By Peter C. Phan
The Ignacio Ellacuría Chair of Catholic Social Thought
Georgetown University

To understand the purpose and scope of this four-part work, it is necessary to briefly consider its historical context. Anyone following religious affairs in the United States in the 1970s would have been aware of a new religious movement called the Unification Church, whose members, popularly and at times derisively, are called the Moonies after Rev. Sun Myung Moon (1920-2012). In 1954, Moon founded the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Church (HSA-UWC) in South Korea. In 1971, Moon moved his operations to the U.S. and expanded his Church’s influence through various organizations in business, politics, education, and news media. The Church favored the Republican Party’s conservative policies and anti-communist stance and supported Korean reunification. On May 1, 1994, Moon declared that the era of the HSA-UWC had ended and inaugurated a new organization: the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification (FFWPU), which would include HSA-UWC members and members of other religious organizations working toward common goals, especially on issues of family, sexual morality, and the unification of people of different religions, nations, and races. Throughout his activities, Moon was supported by his wife, Hak Ja Han (1943-), who co-led the FFWPU, established the Women’s Federation for World Peace, and took over the Church’s leadership after Moon’s death in 2012.

In the 1980s and 1990s, the Unification Church was accused of being a brainwashing cult, a right-wing political machine, and a business empire engaged in questionable practices. In particular, it was attacked for its “Blessing Ceremony,” which featured mass weddings and vow renewals. This latter practice is no publicity-getting gimmick but reflects a central doctrine of Moon’s theology.

This brings us to the book titled Divine Principle, which functions as holy scripture for the Unification Church. Moon claimed that its contents had been revealed to him over a period of nine years, beginning on Easter Sunday, 1935, when Jesus allegedly appeared to him and asked him to continue the work he had not been able to finish while on earth because of the crucifixion. The earliest manuscript of the Divine Principle was lost in North Korea during the Korean War. Upon arriving in Pusan as a refugee, Moon wrote and dictated a manuscript titled Wolli Wonbon (Original Text of the Divine Principle). He then guided Hyo Won Eu, the first president of the Unification Church of Korea, in preparing more systematic presentations of his teaching, with biblical, historical, and scientific illustrations. These common efforts resulted in Wolli Hesul (Explanation of the Divine Principle), published in 1957, and Wolli Kangron (Exposition of the Divine Principle), published in 1966. The first English translation, titled Divine Principle, by Won Pok Choi, was published in 1973, and a revised, official translation, titled Exposition of the Divine Principle, was issued in 1996.

Divine Principle, reprinted in 2006 and totaling 413 pages, is composed of two parts. Part I, with seven chapters, offers a systematic exposition of the doctrines of creation, the Fall, eschatology, the Messiah, the resurrection, predestination, and Christology. Part II, with six chapters, presents a broad narrative of humanity’s restoration to its original state, offering a panoramic history of ancient Israel (with a focus on Adam, Abraham, and Moses), Jesus, the history of the West (especially the two World Wars), and Christ’s return (the Second Advent) in Korea. The last point, that is, the Second Advent, may be surprising, perhaps shocking, to most Christians, but it is central to Unificationists because it advances Moon’s claim that he is the Messiah, appointed by Christ to complete his unfinished mission. Central to Moon’s system of beliefs and practices is the doctrine of restoration or indemnity. After the Fall of Adam-Eve, the entire history is one of the restoration of humanity to the divine “absolute standard of goodness” or the divine “heart principle” through the establishment of a “true” family by providential figures.

In the introduction to this volume, the first of her four-part writing project, Ye-Jin Moon (YJM) expounds the Unificationist theology of this restoration process. It consists of six levels of the realization of the Divine Heart Principle (Heart Principle for short): true individual, true family, true clan, true nation, true world, and true cosmos. So far, it has been carried out in three what YJM terms “try” or “courses.” The first try was carried out Adam-Eve and their children Cain and Abel on the worldwide/cosmic level; the second try, on the worldwide/cosmic level, was done by Noah, his wife, and his family; preparation for the third try, on the clan level, was performed by Abraham and Sarah and their children; preparation for the third try, on the national level, was carried out by the Israelites; the third try, first attempt, on the worldwide/cosmic level, was performed by Jesus, his (potential) bride, and his family; the third try, second attempt, on the worldwide/cosmic level, was done by Sun Myung Moon, his wife Hak Ja Han, their children, and the members of the Unification Movement, until the end of the twentieth century. Finally, in the twenty-first century, the third try, third attempt, on the multi-generational, worldwide/cosmic level, is being carried out under the leadership of YJM, the first child and first daughter of Sun Myung Moon and Hak Ja Han, with her new interpretation.

Chapter 1 of the volume under review addresses the foundation of the Heart Principle, namely, the purpose of God’s creation, whom YJM calls the “Heavenly Parent.” This name for God is explicitly chosen to affirm that God is the “sex/gendered-balanced and equally empowered Heavenly Father/Heavenly Mother” (5). Calculating from God’s six days of creation and rest on the seventh, YJM asserts that God’s creation involves 95 percent of the work, while 5 percent is the responsibility of free-willed creation to bring about the Heavenly Parent’s Heart Principle, the “Ideal Reality.” Chapter 2 analyzes the human fall and Adam (who sinned once), Eve (who sinned twice), and their family, and their failed attempt to achieve the Heart Principle. Chapter 3, the last of the volume, examines the failure of Noah, his wife, and their family to achieve the Heart Principle.

For Unificationists who venerate Sun Myung Moon and Hak Ja Han as the “True Parents,” YJM’s basic argument for the need to carry out the third try, third attempt, on the multi-generational, worldwide/cosmic level, in the twenty-first century can be devastating. In YJM’s view, her parents Sun Myung Moon and Hak Ja Han failed in their mission to achieve the Heart Principle because they “neglected to let go of patriarchal cultural assumptions about the Divinity and humanity as well as the Christianity-inspired, misguided ‘messianic’ notion of their providential position within the restoration history, their 5 percent free-willed interpretation of the basic concepts imitating the Heart Principle remained one-sided and limited, with many errors and omission” (9).

What will Unificationists make of YJM’s rejection of Sun Myung Moon’s claim to be the “Messiah” and Hak Ja Han’s to be the “only begotten Daughter of God”? Will YJM claim the mantle of the true successor of Sun Myung Moon (and perhaps of Hak Ja Han, especially after death) and wrestle the leadership of FFWPU from her brothers Hyun Jin and Hyung Jin? Will she be successful in displacing the male line of succession as the First Child and Daughter? Will her four books (the second volume is already published) help reconcile the rifts within the Unification Church (or Unification Movement, as the Family Federation Association claims) or further inflame them? The answer has to wait until the publication of Part IV, especially chapters 9 and 10. Until then, Divine Heart Principle: Part I is a good, albeit not easy, place to start.