ShinsungHwa: Visualizing Venerable Daehaeng Sunim’s Spiritual Energy (2019)
What is ShinsungHwa?
ShinsungHwa is a unique form of spiritual art where drawings emerge through spontaneous, flowing movements. Artists tap into their subject’s energy and let Qi(氣) guide their hands, creating geometric patterns that serve as a universal language.
A Brief Look at Venerable Daehaeng Sunim’s ShinsungHwa
Surrounding Venerable Daehaeng Sunim’s ‘spiritual core’ are several layers of gently rotating energy. Just above the core, a soft ‘symbol of light’ shines quietly. Around her, a multi-layered mandorla spreads out, wrapping her in a calm, protective glow. Inside this mandorla, a subtle aura of spiritual energy radiates, hinting at the peaceful strength she carries.
Venerable Daehaeng Sunim and Her Life’s Work
As a child, she often slept outdoors under the Korean sky—not because she enjoyed camping, but to escape her father’s anger at home. Born Jum Soon No in 1927, she later became known as Venerable Daehaeng Sunim. Over the years, her Buddhist teachings have reached more than 150,000 people around the world.
A Childhood Marked by Loss and Wonder
Daehaeng’s early years read like something from a wartime novel. Her family had once been well-off, owning large pieces of land stretching from what is now Seoul’s Itaewon district down to the Han River. Her father came from an old Korean military family and had secretly supported resistance against the Japanese occupation of Korea. But in 1932 or 1933, everything changed when the Japanese secret police came looking for him.
The family escaped just minutes before arrest, fleeing south across the Han River to live in a dugout hut in the mountains. Unable to contact friends or family safely, they survived in poverty, gleaning fields for leftover grains of rice or vegetables. Young Daehaeng often slept outdoors to avoid her increasingly angry father, and it was during this harsh period that she became obsessed with a question that would shape her entire life: Why do people suffer?
Around age eight, something remarkable happened. Daehaeng experienced what Buddhists call awakening—a deep understanding of life’s fundamental nature. For a child living in such difficult circumstances, this wasn’t just a spiritual moment; it was the beginning of a lifelong mission to help others find peace in their own struggles.
Finding Her Path in the Mountains
In 1948, when Daehaeng was about 21, she was formally ordained by Venerable Hanam Sunim, a respected Seon (Zen) master. Hanam was known for his dedication—he spent the last 25 years of his life at Sangwon Temple in the Odae Mountains and famously refused to leave even when soldiers ordered him to evacuate during the Korean War. This teacher would profoundly influence Daehaeng’s approach to Buddhist practice.
After her ordination, Daehaeng spent many years wandering Korea’s mountains, wearing ragged clothes and eating whatever she could find. This wasn’t about pursuing hardship for its own sake, she later explained. Instead, she was completely absorbed in what she called “entrusting everything to her fundamental Buddha essence”—basically, learning to trust that deeper wisdom we all have inside us.
Around 1959, she settled in a hermitage below Sangwon Temple in the Chiak Mountains, then moved to the Wonju area in the mid-1960s. These weren’t just geographical moves; each location represented a different stage in her spiritual development.
Breaking Traditional Boundaries
What made Daehaeng different from other Buddhist teachers of her time was her radical idea: everyone could practice Buddhism effectively, not just monks and nuns. In traditional Korean Buddhism, Seon masters typically taught only monks and a few nuns. But Daehaeng saw something that others had missed—laypeople, regular folks with jobs and families, had the same potential for awakening as anyone else.
In 1972, she established the first Hanmaeum Seon Center in Anyang. The name “Hanmaum” means “One Mind” in Korean, reflecting her teaching that we’re all connected at a fundamental level. This wasn’t just another meditation hall; it was designed as a place where anyone could come and learn, regardless of their gender, age, occupation, or family status.
Her approach was refreshingly practical. Instead of focusing only on sitting meditation, she taught people how to apply Buddhist principles to whatever was happening in their daily lives. Having a difficult conversation at work? Dealing with a sick child? Worried about money? Daehaeng’s teaching could be applied to all of it.
The Growth of a Movement
By the time of Daehaeng’s death in 2012, what had started as one small center had grown into a global network. The Hanmaeum Seon Centers expanded to 15 branches in Korea and 10 more in other countries. At the time of her passing, she was guiding over 100 nuns and teaching more than 50 monks, with a lay membership of over 150,000 people.
This growth wasn’t accidental. Daehaeng had deliberately structured her teaching to be accessible. She focused on three main principles that anyone could understand: see others as yourself, love others as yourself, and know that we’re all connected and function as one whole. She called this connection by many names—Buddha-nature, true self, even God or the Father and Mother—recognizing that different people related to these concepts in different ways.
Facing Criticism and Controversy
Not everyone appreciated Daehaeng’s innovative approach. Since her passing, several controversies have emerged, with critics charging that her teachings fall outside of Korean Buddhist orthodoxy. Some traditional Buddhist scholars have questioned whether her methods align with established Buddhist doctrine, creating ongoing and sometimes heated debates about her legacy.
These criticisms aren’t necessarily unfair. Daehaeng did break with many traditional practices, and her emphasis on lay practice over monastic life challenged centuries of Buddhist tradition in Korea. The academic community has produced research both supporting and questioning her methods, often sponsored by her own followers seeking to reinforce the legitimacy of her teachings.
What’s interesting is that these debates continue to rage more than a decade after her death, suggesting that her impact—whether viewed positively or negatively—remains significant in Korean Buddhist circles.
Despite the controversies, Daehaeng’s practical approach to spirituality has clearly resonated with many people. Her teaching centers continue to operate worldwide, and her books, including Wake Up and Laugh and Like Lions Learning to Roar continue to find new readers.
Perhaps her greatest achievement was making Buddhist practice feel accessible to ordinary people dealing with ordinary problems. In a world where spiritual teachings can often feel abstract or removed from daily life, Daehaeng offered something different: a way to find peace and wisdom while still managing a household, holding down a job, or raising children.
Her life story—from that frightened child sleeping under the stars to a teacher who touched hundreds of thousands of lives—reminds us that profound wisdom can emerge from the most difficult circumstances. Whether you accept all of her teachings or not, it’s hard to argue with the basic human impulse that drove her work: the desire to help others suffer less and live with more freedom and dignity.
Today, as people around the world continue to search for meaning and peace in increasingly complicated times, Daehaeng’s simple message remains relevant: trust the wisdom within yourself, and remember that we’re all more connected than we think.
