Jews in the Japanese Mind: The History and Uses of a Cultural Stereotype

Description

The popularity in Japan of books about Jews has climbed to staggering proportions. Such books have sold millions of copies and often top the best-seller list. What explains the virtual obsession with Jews in Japan - a country that has no Jews? Many of the Japanese books about Jews are overtly antisemitic; but even a large number of otherwise respectable scholarly books are replete with egregious distortions and antisemitic canards, such as references to the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, a notorious antisemitic forgery, as though it were a serious work of social and historical analysis; and most propagate the myth that Jews control the American media and dominate international finance. How can we account for the indiscriminate mixture of fact and fantasy in the Japanese view of the Jews? Is Japanese antisemitism a growing phenomenon, and what does it portend for Japan's relations with the West as a whole? In this highly original cultural and intellectual history of modern Japan, authors David Goodman and Masanori Miyazawa use the Japanese image of the Jews to illuminate the Japanese mind. Skillfully tracing the sources and historical development of this image of the Jews against the background of Japan's emergence from centuries of cultural isolation, the authors reveal how its subtle alterations over time also reflect the changing character of Japanese social and political experience in this century. But while the Japanese do seem to have accepted all of the worst anti-Jewish stereotypes at face value, the remarkable fact is that, unlike Western antisemites, the Japanese frequently admire the Jews for achieving such disproportionate power, and argue that their countrymen should follow their example. This history of the Jewish image in Japan thus sheds important light on the ambiguous character of philosemitism for Jews and non-Jews alike, as well as affording valuable insight into the Japanese penchant for adapting imported ideas and images to peculiar cultural ends. I. What the Japanese Think of Jews and Why Anyone Should Care -- II. Momotaro as Antisemite: The Cultural Roots of Japanese Images of Jews -- III. God's Chosen People: Jews in Japanese Christian Theology -- IV. The Protocols of Ultranationalism: The Rise of Antisemitism Between the Wars -- V. Jews as the Enemy: The Function of Antisemitism in Wartime Japan -- VI. Identification and Denial: The Uses of the Jews in the Postwar Period -- VII. The Socialism of Fools: Left-Wing Anti-Zionism and Antisemitism -- VIII. A Signal Failure: Recrudescent Antisemitism and Japan's "Spiritual Condition" -- IX. Japan's Jewish Problem: Implications in a Multicultural World Includes bibliographical references (pages 307-346) and index