在以色列国庆六十周年总统会议分组会上的演说辞

Ladies and gentlemen,

Good afternoon!

I am greatly honoured to have been given the opportunity to address such a distinguished audience on the occasion of the celebration of sixty years of the State of Israel.

As we all know, a profound friendship has existed between the Chinese people and the Jewish people for a long time. Nevertheless, an essential problem has accompanied this friendship from its very beginning all the way to the present days. The problem is the failure to establish a textual dialogue between Jewish scriptures and the Chinese Classics, between Jewish tradition and Chinese tradition. As a result, Jewish tradition was never an integrated part of Chinese tradition or Chinese culture. It has remained foreign and somewhat mystical to the Chinese people all the time. This was one of the main factors that decided the final fate of the Chinese Jewish communities which had only two options, either to be assimilated as in the case of the Kaifeng community or to desert the place as in the cases of the Harbin and Shanghai communities.

Compared with the success of Buddhism, Christianity and Islam, which all entered China as alien traditions but became inseparable parts of Chinese culture later, the failure of the Jewish tradition to become a part of Chinese culture was both apparent and significant. This failure means that there is no spiritual connection between Chinese culture and Jewish tradition, the good relationship is mainly based on mutual interests. If a crisis occurs, the relationship will be in danger of perishing since there is no Jewish power of discourse at all inside Chinese culture.

Therefore, the point is not how we should introduce Jewish people and culture to China as if importing some foreign merchandises, but rather, how we integrate Jewish tradition into Chinese culture so that it will work inside Chinese culture for the benefits of both the Chinese people and the Jewish people? In short, the question is, how do we build a presence of Judaism and Jewish tradition, including modern Jewish tradition of the state of Israel, in Chinese culture?

The answers to these questions, or the strategies by which to reach this purpose, can be found in the wisdom of our forefathers. At the beginning of Pirki Avoth and Confucius’ Analects, both the Men of the Great Assembly and Confucius presented three basic strategies for establishing and perfecting a tradition. They are: to safeguard the core position of traditional texts, to build a successful master-disciple relationship, and to perfect the personal and intellectual qualities of the leaders of the tradition. While the Men of the Great Assembly called for “making a fence for the Torah”, Confucius believed that “a fence” is “to learn the traditional classics with constant perseverance and application” and to enjoy the studies. While the Men of the Great Assembly encouraged “raising up many disciples”, Confucius stated that fellow students coming from afar were a great joy of life. While the Men of the Great Assembly stressed the value of “being deliberating in judgment”, Confucius described “a man of complete virtue” as someone “who feels no discomposure though men may take no note of him”.

To put into practice our forefathers’ wisdom, I believe that there are three basic strategies to reach to our purpose.

The first strategy is to bring the Jewish texts, both classic Jewish scripts and modern Israeli literature, to China. This means a major project for translating the main Jewish texts into the Chinese language must be established and implemented.

The second strategy is to teach the texts to the Chinese people. This strategy includes various activities such as promoting the translated texts, establishing relevant courses in educational institutes in China, etc.

The third strategy is to raise and to support a group of leaders of Jewish tradition in China. This group of leaders could include scholars who are dedicated to the Jewish tradition and its related scholarship, writers who are dedicated to relevant subjects, or activists who are dedicated to the long standing friendship between our two peoples. It could include people who are sitting among our panelists or audience today. Among all the three strategies, this group of leaders is the most crucial factor to our success. Not only must they lead and implement the two above mentioned strategies, but also they must reinterpret the translated texts through their studies, in order to find out how Jewish tradition can become acceptable to Chinese civilization and how it can contribute to Chinese culture. The history of Buddhism, Christianity and Islam in China has shown that unless a foreign tradition can be reinterpreted with Confucianism conceptions, it can hardly be integrated into Chinese tradition.

Back to some two thousand five hundred years ago, when Confucius said that he did not feel discomposure though men might take no note of him, he was probably summarizing his failure to recruit support for his tradition during his lifetime. We should not let this kind of lack of support happen to our group of leaders today! Therefore I’m appealing to all of you, don’t leave them alone, support them！ Support them spiritually, intellectually and financially! I hope that in a few decades, when our descendants examine the friendship between our two peoples, they will find a more solid foundation and will say that this foundation started in our times.

Thank you!

Zhang Ping

May 14, 2008, Jerusalem