Heup Young Kim's Trajectory towards Theodao and His Approach to the Trinity

From the outset, Heup Young Kim showed a strong interest in developing a Korean contextual theology grounded in Korean cultural identity. Kim completed his doctoral thesis on a comparative analysis of Karl Barth and Yang-ming Wang. Since then, Kim has focused on developing the foundations of theodao , a theology of dao from an East Asian perspective. This article examines Kim's theological trajectory towards theodao . Through his exploration of a Christian–Confucian/Daoist dialogue, Kim began by focusing on the question of humanity. He then developed the concept of Christodao , understanding Jesus Christ as “the dao of humanity” or “the dao of new cosmic humanity,” before elaborating Christodao into a distinct theological framework and, ultimately, theodao . However, this article also recognizes that there has been little reference to the Trinity. Explicit discussions of the Trinity first appear only in Kim’s works published in 2011 and 2013. Even in these trinitarian works, however, Kim was overwhelmingly focused on forming an East Asian Christological or theological framework/paradigm/model, rather than on directly exploring Jesus Christ and the triune God. Thus Kim’s proposal of theodao does not appear to establish a necessary or intrinsic connection between Christology and the doctrine of the Trinity. This discovery implies that Kim's trajectory towards theodao has been significantly influenced by his passionate interest in Korean contextual theology that is deeply thoroughly grounded in Jesus Christ, andshould establish a necessary or intrinsic connection between Christology and its understanding of the Trinity.