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Korean Messiah: Kim Il Sung and the Christian Roots of North Korea's Personality Cult

byJonathan Cheng

Jonathan Cheng traces the religious origins of North Korea's political culture to the Christian world that once flourished in Pyongyang and to the American missionaries active there. He examines how Kim Il Sung's regime transformed familiar structures of prophecy, conversion, sacrifice, sacred family, and salvation into a revolutionary personality cult. The book does not reduce North Korean ideology to religion, but shows how leaders repurposed Christian language and institutions while eradicating independent faith. Cheng offers a surprising history of how imported belief, nationalism, colonial rule, and communism combined in the making of a modern dictatorship.

Publisher

Knopf

Publication date

2026-04-14

Format

Hardcover

Pages

768

ISBN

9781524733490