All the great religions worship the same supreme spiritual being: Sahng-jeh-nim, the Ruling God. He governs the universe harmoniously through His command of its supreme order, known in the East as li (理 “principle”). The religions and philosophies of the world recognize Sahng-jeh-nim by many names. Since ancient times, the East has known the Supreme Being who commands li as Sahng-jeh (上帝), sahng (上) meaning “supreme” and jeh (帝) meaning “ruling god.” (Korean adds the honorific nim.) Christianity worships Sahng-jeh-nim as God the Father and as God on the White Throne. Buddhism knows Him as Maitreya Buddha, the Lord of Tushita Heaven. Daoism and Confucianism name Him as Sahng-jeh or Ohk-hwahng Sahng-jeh (“Jade Emperor of Heaven”).

Korea had always been destined as the place of incarnation for Sahng-jeh-nim, the Ruling God of the universe. Jeung San Do’s Supreme Dao Master Ahn Oon-sahn revealed that Korea is the globe’s most auspicious site, where the earth’s life energy most strongly concentrates. According to the principle of earth (which is related to feng shui), the Korean Peninsula is guarded by five oceans and six continents. The Japanese archipelago comprises the “Inner Blue Dragon” (內靑龍); the Americas comprise the “Outer Blue Dragon” (外靑龍); the landmass from China to Singapore forms the “Inner White Tiger” (內白虎); Africa and parts of Eurasia form the “Outer White Tiger” (外白虎); Australia is the “Table Mountain” (案山). These major landmasses consolidate the terrestrial energies in the Korean Peninsula, making Korea the cardinal site of the globe.

In 1871, Sahng-jeh-nim incarnated in Gaeng-mahng Village (客望里), “Expecting Guest Village,” Go-bu County, Jul-la Province. He began mortal life as a member of the Gahng family, Gahng being the oldest surname in history. His given name was Il-soon, but He later adopted the honorific name Jeung-san, which signifies “completion” or “maturation.” He also bears the ageless title of Sahng-jeh-nim, (Sahng-jeh meaning “Emperor Above” or “Highest God,” and the suffix nim expressing reverence). Thus, Jeung-san was the name of the mortal man, and Jeung-san Sahng-jeh-nim signifies the Ruling God on earth.

From childhood, Jeung-san Sahng-jeh-nim displayed exceptional brilliance unmatched in the history of the East and West. At age six (1876), as Sahng-jeh-nim watched a performance of traditional music and dance, poong-mool, He suddenly heard the harmonious sound of heaven and earth―the sound of yool-lyuh, which is the source of heaven and earth’s life and order. Also at age six, Sahng-jeh-nim learned the principle of heaven and earth. Sahng-jeh-nim’s father, the Sacred Father, invited a teacher to teach the young child The Thousand Characters Text. Sahng-jeh-nim “opened the book and recited the words heaven (天) and earth (地) so loudly it shook the house. He then closed the book and left the room without saying anything else” (Dojeon 1:15:7). After the teacher tried to persuade the child Sahng-jeh-nim to continue the study, He said, “From the word heaven I learned the nature of heaven. From the word earth I learned the nature of earth. What more is there to know?” (Dojeon 1:15:8). At age seven, Sahng-jeh-nim greatly surprised the people around Him by writing a magnificent poem:

After three years of travel, Sahng-jeh-nim returned home at age thirty (1900). By 1901, He had concluded that “the world could not be saved by any known means” (Dojeon 2:1:2), and later He proclaimed, “I use ways that are outside the mainstream and unknown to the people” (Dojeon 4:9:4). In search of enlightenment, Sahng-jeh-nim meditated for fourteen days on Shee-ru mountain, then He went to Mo-ahk Mountain, known as the “mother mountain,” in Jul-la province, and there meditated in Dae-wun Temple’s Seven Stars Shrine for twenty-one days. During Sahng-jeh-nim’s meditation, Head Monk Bahk Geum-gohk (1854～1946) attended on Him, believing that “a divine spirit [had] come down to this world” (Dojeon 2:3:4). According to the monk’s later testimony, Sahng-jeh-nim would “repeatedly write on and then burn sheets of paper,” and he also saw Sahng-jeh-nim “jump over a persimmon tree that was five times His height” (Dojeon 2:5:2,4). Head Monk Bahk testified that at the end of Sahng-jeh-nim’s meditation, “[He] did not eat or drink anything for seven days. He meditated with one mind without moving once from where He sat” (Dojeon 2:10:1).

Finally, on July 7, 1901, His twenty-first day of meditation, Sahng-jeh-nim gave Geum-gohk an order:

From His early childhood, Sahng-jeh-nim showed wisdom, energy, and spirit so boundless they shook heaven and earth. Throughout His life, the word of His divine nature spread throughout Korea, and countless people desired to meet Him.

When Sahng-jeh-nim was fourteen (1884), Gim Hyung-yul (1862～1932), who had been seeking dao for many years and had heard of Sahng-jeh-nim’s divine nature, resolved to meet this young man, and so he traveled toward Go-bu County. At sunset, he arrived at Bool-chool Hermitage (佛出庵), “Buddha Appearing Hermitage,” built on a site where two stones in the shape of Maitreya Buddhas had risen from the earth. An owl cried as Hyung-yul stepped through the gate. In the yard of this hermitage, he unexpectedly met Sahng-jeh-nim and then witnessed Him floating in the air. This incident convinced him that the young Sahng-jeh-nim was indeed a divine person (Dojeon 1:17:1～8). Hyung-yul eventually achieved the honor of becoming Sahng-jeh-nim’s head disciple.

Throughout His early life, Sahng-jeh-nim lived in extreme poverty and hardship. At age fifteen (1885), He toiled as a farmhand and as a woodcutter. By embracing both the joys and sorrows of human life, Sahng-jeh-nim sought the wisdom to redeem humanity from the agony in which people lived.

After three years of travel, Sahng-jeh-nim returned home at age thirty (1900). By 1901, He had concluded that “the world could not be saved by any known means” (Dojeon 2:1:2), and later He proclaimed, “I use ways that are outside the mainstream and unknown to the people” (Dojeon 4:9:4). In search of enlightenment, Sahng-jeh-nim meditated for fourteen days on Shee-ru mountain, then He went to Mo-ahk Mountain, known as the “mother mountain,” in Jul-la province, and there meditated in Dae-wun Temple’s Seven Stars Shrine for twenty-one days. During Sahng-jeh-nim’s meditation, Head Monk Bahk Geum-gohk (1854～1946) attended on Him, believing that “a divine spirit [had] come down to this world” (Dojeon 2:3:4). According to the monk’s later testimony, Sahng-jeh-nim would “repeatedly write on and then burn sheets of paper,” and he also saw Sahng-jeh-nim “jump over a persimmon tree that was five times His height” (Dojeon 2:5:2,4). Head Monk Bahk testified that at the end of Sahng-jeh-nim’s meditation, “[He] did not eat or drink anything for seven days. He meditated with one mind without moving once from where He sat” (Dojeon 2:10:1).

Finally, on July 7, 1901, His twenty-first day of meditation, Sahng-jeh-nim gave Geum-gohk an order:

This shaking of heaven and earth marked the moment that Sahng-jeh-nim attained ultimate enlightenment by opening the great gate of the spirit world. His enlightenment was fundamentally different from the enlightenment of past sages, who attained enlightenment only after excruciating meditation and fervent prayers. By opening the way of spirits, He opened a path for humans and spirits to unite as one. With this enlightenment, Sahng-jeh-nim resumed His boundless authority over the three realms of heaven, earth, and humanity, which He had exercised in heaven before assuming His human body.

Beginning in 1901, at age thirty-one, Sahng-jeh-nim once again wielded heaven and earth’s boundless power of creative change. Clad in His divine nature, Sahng-jeh-nim walked through storms without suffering a single drop of rain. He commanded wind, snow, frost, clouds, and lightning. Several times, He even demonstrated to His disciples and to the multitudes His power to stop the rising of the sun, explaining, “The sun and moon are at My command.... I am heaven, earth, sun, and moon” (Dojeon 4:60:11,14).

Sahng-jeh-nim declared, “Starting from Me, all things are renewed” (Dojeon 1:32:3), and He undertook His unprecedented work of renewing heaven and earth: Chun-jee-gohng-sa (天地公事). Chun-jee-gohng-sa was a new program of cosmic proportions, performed with the spirits of heaven and earth to correct the order of the universe and human history. The ultimate purpose of Chung-jee-gohng-sa is to give humanity the means for safe passage through the cataclysmic time of the Autumn Gae-byuk and enable us to reach the world of immortality in the Later Heaven’s era of unity. Chung-jee-gohng-sa will end the order of mutual conflict that had created so much bitterness and grief in the Early Heaven and open the order of mutual life-giving, which will enable harmonious existence in the new world and new civilization.

As part of Chung-jee-gohng-sa, Sahng-jeh-nim undertook the uniting of all cultures by extracting the essence of each culture. Using His authority as the Ruling God of the universe, He replaced the heads of religions with the historical figures within each culture who had contributed most significantly to civilization. Sahng-jeh-nim appointed Chey Su-oon, to whom He personally granted enlightenment, as the head of Immortalism. He appointed the Great Monk Jin-mook, who had attained enlightenment greater than that of Shakyamuni Buddha, as the head of Buddhism. He appointed Zhu Xi, who was revered as the ‘second Confucius,’ as the head of Confucianism. He appointed Matteo Ricci, the Jesuit priest who had worked tirelessly to build heaven on earth, as the head of the Dao of the West. Only Sahng-jeh-nim, as the Ruling God of the universe, could effect these changes using the might of creative change.

For nine years, Sahng-jeh-nim performed His great work of renewal. Eventually, He announced that His work on earth was complete and that He needed to ascend to heaven to continue Chung-jee-gohng-sa. On June 24, 1909, at age thirty-nine, Sahng-jeh-nim shed His human body and returned to His heavenly throne in the Jade City.

Before His ascension, Sahng-jeh-nim undertook the selection of a successor who would receive His authority and continue the sowing of His great dao to ensure that it took firm root. Sahng-jeh-nim established the following of His dao, and after seven years of conducting His work of renewal, He designated a female successor: Tae-mo-nim.

Tae-mo-nim was born on March 26, 1880, in Dahm-yahng County, Jul-la Province. Her family name was Go and Her given name was Pahl-lyeh, but Sahng-jeh-nim called Her Su-bu (首婦), which signifies “the mother of all humans and spirits in heaven and earth,” “the mother who is the head of all,” and “the woman who is the consort of God.” Jeung San Do practitioners add the honorific nim to this title, calling Her Su-bu-nim. Most often, She is addressed by the title Tae-mo-nim (太母), meaning “Great Mother.”

Sahng-jeh-nim conferred His dao lineage and authority upon a woman, not upon a man, because He had decreed a new destiny of equality between men and women. Civilization oppresses yin and reveres yang, leading to great bitterness and grief as women live in servitude and persecution. But women will be freed from this oppression, and their bitterness and grief will be completely resolved to usher in a new era of equal yin and yang. Such harmony of yin and yang will be the underlying order of the Later Heaven, and Tae-mo-nim is the fountainhead who will open this new world of equality.

On September 20, 1911, about two years after the ascension of Sahng-jeh-nim, Tae-mo-nim attained ultimate enlightenment and thus received Sahng-jeh-nim’s spiritual authority. She gathered Sahng-jeh-nim’s disciples, established Her order, and began to dictate the destiny of human affairs as She carried out Sahng-jeh-nim’s work. Like Sahng-jeh-nim, Tae-mo-nim exercised boundless power, conducted numerous miracles, cured diseases, and revived the dead. Beginning in 1926, Tae-mo-nim, God the Mother, conducted Her ten-year work of renewing heaven and earth, which was one year longer than Sahng-jeh-nim’s work of renewal. Her work began with the Seven Stars Program, which would bring forward the young people who would fulfill Sahng-jeh-nim’s great dao.

Tae-mo-nim’s work of renewal ensured that Sahng-jeh-nim’s great dao was firmly rooted in history. As a female spiritual leader in Korea’s male-centered Confucian society, Tae-mo-nim faced continuous opposition; but She persevered with an iron will against all obstacles, succeeding in establishing an organized movement to disseminate Sahng-jeh-nim’s great dao. After fulfilling Her role as dao successor, Tae-mo-nim―the Mother of the New Humanity―ascended to heaven on October 6, 1935, to rejoin Sahng-jeh-nim.