English has one all-purpose way to move a person around with you: bring or take them. "I brought my kids," "I brought my boss," "I brought my grandmother" — same verb, no comment on rank. Korean forces a choice. To bring a junior — a child, a younger sibling, a pet — you say 데리고 오다. To bring a superior — a parent, an elder, a boss, a guest — you say 모시고 오다, built on the humble verb 모시다. There is no neutral middle option, and that is the whole point: because the language makes you pick, picking wrong is not just a grammar slip, it is a small act of disrespect.
데리다 vs 모시다: the forced choice
모시다 completes the family of object-honorific verbs alongside 뵙다 (see), 여쭙다 (ask), and 드리다 (give). Like all of them, it raises the object — the person accompanied — while keeping the speaker humble, and it does so by verb suppletion, never by adding -(으)시-.
| Who you're bringing | Verb | Example |
|---|---|---|
| a child, junior, pet | 데리다 (데리고 가다/오다) | 아이를 데리고 왔어요 |
| an elder, boss, guest | 모시다 (모시고 가다/오다) | 부모님을 모시고 왔어요 |
부모님을 모시고 왔어요.
bumonimeul mosigo wasseoyo
I brought my parents (with me).
아이를 데리고 놀이터에 갔어요.
aireul derigo noriteoe gasseoyo
I took the kids to the playground. (데리다 — for a child)
Note the construction: 모시고 / 데리고 + 가다·오다 is the "take/bring a person" pattern. (For a thing, the parallel is 가지고 가다/오다 — and using it for a person is a classic error, treated below.)
Escorting and showing the way
In service and workplace Korean, 모시다 is the everyday verb for escorting a client, guest, or superior somewhere — showing them in, seeing them to a room, driving them.
제가 공항까지 모시고 갈게요.
jega gonghangkkaji mosigo galgeyo
I'll take you to the airport.
손님을 회의실로 모시겠습니다.
sonnimeul hoeuisillo mosigetseumnida
I'll show the guests to the meeting room. (formal)
For dropping someone off — the honorific of 데려다주다 — Korean uses 모셔다 드리다, stacking two humble verbs (모시- + the humble giving auxiliary 드리다):
집까지 모셔다 드릴게요.
jipkkaji mosyeoda deurilgeyo
I'll take you all the way home.
Notice the nuance between the two escorting patterns: 모시고 가다 keeps you alongside the person for the whole journey, sharing the trip, while 모셔다 드리다 emphasizes delivering them to a destination and then, typically, leaving them there — it is the honorific of "dropping someone off." A driver taking their boss to a meeting and staying uses 모시고 가다; a colleague who walks a visiting professor to the station and turns back uses 모셔다 드리다.
The deeper sense: serving and caring for
모시다 is not only physical escorting. Its older, weightier meaning is to serve, attend to, or look after a respected person — and here it reaches a cultural idea English has no single word for. 부모님을 모시다 means to support and care for your parents, typically by living with them and looking after them in old age. 모시고 살다 ("to live [with someone], serving them") is the standard way to describe multigenerational filial care.
할머니를 모시고 병원에 다녀왔어요.
halmeonireul mosigo byeongwone danyeowasseoyo
I took my grandmother to the hospital and back.
부모님을 모시고 사는 게 쉽지 않아요.
bumonimeul mosigo saneun ge swipji anayo
Living with and caring for your parents isn't easy.
그분은 평생 부모님을 정성껏 모셨어요.
geubuneun pyeongsaeng bumonimeul jeongseongkkeot mosyeosseoyo
She devotedly cared for her parents her whole life.
Conjugating 모시다
모시다 is a regular 이-stem verb — the same shape as 드리다 — so 모시 + 어 contracts to 모셔:
| Form | 모시다 | Reading |
|---|---|---|
| past | 모셨어요 | mosyeosseoyo |
| 모시고 | mosigo |
| 모시러 | mosireo |
| 모실게요 / 모시겠습니다 | mosilgeyo / mosigetseumnida |
이번 명절에는 할아버지를 모시러 시골에 가요.
ibeon myeongjeoreneun harabeojireul mosireo sigore gayo
This holiday I'm going to the countryside to bring my grandfather.
Beyond living people: revering and "having as"
모시다 reaches past the living, too. You 모시다 ancestors — enshrine and venerate them at a memorial rite (제사) — and you 모시다 a boss or teacher in the sense of having them as your superior and serving under them. In every case the core idea holds: you place someone (or something revered) above you and attend to them.
조상을 모시는 제사예요.
josang-eul mosineun jesayeyo
It's a rite for honoring our ancestors.
좋은 분을 상사로 모시게 됐어요.
joeun buneul sangsaro mosige dwaesseoyo
I've come to have a good person as my boss.
Common Mistakes
Mistake 1: 데리다 for an elder. The most consequential error — using the junior verb for a respected person, which subtly demotes them.
❌ 할머니를 데리고 왔어요.
Disrespectful — 데리다 is for children and juniors. For your grandmother, use 모시고 왔어요.
✅ 할머니를 모시고 왔어요.
halmeonireul mosigo wasseoyo
I brought my grandmother.
Mistake 2: 모시다 for a peer or junior. Over-honorification is also wrong — you don't 모시다 a younger sibling or a friend.
❌ 동생을 모시고 왔어요.
Over-honorific — a younger sibling is a junior. Use 데리고 왔어요.
✅ 동생을 데리고 왔어요.
dongsaeng-eul derigo wasseoyo
I brought my younger sibling.
Mistake 3: 가지고 오다 (bring a thing) applied to a person. English "bring my parents" tempts the object-carrying verb — but that treats a person like luggage.
❌ 부모님을 가지고 왔어요.
Wrong — 가지고 오다 is for objects. A person is brought with 모시고 (superior) or 데리고 (junior).
✅ 부모님을 모시고 왔어요.
bumonimeul mosigo wasseoyo
I brought my parents.
Mistake 4: Marking the accompanied person with 께. 모시다 is transitive — the person accompanied is a direct object (을/를), not a dative (께).
❌ 할머니께 모시고 왔어요.
Wrong particle — 모시다 takes a direct object. Use 을/를: 할머니를 모시고 왔어요.
✅ 할머니를 모시고 왔어요.
halmeonireul mosigo wasseoyo
I brought my grandmother.
Key Takeaways
- 모시다 is the humble verb for accompanying, escorting, or looking after a superior — an object-honorification verb, no -시-.
- It replaces 데리다, which is only for juniors, children, and pets; Korean has no neutral verb for bringing a person, so the wrong choice is itself disrespect.
- "Take/bring a person" = 모시고 / 데리고 + 가다·오다; for a thing it's 가지고 가다/오다.
- Beyond escorting, 모시다 means to serve and care for — 부모님을 모시고 살다 is the filial-care sense with no English one-word equivalent.
- The person accompanied is a direct object (을/를), not 께.
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- 뵙다 / 뵈다: To See or Meet a SuperiorTOPIK 3 — 뵙다/뵈다 is the humble verb for meeting or seeing someone above you, replacing 만나다/보다 — an example of OBJECT honorification, where you can't use -시- (which would honor the subject, i.e. yourself) so you switch verbs to lower your own act of meeting toward the respected person.
- 여쭙다 / 여쭈다: To Ask a SuperiorTOPIK 3 — 여쭙다/여쭈다 is the humble verb for asking a question OF a superior, replacing 묻다/물어보다 — like 뵙다, it works by verb suppletion (you humble your own asking rather than adding -시-), and the person asked is marked with honorific 께. Its mirror image: when a superior asks YOU, that's plain 물어보다 + -시-.
- 드리다: To Give (Humble) — vs 주다 and 주시다TOPIK 2 — 드리다 is the humble 'give' you use when YOU give something to a superior — the third point of Korean's give-system alongside 주다 (give to an equal/junior) and 주시다 (a superior gives to you), because Korean picks the verb by the social direction of the transfer, not just the act.
- Titles, Kinship & Fictive-Kin Address (부장님, 언니, 이모, 민수야)TOPIK 3 — How Koreans actually address each other day to day — by role and kin term, not by name — and why the right to call someone by their bare name is itself a measure of intimacy.