Past Life Story

In the eighteenth year of King Myeongjong, you were born in a fishing village on the southern coast. Your father was a fisherman, and your first scenery was the sea. You learned to swim before you could walk, you knew how to row before you could speak. The sea was your mother and your teacher. By five you could row a small boat alone. By seven you did not waver even in fierce waves. Your palms had hardened early, and your shoulders were firmer than your peers. It was the body of a man of the sea. In your tenth year, you met a great storm. You were aboard your father's boat when the storm rose suddenly. One of your father's companions fell into the sea. Without hesitation you leapt in. When you pulled him up, you nearly died yourself. Your father held you and trembled long. That day your father said, "You are a man of the sea. But fear the sea." At fifteen you became a fisherman in earnest. Each dawn you went out to sea, each evening you returned with the fish you had caught. Your life was simple. The sea and you, that was all. Yet that was enough. In your twenty-eighth year, the Imjin War broke out. The southern coast was filled with Japanese ships. The fishing village burned, and people died. You volunteered for the navy at once. As one born a fisherman, the navy was a natural path. In the navy you saw the Geobukseon, the Turtle Ship. That magnificent vessel—which deflected enemy arrows and enemy blades—you looked upon in long silence. It was not merely a ship but a shield that protected the people. You became one of the soldiers who pulled its oars. In your twenty-ninth year, you fought your first naval battle—the Battle of Hansando. The enemy ships filled the sea, but your fleet's crane-wing formation overwhelmed them. You pulled the oar, shouting with your comrades. As arrows flew and cannons exploded, you did not waver. "When the waves grow fiercer, row harder"—that was your conviction. In your thirtieth year, you took part in the Battle of Myeongnyang. With only twelve ships, you held off more than a hundred enemy vessels. All had resolved to die. So had you. But your commander cried out, "Your servant still has twelve ships." That cry shook your heart. That day you wrought a miracle. In a dawn of your thirty-second year came the Battle of Noryang. The last great battle. As you took up the oar that morning, a presentiment came over you. The presentiment proved true. Your commander fell to an enemy arrow that day. Yet to the very last he cried out, "Do not announce my death!" Even as you wept, you did not stop rowing. At the battle's end, you too were wounded. The arrow lodged deep in your shoulder. Your comrades drew you out. You recovered behind the lines, but you never took the oar again. After the war ended, you returned to your home fishing village. You became a fisherman again. Yet each morning, as you went out to sea, the Geobukseon was within your heart. Your comrades, with whom you had pulled oars, and your commander were within your heart. In your fiftieth year, as always, you went out to sea, and there you departed. It was a day a small storm rose. Your boat was never found. The villagers said, "A man of the sea has returned to the sea." Your children became fishermen, and they too lived with the sea, like their father. Your story was passed down in the village from generation to generation—the story of a fisherman who pulled the oars of the Turtle Ship. When the waves grow fiercer, row harder—that was your life. You did not waver even in fierce waves, and to the very end you did not let go of your oar.