Meir Shahar

Meir Shahar was born in 1959 in Jerusalem

Meir Shahar was born in Jerusalem in 1959. His mother is the historian Shulamit Shahar, an Israel Prize laureate, and his father was the writer David Shahar.

He earned a bachelor's degree in East Asian studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and studied Chinese in Taipei. In 1992 he received a PhD from Harvard University in East Asian languages and civilizations. His dissertation dealt with how 16th and 17th century novels shaped the Chinese pantheon.

He taught at the Hebrew University and has taught at Tel Aviv University since 1995, where he holds the Shaul Eisenberg Chair for East Asian Affairs. He headed the East Asian studies department from 2004 to 2006 and the university's Confucius Institute from 2007 to 2012. He was also a visiting professor at Stanford and a visiting researcher at Oxford, Berkeley, Peking University and Academia Sinica.

His research covers the links between Chinese religion and literature, the history of Chinese martial arts, and the influence of Indian culture on China. His books include studies of the god Crazy Ji, the Shaolin Monastery and the god Nezha. In 2002 he received the Michael Bruno Memorial Award.

He is married to the painter Noga Zhang-Hui Shahar, who illustrated his Hebrew adaptation of a Chinese tale. They live in Tel Aviv and have 2 children.