Chong Yagyong

(1762 - 1836)

Chong Yagyong was banished at the age of forty to a remote village during a purge of Roman Catholics from the Korean government. While in exile, he wrote, under the pen name Saam (Waiting in Hermitage) over five hundred volumes, challenging orthodox neo-Confucianism and combining Confucian principles with Christianity. In 1818 he was allowed to return to his home in Gyeonggi Province, where he died in 1836.