Jeon Pil-sun (全弼淳, Japanese name: Hirayasu Beishū (平康米洲), 1897–1977) was a Presbyterian Pastor in Korea. His wife was the educator Cha Sa-baek.
Life
He was a native of Yongin, Gyeonggi Province. He began attending a Protestant church in his early teens, in 1909, and was baptized in 1914. At that time, a team dispatched from Yeondong Church in Gyeongseong for the purpose of rural evangelism was active in the Yongin area. Influenced by them, Jeon took part in their rural activities and, in 1919, was selected as an assistant (助事) of Yeondong Church.
During this period, the March 1st Movement, in which many Protestant figures took part, broke out, and Jeon joined it under the guidance of Park Yong-hui. Afterward, he maintained contact with the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea established in Shanghai, and was implicated in the Daedongdan incident, for which he was sentenced to one year in prison and served his term. After the setback of the March 1st Movement, the independence movement developed in several directions. While in prison, Jeon came to feel keenly the need for long-term capacity-building and national enlightenment, and after his release he took part in lecture meetings and other activities centered on Christian cultural work.
When these activities did not go well, he studied for four years from 1922 at Kobe Theological Seminary. After briefly serving as an evangelist at Yeondong Church, he was ordained as a minister by the Gyeonggi Presbytery in 1927 and became senior pastor of Myodong Church. In 1931, he resigned from Myodong Church and, as part of the Christian cultural work he had long been committed to, became a reporter for the Christian Bosa, jointly founded by the Presbyterian and Methodist churches. Later, Jeon acquired the Christian Bosa in his personal name and became its president in 1933. However, in the course of acquiring the Christian Bosa, he faced opposition from church figures such as Yun Chi-ho, Yang Ju-sam, and Chung In-gwa. Jeon, who had until then been classified as an anti-Japanese figure, gradually drew closer to the Government-General of Korea from this period and came to be called a pro-Japanese collaborator.
In 1941, he again became the designated pastor of Yeondong Church, and as chairman of the Gyeonggi Presbytery he was elected vice-chairman at the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church. He worked as a leader in the church community and actively took part in the imperialization movement (皇民化運動). During the Second Sino-Japanese War, he toured various regions urging support for the war effort, and he resolved to install Kamidana (Shinto household shrines) within churches and to establish a research association on the Imperial Way. In particular, in 1943 he organized the strongly pro-Japanese Hyeoksin Gyodan and took charge of its governance, but after encountering severe opposition within the denomination, the project collapsed within a month.
After liberation, in 1949 he was arrested under the Special Act on the Punishment of Pro-Japanese Collaborators and held in Mapo Prison, but was granted suspension of prosecution. Among Protestant figures, those whose pro-Japanese records were as clear as Jeon's, such as Chung In-gwa and Chung Chun-su, were arrested by the Special Committee for the Investigation of Pro-Japanese Collaborators and, amid controversy over their collaboration, were unable to return to church leadership. Jeon, however, after asking the church members for their confidence, regained their trust on the logic that "we all committed sins together, so who can throw the first stone?"1
After being released from the Special Committee, Jeon took the lead in the Lee Seung-man–Ham Tae-young support movement during the 8.5 presidential and vice-presidential election of 1952, and the Lee Seung-man–Lee Ki-bung support movement during the 5.15 presidential and vice-presidential election of 1956. During the April Revolution, which rose against the 3.15 election rigging of the Liberal Party government, a statement issued by young members of Saemunan Church contained a denunciation of Pastor Jeon Pil-sun for having served as a henchman of the Liberal Party government. However, he had served as General Assembly chairman during the Presbyterian Church era before the split into the Tonghap and Hapdong denominations, and had also served as chairman of the Gyeonggi Presbytery for five years. Moreover, when he died in 1977, the press described him as an "independence activist." (See the Chosun Ilbo of March 12, 1949, under the headline "Pro-Japanese Pastor Jeon Pil-sun Arrested," and the Chosun Ilbo of February 15, 1977, under the headline "Independence Activist Pastor Jeon Pil-sun Passes Away.")
In particular, by remaining in Korea during the early period of the Korean War and keeping the church under the rule of the Korean People's Army, he restored the trust placed in him and made a comeback. In 1955 he was again elected vice-chairman of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church of Korea, and in 1957 he served as its chairman. In 1959, the Presbyterian Church split into the Hapdong and Tonghap denominations, and Jeon, as a former General Assembly chairman, was a central figure in the Tonghap side. In 1961 he was elevated to elder pastor of Yeondong Church, and he retired in 1962.
Posthumous
He was included in the "Other" category of the List of 708 pro-Japanese collaborators published in 2002, in the religious category of the List of individuals scheduled for inclusion in the Dictionary of Pro-Japanese Collaborators by the Institute for Research in Collaborationist Activities released in 2008, and in the List of 705 pro-Japanese collaborators published in 2009 by the Committee for the Investigation of Pro-Japanese Collaborationist Activities.
References
- Institute for Research in Collaborationist Activities (April 1, 1993). 〈전필순 : 혁신교단 조직한 기독교 황민화의 앞잡이 (김승태)〉. 《친일파 99인 3》. Seoul: Dolbegae. ISBN 9788971990131.
- Kim Su-jin (September 20, 2005). 〈제42회 총회장 전필순 목사 (1957-1958년)〉. 《총회를 섬겨온 일꾼들》. Seoul: Korea Presbyterian Publishing House. ISBN 8939806433.
Footnotes