Jesuit reports on Chinese Jews enabled the readmission of Jews to England.

Evidence

After Ricci, several Jesuit missionaries visited Kaifeng in search of this Kaifeng Jewish Bible. Like Ricci, their letters or reports on the Kaifeng Jews became available as a part of the Jesuits’ account of their work in China. What they did not anticipate was that their tale of the “Chinese Jews” would provide the crucial missing link for Menasseh ben Israel’s narrative of the Ten Lost Tribes. Furthermore, Menasseh’s “Chinese Jews” played an essential part in the readmission of the Jews to England during the time of Oliver Cromwell. — Ivan Davidson Kalmar, Derek Penslar, Orientalism and the Jews, 345

Categorization

• XREF: A striking case of missionary intelligence being repurposed for political ends; connects to how colonial/evangelical knowledge was recycled in European domestic politics.