The Lost Books of the Zhao Brothers

 

detail from Along the River During the Qingming Festival

In Michael Pollak's articles of missing manuscripts and artifacts from the Kaifeng Synagogue, he mentions two books written by Chinese Jews that have been items of curiosity for Kaifeng enthusiasts and scholars for decades:

mention by Pollak with my notes

Zhao Yingcheng's book was titled Records of the Vicissitudes of the Holy Scriptures, 圣经记变.  His younger brother Zhao Yingdou wrote a book titled  Preface to the Illustrious Way, 明道序).   We will take a closer work at these brothers, and the impact they had on the life of Chinese Jews in the near future.

 An entire set of questions revolve around these men, who reach very high levels in the Neo-Confucian bureaucracy of Qing China, but were also were involved in the reconstruction of the synagogue after the Flood of 1642 and the copying of Hebrew texts.  The Zhao brothers are often viewed by scholars as the pinnacle of secular success (if we consider Confucianism secular to use a modern term) among the Kaifeng Community.

We will return to these two again, but for now, we will concentrate on their two books.  What were they, and are their truly no longer extant?  

In the same Pollak article I cite above, he reveals a few attempts at finding Zhao books:

Unfortunately, Pollak loses track of this connection.

The idea that members of the Zhao family had or have copies of their illustrious ancestors has long been held, but never convincingly explored, as far as I can see.   Pollak also cites this page in The Jews of Old China:

There notes were from Wang Yisha, the curator of the Kaifeng City Museum.  He interviewed many Kaifeng Jewish descendants,  and had a great interest in the community.  This in the above list held Pollak's interest:

Pollak contacted Shapiro, who clarified that:

 

Pollak learned of this mistake in 1984, in a maximum of two long distance calls, between two people in China, one speaking English and the Chinese.  It is not at all certain that the Kaifeng City Museum does not have these volumes.  The traditional difficulty of access to the Kaifeng City Museum continues today, long after China opened in the late 80s.

  

Often in literature about the Kaifeng Jews it is claimed that scholars in China are looking for the Zhao books.  What exactly does that mean?

In discussion with Moshe Bernstein in 2019,  he said this about missing Kaifeng books:

I cannot tell you exactly  what the search for the Zhao brothers’ books entails.  As I mention in the article, over the centuries, the synagogue suffered periodic damage due to flooding. Many books may have been lost as a result. My colleague from Nanjing, Professor Xu Xin, informed me that there are many such lost books in China, and that the authorities responsible for finding and preserving such relics are aware of the lost Kaifeng books. 

This seems to imply that there are dedicated scholars looking for lost books?  And they are aware of lost books of the Kaifeng Jews?  It is certainly possible that these two books are in an archive somewhere in China, perhaps far from Kaifeng. 

The 1663a inscription is where we get the references to the Zhao books:

Gozani noted that the Kaifeng Jews "do not print any Chinese books about their sacred mysteries, but they have printed only one small one in Chinese in which they give a brief account of their sect, for the Mandarins, at the onset of persecution."

It is difficult to believe they kept this book at times of persecution.  Were the Kaifeng Jews ever persecuted?  More likely, they used to book to educate officials about their religion.  Was this book A Preface to the Illustrious Way?  This book was in ten chapters.  Was it an introduction to Judaism as understood by the Kaifeng Community?   The title suggests as much.  What would the content have been?  

There can be little doubt it, and any other writings in Chinese by the Kaifeng Jews about Judaism, would have had a great deal in common with the explanations of Judaism found in the stone inscriptions, and in a general sense, the works by Chinese Muslim were creating in the 1600s and 1700s coordinating Neo-Confusion thought and Islam, called the Han Kitab

Just as the Jews of Kaifeng share sacred architecture with Hui Muslims, and just as they most likely shared cuisine from Central Asia modified to a Chinese environment, so too they would have shared a Confucian understanding of Judaism along the lines of the Han Kitab.  Islam and Judaism have much i common both in details and broad strokes. It is unlikely that any literary output of the Kaifeng community would not be as broad and vibrant at the Han Kitab, as they were always far less of a Jewish population is China than Muslim.

Zhao Yingheng's book, Records of the Vicissitudes of the Holy Scriptures, suggests from its title that it maybe about the history of the Torah scrolls, and other Hebrew/religious books in Kaifeng.  This would make sense, given that Yingcheng was instrumental in arranging the books after the flood:

If he classified and arranged Hebrew writings in order, than he was not just a Confucian scholar, but an accomplished Hebraist.  We are also told in this inscription that he produced a Torah scroll:

He was close to the rescue, rehabilitation, and production of Torah scrolls after the 1642 flood.  He was in an excellent position to write about the vicissitudes of the holy books of his community. 

Leslie found Zhao Yingcheng's only extant writings, below.   There are two essays he did not translate, as  they do not concern Judaism.  The first is called "Record of the Communal School in Hang-ch'uan.  The second is titled "Preface to the Lung-wen Society."

We will return to the Zhao brothers in future entries.