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Full Description
A thousand years ago, the Chinese government invited merchants from one of the Chinese port synagogue communities to the capital, Kaifeng. The merchants settled there and the community prospered. Over centuries, with government support, the Kaifeng Jews built and rebuilt their synagogue, which became perhaps the world's largest. Some studied for the rabbinate; others prepared for civil service examinations, leading to a disproportionate number of Jewish government officials. While continuing orthodox Jewish practices they added rituals honouring their parents and the patriarchs, in keeping with Chinese custom. However, by the mid-eighteenth century - cut off from Judaism elsewhere for two centuries, their synagogue destroyed by a flood, their community impoverished and dispersed by a civil war that devastated Kaifeng - their Judaism became defunct.
The Theology of the Chinese Jews traces the history of Jews in China and explores how their theology's focus on love, rather than on the fear of a non-anthropomorphic God, may speak to contemporary liberal Jews. Equally relevant to contemporary Jews is that the Chinese Jews remained fully Jewish while harmonizing with the family-centred religion of China. In an illuminating postscript, Rabbi Anson Laytner underscores the point that Jewish culture can thrive in an open society, ""without hostility, by absorbing the best of the dominant culture and making it one's own.""
Contents
The Theology of the Chinese Jews, 1000-1850 by Jordan Paper
Prologue
Acknowledgments
Chapter 1: Introduction: The Four Questions
Who Are the Chinese Jews?
Are the Chinese Jews Jewish?
What Are the Sources for the Theology of the Chinese Jews?
Is This Theology Relevant Today?
Chapter 2: From Whence They Came to Where They Went
The Extent of the Diaspora
Jewish Life under Christianity and Islam: Tenth to Twelfth Centuries
The Sea Route to China and the Settlement in Kaifeng
Chapter 3: Life in China: Tenth to Nineteenth Centuries
Religion
Education
Social Structure
Government
Economy
Culture
Chapter 4: Brief History of Buddhism and the Abrahamic Traditions in China
The Buddhist Experience in China
Christianity to the Mid-Nineteenth Century
Christianity in China after the de Facto Demise of Judaism
Islam
Judaism
Chapter 5: The Sinification of Judaism
Veneration of Ancestors: Family, Tribal, Religious, and Cultural
Education and Its Relationship to Judaism
The Kaifeng Jews and Their Neighbours
Chinese Judaism
Chapter 6: A Speculative Theology of the Chinese Jews
The Names of God: Hebrew
The Kaifeng Synagogue's Stelae and Plaques
The Names of God: Chinese
The Nature of Creation
Monotheism from a Chinese Perspective
A Speculative Chinese-Jewish Theology
Assimilation and Theology
Historical and Cultural Context
Epilogue
Postscript: What Western Jews Can Learn from the Kaifeng Jews Rabbi Anson Laytner
Appendix: Chinese Logographs for Terms and Translations in Chapter 6
Notes
References
