The Most Famous
RELIGIOUS FIGURES from North Korea
This page contains a list of the greatest North Korean Religious Figures. The pantheon dataset contains 3,187 Religious Figures, 3 of which were born in North Korea. This makes North Korea the birth place of the 83rd most number of Religious Figures behind Albania, and Jamaica.
Top 3
The following people are considered by Pantheon to be the most legendary North Korean Religious Figures of all time. This list of famous North Korean Religious Figures is sorted by HPI (Historical Popularity Index), a metric that aggregates information on a biography’s online popularity.
1. Sun Myung Moon (1920 - 2012)
With an HPI of 68.56, Sun Myung Moon is the most famous North Korean Religious Figure. His biography has been translated into 38 different languages on wikipedia.
Sun Myung Moon (Korean: 문선명; Hanja: 文鮮明; born Moon Yong-myeong; 6 January 1920 – 3 September 2012) was a Korean religious leader, also known for his business ventures and support for conservative political causes. A messiah claimant, he was the founder of the Unification Church, whose members consider him and his wife Hak Ja Han to be their "True Parents", and of its widely noted "Blessing" or mass wedding ceremonies. The author of the Unification Church's religious scripture, the Divine Principle, was an anti-communist and an advocate for Korean reunification, for which he was recognized by the governments of both North and South Korea. Businesses he promoted included News World Communications, an international news media corporation known for its American subsidiary The Washington Times, and Tongil Group, a South Korean business group (chaebol), as well as other related organizations. Moon was born in what is now North Korea. When he was a child, his family converted to Christianity. In the 1940s and 1950s, he was imprisoned multiple times by the North and South Korean governments during his early new religious ministries, formally founding the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity, simply known as the Unification Church, in Seoul, South Korea, in 1954. The Unification Church teaches conservative, heterosexual family-oriented values from new interpretations of the Christian Bible mixed with theology from Moon's own text, the Divine Principle. In 1971, Moon moved to the United States and became well known after giving a series of public speeches on his beliefs. In the 1982 case United States v. Sun Myung Moon, he was found guilty of willfully filing false federal income tax returns and sentenced to 18 months in federal prison. His case generated protests from clergy and civil libertarians, who said that the trial was biased against him. Many of Moon's followers were very dedicated and were often referred to in popular parlance as "Moonies". His wedding ceremonies drew criticism, specifically after members of other churches took part, including the excommunicated Roman Catholic archbishop Emmanuel Milingo. Moon was also criticized for his relationships with political and religious figures, including US presidents Richard Nixon, George H. W. Bush, and George W. Bush; Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev; North Korean president Kim Il Sung; and Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan.
2. Francis Hong Yong-ho (1906 - 2013)
With an HPI of 60.20, Francis Hong Yong-ho is the 2nd most famous North Korean Religious Figure. His biography has been translated into 20 different languages.
Francis Hong Yong-ho (Korean: 홍용호 프란치스코; Hanja: 洪龍浩; born 12 October 1906 – death unknown, but acknowledged in June 2013) was a Catholic prelate in North Korea who was imprisoned by the communist regime of Kim Il Sung in 1949 and later disappeared. After his disappearance, he was for many years listed as the Bishop of Pyongyang.
3. Kim Han-sol (b. 1995)
With an HPI of 43.50, Kim Han-sol is the 3rd most famous North Korean Religious Figure. His biography has been translated into 12 different languages.
Kim Han-sol (Korean: 김한솔, born 16 June 1995) is the eldest son of Kim Jong-nam and a grandson of the former North Korean ruler Kim Jong Il. His father was the unofficial heir apparent until 2001, when he fell out of favor with the regime after a failed attempt to secretly visit Tokyo Disneyland in May 2001. Kim Han-sol's half-uncle, Kim Jong Un, was named the heir apparent in September 2010, and succeeded Kim Jong Il upon the latter's death in December 2011. Since his father's assassination in 2017, he has been under the protective custody of the United States Central Intelligence Agency and is reportedly living in the United States.
People
Pantheon has 3 people classified as North Korean religious figures born between 1906 and 1995. Of these 3, 1 (33.33%) of them are still alive today. The most famous living North Korean religious figures include Kim Han-sol. The most famous deceased North Korean religious figures include Sun Myung Moon, and Francis Hong Yong-ho. As of April 2024, 1 new North Korean religious figures have been added to Pantheon including Kim Han-sol.
