48 replies to this topic

[General_Zhaoyun]

I've been wondering. My dad told me that Jews were great businessman/merchants in history. I'm not too sure if this is true, as I'm not familiar with this part of history. Probably he's referring to those Jews who made lots of wealth in the US.

Can someone tell me more about the history of Jews and whether they are great merchants in history?

[tung2sai]

eh...This might be a bit subjective for some people, however we can try to view it objectively as possible.

[DurstigerMann]

I've been wondering. My dad told me that Jews were great businessman/merchants in history. I'm not too sure if this is true, as I'm not familiar with this part of history. Probably he's referring to those Jews who made lots of wealth in the US.

Can someone tell me more about the history of Jews and whether they are great merchants in history?

To put it very short (I don't have much time):
Jews as non-christians were per se without rights in medieval times. They were not allowed to be handcraftmen or traders, therefore they were bound to be moneylenders (with interests or dead pledge) in order to make a living. As a consequence thereof many non-jews got into debt, which even increased the common aversion against jews (the pointed yellow hat and yellow dot have their origins in this).
Protection of jews by royal decree was (IF applied) limited to cities and urban regions. Jews were often used as servants by kings and other peers in order to manage financial affairs like taxes even during late mid-age.
And even though the basis of jew-rights changed in the recent centuries, many of them still remained in the financial business by (family) tradition.


It's not any kind of core theme in my university lectures, so I'm by far no expert.
Hopefully I gave you the right hints to do research with english sources.

Edited by DurstigerMann, 29 December 2007 - 08:52 AM.

[fireball]

The great bankers of the past were Jews. In addition, because of their neutral status between the Christians and Muslims, they could travel between the Christian countries and the Muslim countries without too much problems when the Christians forgot to persecute them. Thus, they were able to be the middlemen between the Christian countries and the Muslim countries. Because of the persecutions from many Christian countries as well as other countries, Jews need to go from countries to countries. They had many cousins and family members settled in many locations all across the world (sort of like the Vietnamese refugees in the modern day). Therefore, they had better information, news, and supports from their local and faraway cousins to do business. Thus, they were in more advantage to be great merchants than any other groups of people. Finally, the Jews were not allowed to be in high government positions, so they had nothing better to do except for commerce and studying their own Classics (the Torah). They also had very scholarly communities and high literacy rate because of that.

The Jews are great merchants because they are smart, flexible, methodological, detailed, careful, and have many connections, but they are also great believers of helping others. All the people who have helped my family when we first came to U.S. and since are/were Jews. Many of my Chinese new immigrant friends as well as other new immigrants to U.S. told me the same. They also donated a lot of their wealth to the Universities for scholarships for poor students. When I looked up for scholarships, I saw hundreds of scholarships were donated by Jewish people. Unfortunately, I was neither Jewish nor had high enough grades to qualify for them. However, I told myself I would set up scholarship for poor Chinese students when I have money (with very low grade point average requirement. I don't believe grade point average showed a person's love for knowledge.) -- I saw very, very few Chinese scholarships -- a direct contrast to the Jewish ones. I had that wish wrote into my will, and I have donated to various scholarships after I started working because my father was a poor struggling student in Shanghai's University and my mother did not even have a chance to go to school when she actually (probably) has a genius level of IQ (my mom could learn something within a few glances , and I, unfortunately, did not get my brain from her! Yes, my mom also complains about my intelligence many times, "How could I have give birth to such stupid daughter!" ).

[One time poster]

Seems odd to me not to address how the Jews got the money to lend other people in the first place.

So, how did the Jews get the money to lend to others in the first place if apparently they were not allowed to participate in any other form of commerce other than money lending? How did great families such as the Fuggers and the Rothschild accumulate their wealth in the first place?

Also another question. Is it fair to say that the Jewish community of 1,000 or even 500 years ago are the same Jews of today? Or is that statement unfair?

[fireball]

Seems odd to me not to address how the Jews got the money to lend other people in the first place.

So, how did the Jews get the money to lend to others in the first place if apparently they were not allowed to participate in any other form of commerce other than money lending? How did great families such as the Fuggers and the Rothschild accumulate their wealth in the first place?

Also another question. Is it fair to say that the Jewish community of 1,000 or even 500 years ago are the same Jews of today? Or is that statement unfair?

Jews got the money the same way my home town Wenzhou merchants got their money as well as the Vietnamese refugees got their money. They worked like dogs for others or with some skills, like being tailors or barbers or hairdressers or nail polishers (modern day), etc. Then, they save whatever they have earned from those very low wage jobs -- even one penny is important. Then, they pool their resources from all the family members and relatives and friends and acquaintances to start a small business. Then, with their flexibilities, connections (with many people from many communities), as well as sensitivities to any news that might affect business environments and their guts (yes, guts), they made their business prosperous. Finally, they send their children to schools and make sure their children understand their own roles and responsibilities for their families. These children learned more advance techniques, managing methods, financing methods, and made their own connections in the main stream world and bring their family business into the main stream and eventually to the level of international corporations. Many of these people started off with clothes on their backs and nothing but their own physical strengths and strong wills to survive and survive well. They have/had only one goal and one belief: Their children will live better than them. That was how they made it.

The great families of Fuggers and the Rothschild took at least 500 to 1000 years and many generations of their forefathers and many burnings and killings of their forefathers by the Europeans, Muslims, Persians, and Turks, and many starting over from close to ground zero before they had accumulated those wealth. They deserved those wealth from their many generations of hard works and innocent lives. When the European nobilities only knew about killings and fightings and robbing the rich Jews and other rich merchants and spending and wasting money on parties and castles and wars and accumulating great debts from these Jews, the Jews were hard working and saving their resources even with all those restrictions imposed on them to limit their careers, movements, and places of residence.

The old time Jews and the modern Jews are not much different because they still have the same culture of learning and being methodological and flexible and sensitive to news around them in the modern world. They are more bounded together and know that they must protect themselves from Jew haters after Nazi's attempt to exterminate them. "Never Again!" is what they are saying since then and today!!! If you see/saw some Jewish strong reactions to anti-Jewish words or activities or anything just have a hint of it, you should understand that they are "驚弓之鳥" (birds who are scared of the arrows) and many people want them dead in the past as well as now.

I am a Chinese, and I have married a Jew. I consider Chinese as Asian Jews because we were killed and robbed and discriminated over and over again in oversea communities, especially in the Southeast Asia region. I identify strongly with Jews, and my family and myself had been helped by many Jews in U.S. (before I even met my husband), so I am sympathetic to their cause. I will apologize for my ill-mannered or seemly rude post here, but I sense a bit of the misunderstanding of Jews' past behaviors in the question about how Fuggers and the Rothschild accumulated their great wealth when they couldn't work in other professions and the question about where did they got the money to lend others. Many times in the past, these were the questions leading to anti-Jewish statements from the neo-Nazi groups around the world. Therefore, I want to clarify this for you. However, One time poster, I do not believe you are anti-Jew or anything like that, and I do believe you have a sincere question about this matter.

[tung2sai]

I'm quite surprised at how well manner this forum is... kudos to all members!

[fireball]

There was a LA times or Orange County Register news article about the Vietnamese refugees in U.S. The writer was amazed of the following phenamena: Many Vietnamese refugees came to U.S. with nothing and were on government welfares. Within 5-10 years, they own successful businesses and Real Estate properties, and most of their children went to Universities or at least colleges. These sorts of achievements could not be accomplished by many of the middle income White families who are in U.S. for generations!!! Part of my previous posting was information from that article when the writer interviewed many Vietnamese families in U.S. It was a multi-part series and had in depth research and interviews.

The writer found the following: The family members, especially the parents, worked 2-3 jobs even during the weekends. They saved every penny by getting other's throw away clothings and furnitures. The mother or elder sisters cooked for the whole family so that they would all have cheap but nutritious food. Sometimes, they made their own clothings and cut their own hairs. The children studied like crazy so that they could help their family to get out of poverty. They also helped out in the family business, be it restaurants or street cart vendors. The children also worked and get scholarships to help out the family finances. There were no such talks about dreamy majors, such as Art or Literature!!! The parents won't kill them -- the children themselves would kill themselves before they got into any fields thet could not make good money quickly -- for a lot of money, like being a doctor, it was OK to spend more time in school because it was considered an investment. Finally, when the children grew up and got into their professions of doctors, lawyers, and engineers, they would have enough money to buy homes for their parents and themselves. They still stayed together and pooled all their money together. The mother would cook for them and take care of their shoppings for them, like clothings, etc. Therefore, they would save on rent, food costs, and have people who were more experienced to buy good quality goods with less money. When they got enough money, they first bought the house for their parents, then they bought the house for each of the brothers and sisters until all of them had their own homes. That was how they were able to achieve their American dreams. The last I heard from one of my Vietnamese Chinese classmate --- her brother is pooling their family members' and relatives and acquaintances' money to open a first Vietnamese owned/controlled bank.

As I was growing up, most of my Wenzhou tong xiang (people from the same town) did similar things. My father bought his first house in Taiwan (my old Japanese home) with the help of his tong xiang. I heard Wenzhou people is the only mainland Chinese people who started their own businesses without any oversea money and help. They now have the highest concentration of multi-millionairs of all China in their city. Jews also do it the same way like the Vietnamese and the Wenzhou Chinese.

The Wenzhou Chinese are also taking over the shoe factories in France, the leather and fashion businesses (as well as Pasta restaurants, I heard) in Italy, and many other businesses all over the world. Right now, they are the most despised group of people in and out of China every where in the world (more so than the Jews because they also beat Jews in some of the business dealings)!!! I don't even dare to say I am a Wenzhou person in China when I travel there because I don't want to get beaten up. Btw, the pirates and mountain bandits traditions I mentioned in my heritage is referred to the Wenzhou people. They would go anywhere in the world, including Russia, middle east, Afghanstan, and Iraq when there are/were wars and chaos because those times are the times when there would be the most business opportunities. They have the typical "要錢不要命" (Money is above life) school of thoughts -- not other people's lives, and not their own lives!!! When they get more and more experiences in recent years, they learned that the total disregard of other's lives would not gain them good and long term business relationships so that they became better about that. They still do not value their own lives, though.

Jews have guts like the Wenzhou people, and many times they were forced to have guts to go into strange and unfamilier territories, like China, like India, like America because they were chased out of their home lands. However, they are not like my Wenzhou people in a way. The Jews learned through many experiences to not cheat or shy on the quality of their goods because the people around them always find faults about them even when they have lived meekly and honestly among the locals. Therefore, Jews usually have better quality goods and have better reputations in finance and business. Otherwise, who would buy from them or entrust money or goods to them? Jews had systems to transport money and goods without having to transport them through long distances hundreds of years ago. They did it through credits and their own reputations as well as their cousins and friends in the far away countries. The idea is you can deposit a great sum of money with a Jew in London and get a letter of credit. Then, you could draw money from other Jewish bankers in far away places, like Turkey. These type of things, I believe, already happened in Crusader's time or even earlier.

Edited by fireball, 29 December 2007 - 03:02 PM.

[One time poster]

Jews got the money the same way my home town Wenzhou merchants got their money as well as the Vietnamese refugees got their money. They worked like dogs for others or with some skills, like being tailors or barbers or hairdressers or nail polishers (modern day), etc. Then, they save whatever they have earned from those very low wage jobs -- even one penny is important.

I was under the impression that Jews were limited in their ability to earn money because that was what it seemed like in one of the previous poster's posts. It of course made me curious how they would earn money if they were outlawed from so many professions.

I will apologize for my ill-mannered or seemly rude post here, but I sense a bit of the misunderstanding of Jews' past behaviors in the question about how Fuggers and the Rothschild accumulated their great wealth when they couldn't work in other professions and the question about where did they got the money to lend others. Many times in the past, these were the questions leading to anti-Jewish statements from the neo-Nazi groups around the world. Therefore, I want to clarify this for you. However, One time poster, I do not believe you are anti-Jew or anything like that, and I do believe you have a sincere question about this matter.

There is no need to apologize. I was simply curious because no one ever addressed how money was accumulated when it was already stated that Jews were barred from many money earning professions. I just thought it weird.

I'm far from a Neo Nazi or anti-Jewish. That does not mean I won't criticize either ones when I see something isn't right. It just means I'm not against anyone in principle. Besides, how many Asian Neo-Nazis have you ever met? Hahaha

Edited by One time poster, 29 December 2007 - 07:08 PM.

[tung2sai]

I think people can earn money if they really needed it or greatly desired it.
Like if there is a will, there is a way.

It seems from the posts I'm reading, it depended largely on the societies and time periods. Certain eras, they were forced to be middlemen and limited, and in others where they were a bit more free, they pursued education and focus a lot on their networks.

[One time poster]

I think people can earn money if they really needed it or greatly desired it.
Like if there is a will, there is a way.

It seems from the posts I'm reading, it depended largely on the societies and time periods. Certain eras, they were forced to be middlemen and limited, and in others where they were a bit more free, they pursued education and focus a lot on their networks.

Well we've mostly been looking at the situation purely in the 20th-21st century industrial country view. None of the previous posters even touched on the fact that the majority of the population of Europe during medieval times had no use for money. Many were tied to the land through the feudal system, while others were simply subsistent farmers. What sort of education were they expected to have when they exist in this type of society?

But I'll agree with you in the modern world that with education and access to an industrial country it's very easy to make money.

At any rate I'm more interested in looking at it more seriously than saying they worked hard and saved money. That's really not difficult to figure out. Unless someone inherits their wealth it's really tough to gain wealth through laying around and being lazy. Well, for most of us anyway hehe. I'm more interested in how their situation truly was. Did all Jews develop the same way? The Italian cities would be a very different environment from the German lands. The Italian cities were much more heavily involved in trade and commerce, while the German lands would be mostly tied to the feudal system until later.

Edited by One time poster, 29 December 2007 - 07:27 PM.

[DurstigerMann]

Seems odd to me not to address how the Jews got the money to lend other people in the first place.

So, how did the Jews get the money to lend to others in the first place if apparently they were not allowed to participate in any other form of commerce other than money lending? How did great families such as the Fuggers and the Rothschild accumulate their wealth in the first place?

Also another question. Is it fair to say that the Jewish community of 1,000 or even 500 years ago are the same Jews of today? Or is that statement unfair?

Jews were not without rights and restricted to a narrow field of engagement from the beginning of time...
The christianisation of Europe was a gradual process and took many centuries.
And even at that point, the disdain that many christians felt for Jewish people (as Judas was a Jew as well) didn't make a ring bell and every Jew was a merchant instantly.
You have to realize that the medieval Europe wasn't a very populous region and severely lacked paved roads or other ways for a fast spread/flow of informations, news, habits or other things. The medieval Europe was technologically impaired. When the Roman Empire collapsed, almost everything of its (for that time) so advanced technology was lost (here we have a gradual process again).

The information flow of that time might have taken years or rather decades (my guess emphasizes the plural of the latter), until something was commonly known or practiced.

Edited by DurstigerMann, 29 December 2007 - 08:33 PM.

[Chris Weimer]

To put it very short (I don't have much time):
Jews as non-christians were per se without rights in medieval times. They were not allowed to be handcraftmen or traders, therefore they were bound to be moneylenders (with interests or dead pledge) in order to make a living. As a consequence thereof many non-jews got into debt, which even increased the common aversion against jews (the pointed yellow hat and yellow dot have their origins in this).
Protection of jews by royal decree was (IF applied) limited to cities and urban regions. Jews were often used as servants by kings and other peers in order to manage financial affairs like taxes even during late mid-age.
And even though the basis of jew-rights changed in the recent centuries, many of them still remained in the financial business by (family) tradition.


It's not any kind of core theme in my university lectures, so I'm by far no expert.
Hopefully I gave you the right hints to do research with english sources.

Please do not forget that in many places, Jews weren't allowed to be moneylenders. I'm afraid the is a vicious lie propogated by anti-Semites (not DurstigerMann, he's merely repeating it). Jews were discriminated against chiefly on account of Christianity. It wasn't until the Holocaust that the notion of Christ-killers began to subside.

[tung2sai]

Well we've mostly been looking at the situation purely in the 20th-21st century industrial country view. None of the previous posters even touched on the fact that the majority of the population of Europe during medieval times had no use for money. Many were tied to the land through the feudal system, while others were simply subsistent farmers. What sort of education were they expected to have when they exist in this type of society?

But I'll agree with you in the modern world that with education and access to an industrial country it's very easy to make money.

At any rate I'm more interested in looking at it more seriously than saying they worked hard and saved money. That's really not difficult to figure out. Unless someone inherits their wealth it's really tough to gain wealth through laying around and being lazy. Well, for most of us anyway hehe. I'm more interested in how their situation truly was. Did all Jews develop the same way? The Italian cities would be a very different environment from the German lands. The Italian cities were much more heavily involved in trade and commerce, while the German lands would be mostly tied to the feudal system until later.

If you want to look at it in a serious manner, like as in seeing the entire picture, I think the first place to look would be the history of Jews in each place, like those in German lands, the Iberian penninsula, in Italy, beyond Europe in the Middle East, the Americas, etc. Each place is going to have a different story, maybe similar situations and decrees, but there are going to be some differences.
So, the research on Jewish history in general would be helpful, alongside with how Jews were treated and thought of by their host communities. I think it would be more helpful to look at various sources of the same place, this is something that has that potential for biased opinions for both sides.

There's the formal education, but also the main education for many observant Jews would be their study of their holy texts and literature. I've heard how many knew Arabic, as this helped them with maintaining the Hebrew language. A lot of their literature is full of knowledge regarding many things, from family issues, relationships, finances, etc. Their way of learning wasn't just to read a book and follow the instructions, a lot of their teachings encourage them to read between the lines, go with the times when necessary, and think outside the box. I'm aware of some of the assumptions people have, but the culture and religion of many observant Jews in the diaspora was very intellectual, full of debate.
It pretty much kept challenging them to think, be creative and to be themselves, which would be very helpful in whatever situation your in.

[DurstigerMann]

Please do not forget that in many places, Jews weren't allowed to be moneylenders. I'm afraid the is a vicious lie propogated by anti-Semites (not DurstigerMann, he's merely repeating it). Jews were discriminated against chiefly on account of Christianity. It wasn't until the Holocaust that the notion of Christ-killers began to subside.

If you think that I'm repeating anti-Semitic lies...in that case my university is repeating such lies as well.
That said, my posting was too short to address many discrimiative things which the Jews had to endure.
Pogromes such as the Pogromes of Cologne in 1096 (during the German Crusade / First Crusade) or 1146 are absolute evidence of hatred towards Jews.
They had to live in Ghettos in many cities or urban regions -> and those were the regions where the prohibitions for Jews were drawn through. Rural areas weren't as much affected (which doesn't mean that anti-Semitism wasn't clearly present there as well).

But that Jews had to take Jobs like the most noted moneylender (or moneychanger, trader, scholar/scientist - they were basically expelled from all "honorable" professions) is a historical fact. Of course this wasn't the only option. Many Jews got baptized either voluntarily or under compulsion. This was a very important base for the christianization of Europe.

Edited by DurstigerMann, 30 December 2007 - 06:26 AM.