"Empire of the Dharma" explores the dynamic relationship between Korean and Japanese Buddhists in the years leading up to the Japanese annexation of Korea. Conventional narratives cast this relationship in politicized terms, with Korean Buddhists portrayed as complicit in the religious annexation of the peninsula. However, this view fails to account for the diverse visions, interests, and strategies that drove both sides.

Hwansoo Ilmee Kim complicates this politicized account of religious interchange by reexamining the alliance forged in 1910 between the Japanese Soto sect and the...