A monk from the Jogye Order conducted a ceremony for the Lion Boys from ‘K-Pop Demon Hunters’.
On the 9th, the Vtuber ‘Buddhist Monk’, who debuted on YouTube and Chijijik, conducted a ceremony for the members of the idol group Lion Boys appearing in the Netflix original animation ‘K-Pop Demon Hunters’ (hereafter ‘Kedahon’) during his debut broadcast.
The Buddhist Monk explained, “The day after I announced my Vtuber debut, I happened to see a photo of the Lion Boys' ceremonial altar while browsing an online community. I thought it would be interesting, so I showed it to the people helping at the temple, and they suggested, ‘Let’s do it too.’”
He continued, “I knew that the rights and copyrights for ‘K-Pop Demon Hunters’ belonged to Sony and Netflix, but one of the helpers contacted a lawyer directly. The lawyer said, ‘As long as it’s a derivative work, there’s no problem,’ and ‘You can do it freely as long as you don’t generate profit.’ I thought, ‘How long will it take for a derivative work to come out?’ but I was able to contact an illustrator right away, and the work progressed quickly,” adding, “I’ve just taken my first steps, but it feels like people have put me in an F1 race car.” He mentioned that the ceremony was planned and conducted quickly, independent of his will.
The Buddhist Monk explained, “A ceremony (齋) means offering the teachings of Buddha and the monks’ offerings, wishing that the merit may be shared by all,” and added, “A ceremony for the deceased is a Buddhist ritual where the bereaved and monks accumulate merit to guide the spirits (亡魂) to a good place.”
He further elaborated, “It’s not simply about wishing ‘go to a good place,’ but about conveying the teachings of Buddha to the deceased so that they can attain enlightenment and be reborn in a better place.”
Some netizens looking forward to season 2 of ‘Kedahon’ jokingly commented, “What if all the Lion Boys go to paradise through the ceremony?” In response, the Buddhist Monk said, “Some were worried that if everyone is guided, we won’t be able to meet again, but the state of not being reborn is called ‘breaking the cycle of reincarnation.’ That state is the state of Buddha. If we reach that state through the ceremony, it would be a blessing in itself. However, we cannot achieve that state right away. We will meet again someday, so don’t worry too much and just watch over the ceremony.”
The Buddhist Monk conducted the ceremony for Lion Boys members Jinwoo, Romance, Baby, Abbey, and Mystery for about two hours, watched by over 4,000 viewers.
Meanwhile, ‘Kedahon’, which was released on the 20th of last month, is captivating audiences worldwide. It not only topped the Netflix global movie rankings but also saw its soundtrack songs dominate various music charts. Notably, all eight songs featured in the OST charted simultaneously on the Billboard ‘Hot 100’ as of the 19th, and the main album chart ‘Billboard 200’ ranked second.
[Kim So-yeon, Star Today Reporter]
