Claim. Good and evil spirits engage in active warfare in the spirit-world, with evil spirits descending into the descendants of their earthly enemies and causing sudden accidents in pursuit of revenge.
Elaboration. SMM describes the conflict in concrete terms: “Good spirits are trying to lead evil spirits to good places, while evil spirits are doing everything they can to prevent good spirits from going up to good places” (3.1. The spirit world is divided into good and evil worlds, 134-9, 1985.1.1). Earth-bound consequences follow: “If you go to the other world, you will find murderers, their victims, and all sorts of people staying there. That being the case, there are times when people brandish their swords to get their revenge. But many walls are blocking them. For that reason, evil spirits go to the descendants of their enemies and cause sudden deaths by accidents in order to bring them to the spirit world” (ibid, 191-205, 1989.6.24). Resolution is earth-mediated: “These things must be resolved. In order to deal with this, it must first be resolved on earth … something better must be offered” (ibid). This grounds the doctrine that descendant-mediated indemnity ceremonies (e.g. Cheongpyeong) are not symbolic but actually intervene in ongoing spirit-world conflicts.