Traveling home last night I witnessed a peculiar spectacle. While changing subway lines at Kasumigaseki, a neighborhood in Tokyo just south of the Imperial Palace where the offices of Parliament and government ministeries are located, I saw a man hastily start to tear down a poster for Spielberg’s movie “Munich,” which just opened in Japan. I decided to take a picture with the camera on my cell phone just for kicks. But I expected him to roll it up and take it home. Instead, he tore it to the ground and furiously trampled on it before walking off to catch his subway (in the direction of Ayase, for those of you in the know).
Hidden anti-Semitism in Japan or just bureaucrat stress relief?
About Curzon
Lord George Nathaniel Curzon (1859 - 1925) entered the British House of Commons as a Conservative MP in 1886, where he served as undersecretary of India and Foreign Affairs. He was appointed Viceroy of India at the turn of the 20th century where he delineated the North West Frontier Province,
ordered a military expedition to Tibet, and unsuccessfully tried to partition the province of Bengal during his six-year tenure. Curzon served as Leader of the House of Lords in Prime Minister Lloyd George's War Cabinet and became Foreign Secretary in January 1919, where his most famous act was
the drawing of the Curzon Line between a new Polish state and Russia. His publications include
Russia in Central Asia (1889) and
Persia and the Persian Question (1892).
In real life, "Curzon" is a US citizen from the East Coast who has been a financial analyst, freelance translator, and university professor; he is currently on assignment in Tokyo.
Wouldn’t hate-ful antisemitism be putting up a poster promoting the movie?
/natch
Unemployed movie critic?
Good call Dan.
Japan has a weird and fascinating relationship with the Jews world and on the idea of what a “Jew” is. “Here is but one example.”:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fugu_Plan
I’ve always wanted to learn more, so if anyone could recommend a book, please let me know.
Hmm, the link didnt post correctly, well, just Google/Wiki “Fugu Plan”
SU: Corrected — click “Formatting” to learn more about creating modified text with Textile.
There is a fascinating book in Japanese called “日本人ãÂ?¨ãƒ¦ãƒ€ãƒ¤äºº”:http://www.amazon.co.jp/exec/obidos/ASIN/404704167X/qid=1138850280/sr=8-5/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i5_xgl14/249-2352931-8190761 (The Japanese and the Jews) which has sold 3 million copies here in Japan since being first published in 1970 (only in Japanese, sorry) that talks about (largely speculative) connections between the Japanese and the Jews from ancient times. I remember once being at Kiyomizu Dera (temple) in Kyoto and hearing about a marked stone that was actually brought to Japan by the Jews years before Japanese civilization even existed by none other than the temple’s curator. The Fugu Plan isn’t forgotten by all, Foreign Minister Aso, a noted possible PM after Koizumi, has said that “a good ccountry is one where Jews feel like settling.”:http://www.mutantfrog.com/2006/01/31/aso-backs-off-of-tactless-emperor-visit-yasukuni-speech-plus/
Interesting post. Do the Japanese think about Jews? I don’t think too many koreans do, and if they do, they’ve mostly just learned some second hand opinions from overseas sources (unfortunately, often anti-semitic sources).
I’m surprised to hear about the man’s reaction in the subway. Why do Jews elicit such strong reactions (anti or pro) seemingly everywhere in the world?
Could be mistaken, but I received about 70 pages of the Japanese and the Jews from my Jap. Politics professor at Obirin a couple years back. And it was all in English. Interesting stuff, in either language.
This link will give you a brief synopsis of the Jewish presence in China. If Jews were in China in the 12th Century, some may well have traveled on to Choseon even before the arrivfal of the Russians in the Far East.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/vjw/chinajews.html
Snow: Jews are hardly ever mentioned in Japanese daily life. However, a few people, some of influence, have a rather curious (not necessarily racist) view of Jewish influence worldwide; Jewish influence in the US; alleged wealth of the Jews, etc. The above book, and the background to the Fugu Plan, both touch on this.
Lirelou: The more cryptic theorists about Jews and the Japanese cite links that predate the written language in Japan, i.e. before the 7th century A.D.
I wanted to respond to Snow’s comment about Koreans and Jews. There’s actually a growing friendship between the two cultures:
Many Korean Christians visit the Holy Land.
South Korea started a peace camp program which brings together Israeli and Palestinian students.
Jewish organizations, such as the Simon Wiesenthal Center, are active in improving North Korean human rights.
The South Korean Air Force will give a large contract to an Israeli company. There’s growing trade between the two countries.
Actually, the book “Japan and the Jews” was based on a book written by a guy named something like Benjamin Izach.” I think it may have been writtin in Hebrew and not English though, and it looks like the Japanese edition is more of an expanded work than just a rewrite. It’s of course total nonsense, but interesting nonsense.
There’s very, very little real history of Jews in Japan, but there is a synagogue in Kobe left over from a community of Jews that settled in Japan after leaving China, having fled from Europe earlier.
Here in Taiwan I’ve seen a popular book about something like how the Jews raise their kids to be geniuses, which of course ties in well with the Confucian education obsession. My Chinese was only good enough to read the cover though-I left the book closed.
MF: The book “The Japanese and the Jews” was an original work written by one of the more novel (if nutty) Nihonjinron professors by the name of Yamamoto (actually, all Nihonjinron professors are nutty; this one was just creative nuttiness). And the book wasn’t about the history of the Jews in Japan but rather bizarre cultural/religious habits that suggest some ancient link between the two people.
Roy: Just heard from a friend that Benjamin Izach is an alias for Yamamoto, i.e. it’s the same person!!
Wow! I’m genuinely shocked!
Do you think it’s possible that he originally published the book under the pretense that it was based on the research of a Hebrew scholar?
Mihwa, thanks for that link on the Palestinians and Israelis coming together in Korea. I’d read about that years ago, but didn’t know what came of it. Maybe this year I’ll get involved with that.
Anyway, while I have long found that minority Japanese sentiment on Jews (and by extention, the minority Korean sentiment that appears to be derived from it) bewildering, its existence is also intriguing.
Japanese negativity against Jews seems like such a non sequitur, except possibly as a throwback to the days of the Axis, but with Chiune Sugihara being so prominently known in Japan, that makes it seem more out of place.
The Korean acceptance of this idea (and again, as in Japan, anti-Semitism is a minority view), seems even more of a non sequitur. There are certain viewpoints””?like acceptance of blood type as a key to personality””?that were adopted in Japan and therefore quickly adopted in Korea. Even since the end of occupation, the cultural similarities between the two modern countries have made the acceptance of some Japanese notions easily accepted in Korea.
The blood type thing is also huge in Taiwan. And don’t forget that they whole concept was created by a Nazi doctor and imported to Japan during that period!
Plus, don’t forget that Japan relies on Middle East oil for a lot of its energy imports, leading to tacit endorsements of Arab governments’ hostility towards Israel.