Louis Em was an important modernist Buddhist monk who encouraged the 1942 Umbrella Revolution against the French protectorate of Cambodia, translated many major documents from Pali to Khmer.
One of Louis Em's most notorious students was Khieu Chum whom he ordained in 1928 before the latter became the most powerful and explicit champion of the "Wat Langka line" of which blended Khmer nationalism with modernism.
His attitude resonated with the commitment of King Sihanouk in the wake of his "crusade for independence" as the monarch in his inaugural speech express his desire his colors "nailed to the mast of a modernized and engaged Buddhism.
[15] Ian Harris considers that Louis Em was part of the wave of the "Pali-text puritanism" which swept across Theravada Buddhism at the time in an effort to recover the true teachings of the Buddha and restore its canonical authenticity apart from the literary melange with traditional local practices.
[16] Along with the "modernist views of moral purification", Pali studies was part of a Buddhist Entmythologisierung to "demythologize the cosmic vision of [reincarnation] and bring it in line with human history.