The Letters of Saint Andrew Kim Dae-geon

Introductory Message
Remembering Saint Andrew Kim Dae-geon · 9

Message from the Cardinal Archbishop of Seoul
Celebrating the 200th anniversary of St. Andrew Kim Dae-geon’s birth · 11

Preface : Bibliographical Introduction
The materials collected in this volume · 18
When and where the letters were written · 22
The recipients of the letters · 24
Historical value and significance of the letters · 29
Table of the Letters and Reports · 31
Notes · 32
A Chronology of the life of Saint Andrew Kim Dae-geon · 34
Genealogy of Kim Dae-geon · 45

The Letters of Saint Andrew Kim Dae-geon
The first letter · 49
The second letter · 52
The third letter · 53
The fourth letter · 59
The fifth letter · 72
The sixth letter · 76
The seventh letter · 83
The eighth letter · 90
The ninth letter · 93
The tenth letter · 116
The eleventh letter · 122
The twelfth letter · 129
The thirteenth letter · 136
The fourteenth letter · 137
The fifteenth letter · 138
The sixteenth letter · 139
1. Report on the History of the Korean Martyrs · 147
Part 1: Overview of the establishment of the Korean Church · 149
Part 2: The truth of the 1839 Gihae Persecution · 158
2. Report on the Korean Martyrs · 171
Laurent Imbert, Titular Bishop of Capsa and Vicar Apostolic of Korea · 171
A brief description of the priests’ martyrdom · 175
A description of the main punishments that the priests and other Christians received · 178
Prison and tribunals · 180
Father Pierre Maubant, Pro-Vicar General of Korea · 181
Father Chastan, James Jeong · 182
The Deeds of Several Important of Martyrs of 1839 in Seoul · 185
The seventeenth letter · 222
The eighteenth letter · 225
The nineteenth letter · 228
The twentieth letter · 232
The twenty-first letter · 244

Annex : The Historical Background
Meeting Catholicism through the translation into Chinese of Western Scholarship · 251
The Ganghakhoe: academic seminars on Catholicism among Korea intellectuals at Jueo Temple and nearby Cheonjinam · 253
The establishment of the Church in Korea · 255
The first crisis 256
“Pseudo-hierarchy era” and the movement to recruit priests · 257
The believers’ response to the ban on the ancestral rites · 259
The martyrdom of Yun Ji-chung and Kwon Sang-yeon · 260
The first missionary · 261
Sinyu: the first official countrywide persecution · 263
In the aftermath of the persecution · 266
Petitioning for a priest · 268
The Eulhae (1815) and Jeonghae (1827) Persecutions · 269
The ministry of Jeong Ha-sang and the movement to recruit priests · 271
The establishment of the Apostolic Vicariate of Korea (1831) · 272
The first Vicar Apostolic attempts to enter Korea · 274
The entry and work of the French missionaries · 275
The Gihae Persecution (1839) · 277
Father Andrew Kim Dae-geon, the first indigenous priest · 280
The White Martyr: Choe Yang-eop, the second indigenous priest · 283

Index · 285