The spiritual teachings of the past and present that profess the equality of men and women do so with the mouth and not the deed; but in Jeung San Do, this equality truly manifests. As part of His decree of a new destiny of equality between yin and yang in which women would be freed from their oppressive lives of servitude and persecution, Sangjenim conferred His dao lineage and authority not upon a man, but upon a woman: Taemonim.

Taemonim incarnated into this world on March 26, 1880, in Do-ri Village, in southern Korea, as Go Pan-rye. Taemonim’s father died when She was only six years old, and She and Her impoverished mother went to live in a small temple presided over by Her mother’s maternal grandparents. In this way, Taemonim became immersed in a culture of meditation at an early age. On November 3, 1907, Sangjenim beheld a ceremony in which He invested Taemonim as the Subu. In this ceremony, angjenim proclaimed to the gathered disciples, “… I confer My dao lineage and authority upon My Subu, your Mother, to save humanity” (Dojeon 11:213:7). The title ‘Subu’ signifies the consort of Sangjenim. As the Subu, She was the ‘Mother of All Life,’ the head woman who received the dao lineage and authority of Sangjenim’s supreme dao from Sangjenim Himself.

Two years after Sangjenim’s ascension, Taemonim underwent a series of meditations in which She attained ultimate enlightenment, acquiring insight into all things in the universe – awakening to all the principles of the world. Having attained ultimate enlightenment and having thus received Sangjenim’s spiritual authority, Taemonim exercised boundless power – curing diseases, controlling the weather, and even reviving the dead.

After Her enlightenment, Taemonim established Her dao order to spread Sangjenim’s teachings. This marked the beginning of the organized movement to disseminate Sangjenim’s dao, a movement that would eventually culminate in the form of Jeung San Do. During Her lifetime, Taemonim pioneered three households (or dojangs, “dao centers”), and undertook Her own ten-year Cheonjigongsa. These labors served to ensure that Sangjenim’s dao took firm root in history.

Taemonim, like Sangjenim before Her, reached the end of Her mortal life when Her work on earth had been completed. She ascended to heaven on October 6, 1935, to rejoin Sangjenim in His continuing labors of Cheonjigongsa.