Chapter Twelve: Exemplary Acts 47

Kim Kwangsŏn sighed and exclaimed: “While I have been under the Great Master’s guidance for over twenty years, I have respected and admired every single one of the Master’s words and actions and have tried to conduct myself by following his example. Even so, I am still not even one ten-thousandth of him. There are three things about him that I most admire and wish to learn but have been unable to follow: one, is his genuine, unselfish public spirit; two, is his unvarying and unalloyed sincerity; three, is his magnanimity in embracing both the pure and the sullied. Generally speaking, from my observations of the Great Master’s employment of mind and his handling of matters, every single word and action are concerned only with the public, never for himself. Apart from establishing this religious order, he has no other thought, speech, or conduct. This is what I admire deeply in my heart and wish to learn. When I watch the Great Master carrying out his work, it is true he has superior natural endowments; but his sincerity now after so much time has passed is certainly not less, but may in fact be more, than the sincerity he showed in guiding us nine disciples during the reclamation work in Killyong-ni in Yŏnggwang. This is also something that I admire deeply in my heart and wish to learn. When I watch the Great Master guiding the congregation, the more a person behaves hatefully, the more he discreetly corrects and loves him, saying always, ‘Who wouldn’t love a good person? To love a hateful person is the practice of what we call great loving-kindness and great compassion.’ This also is what I admire deeply in my heart and wish to learn.”