No.16, Spring 2008
|
Journal of
the Babylonian Jewry Heritage Center No.16, Spring 2008 |
Joan Bieder:
THE JEWS OF SINGAPORE
Joan Bieder, The Jews of Singapore, Singapore, Suntree Media, 2007. 248pp.
The trustees of the Jacob Ballas Estate (Frank Benjamin, Joseph Grimberg and Norma Palmer) commissioned Joan Bieder of the University of California at Berkeley to write a book on the history of Singapore Jewry. The book is part of the generous legacy left by Jacob Ballas to ensure the history, heritage and future of Singapore’s Jews will endure. Ballas, internationally known as a successful financier, was president of the Jewish Welfare Board of Singapore from 1990 until 2000 and a supporter of the Babylonian Jewry Heritage Center among many other charities in Israel, Singapore and London.
The Community
I first learned about the community in 1995 when I was in Singapore and decided to go to Friday night services. I grew up going to an Orthodox Ashkenazi synagogue in Connecticut, so felt comfortable at Singapore’s Maghain Aboth synagogue. While talking with members of the community, I was surprised to learn that the community traced its roots to Baghdad. I began to wonder what could have brought the first group of Jewish pioneers from Baghdad to South East Asia. I wondered how a group of Judeo-Arabic speaking immigrants in long exotic robes managed to get along with their Malay, Chinese, Indian and Indonesian neighbors and how succeeding generations fared in colonial Singapore. I had many questions: What happed to them during the Japanese Occupation of World War II? What forces after the war allowed them to regroup as a community and what was the impact on the community of Singapore becoming a Republic? These questions led me to research on the community.
Research and material
I found fascinating records in the National Archives of Singapore including an 1840 letter to the colonial government from the six Baghdadi traders who were the founding fathers of the community. Signing the letter in Hebrew and English, they requested permission to build a synagogue and establish a burial ground. Here in California, at the UC Berkeley library I found books with memoirs written by missionaries and colonial surveyors about their encounters with Jewish traders in the 1830s and 40s as well as early accounts of life in South East Asia. Then it turned out that the Central Zionist Archives in Jerusalem had about forty folders on Singapore filled with correspondence between Palestinian or Israeli sources and members of Singapore’s Jewish community as well as articles and documents from the 1920s through the 1950s. Finally I was able to interview many members of the community, beginning with Jacob Ballas and including family members of early settlers, present and former members of the community who live in Singapore, England, Australia, the United States and Israel.
Many of the photographs in the book are rare, including a November 1922 photograph of Albert Einstein sitting among the elite members of Singapore’s Jewish community during a visit he made to raise funds for Hebrew University in Jerusalem. I received that photograph from Alan Frankel, my neighbor in Kensington, California. Alan was born in Singapore where his grandparents had settled in the 1880s. His maternal grandparents were wealthy Baghdadi Jews involved in the opium trade and in real estate while his paternal grandparents were Russian Jews who made their fortune in the furniture business and by owning a great deal of property in Singapore. I had complete access to his photographs that showed large estates, palatial homes, parties, family religious and leisure activities from the 1890s to the 1950s. Other photographs came from members of the community in Singapore and Los Angeles, from the Jewish Welfare Board archives and Israeli, Dutch and British archives. Together make the book’s Introduction and 18 chapters very beautiful and visually rich.
The story of Singapore Jewry
I was interested to learn how a small enclave of very religious traders, part of what historians call the Baghdadi Trade Diaspora, came to a place that had absolutely no Jewish life at all and created one. After the opening of the Suez Canal when Jews arrived from many parts of Europe and even Egypt as well as Baghdad, a division grew between the rich and the poor, those who hung onto their Baghdadi way of life and those who aspired to become part of British colonial life and its education system. I learned how connected Singapore Jewry was to Jewish communities in India, in the Dutch East Indies (Indonesia) and Shanghai in China. I was impressed that after World War II when everyone lost everything, it was the ordinary people who reorganized the community while most of the wealthy had fled Singapore forever. I thought it was remarkable that members of such a small community have had such a large impact on Singapore. Sir Manasseh Meyer became a Knight of the British Empire, the first Chief –Minister of Singapore was David Marshall, a Jew with Baghdadi origins, and other members of the community have contributed to Singapore in the area of finance, business, medicine and law. In return Singapore Jews have flourished, living in a multi-cultural Republic that provides respect, religious freedom equal opportunity and full integration into society.
The future of Singapore Jewry
It has a very promising future. While less than 200 Jews of Baghdadi origins remain in Singapore, the community has actually grown, augmented by ex-patriot and Israeli families who live in Singapore for a few to several years at a time. A recent rebirth of religious practice led by an Orthodox Sephardic Rabbi trained in the Chabad tradition, has helped the community grow and mature spiritually.
The community places great emphasis on educating Jewish children. There is a very active Talmud Torah on Sunday mornings attended by Singaporean, ex-pat and Israeli children. A nursery school called Ganenu (“our garden” in Hebrew) is slowly growing into a full primary school that hopes to become secular but maintain a Jewish emphasis. Orthodox, Reform and Conservative Jews sent their children to both the school and the Talmud Torah. The Jewish Welfare Board believes that people are likely to stay in Singapore longer – and contribute to the community’s growth – if there are good schools for their children.
The newly opened 7-story Jacob Ballas Centre located next to Maghain Aboth Synagogue provides a central gathering point for the community. It contains a home for the Rabbi and his family, the Hazan and his family, room for visiting Chabad students who spend a year in Singapore as part of their outreach training, offices, small chapel for morning services, a kosher restaurant and a large banquet hall for parties and celebrations.
The future of Baghdadi community
The present community is about six hundred Sephardic and Ashkenazi Jews. While the number of people with Baghdadi roots is under 200 and declining, the institutions built by Baghadadi Jews will forever be the foundation of the community. The Maghain Aboth and Chesed-El synagogues, the Jewish Welfare Board, the Jewish cemetery, the Abdullah and Flora Shooker Home for the Aged, the Talmud Torah and the Jacob Ballas Centre were founded and/or endowed by Baghdadi Jews – among them, founding father Abraham Solomon, dressed in a turban and flowing robes of the Orient, Sir Manesseh Meyer, David Marshall, Jacob Ballas.
I wanted the book to reflect their histories and ways of life over the past 170 years and that of the many individuals and families, rich and poor, who were the Jewish community of Singapore from its beginnings to times of prosperity, suffering and survival and into the present, uplifting future.
The Jews of Singapore is available through the publisher at Suntree@pacific.net.sg or through The Jewish Welfare Board of Singapore at aryeh12002@yahoo.com.