THE ORIGIN OF THE JAPANESE PEOPLE

The earliest immigrants to Japan came from the islands lying off the Southeastern coast of Asia. Borne along on the swift Japan current, they drifted past the Ryukyu Islands, finally reaching the beautiful green islands of Japan. The large-eyed, heavy-lidded, oval-faced, high-nosed segment of the Japanese people derives from this source, which was of Malayan and Polynesian ancestry.

The classic Japanese architecture owes its beginnings to these people who continued to build their homes in the tropical and semi-tropical styles of their former place of abode. Truly unsuited for the temperate of Japan, these flimsily built hut-like structures would have been far more suitable for the South Pacific islands.

From the northern regions of Asia came different racial strains. They were the people of the vast grassland that spreads between Manchulia, Mongolia, Tibet, and Pamir Highland. According to many philologists, Japanese language belongs to the North-Altaic family; this shows that the majority of the people belongs to this North-Asian racial strains. These people crossed over from the Asian Continent by way of Korea, the nearest point of the mainland to Japan. From Siberia came the Tartars, among other stocks, the color of whose skin closely resembled that of the American Indian.

However, the most important immigrants to early Japan were many groups of Semitic people&emdash;including the tribe of Hada. * Coming to Japan through Central Asia, China, and Korea, their origins are directly traceable to the ancient Land of Israel.

* In Japanese, "Hada" and "Hata" are used interchangeably. In Japanese language, -his euphonical interchangeability takes place quite often. For example, both "Nihon" and "Nippon" are used referring Japan, though they are different readings of the Chinese characters nihon. In ancient China, "nihon" was pronounced "Ji-pang," which became the etymology of the English "Japan" or French "Japon."