took various forms. This article focuses on the arguments related to Confucianism and the transformation of the Confucian knowledge system following the acceptance of Western concepts. The status of Confucianism, which had been the state religion during the transitional period to modernity, continued down a path of decline, and its knowledge system was unable to function as the leading principle of the society. The shock brought on by the West was a civilizational transition that could not be resolved by the restoration of morality. The stance to preserve Eastern ways, or moral values, while adopting Western means, or scientific technology, was proposed as a response to the situation. In the dispute over old and new learning, however, Confucianism had to prove whether it could be the proper knowledge system that would satisfy the demands of civilizational advancement and historical progress. Confucianism resorted to the re-appropriation of the existing notion of practical learning, which referred to the scientific technology of the West. From the stance of reformists, Confucian ethics was a universal practical learning. The scientification of learnings brought into the concept of philosophy, which accelerated the changes in the knowledge system centered on Confucianism. When the term gyeokchi, or the investigation of things and the extension of knowledge, and gungni, or the exhaustive search for the principle, were used together as translations of the terms philosophy and science, it was difficult to add the meaning of moral practice beyond the definition as the observation of things and the investigation of principle. Confucianism, which was once regarded to the counterpart to Western philosophy, was pointed as an obstacle to civilization and became a Confucian philosophy during the process of the deconstruction of the knowledge system. Similar to how the traditional knowledge system was rearranged under the name of philosophy, the acceptance of the concept of religion, in which Christianity was the universal religion of civilization, gave rise to skepticism of the religiosity of Confucianism. The social and political teachings of Confucianism were regarded to be closer to philosophy. Although there were many attempts to reform Confucianism from within including by Bak Eunsik as well as movements to make Confucianism into a religion, it was hard for these attempts to spread among the public and be socially influential. The colonial authorities instrumentalized Confucianism, relegating it to a moral resource for the loyal subjects of the Japanese Empire, recognized only Shintoism, Buddhism, and Christianity as religions, and did not acknowledge Confucianism as a religion. Although Confucianism of modern Korean is now regarded as part of the historical cultural heritage, the historical significance of Confucianism during the transitional period to modernity is essential in contemplating modernity.