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Islam (Korean: 이슬람교) is a minor religion inSouth Korea andNorth Korea. The Muslim community is centered inSeoul andBusan and there are a few mosques around the country. According to theKorea Muslim Federation, there are about 200,000 Muslims living in South Korea, and about 70 to 80 percent are foreigners.[1] Seoul alone has 40% of South Korea's total Muslim population. TheMinistry of Foreign Affairs has hosted anIftar dinner during the month ofRamadan every year since 2004.[2]
During the middle to late 7th century,Muslim traders had traversed from theCaliphate toTang China and established contact withSilla, one of theThree Kingdoms of Korea.[3] In 751, a Chinese general of Goguryeo descent,Gao Xianzhi, led theBattle of Talas for the Tang dynasty against theAbbasid Caliphate but was defeated. The earliest reference to Korea in a non-East Asian geographical work appears in theGeneral Survey of Roads and Kingdoms byIstakhri in the mid-9th century.[4]
The first verifiable presence ofIslam in Korea dates back to the 9th century during theUnified Silla period with the arrival ofArab navigators andtraders. According to numerous Muslimgeographers, including the 9th-century Muslim Persian explorer and geographerIbn Khordadbeh, many of them settled down permanently in Korea, establishing Muslim villages.[5] Some records indicate that many of these settlers were fromIraq.[6] Korean records suggest that a large number of the Muslim foreigners settled in Korea in the 9th century CE led by a man named Hasan Raza[7] Further suggesting a Middle Eastern Muslim community in Silla are figurines of royal guardians with distinctly Persian characteristics.[8] In turn, later many Muslims intermarried with Koreans. Someassimilation intoBuddhism andShamanism took place owing to Korea's geographical isolation from theMuslim world.[9]
In 1154, Korea was included in the Arab geographerMuhammad al-Idrisi's world atlas,Tabula Rogeriana. The oldest surviving Korean world map, theGangnido, drew its knowledge of theWestern Regions from the work ofIslamic geographers.[10]
According to local Korean accounts, Muslims arrived in the peninsula in the year 1024 in the Goryeo kingdom, a group of some 100 Muslims, including Hasan Raza, came in September of the 15th year ofHyeonjong of Goryeo and another group of 100 Muslim merchants came the following year.[11]
Trading relations betweenthe Islamic world and the Korean peninsula continued with the succeeding kingdom ofGoryeo through to the 15th century. As a result, a number of Muslim traders from theNear East andCentral Asia settled down in Korea and established families there. Some MuslimHui people from China also appear to have lived in the Goryeo kingdom.[12]
With the Mongol armies came the so-calledSaengmogin (Chinese:色目人), this group consisted of Muslims from Central Asia. In the Mongol social order,Saengmogin occupied a position just below the Mongols themselves, and exerted a great deal of influence within theYuan dynasty.
The first named Muslim of Korean provenance,Ramadan ibn Alauddin, died in 1349.
Small-scale contact with predominantly Muslim peoples continued on and off. During the lateGoryeo, there were mosques in the capitalKaesong, calledYegung, whose literary meaning is a "ceremonial hall".[14]
One of thoseCentral Asian immigrants to Korea originally came to Korea as an aide to a Mongol princess who had been sent to marry KingChungnyeol of Goryeo. Goryeo documents say that his original name wasSamga but, after he decided to make Korea his permanent home, the king bestowed on him the Korean name ofJang Sunnyong. Jang married a Korean and became the founding ancestor of theDeoksu Jang clan. His clan produced many high officials and respected Confucian scholars over the centuries. Twenty-five generations later, around 30,000 Koreans look back to Jang Sunnyong as the grandfather of their clan: theJang clan, with its seat at Toksu village.[3]
The same is true of the descendants of another Central Asian who settled down in Korea. A Central Asian namedSeol Son fled to Korea when theRed Turban Rebellion erupted near the end of the Mongol'sYuan dynasty. He, too, married a Korean, originating a lineage called the Gyeongju Seol that claims at least 2,000 members in Korea.[4]
Soju was first distilled around the 13th century, during theMongol invasions of Korea. The Mongols had acquired the technique of distillingarak from theMuslim World[15] during their invasion ofCentral Asia and theMiddle East around 1256, it was subsequently introduced to Koreans and distilleries were set up around the city ofKaesong. Indeed, in the area surrounding Kaesong, Soju is known asarak-ju (Korean:아락주).[16]
There are many restrictions in Muslim community[17] including dietary and clothing;drinking alcohol and eating pork is forbidden. However, Korea's soju export to Islamic countries are increasing,[18] especially Indonesia, the largest Muslim community country, increased 10.1% from 2017.[19] While Islamic countries enforce theirdietary rules, they allow alcohol imports for the non-Muslims and foreigners living in Indonesia are permitted to not follow the Islamic dietary laws.
In the earlyJoseon period, theIslamic calendar served as a basis for calendar reform owing to its superior accuracy over the existing Chinese-based calendars.[4] A Korean translation of theHuihui Lifa "Muslim System of Calendrical Astronomy", a text combiningChinese astronomy with thezij works ofJamal al-Din, was studied during the time ofSejong the Great in the 15th century.[20] The tradition of Chinese-Islamic astronomy survived in Korea up until the early 19th century.[21]
In the year 1427,Sejong ordered a decree against the Huihui (Korean Muslim) community that have had special status andstipends since theYuan dynasty. The Huihui were forced to abandon their headgear, to close down their "ceremonial hall" (Mosque in the city ofKaesong) and worship like everyone else. No further mention of Muslims exist during the era of theJoseon.[22]
Islam was practically non-existent in Korea by roughly the 16th century, although memories of it[23] and a minor Islamic presence survived until the 19th century and onwards.[24][25] It is believed that many of the religious practices and teachings did not survive.[4] However, in the 19th century, Korean settlers inManchuria came into contact with Islam once again.[26] It was re-introduced in a more concerted way than the centuries before in the 20th century.
During theKorean War,Turkey sent a large number of troops to aidSouth Korea under theUnited Nations command called theTurkish Brigade. In addition to their contributions on the battlefield, the Turks also aided in humanitarian work, helping to operate war-time schools for war orphans. Shortly after the war, some Turks who were stationed in South Korea as UN peacekeepers beganpreaching Islam to Koreans.[citation needed] Early converts established the Korea Muslim Society (한국이슬람협회) in 1955, at which time the first South Korean mosque was erected atImun-dong.[26] The Korea Muslim Society grew large enough to become theKorea Muslim Federation in 1967.[4]
The Pew Research Center estimated that there were 3,000 Muslims inNorth Korea in 2010, up from 1,000 in 1990.[27] TheIranian embassy inPyongyang hostsAr-Rahman Mosque, the only mosque in the country.[28]
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In 1962, the government ofMalaysia (then Malaya) offered a grant of 33,000 USD for a mosque to be built in Seoul. However, the plan was derailed due toinflation.[4] TheSeoul Central Mosque was finally built in Seoul'sItaewon neighborhood in 1976. Today there are also mosques inBusan,Anyang, Gyeonggi,Gwangju,Jeonju,Daegu, andKaesong. According to Lee Hee-Soo (Yi Huisu), president of the Korea Islam Institute, there are about 10,000 listed Muslims (mostly foreign guest workers) in South Korea.[29]
Seoul also hosts aHussainiya nearSamgakji station for offeringsalah and memorializing the grandson of Muhammad,Husayn ibn Ali. Daegu also has a hussainiya (imambargah).[30]
The Korean Muslim Federation said that it would open the first Islamicprimary school, Prince Sultan Bin Abdul Aziz Elementary School, in March 2009, with the objective of helping foreign Muslims in South Korea learn about their religion through an official school curriculum. Plans are underway to open a cultural center, secondary schools and even university. Abdullah Al-Aifan, Ambassador of Saudi Arabia to Seoul, delivered $500,000 to KMF on behalf of the Saudi Arabian government.[31]
The Korean Muslim Federation provides halal certificates to restaurants and businesses. Their halal certificate is recognized by the Department of Islamic Development Malaysia (JAKIM), and there are a total of 14 KMF-halal approved restaurants in South Korea as of January 2018.[citation needed]
Before the formal establishment of an elementary school, amadrasa named Sultan Bin Abdul Aziz Madrasa functioned since the 1990s, where foreign Muslim children were given the opportunity to learn Arabic, Islamic culture, and English.[citation needed]
Many Muslims in Korea say their different lifestyle makes them stand out more than others in society. However, their biggest concern is the prejudice they feel after theSeptember 11 attacks.[32]A 9-minute report was aired onArirangTV, a Korean cable station for foreigners, on Imam Hak Apdu and Islam in Korea.[33]
Migrant workers fromPakistan andBangladesh make up a large fraction of the Muslim population. The number of Korean Muslims was reported byThe Korea Times in 2002 as 45,000[14] while thePew Research Center estimated that there were 75,000 South Korean Muslims in 2010, or one in every five hundred people in the country.[27] Muslim immigration rates show a consistent upward trend.[34]
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Among Muslim communities, there are two distinct groups: Traditional and immigrant Muslims. The "traditional" community of Muslims are usually Korean converts to Islam, while immigrants are people who migrated from Islamic countries to Korea for jobs,increasing the awareness of the religion and to escape hardship.[35] Said migrants usually hail from regions such as the Middle East, Central Asia, South Asia, and Southeast Asia.[36] The immigration of non-Koreans had increased 9.2%[37] compared to 2017, and among the people, the highest age group that decides to migrate are between 20 and 29, followed up with age of 10–19.
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