[횡설수설/우경임]“I don’t have to put it on the table.”

‘The main meal for Chuseok is songpyeon, vegetables, grilled vegetables, kimchi, fruit, and alcohol, and meat, fish, and rice cakes can be added.’ Ahead of Chuseok, Sungkyunkwan announced a new standard for table order that has been simplified so that only up to 9 dishes are listed in turn. It is said that it is not necessary to put the jeon, which the daughter-in-laws are very angry regarding, among the dishes. Donggurangtin fish pancake, mung bean pancake, etc. smell of oil and have to be fried all day. It is a high level of ‘aigo’ sound when the waist is spread out. There is even a saying, ‘If you see your ancestors during the holidays, you go abroad, and if you don’t have the virtue of your ancestors, you send everything’.

▷The reason for the absence of rites is that Kim Jang-saeng, a philosopher of the Joseon Dynasty, wrote in his Sagyejeonseo (沙溪全書) that ‘It is not polite to use fatty food for ancestral rites’. It is an orthodox theory that the ceremony was changed to luxury unlike the original etiquette due to competition between noblemen in the late Joseon Dynasty. Lee Sang-ryong Seok-ju, Myeong-jae Yoon-jeung, and Toegye Yi-hwang are handed down a guideline to ‘make the ancestral rites simple’. The size of the ancestral rite was set at 99 cm in width and 68 cm in height, and Yugwa or Jeon were not placed on it.

▷Daughters-in-law, who even welcomed the new table, are blaming Sungkyunkwan, saying, “It is unfair that my former father has been doing this.” “Why are you announcing it now? I got divorced last holiday.” “Men who play while watching TV get more excited regarding setting the table” “There are many houses that don’t have a turn already”. It is pointed out that the perception of Sungkyunkwan is lagging behind the rapid changes in our society, such as the dissolution of families and the spread of a culture of gender equality. Another reason is that the culture of Chuseok and Lunar New Year holidays has changed so much that it is impossible to go back to the past during the COVID-19 pandemic, where family distancing was forced.

▷ Even now, there is no need to disparage Sungkyunkwan’s efforts to reestablish Confucian traditional culture. Choi Young-gap, chairman of the Sungkyunkwan Rite Establishment Committee, said before the announcement of the new turn award, “Confucianism failed to play a pioneering role in the process of modernization, thinking only of old films.” He said that he might not change the practice even though he knew that the ‘holiday syndrome’ and ‘discrimination between marriage and marriage’ stemmed from wrong rituals. He said, “The turn is a ceremony filled with the sincerity of the descendants, and it is not desirable if this causes suffering or discord in the family.”

▷ It is the essence of the holiday, when families get together to share friendship and look back on our roots. If you are engrossed in an old fashioned form, fights between family members, and you cannot even share a warm table, you are far away from the essence of it. In the historical Jongga, it is said, “It is a matter of preparing food together regardless of gender, trimming irrational etiquettes, and establishing and following the gagarye for each family.” The etiquette cannot lose its essence only when it is rewritten according to the times.

Kyung-Im Woo, Editorial Board member [e-mail]

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