Scholar and disciple of Jo Sik who took part in compiling the Annals of King Myeongjong as a section chief of the Ministry of Personnel; pen name Deokgye
| Life | 1521 ~ 1574 |
| Era | 조선 중기 |
| Clan | 함양 오씨 |
O Geon (吳健, 1521-1574) was a mid-Joseon civil official and scholar of the Hamyang O clan, with courtesy name Jagang and pen name Deokgye. He was born in 1521 at Deokchon in Saneum County (today Jiri in Sancheong-eup, South Gyeongsang), the only son of O Se-gi, a royal-tomb steward, and a woman of the Seongju (Palgeo) Do clan. He lost his father at eleven, and his strict observance of mourning for his mother won him a commendation from the Ministry of Rites and exemption from taxes and labor service in 1549. Too poor to hire a teacher, he is said to have read the Doctrine of the Mean hundreds of times and mastered it alone.
He passed the licentiate examination in 1552 and the civil examination in 1558. After a first post at the Seonggyungwan he served as instructor (hundo) at Seongju, where, with Magistrate Hwang Jun-ryang, he built the Nokbong study hall and taught; Jeong Gu is said to have studied under him as a boy. He then served in the Royal Secretariat and as remonstrator, censor, lecturer and section chief in several ministries, and in 1571 as a section chief of the Ministry of Personnel who also served as an Annals compiler, he took part in compiling the Annals of King Myeongjong. At the royal lectures he argued that learning lies in investigating principle and maintaining reverence.
On a base of self-study he is said to have visited Jo Sik at Deoksan at thirty-one and Yi Hwang at Dosan at forty-three, and he is also described as a disciple of Kim In-hu. Because he met Jo and Yi late, some scholars regard his learning as largely self-taught, and his collected works, with little metaphysics and much on self-cultivation, are judged closer to Jo Sik's practical bent than to Yi Hwang. When the court shunned plain speaking and kept scholars away, he gave up his post in 1572 and returned to Deokgye village, refusing repeated summons until his death in 1574. His Deokgye Munjip and Jeongmyo Ilgi survive; his disciples called him Master Deokgye, and he is enshrined at Seogye Seowon in Sancheong.
Appointed in 1559, O Geon went to Seongju as instructor. Magistrate Hwang Jun-ryang, a favorite pupil of Yi Hwang, discussed Zhu Xi's writings with him and together they built the Nokbong study hall in Chilgok. He taught the Seongju students in four grades, and Jeong Gu, later a great scholar, studied under him then. He resigned on grounds of illness in 1562 and went home.
In 1571 he took part in compiling the Annals of King Myeongjong as a section chief of the Ministry of Personnel. A Sancheong tourism source says that in 1572 he recommended Kim Hyo-won as successor to the personnel post and that Sim Ui-gyeom's objection became one trigger of factional strife. He soon left office, read, wrote poems and lectured at home, and died in 1574 aged 54.
Seogye Seowon in Sancheong was founded in 1606 in his memory, received a royal plaque in 1677, was demolished in 1868 and later restored. Its Changdeoksa shrine holds tablets for Deokgye together with O Han (Suodang) and Park of Yongho. The blocks for the ten-fascicle Deokgye Seonsaeng Munjip, cut for the 1817 printing, together with those for his son's Saho-jip and O Han's Suodang Silgi, 132 blocks in all, are designated South Gyeongsang tangible cultural heritage.
His tomb is said to lie beside Seogye Seowon at Jiri, Sancheong-eup, South Gyeongsang.
His son O Jang passed the civil examination in 1610. The printing blocks of the Deokgye Seonsaeng Munjip were designated a South Gyeongsang tangible cultural heritage together with those of his son's Saho-jip and O Han's Suodang Silgi.