Taiwan’s Talmud tourism: the business hotel with a Jewish edge

Marketing ideas about successful Jews like those at the Talmud Business Hotel, with rooms named after George Soros and Alan Greenspan, are common in East Asia

IF YOU’RE COMING to the coastal Taiwanese city of Taichung on business, what better place to rest your head than at a hotel built on the ancient wisdom of the wealthiest and most successful people in the world?

This is the idea behind Taiwan’s Talmud Business Hotel, whose founder was apparently inspired by the rabbinic text.

Its flagship location in Taichung’s central district is outfitted with deep red interiors “inspired by the Talmud theory,” according to its English-language website.

Each room type is named after “world famous successful” individuals, only two of whom are actually Jewish: George Soros and Alan Greenspan (the others are named after John Rockefeller, Conrad Hilton, Warren Buffett and Bill Gates).

The Talmud’s “teachings,” authentic or not, seem to have helped the Talmud Hotel Group: It’s now “one of [the] fastest-growing and leading hotel groups in Taiwan,” by its own description, having expanded from one location in 2009 to a total of three brands and several branch hotels across the island.

While to the Western eye it all can look almost comically antisemitic, ideas about Jews like the ones displayed at the Talmud Hotel are commonplace in East Asia. They are not based on Western prejudices, but rather seem to be the result of genuine admiration.

In East Asian countries, including Taiwan, the idea that Jews are naturally wise is often evidenced by a long list of Jewish Nobel Prize winners whose secrets, it’s believed, lie in their education practices and in ancient texts like the Talmud.

FULL STORY New destination for Jewish vacation: welcome to Taiwan's Talmud business hotel (Haaretz)