Who is Sun Myung Moon, the founder of the sect that combines Protestantism and Far Eastern Philosophy?

After former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe died after being attacked with a gun in the middle of the street on July 8, 2022, all eyes turned to the assassin. The fact that the perpetrator's mother is a member of the Moon sect brings to mind the question 'Who is the Moon sect, and what is its connection with Abe's death?' brought questions.

Here are interesting facts about the Moon sect and its founder Sun Myung Moon, who introduced sushi to the whole world...

It was revealed that the person who organized the assassination was 41-year-old Tetsuya Yamagami and that his mother was a former member of the Moon Unification Church, one of the largest churches in Japan.

So what is the Moon sect, how did it emerge and what is its connection to Abe's death?

Sun Myung Moon (born Moon Yong-Myeong; 6 January 1920 – 3 September 2012) was a Korean religious leader, also known for his business ventures and support for conservative political causes. A messiah claimant, he was the founder of the Unification Church, whose members consider him and his wife Hak Ja Han to be their "True Parents", and of its widely noted "Blessing" or mass wedding ceremonies. The author of the Unification Church's religious scripture, the Divine Principle, he was an anti-communist and an advocate for Korean reunification, for which he was recognized by the governments of both North and South Korea.

When Moon was ten years old, his family converted to Christianity, thus introducing him to Christianity; He was convicted of espionage in North Korea in 1947 and was imprisoned for 5 years.

The Moon sect, also known officially as the "Family Federation for World Peace and Unification", was first founded in 1954 by Sun Myung Moon.

Moon was born into a farming family in what is now North Korea. Although Moon's family adhered to Confucian beliefs when he was born, they converted in the 1930s and joined Protestant churches.

Moon, who studied engineering in high school, moved to Tokyo at a young age.

Moon claimed that when he was only 15 years old, Jesus appeared before him on Easter and gave him the task of "returning humanity to sinlessness and completing the work he left unfinished."

Moon, who was not accepted into major Protestant churches due to his extreme religious and political views, fled from North to South Korea in 1954 and reached hundreds of thousands of people just a few years after establishing his own church!

In the Unification Church founded by Moon, the Bible was read and reinterpreted, mass weddings were held, thousands of couples were married, financial aid was collected, Moon was accepted as a "Messiah", and church members were called "Moonie".

However, the most important point in the rapid growth of the sect was political and historical events. During the same period, Japan's defeat in World War II and the Korean War in Moon's hometown changed the worldview of many people.

Not only Moon's religious side but also his pro-fascist and anti-communist views, which he adopted after being trapped in the camps during the Korean War, caused many political figures to surround him.

He met with Ryoichi Sasakawa, a far-right extremist and war criminal who is considered the richest fascist in the world, and joined hands with Yoshio Kodama, the man who united the Japanese mafia Yakuza.

He became the right-hand man of anti-communist and dictator President Park Chung-Hee, who came to power in Korea in 1961. In the USA, he met first with President Eisenhower and then with Nixon.

The fame of the sect, which had millions of members in the 60s, spread not only in Korea and Japan but all over the world. Moon, who made a world tour during these periods, ventured into many different sectors, from media to education, from construction to a professional football club.

Tax evasion charges were revealed against Moon, who moved to the USA in the 1970s, and he was sentenced to 11 months in prison.

However, Moon, who did not lose power, touched on a very interesting subject in his last sermon to his followers and advised them to "get into the tuna business". He wanted to expand Japan's tuna industry, first to the USA and then to the whole world.

A church member named Takeshi Yashiro, who listened to the sermon, founded the company called "True Worlds Food" with his friends and introduced Japan's traditional dish, sushi, to the whole world with his chain restaurants.

After Sun Myung Moon married Hak Ja Han in 1960, he described his wife as the "real mother" of the church and himself as the "real father" of the church. He passed away in 2012.

As far as is known, the couple had a total of 14 children.

Although Moon's youngest son, Hyung Jin Moon, took over his father's place, he left the sect and founded his own church as a result of arguments with his mother.

Although the sect led by Hak Ja Han is not as strong as it used to be, it is known that it still has millions of followers around the world, especially in Japan and Korea...

Shinzo Abe's grandfather, Nobusuke Kishi, who was also a former prime minister, met Moon years ago and founded an organization linked to the sect.

Yamagami's mother, who shot Abe, is also a former member of the sect! He says that his family was left penniless and in debt because of the large donation his mother used to give to the sect.

Former Prime Minister Abe was heavily criticized in the past for sending a message via video to a group affiliated with the sect.

Seeing Abe's connections with the sect, Yamagami says that he got angry at the former prime minister and made a plan.

So the deals Shinzo Abe's grandfather made with the Moon sect in the past ended years later when his grandson was assassinated with a homemade weapon...