Zhao Yingcheng

Zhao Yingcheng, who also bore the Hebrew name Moshe ben Avraham, lived from 1619 to about 1663 and was a Chinese Jewish philosopher and mandarin of the Ming dynasty. Born to a Jewish family in Henan, he mastered both Hebrew and Chinese, earned the jinshi degree in 1646 and was named director in the Ministry of Justice, later serving as an official in Fujian and Huguang, where he is remembered as an efficient administrator and Confucian scholar who put down local bandits and founded schools. After the flooding of Kaifeng in 1642 and the destruction of its synagogue, he helped persuade the Jewish community to return to the city and supported the rebuilding of the temple in 1653. A stone stele of 1663 records his action. With his brother Zhao Yingdou he held important posts in the 1660s.