Names commonly used by Jews

Ai, Zhao, Zhang, Shi, Jin, Gao and two Li surnames.

Kaifeng Jews are the best preserved Jewish community in China. Kaifeng Jews changed their surnames to Han surnames, which were divided into seven surnames and eight surnames. After nearly 700 years of history, Zhang and Li have disappeared, and there are still six Jewish descendants living near Kaifeng.

Statistics at the beginning of 1987 show that there are 66 families of Jewish descent living in Kaifeng, with 159 people. Among them, there are 64 people named Shi 3 1 household; There are 12 households with 42 people surnamed Li; There are two families named Zhao, 1 1 person; There are 32 people in 17 households with the surname of Ai; There are two families and seven people named Jin; There are two families with high surnames, three people in Kaifeng and seven families with seven surnames of Jews.

Zhang and Li only marry Hui people. According to genealogy, only Jews married their daughters to Muslims, and no Muslims married their daughters to Jews. This may be the reason why these two surnames disappeared, while the other six were married to Han Chinese. Among the six existing Jewish descendants, there is no record of intermarriage with the Hui people.

Extended data:

According to historical records, there was a Jewish community and a synagogue in Kaifeng at least from the Song Dynasty in the12nd century to the late19th century. Some reports show that they have actually lived there since the late 9th century.

In Kaifeng, they call themselves "a Christian who gives happiness", which is probably a transliteration of Israel. The people around China call it "tendon-picking religion" because they don't know much about its religion, which comes from its habit of removing tendons when slaughtering cattle and sheep (it is said that Jacob, the Jewish ancestor, sprained his thigh when wrestling with an angel, so this custom exists). Or "police tactical unit Hui people", "Tianzhu religion" and so on.

When Jews first came to China, there were always theories of Zhou Dynasty and before, Han Dynasty, Tang Dynasty and Song Dynasty.

Baidu encyclopedia-Jews