Master Byukwoon

The Story of Mago Castle

Yul’yo
In the beginning there was only the warmth of the beaming sunlight and there was nothing visible.  From the creative power inherent in the empty space of the universe, there arose the sounds and rhythms of life – Yul’ yo.  Yul’ yo is the basic rhythm of light, sound and vibration which is the basis of all life. 

The sounds of Yul’yo resonated over a long period of time, and eventually created harmony.  From this harmony a faint and indistinct invisible world slowly began to appear – this is the world of the mind.

Mago
First the Mother of all creation (Mago) appeared.  She used the sounds and rhythms of life to create Mago Castle which is the realm of the invisible, spiritual world. 

Mago then orchestrated Yul’yo and created two other castles below Mago Castle.  These two castles were the first division of energy into the potential for a material world.  The first one, Huh-Dahl Castle, represents the emptiness of the invisible world.  The second one, Shil-Dahl Castle, represents the fullness of the material reality.

Mago also orchestrated Yul’yo to create two daughters for herself.  At this point, all was still in the invisible world, so Mago and her daughters had no actual physical form or gender.  As life first begins, it has no forms or shapes; it has no gender.  At this level, life can recreate continuously.  One divides into two; two divides into four, and so on.  This is the basis of the creation of the invisible world and the visible world.  It is how all new life is created, whether it is a human baby, animal baby, plants, etc.

Mago’s daughters were given the task to govern Yul’yo’s celestial five sounds and seven melodies.  As the daughters played these sounds with the freedom and purity of their home in Mago Castle, the rhythms of Yul’yo created the preparation for life to sprout in the universe.

Creation of Land and Sea
Mago used her masculine, physical energy (represented by Shil-Dahl Castle) to create land and sea.  As the physical energy expanded, giant land masses were formed in the midst of vast oceans.  As the boundaries of land and sea went through myriad changes, the four elements that form all living things in nature – fire, water, earth and ki energy – and the directions of up and down - mingled with each other.  As this happened, night and day became differentiated, the four seasons developed, and plants and animals were born.

Creation of Heavenly Men and Women
Mago’s two daughters (Ghoong-Hyee and Soh-Hyee) asked their mother for the fullness energy of Shil-Dahl Castle and for the emptiness energy of Huh-Dahl Castle) to use within themselves to create new life.  By combining the energies of emptiness and fullness, each of Mago’s daughters was able to create new invisible life.  In this way, each daughter “gave birth” to two heavenly women (chun-nyeo), creating a total of four heavenly women between the two daughters.

Each of the four heavenly women then created a heavenly woman (chun-nyeo) and a heavenly man (chun-in).  In this way, from the four heavenly women, came eight heavenly “people.”  At this point, the heavenly people still had no physical shape or gender.  They were only heavenly “men” and “women” because of different characteristics.  So now, the invisible is verging on becoming physical.

But because they were not yet physical, these eight heavenly men and women were physically nourished by drinking the milk that sprang from the earth (ji-you).  They needed no other food or drink.

These eight heavenly “people” were divided into four heavenly couples – each couple having one heavenly man and one heavenly woman.  From the center of the invisible world, Mago’s daughters assigned each heavenly couple to govern one of the four elements: the couple named Hwang-Ghoong was put in charge of earth; the couple Baek-Soh was put in charge of ki (energy); third, the couple Chun-Ghoong was put in charge of water; and the couple Heuk-Soh was put in charge of fire.

The eight heavenly people also were assigned the task of governing the four directions: north and south were governed by the heavenly men; and east and west were governed by the heavenly women.  The fifth direction was governed by Mago’s two daughters: up by Ghoong-Hyee and down by Soh-Hyee.

Evolution of the Visible World
When the elements of fire and ki energy were mixed together, and sent to the heaven, the cold energy in the heaven disappeared. When the water and earth energies were mixed, the earth became fertile.  Trees, grasses and plants flourished and many diverse life forms were born on the earth.

Under Mago’s guidance, the four heavenly couples each had two sons and two daughters.  So the eight became sixteen.  This new group of sixteen was the origin of present day human beings.  At this point, the invisible world gave rise to a visible reality.  These sixteen people had physical forms and gender.  They married one another and after many generations, they became a group of 12,000 people. 

Mago Castle
These 12,000 people lived rightly in accordance with the principles of heaven and earth.  They lived life in tune with the rhythm of the universe – Yul’yo.  Their characteristics were harmonious.  They had great respect for all other life forms.  They continued to be nourished only by the milk that came from the earth (ji-you).  Their blood and ki energy were pure.

They listened to the sounds of heaven; and they knew that they were one with heaven.  They communicated with each other and with other forms of life without speaking. They were able to go wherever they wanted to go.  With the eyes of wisdom, they read the true nature and essence of all the things in nature.  Since they lived according to the principles of Yul’yo they transcended the limitations of the physical body; and thus their life span was infinite.

The Changing of the Five Tastes
One day, a descendant of Baek-Soh, named Ji-Soh, was hungry and went out to find a spring of earth’s milk to drink from.  There were so many people at the spring.  When Ji-Soh let the elderly and the pregnant women drink before him, there was not enough ji-you to go around and he was not able to drink. 

When Ji-Soh came back home, he was so hungry that he hastily picked and ate the ripened grapes that were on the vine near by his home.  Thereupon, he could not see; his ears were ringing; his tongue was burning; his whole body was itching.  Ji-Soh fainted.

After some time had passed and he gathered his senses, enchanted scenery unfolded in front of his eyes.  He saw a shiningly colored world, with fragrant scents, the sounds of the birds, and a cool breeze that touched his skin.  Ji-Soh came down from his home and walked and sang.  “Heaven and earth is beautiful and vast.  However, it cannot surpass my power.  All this is from the power of grapes!”  People of the Baek-Soh tribe decided it was miraculous, and they fought each other to get to the grapes first to eat.  And indeed it was just as Ji-Soh had said.

Those people, whose five senses of the body awakened from eating the grapes, became wrapped up in personal desires and emotions.  This is the “changing of the five tastes.”  The other people of the Baek-Soh tribe became shocked.  They prohibited the eating of grapes.  Thereafter, people’s trust was broken.  As people lost their trust and respect for each other, the human mind gradually began to change and become constrictive.  As people began to judge each other and began to make man-made laws, the ability to live according to one’s true nature and the heaven’s laws was gradually lost.

Loss of Heavenly Nature
As people began to eat other life forms by force, teeth were formed, their blood and flesh became impure, and eventually they began to lose their beautiful heavenly nature.  They could no longer hear the voice of heaven – Yul’yo.  They were no longer connected to the mind’s true nature.   As they began to depend only on the five senses of the body, they no longer could feel rhythm of the universe.  Becoming trapped in the limitations of the physical body, their life span shortened, and there were many who gave birth to animal-like features.

The people of Mago Castle resented Ji-Soh who created the changing of the five tastes; and he was ashamed of what he had done.  Ji-Soh and the other people who had eaten the grapes left Mago Castle and went into hiding.  They scattered into many different places.

Hwang-Ghoong was the most elderly of the people living in Mago Castle in a physical human form; and he was the one governing the earth element.  He felt pity for those who had left; and he said, “There is nothing that can be done since their minds have become terribly impure and the true essence of the mind has changed.  However, when they realize the heaven’s principle and the mind becomes pure once again, they will naturally recover their true nature which is ‘heaven’.” 

Leaving Mago Castle
When Ji-Soh and the other people who left Mago Castle started to dig in the area below the Mago Castle to find the ji-you, the castle ground was destroyed; and the source of the ji-you spring flowed down and turned into hardened soil.  The people could no longer drink from the ji-you spring. 

Because the ji-you in Mago Castle had dried up, even the people inside the castle began to search for something to eat.  They began to eat plants and fruits.  Even for those people left inside Mago Castle, it was difficult to preserve its purity.  For this reason, the Castle was now in danger.

Outside of Mago Castle, the people who had already left lost the harmony of the four elements: ki (energy), fire, water and earth.  Their new home became cold and dark.  In order for those humans and other animals with physical bodies to survive, they had to harm and threaten each other and other life forms in order to eat.  Among those people who left the castle, some realized their mistake and tried hard to recover their true essence in order to return to Mago Castle.  But their efforts were in vain because they did not realize that there is a certain time for the tearing down or destruction of structures, and a certain time for the building up or creation of structures. They did not realize that there would come a certain time to return to the origin and the beginning.

Hwang-Ghoong took the responsibility himself for the changing of the five tastes; and he asked Mother Mago for a pardon. He vowed “to rebuild an ideal collective community like that of Mago Castle in order for humans to return to the original mind.’

Hwang-Ghoong said “the calamity of the change of the five senses came close to Mago Castle. It is because those people who had left the castle lost the heaven’s laws and principles, and the ignorance grew bigger.  Even Mago Castle became in danger.”  When Hwang-Ghoong informed the other three tribes of the situation, they all decided to leave Mago Castle in order to preserve it intact.

In order that the people of all four tribes would not lose the heaven’s true essence, Hwang-Ghoong transmitted an invisible, spiritual symbol of the purity of heaven’s nature to them as they departed so they would never forget their true nature. 

He also taught them how to pick arrowroot and make food from it.  He then divided the four tribes to group themselves and he sent them into the four directions.

Chung-Ghoong’s tribe left the east gate of Mago Castle to go to the Yoon-Hae region Baek-Soh and his tribe left the west gate to go to the Wol-Shik region.  Heuk-Soh and his people left the south gate to go to the Sung-Sang region.  Hwang-Ghoong left the north gate to go to the frigidly cold and rugged land of the Chun-San region.  This was a promise that Hwang-Ghoong made, to leave and endure the anguish of the harshest region because of his responsibility for the changing of the five tastes which led to all of them having to leave Mago Castle.  Also, in order for him to build an ideal collective community to return to the original mind, he had vowed that he and his tribe would endure the most anguish of all the people.

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