Late Joseon civil official and scholar who proposed the theory of Great Ultimate impartiality; leader of the Soron faction
| Life | 1631 ~ 1695 |
| Era | 조선 |
| Clan | 반남 박씨 |
Bak Se-chae (1631-1695) was a late Joseon official and scholar whose courtesy name was Hwasuk and pen names were Hyeonseok and Namgye, of the Bannam Bak clan.
An authority on Neo-Confucianism and ritual studies, he led the Soron faction and proposed the royal-arbiter theory of factional balance to ease court partisanship. Removed from office in the 1689 purge known as the Gisa Hwanguk, he spent his years out of government corresponding with fellow scholars Yun Jeung and Jeong Je-du; after returning to office following the 1694 Gapsul Hwanguk he rose to State Councillor of the Left and, together with Nam Gu-man, helped secure the enshrinement of Yi I and Seong Hon in the Confucian shrine and worked to extend the daedongbeop tax reform nationwide.
He left an extensive body of writing, including the Dongyu Sawurok, a record tracing the lineage of Confucian teacher-student relationships from Silla to mid-Joseon, and his collected works the Namgyejip, and he was himself later enshrined in the Confucian shrine.