Luo Jialing 羅迦陵

Liza Roos (1864-1941)

Alternate names: Mrs. Silas Hardoon Born March 28, 1864 (2/21 Tóngzhì 同治 ) in Shànghǎi 上海 Died October 3, 1941 (Mínguó 民國 30)

Notable Associates: Chísōng 持松 Yuèxiá 月霞 Zōngyǎng 宗仰

Article editor: Erik Hammerstrom

Liza Roos, Luó Jiālíng 羅迦陵 (1864-1941)

The wife of prominent Shànghǎi businessman Silas Hardoon. She donated a great deal of wealth to various Buddhist activities, and she was a supporter of the monk Zōngyǎng 宗仰.

Biography

According to her own biography, Liza was the daughter of a Chinese mother and a French sailor who returned to France soon after her birth. Her mother died when she was young, and she may have been a prostitute to French sailors. She did learn French and English.

On September 24, 1886 she married Silas Aaron Hardoon in a Jewish ceremony. Hardoon was a Jew born in Baghdad who had been educated in India. The Hardoons were very successful beginning in the 1890s in the International Settlement.

Her Buddhist name, Jiālíng 迦陵, is short for Kalaviṇka 迦陵頻伽, the name of a mythical Indian bird that lives in the Himālayas and has a beautiful voice.

In her life, she generously supported Buddhist activities. At Hardoon Gardens 哈同花園 (also called Àilì Gardens 愛儷園, 愛儷花園), she established the Kalaviṇka Hermitage 頻伽精舍 in 1904, where the monk Zōngyǎng 宗仰 lived for several years. The Gardens also served as the location where Yuèxiá 月霞 founded Huáyán University 華嚴大學 in 1912.

In 1908, with Zōngyǎng's assistance organizing, she paid for the publication of the Kalaviṇka Hermitage Canon 頻伽精舍校刊大藏經 in 8,146 volumes.

During the Second-Sino Japanese War, she helped finance the publication of works by Chísōng 持松.

References:

• Welch, Holmes. The Buddhist Revival in China. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1968. 16, 298-299, 319.
• 维基百科-罗迦陵