The King of Yom-na (Hell)

In Yon-nan County, in Whang-hai Province, there lived a graduate scholar whose name has been forgotten. One day he fell ill and stayed in his room, leaning weakly on his armrest. Suddenly several spirit soldiers appeared in front of him. “The Governor of the lower world has ordered your arrest,” they said. They put a chain on him and led him away.

They traveled many hundreds of miles and came at last to a place with a very high wall. The spirits took him inside and went on a long way, until they reached a great building that rose up to the sky. They led him through the gate into the inner courtyard and made him lie face down on the ground.

Peeking up, he saw what looked like a king seated on a throne, with officers standing on either side and scores of clerks and soldiers hurrying to and fro on urgent errands. The King looked terrible, and his orders filled everyone with awe. The scholar felt sweat break out on his back, and he did not dare raise his eyes.

Soon a clerk came forward and stood in front of the raised platform to pass on the King’s words. “Where are you from?” the King asked. “What is your name? How old are you? What do you do for a living? Tell me the truth, and no tricks.”

Scared half to death, the scholar answered, “My family name is such-and-such, and my given name is such-and-such. I am so many years old, and my family has lived in Yon-nan, in Whang-hai Province, for generations. I am dull by nature and have done nothing special. All my life I have heard that if you pray with love and pity in your heart, you will escape the lower world, so I have spent my time calling on the Buddha and giving to the poor.”

The clerk went straight off and reported this to the King. After a while he came back with a message. “Come up closer to the steps,” he said. “You are not the person we wanted. You happen to have the same name, and so you were arrested by mistake. You may go.”

The scholar put his hands together and bowed low. Then the clerk brought another message from the King. “When I lived on earth, my house was in such-and-such a ward of Seoul. When you go back, I want you to carry a message for me. I have been here a long time, and my outer coat is worn to rags. Ask my family to send me a new one. I shall be very grateful, so be sure you don’t forget.”

“I will certainly pass on Your Majesty’s message,” said the scholar. “But the ways of the two worlds, the dark one and the bright one, are so different that people will say I am talking nonsense. I will tell them exactly what you have commanded, but what if they won’t listen? I ought to have some proof to help me.”

“You are quite right,” said the King. “This will help you. When I was on earth, one of the jade buttons I wore on my headband had a chipped edge, and I hid it in the third volume of the Book of History. Only I know about it, no one else in the world. Give them that as proof, and they will listen.”

“That will do,” said the scholar. “But if they make the new coat, how will they send it?”

“Let them prepare a sacrifice and offer the coat by fire,” said the King, “and it will reach me.”

The scholar said goodbye, and the King sent two soldiers with him as guards. As they went out, he asked them who the one on the throne was. “He is the King of the Underworld,” they said. “His family name is Pak, and his given name is Oo.”

They came to the bank of a river, and the two soldiers pushed him into the water. He woke with a start and found that he had lain dead for three days.

When he had recovered, he traveled up to Seoul, found the house he had been told of and asked careful questions about the name. It was indeed the house of Pak Oo. Pak Oo had two sons, both graduates, who now held office. The scholar wanted to see them, but the gatekeeper would not let him in, so he stood helplessly outside the red gate until the sun went down.

At last an old servant came out from the inner part of the house, and the scholar begged him for a chance to see the master. The servant went in and told the master, who soon ordered the visitor brought in. Inside, he found two gentlemen who seemed to be the heads of the house. They had him sit down and asked who he was and what he wanted.

“I am a student from Yon-nan County, in Whang-hai Province,” he said. “On such-and-such a day I died and went into the other world, where your honored father gave me a commission.”

The two listened for a moment and then, without waiting to hear the rest, flew into a rage. “How dare a scarecrow like you come into our house and say such things!” they cried. “This is utter nonsense. Throw him out!” they shouted to the servants.

“I have proof!” the scholar called. “Listen. If it fails, then throw me out.”

“What proof could you possibly have?” said one of them. And the scholar described the hidden button very exactly and carefully.

Astonished, the brothers had the book taken down and looked inside, and there, in the third volume of the Book of History, was the button, just as he had said, down to the smallest detail. It was a button that had gone missing when their father died, and they had hunted for it with no luck.

Now they accepted the message as true, and the whole family went into mourning. The women of the family also called the scholar in and asked him specially about all he had seen. Then they made the outer coat, chose a day and offered it by fire at the family altar.

Three days after the sacrifice, the scholar had a dream, and so did the Pak family. In it the King of the Underworld came and thanked each one of them for the coat. The family kept the scholar at their home for a long time, treating him with great respect, and they stayed firm friends with him all their lives.

Pak Oo, the storyteller adds, was a great-grandson of Minister Pak Chom. In office he was honest and fair, and the people honored him. While he was mayor of Hai-ju, he had a dispute with the provincial governor, and that too showed which of the two was the honest man. This tale came to Im Bang from a graduate named Choi Yu-chom, whom he met in Hai-ju.

About this story

“The King of Yom-na (Hell)” comes from Korean Folk Tales: Imps, Ghosts and Fairies, James Scarth Gale’s 1913 translation of Im Bang. Yom-na is the Korean name for Yama, the judge of the dead in Buddhist belief, whom this tale portrays as a former human official serving after his death.

This story imagines a coat reaching the dead when the family offers it by fire. The mix-up of names sends a humble scholar home with a message, and the chipped button gives the family a reason, within the narrative, to accept his account.

Read the original: Korean Folk Tales: Imps, Ghosts and Fairies (Project Gutenberg)

Best for ages 9–12 — a scholar arrested by mistake in the world of the dead carries home a message and a secret proof.

Even the judgment hall makes a mistake

The great wall, chains and officials make the underworld look authoritative, yet its soldiers have arrested the wrong man. The scholar’s later caution is therefore important: he asks for a detail the family can check rather than expecting his strange journey to be believed on his word alone. The sons initially judge his appearance; the hidden, chipped button changes their minds.

Follow the evidence

Make three pairs of notes: the mistaken arrest and its correction, the sons’ first response and their search, and the message about the coat and the later dream. Which events can the family check within the story? The button persuades these characters; a folktale’s account of it is not independent proof of an afterlife.

Questions to ask

• Why was the scholar taken to the lower world?
• What proof did the King give him, and why was it a good one?
• How did Pak Oo’s sons change their minds?

Related stories

• The Literary Man of Imsil — a soul rescued on the road to the other world
• Savitri and the Lord of Death — Yama, the judge of the dead, in an Indian tale
• The Snake’s Revenge — another Korean tale of life after death