Today I want to discuss holiness. Park Jeong-gyu, a public relations officer in the union of Jogye Order administrative employees, was recently dismissed. Among the reasons reportedly cited was his use somewhere of the expressions “figurehead Supreme Patriarch” and “figurehead President.” The objection was that such language could not be tolerated.
I want to begin with a question. Can an employee of the Jogye Order be fired for criticizing the Supreme Patriarch or the President of the administration? People accustomed to hierarchy may think that criticizing the head of one’s organization naturally deserves dismissal. We should examine whether that intuition is actually sound.
Even a chair does not own a public company
Imagine a Samsung employee criticizing or insulting the chair of Samsung. Many people might assume the employee could obviously be fired. But Samsung affiliates are public corporations, not personal businesses. Their owners are not the president, chief executive, or chair. Their owners are the shareholders, each possessing rights in proportion to their shares.
If a chair or executive uses authority to act against the company’s interests for personal benefit, that is a breach of fiduciary duty. It is the opposite of the obligation entrusted to that person. Because an executive does not own the company, the company cannot rightfully be used at personal whim. An employee therefore should not be dismissed merely for criticizing conduct that harms the company or calling a judgment foolish.
Leaders of the Jogye Order do not own the order
Bring the same question to the Jogye Order. Must employees be forbidden to call its leaders figureheads? Someone shaped by Confucian hierarchy or military culture may protest that a subordinate cannot insult an elder or organizational superior. That discomfort reveals how deeply authoritarian habits remain embodied in Korean society.
First ask why the Jogye Order exists. The sangha is a community in which monks gather to follow the Buddha’s teaching, strive for awakening, and work for the liberation of sentient beings. As long as it uses the name Buddhism, it cannot abandon those two purposes: the effort to awaken and the effort to help beings. Compassion naturally belongs within them.
Administrative employees work for those purposes. When the Supreme Patriarch acts wrongly, an employee must be allowed to criticize him. Even if the employee’s judgment later proves mistaken, criticism itself cannot be prohibited. A society within which people may say “figurehead Patriarch” or “figurehead President” does not thereby betray the order’s purpose.
The Buddha’s sangha was an egalitarian community
About 2,500 years ago, the Buddha created within the sangha a degree of equality rarely seen in his world. A community that refuses to place “me” inherently above “you” follows the Buddha’s teaching. Gautama Siddhartha himself avoided behaving as though awakening made him a superior being and tried to live with disciples as equals.
Although he transmitted an extraordinary awakening, he placed himself at the common level and refused discrimination. In a society ruled by caste, he accepted people without regard to status. Even when receiving food, he did not elevate himself by distinguishing prestigious offerings from humble ones. Equality mattered profoundly to the Buddha.
In Korea, where caste has no place, claiming that the Jogye Supreme Patriarch cannot be criticized moves away from the sangha’s original direction. Office is not a privilege against criticism in an egalitarian community.
Holiness is not a status obtained on demand
Holiness does not arise because I want to be holy. It appears when people observe someone’s speech and conduct and spontaneously say, “That person is truly noble,” or “That person is like a sage.” A person looks holy by doing what is right despite danger and loss, treating everyone equally without discrimination, and refraining from anger even when insulted.
In Buddhism, no one is sacred merely by office. Holiness has nothing to do with caste or rank. If hierarchy and authoritarianism are imagined to be sacred, that is not Buddhism but a desire reshaped within Korean authoritarian culture. An organization that damages equality is the opposite of a sangha.
This dismissal shows why reform is necessary
The dismissal of an employee for saying “figurehead Patriarch” and “figurehead President” is itself evidence that the Jogye Order requires reform. He should not have been fired. The order is now walking opposite to the Buddha’s teaching.
If a patriarch wished so intensely to appear holy that, while still alive, he arranged for a statue of himself to stand beside statues of his teachers, criticism is warranted. I believe that placing a person saturated with pride, rather than awakening, at the head of the order and having him represent it before national gatherings of monks makes reform unavoidable.
Monks who remain silent instead of demanding the restoration of the worker who voiced that criticism are not free of responsibility. If the President becomes angry at being called a figurehead, he implicitly claims to have made the order’s decisions himself. If that is true, he must answer for harmful decisions. If not, he must endure the criticism that he lacks real authority.
We must look again for the location of nobility and holiness. They may reside less in office, statues, and demanded obedience than in an employee who accepted personal cost to speak critically. Buddhism is not a religion that encourages the desire to be treated as sacred.
The higher one places oneself while pursuing holiness, the farther one travels from awakening. Monks who gather to awaken according to the Buddha’s teaching must be especially vigilant toward that desire. Until reform is achieved, I will continue to explain why the words “figurehead President” and “figurehead Patriarch” arise. The sangha’s holiness is revealed not by authority that silences criticism, but by equality that can receive it.
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