The Chinese Jews of Kaifeng

A Millennium of Adaptation and Endurance

Contributions by Alex Bender, Moshe Yehuda Bernstein, Irene Eber, Mathew A. Eckstein, Xianyi Kong, Anson H. Laytner, Donald Daniel Leslie, Jordan Paper, Andrew H. Plaks, Mohammed Turki al-Sudairi, Nigel Thomas, Erik Zürcher Edited by Anson H. Laytner, Jordan Paper

Publication date:

21 July 2017

Length of book:

290 pages

Publisher

Lexington Books

ISBN-13: 9781498550260

This scholarly collection examines the origins, history, and contemporary nature of Chinese Judaism in the community of Kaifeng. These essays, written by a diverse, international team of contributors, explore the culture and history of this thousand-year-old Jewish community, whose synthesis of Chinese and Jewish cultures helped guarantee its survival. Part I of this study analyzes the origin and historical development of the Kaifeng community, as well as the unique cultural synthesis it engendered. Part II explores the contemporary nature of this Chinese Jewish community, particularly examining the community’s relationship to Jewish organizations outside of China, the impact of Western Jewish contact, and the tenuous nature of Jewish identity in Kaifeng.

Introduction, Jordan Paper and Anson Laytner
Part I: Past
Chapter 1: Radhanites, Chinese Jews, and the Silk Road of the Steppes, Nigel Thomas
Chapter 2: Eight Centuries in the Chinese Diaspora: The Jews of Kaifeng, Erik Zürcher
Chapter 3: Kaifeng Jews: Sinification and the Persistence of Identity and History, Irene Eber
Chapter 4: The Confucianization of the Chinese Jews: Interpretations of the Kaifeng Stelae Inscriptions, Andrew H. Plaks
Chapter 5: The Old Testament and Biblical Figures in Chinese Sources, Donald Daniel Leslie
Chapter 6: The Issue of the Jewishness of Chinese Jewish Magistrates, Jordan Paper
Chapter 7: Zhao Yingcheng from Fact to Fiction: The Story of “The Great Advisor,” Moshe Yehuda Bernstein
Part II: Present
Chapter 8: A History of Early Jewish Interactions with the Kaifeng Jews, Alex Bender
Chapter 9: Delving into the Israelite Religion of Kaifeng: The Patriotic Scholar Shi Jingxun and his Study of the Origins of the Plucking the Sinews Sect of Henan, Xianyi Kong
Chapter 10: Identity Discourse and the Chinese Jewish Descendants, Mathew Eckstein
Chapter 11: Messianic Zionism, Settler Colonialism, and the Lost Jews of Kaifeng, Mohammed Turki al-Sudairi
Chapter 12: Between Survival and Revival: The Impact of Contemporary Western Jewish Contact on Kaifeng Jewish Identity, Anson Laytner

"Never has so much been written about so few," the editors of this diverse collection of articles concerning the Kaifeng (China) Jewish community concede. The 12 chapters (some by specialists, others by amateurs; some original, others reprinted; some new, others dated) range from antiquity to the present and vary greatly in quality. Most were previously delivered at conferences of the Sino-Judaic Institute. Valuable recent scholarship by Xu Xin and Lihong Song, among others, receives little notice here, while a "fictionalized" biography of Zhao Yingcheng and a political screed against supposed "right-wing messianic Zionist organizations" currently operating in China are printed in full. Still, the best articles—the discussion of recent interactions with Western Jews (including Israelis)—and the recommended reading list make this volume a useful addition to the already considerable literature on the subject. For specialized collections. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates and above.