신들 사이의 영역 구별, 신과 인간의 영역 구별: 제주 토착종교의 정결 개념에 관한 연구 (Separation between the Realms of Gods and Separation of the Divine Realm from the Human Realm: A Study of Purity Idea in the Indigenous Religion of the Jeju Island)

서지정보

· 발행기관 : 서울대학교 종교문제연구소
· 수록지 정보 : 종교와 문화 / 25호 / 27 ~ 65페이지
· 저자명 : 유요한

초록

In Jeju-Do, South Korea, the indigenous religion is alive in that many indigenous people accept its myths as true and think its rituals to be effective. Adherents of the indigenous religion pay very careful attention to matters of purity and impurity. This article focuses on the ideas of purity and impurity that appear in Bon-pu-ri and Gut. The idea of purity is generated when people separate multiple realms within a cosmological worldview and specify the conditions for each realm. Purity refers to the requisite conditions of each realm. These conditions are the attributes of a realm that people observe when they interpret their surroundings. Impurity, then, is the state of not satisfying the condition of one realm, often owing to the negative effects of other realms. Purification rituals should be performed in order to meet and maintain the necessary condition of a realm or in order to get rid of the influence of other realms.
In Jeju Bon-pu-ri and Gut, two basic types of confrontations between realms are clearly seen. First, there are separations of the realms between gods when they cannot coexist under the same condition of one realm.
The chief god of a village community who is in charge of all lives of the people and the domain of the village often separates his or her realm from those of other gods, who are said to be impure to the chief god because they eat pork. The impure gods hold lower positions than the chief god and take roles that the chief god does not occupy. In this case, the chief god who does not eat pork and the lower god who eats pork stay in the same village and are served by the same community. On the other hand, when the people of Jeju believe that two gods have decided to separate their realms completely, they separate the domains of villages that they take charge of. The communities that serve one god are also separated from communities serving the other god. In this case, the reason for the separation is not pork impurity. A god may divide his or her realm from that of another god when he or she is in conflict with the other god for various reasons such as the unfaithfulness or rudeness of the other god.
When a god declares that the state in which he or she is with another god is “full of impurity,” the god is saying that he or she cannot stay with the other god any longer. When a god tries to enter another gods’ realm of which the requisite conditions are different from his or her own, the god has to perform a purification ritual to cleanse his or her realm’s influence that may cause impurity in the other god’s realm. Second, the divine realm is strictly separated from the human realm. Some characteristic features of the human realm can cause impurity in the divine realm. Before people enter shrines or before they invite the gods to the place of Gut, which is a temporarily separated divine realm within the human realm, people must abstain from the behaviors that may pollute the divine realm and they must purify any impurity that they have incurred unconsciously. Gods entering the human realm also should be purified through rituals in order to remove impurity from the human realm.
The confrontations among gods and between gods and humans differentiate clearly the system of purity and impurity from that of sacred and profane. Whether a god or a person is pure or impure is determined by the realm which the god or person occupies. While gods are always sacred to people, they may be impure in another god’s ream and an impure god in another god’s realm is nevertheless supposed to be pure in his or her own realm. People who are pure in their daily lives are impure when they enter a divine realm.

영어초록

In Jeju-Do, South Korea, the indigenous religion is alive in that many indigenous people accept its myths as true and think its rituals to be effective. Adherents of the indigenous religion pay very careful attention to matters of purity and impurity. This article focuses on the ideas of purity and impurity that appear in Bon-pu-ri and Gut. The idea of purity is generated when people separate multiple realms within a cosmological worldview and specify the conditions for each realm. Purity refers to the requisite conditions of each realm. These conditions are the attributes of a realm that people observe when they interpret their surroundings. Impurity, then, is the state of not satisfying the condition of one realm, often owing to the negative effects of other realms. Purification rituals should be performed in order to meet and maintain the necessary condition of a realm or in order to get rid of the influence of other realms.
In Jeju Bon-pu-ri and Gut, two basic types of confrontations between realms are clearly seen. First, there are separations of the realms between gods when they cannot coexist under the same condition of one realm. The chief god of a village community who is in charge of all lives of the people and the domain of the village often separates his or her realm from those of other gods, who are said to be impure to the chief god because they eat pork. The impure gods hold lower positions than the chief god and take roles that the chief god does not occupy. In this case, the chief god who does not eat pork and the lower god who eats pork stay in the same village and are served by the same community. On the other hand, when the people of Jeju believe that two gods have decided to separate their realms completely, they separate the domains of villages that they take charge of. The communities that serve one god are also separated from communities serving the other god. In this case, the reason for the separation is not pork impurity. A god may divide his or her realm from that of another god when he or she is in conflict with the other god for various reasons such as the unfaithfulness or rudeness of the other god. When a god declares that the state in which he or she is with another god is “full of impurity,” the god is saying that he or she cannot stay with the other god any longer. When a god tries to enter another gods’ realm of which the requisite conditions are different from his or her own, the god has to perform a purification ritual to cleanse his or her realm’s influence that may cause impurity in the other god’s realm. Second, the divine realm is strictly separated from the human realm. Some characteristic features of the human realm can cause impurity in the divine realm. Before people enter shrines or before they invite the gods to the place of Gut, which is a temporarily separated divine realm within the human realm, people must abstain from the behaviors that may pollute the divine realm and they must purify any impurity that they have incurred unconsciously. Gods entering the human realm also should be purified through rituals in order to remove impurity from the human realm.
The confrontations among gods and between gods and humans differentiate clearly the system of purity and impurity from that of sacred and profane. Whether a god or a person is pure or impure is determined by the realm which the god or person occupies. While gods are always sacred to people, they may be impure in another god’s ream and an impure god in another god’s realm is nevertheless supposed to be pure in his or her own realm. People who are pure in their daily lives are impure when they enter a divine realm.

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