254 replies to this topic

[Karakhan]

Lets get the ball rolling.

I happen to have a book right now with me called "The Jews and the Japanese" by Ben-Ami Shillony (1992) where there is alot of talk on Jews in Northern China and Shanghai.. some excerpts..

p. 178

The number of Jews in China is not great, but their influence on the Chinese economy is immense, and they maintain covert links with powerful Jewish politicians, businessmen, and journalists in the U.S., Britain, and other countries."  It was this pragmatic principle of using Jewish power for the benefit of Japan that guided Japan's policy toward the Jews during World War II.

p. 181

While there were only a few Jews who stayed free in Japan during the war, tens of thousands came under Japanese rule on the Asian continent.  When the Japanese occupied Manchuria in 1931, they found a thriving Jewish community of thirteen thousand, most of them in the city of Harbin.  These were Russian Jews, some of of whom had settled there at the beginning of the century and others who had fled from the Russian revolution.  The Harbin Jews led a rich communal life, maintaining several synagogues, religious schools, a Jewish hospital, two Jewish banks, and two Jewish journals. 

p. 182

After the Japanese occupation, business opportunities worsened, and many Jews left Harbin for Shanghai and Tianjin, but the five thousand who remained were allowed to maintain their social and religious institutions.  The Guandong army, which controlled Manchuria, was also in charge of the Jews. In 1933 the intelligence section of the Guandong army, the Tokumu Kikan, conducted a study of the Jews and reached the conclusion that although they were few in number, Manchurian Jews wielded considerable power and that it would therefore be in Japan's interest to treat them well.  In December 1935 the Japanese consul general in Harbin, Sato Shoshiro, recommended to General Minami Jiro, the commander of the Guandong army, that Japan should treat the Jews well in order to attract their capital to Manchuria.

p. 182

... General Higuchi Kiichiro, chief of Guandong army's Special Branc, and Colonel Yasue Norihiro, the army's specialist of Jewish Affairs.  Higuchi and Yasue allowed thousands of Jewish refugees to settle in Manchuria, and for this the Jewish community of Harbin inscribed their names in the Golden Book of the Jewish National Fund in Jerusalem.  The German ambassador to Japan, Eugen Ott, protested the actions of Higuchi and Yasue, but the Japanese government ignored his protests.

p.186

Other Jewish refugees arrived in Shanghai by boat from Europe.  Until the outbreak of the Pacific war about twenty-five thousand refugees settled there, joining a local Jewish population of five thousand that included several wealthy families from the Middle East, such as the Sassoons and the Kadoories, as well as Russian Jews.  After the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Japanese occupied the whole city of Shanghai.  At that time the thirty thousand Jews in the city constituted the largest foreign group there and the largest Jewish community that had ever come under Japanese control.  No more refugees were allowed into the city, but those already there were not harmed

[Yun]

According to S.A.M. Adshead, there is a great discrepancy between Jewish accounts of when their religion and people first came to China, and Chinese accounts of the Jews. A Jesuit recorded in the 17th century that the Chinese Jews believed that their first community arrived in the reign of Han Mingdi (58-75 AD), which would correspond to the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem by the Romans. However, a 1663 inscription in the Kaifeng synagogue claims that the religion has been in China since Zhou times.

However, in Chinese records there is no evidence of the religion having been around before the Song dynasty. It was not included in the proscription of foreign religions in 845, which included Nestorian Christianity, Buddhism, Zoroastrianism, and Manichaeism. What we know is that there were Jewish communities in the port of Quanzhou and along the Silk Road by the time Marco Polo visited in the late 13th century, and there was a large Jewish community in Kaifeng by the time the Jesuits came in the 16th century.

Kaifeng has traditionally been the centre of the Jewish community in China since as early as 1163, when the first synagogue was built there. The Jews mentioned in the quotes by Karakhan probably migrated to China much later, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

[DavidG]

I heard from a friend that there is Jewish blood in Hakka (Kejia) people. Is that true? Are they related at all in any way? Thanks!

[LYY]

I am a Hakka.

I like the notion of the "Jewish Chinese".
Probably the Hakka has suffered a lot by not owning a "land" of their own.
However, this has yet made Hakka a world class player in the financial world ...

[urofpersia]

I heard from a friend that there is Jewish blood in Hakka (Kejia) people. Is that true? Are they related at all in any way? Thanks!

I'm Hakka and there are no relations that I am aware. However, comparisons have been made between the Jews and the Hakkas, could this be what you friend mean?

If you go back far enough we are all related...

[DaMo]

There are some Jews around Kaifeng, and maybe Xi'an.

Hakka are basically Northern Han in origin. I doubt they have any more Jewish blood than the average Chinese.

[Boarhuntr]

I heard from a friend that there is Jewish blood in Hakka (Kejia) people. Is that true? Are they related at all in any way? Thanks!

The Hakka migration from the Northern Plains to South China dates from the Age of Fragmentation. Correct me if I'm wrong. Specifically it was during the Wu Hu Luan Hua period, when China was invaded by the Northern nomads that Chinese collectively called the "Hu Ren".
The Jews of Kaifeng I think date back to the Song dynasty or perhaps the Tang dynasty, when many Middle Easterners came to China to trade and sojourn. The Jews were a small minority and very unlikely to have passed on their genes to make a difference. Certainly not as much as the Hui, or Muslims, who hail mainly from India, Iran, Afghanistan and the Arab countries.
In pure numbers the Muslims of China, collectively called the Hui Min, are a significant number, probably numbering in the 10's of millions. The Jews of Kaifeng have pretty much blown away by the winds of history and only fragments of them exist today, and not even in pure form, having been totally assimillated.

Boarhuntr

[urofpersia]

The Hakka migration from the Northern Plains to South China dates from the Age of Fragmentation. Correct me if I'm wrong. Specifically it was during the Wu Hu Luan Hua period, when China was invaded by the Northern nomads that Chinese collectively called the "Hu Ren".

There is already a thread in CHF on the origin of the Hakka. I am sure some of the more knowledgeable members will come in to direct you to the old one.

Suffice to say the origins of the Hakka is still under debate. There are some theories which are more popular especially among those of Hakka descent themselves but personally I have yet to see any conclusive evidence that convinces me one way or the others.

[Too hi Fat]

Don't tell Adolf that Hakka are related to the Jews ... SHHHH!



This is the first time I have heard someone said this. Wonder where this idea comes from.

P.S Hakka are not that great at finance. Hakka are the best at growing stuff and industrial minded. Teochew ... now those guys are friggin business master. Did you know that if you are born teochew you automatically get a 2 year exemption off a 4 year Bachelor of Business ? IT'S TRUE!

[qrasy]

I heard from a friend that there is Jewish blood in Hakka (Kejia) people. Is that true? Are they related at all in any way? Thanks!

??? I don't know. There are probably Jewish blood in every race in the world

I like the notion of the "Jewish Chinese".
Probably the Hakka has suffered a lot by not owning a "land" of their own.
However, this has yet made Hakka a world class player in the financial world ...

I'm Hakka and there are no relations that I am aware. However, comparisons have been made between the Jews and the Hakkas, could this be what you friend mean?

Yeah, perhaps it's the analogy between Jews and Hakkas, but no close relationship.

There are some Jews around Kaifeng, and maybe Xi'an.

I've heard there were once hundreds of thousands of Jew in Henan, is it true?

Hakka are basically Northern Han in origin. I doubt they have any more Jewish blood than the average Chinese.

The Hakka migration from the Northern Plains to South China dates from the Age of Fragmentation. Correct me if I'm wrong. Specifically it was during the Wu Hu Luan Hua period, when China was invaded by the Northern nomads that Chinese collectively called the "Hu Ren".

Hakka likes to say they are the original Chinese that migrated from North, but I never know any Hakka said to be "Northern Han" Chinese. They even claim that the Northerner have considerable "Hu" heritage..

The Jews of Kaifeng I think date back to the Song dynasty or perhaps the Tang dynasty, when many Middle Easterners came to China to trade and sojourn. The Jews were a small minority and very unlikely to have passed on their genes to make a difference.

I heard here were several hundred thousand!! There were so many! But maybe it will not affect Chinese too much.

Certainly not as much as the Hui, or Muslims, who hail mainly from India, Iran, Afghanistan and the Arab countries.
In pure numbers the Muslims of China, collectively called the Hui Min, are a significant number, probably numbering in the 10's of millions. The Jews of Kaifeng have pretty much blown away by the winds of history and only fragments of them exist today, and not even in pure form, having been totally assimillated.

Even the most Jew today seem mixed with Europeans.. I wonder if there are still relatively-pure Jews in the world nowadays.

[General_Zhaoyun]

Check out this link on the history of Jews in China...

http://chinese-schoo...s.com/Jews.html

Archaelogical evidence suggests that Jews were in China as early as the 8th Century, having arrived from Persia along the Silk Road. In 1163 the Emperor ordered the Jews to live in Kaifeng, where they built the first Chinese synagogue. Marco Polo recorded that Kublai Khan celebrated the festivals of the Muslims, Christians and Jews, indicating that there were a significant number of Jews in China in the 13th Century.

A Ming Emperor conferred on the Jews seven surnames - Ai, Lao, Jin, Li, Shi, Zhang and Zhao. To this day Chinese Jews will only have one of these seven names. Christian missionaries also recorded meetings with Chinese Jews. At least one synagogue was constructed, and the community was active for about eight centuries. Currently, the Vatican holds letters from Jesuits in the 18th Century describing the daily life and religious practices of Jews in Kaifeng, and drawings of their synagogue.

Westerners lost touch with Kaifeng Jews in the mid-1700s. It was not until 1900 that an effort was made to re-establish contact.

In the late 19th century, Russian Jewish communities were founded in Harbin, Tianjin and elsewhere. The project to construct a Russian railway to East Asia was centered in Harbin. Anxious to populate the city, the Russian government provided incentives to minorities, including Jews and Karaites, to settle there. In the early years of the 20th century, Jews fleeing pogroms in the Pale of Settlement and demobilized soldiers from the Russo-Japanese War joined them, raising the Jewish population of Harbin to approximately 8,000 by 1908. The Russian Revolution of 1917 practically doubled the size of the community, and served as a stimulus to Zionist activism. Japanese annexation in 1931 brought increased restrictions on many facets of life, and many Jews left for free countries. Most of the Russian Jews remaining at the end of World War II emigrated to the West. Some were repatriated, both voluntarily and involuntarily, to the Soviet Union.

The development of the port city of Shanghai as a Jewish center parallels that of Hong Kong. Sephardi families from Baghdad, Bombay and Cairo, including the Kadoories, Sassons and Hardoons, established a communal structure in Shanghai in the 19th century. By 1903, there were three synagogues in the city, and the number of Jews totaled to 30,000. However, most of them fled when the Communists took over in 1959.

The Chinese government now recognizes Jews as an official Chinese ethnic group. On Sept. 29, 2000, Rosh Hashanah services were held at the Ohel Rachel Synagogue for the first time in nearly 50 years. There are also a Jewish library and a Jewish museum in the city.

[Ed Ziomek]

David G, General Z, several others, thanks for this thread.

GZ... you mentioned Shanghai and the Jews there. Isn't Shanghai next to Nanking? It would be interesting to see how foreigners, possibly Jewish types... how they faired during the WW2 years.

I think I already know the answer... everyone was treated badly!?!

Great thread.

[General_Zhaoyun]

David G, General Z, several others, thanks for this thread.

GZ... you mentioned Shanghai and the Jews there. Isn't Shanghai next to Nanking? It would be interesting to see how foreigners, possibly Jewish types... how they faired during the WW2 years.

I think I already know the answer... everyone was treated badly!?!

Great thread.

Shanghai is not next to Nanking. It is about 100 km away from Nanking (reckon 4 hours drive from Nanking)

[MengTzu]

Don't tell Adolf that Hakka are related to the Jews ... SHHHH!



This is the first time I have heard someone said this. Wonder where this idea comes from.

P.S Hakka are not that great at finance. Hakka are the best at growing stuff and industrial minded. Teochew ... now those guys are friggin business master. Did you know that if you are born teochew you automatically get a 2 year exemption off a 4 year Bachelor of Business ? IT'S TRUE!

Does this apply to America? Cuz I was thinking may be I want to get my law degree and my MBA together (joint program.) I didn't wanna do that cuz I don't want too much work (hehe.) Since I'm half Teochow, does it mean I can get one year exemption? Oh wait, you said Bachelor, not MBA. Darn it. Nevermind.

[DavidG]

Thanks to all of you who have answered my post :-)

Appreciate that!

The conclusion is that there are no specific link between Hakka and Jews. But then again, some of us Chinese might have Jewish blood in us due to the intermarriages and migration over the years of both Chinese and Jews who have resided in China since the 8th century

Check out this link on the history of Jews in China...

http://chinese-schoo...s.com/Jews.html

Archaelogical evidence suggests that Jews were in China as early as the 8th Century, having arrived from Persia along the Silk Road. In 1163 the Emperor ordered the Jews to live in Kaifeng, where they built the first Chinese synagogue. Marco Polo recorded that Kublai Khan celebrated the festivals of the Muslims, Christians and Jews, indicating that there were a significant number of Jews in China in the 13th Century.

A Ming Emperor conferred on the Jews seven surnames - Ai, Lao, Jin, Li, Shi, Zhang and Zhao. To this day Chinese Jews will only have one of these seven names. Christian missionaries also recorded meetings with Chinese Jews. At least one synagogue was constructed, and the community was active for about eight centuries. Currently, the Vatican holds letters from Jesuits in the 18th Century describing the daily life and religious practices of Jews in Kaifeng, and drawings of their synagogue.

Westerners lost touch with Kaifeng Jews in the mid-1700s. It was not until 1900 that an effort was made to re-establish contact.

In the late 19th century, Russian Jewish communities were founded in Harbin, Tianjin and elsewhere. The project to construct a Russian railway to East Asia was centered in Harbin. Anxious to populate the city, the Russian government provided incentives to minorities, including Jews and Karaites, to settle there. In the early years of the 20th century, Jews fleeing pogroms in the Pale of Settlement and demobilized soldiers from the Russo-Japanese War joined them, raising the Jewish population of Harbin to approximately 8,000 by 1908. The Russian Revolution of 1917 practically doubled the size of the community, and served as a stimulus to Zionist activism. Japanese annexation in 1931 brought increased restrictions on many facets of life, and many Jews left for free countries. Most of the Russian Jews remaining at the end of World War II emigrated to the West. Some were repatriated, both voluntarily and involuntarily, to the Soviet Union.

The development of the port city of Shanghai as a Jewish center parallels that of Hong Kong. Sephardi families from Baghdad, Bombay and Cairo, including the Kadoories, Sassons and Hardoons, established a communal structure in Shanghai in the 19th century. By 1903, there were three synagogues in the city, and the number of Jews totaled to 30,000. However, most of them fled when the Communists took over in 1959.

The Chinese government now recognizes Jews as an official Chinese ethnic group. On Sept. 29, 2000, Rosh Hashanah services were held at the Ohel Rachel Synagogue for the first time in nearly 50 years. There are also a Jewish library and a Jewish museum in the city.