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Judaism

Jews, a people who have maintained a distinct cultural identity originally based on the idea of a covenant, or special relationship, with God. The Jewish people are among the oldest of the many peoples known to history. Their origins date back at least 3,000 years, and perhaps even further. During this lengthy period Jews have settled in all parts of the world and have had an impact on many civilizations. The Jewish religion, Judaism, has exerted influence far beyond its own adherents. Christianity grew out of Judaism, and Islam accepted many of the traditions and practices of Judaism. Knowledge of the history of the Jews and their culture contributes to a fuller understanding of the history of the Western world and its spiritual life.

The word Jew came into existence in the 5th century bc to refer to the inhabitants of the province of Judea (now part of Israel). It derives from the Hebrew word, yehudi, and the Greek, ioudaios, for Judeans. In time it was also applied to people who originated in Judea but moved elsewhere. The Judeans were descended from the Israelites, an ancient people whose origins are shrouded in mystery.

Historians know little about the early history of the Israelites, but they do know that at some point the Israelites came to see themselves as bearers of a unique covenant with a single God whom they called by many names, most importantly, Yahweh. Yahweh provided them with a law and way of life, as well as with a territory—the land of Israel—in which to carry out that way of life. Acceptance of this covenant and monotheism (belief in a single God) distinguished the Israelites from most of their contemporaries, who believed in multiple gods, a practice known as polytheism, and worshiped idols, a practice known as idolatry. Israelites often separated themselves from people who did not share in this covenant with their one God.

In the 6th century bc, the Neo-Babylonian Empire conquered the land of the Israelites and sent much of the population of its southern province, Judea, to Babylonia. The Israelite exiles appear to be the most direct ancestors of the Jewish people. During their exile the nature of the Israelites’ identity changed as they came to see themselves primarily as a religious group rather than simply as an exiled group with a common ethnic background.

Sometime after the 5th century bc it was possible to become a Jew, although what conversion meant at that time or how it was done remains unclear. Ancient sources speak of individual Persians, Greeks, Romans, and members of Arab tribes becoming Jews during the centuries that followed the Babylonian Captivity.

Religion, ethnic identity, and language have all played important roles in maintaining Jewish identity. Because Judaism related to so many aspects of life, including those considered secular in other cultures, being a Jew led to a strong group or ethnic identity. For example, the Hebrew Bible (known to Christians as the Old Testament) laid down dietary laws and indicated which foods were considered kosher (fit) for consumption. Jews also had their own written language, Hebrew, and distinct spoken languages developed. The best known of these spoken languages is Yiddish, which is based on the German language.

Yom Kippur (Hebrew yom hakippurim, “day of atonement”), the most sacred holy day in Judaism. It falls on the tenth day of the Hebrew month of Tishri, in September or the first half of October in the Western calendar. The day is observed by fasting and prayer and by rededication to a religious life. Like any other day in the Hebrew calendar, it is reckoned from sundown to sundown.

Yom Kippur marks the culmination of the Ten Penitential Days, which begin with Rosh Hashanah, or the Jewish New Year. With Rosh Hashanah it constitutes the so-called High Holy Days. Yom Kippur is a day of confession, repentance, and prayers for forgiveness of sins committed during the year against the laws and covenant of God.

Although Yom Kippur is solemn and is regarded as a day of judgment, it is not mournful in character because it offers an opportunity for forgiveness for sins against God. In the case of sins committed against individuals, one must first ask forgiveness from the person who has been wronged. It is also the day on which an individual’s fate for the ensuing year is thought to be sealed.

The liturgy for Yom Kippur is elaborate. The service on the eve of Yom Kippur begins with the chanting of the Kol Nidre. This prayer is a plea for absolution from vows made between humans and God that cannot or should not be kept. Prayers are offered throughout the whole of the following day. The Torah (first five books of the Bible) is read aloud, and Yizkor, the memorial prayer for the dead, is recited. The blowing of the shofar, or ram’s horn, marks the end of Yom Kippur.

Judaism, religious culture of the Jews (also known as the people of Israel); one of the world’s oldest continuing religious traditions.

The terms Judaism and religion do not exist in premodern Hebrew. The Jews spoke of Torah, God’s revealed instruction to Israel, which mandated both a worldview and a way of life—Halakhah. Halakhah derives from the Hebrew word “to go” and has come to mean the “way” or “path.” It encompasses Jewish law, custom, and practice. Premodern Judaism, in all its historical forms, thus constituted (and traditional Judaism today constitutes) an integrated cultural system encompassing the totality of individual and communal existence. It is a system of sanctification in which all is to be subsumed under God’s rule—that is, under divinely revealed models of cosmic order and lawfulness. Christianity originated as one among several competing Jewish ideologies in 1st-century Palestine, and Islam drew in part on Jewish sources at the outset. Because most Jews, from the 7th century on, have lived within the cultural sphere of either Christianity or Islam, these religions have had an impact on the subsequent history of Judaism.

Judaism originated in the land of Israel (also known as Palestine) in the Middle East. Subsequently, Jewish communities have existed at one time or another in almost all parts of the world, a result of both voluntary migrations of Jews and forced exile or expulsions (see Diaspora). In the late 1990s the total world Jewish population was 14.1 million, of whom 5.9 million lived in the United States, 4.6 million in Israel, and 700,000 each in France and Russia, the four largest centers of Jewish settlement. About 500,000 Jews lived in Ukraine, 350,000 in Canada, 300,000 in the Great Britain, 250,000 in Argentina, and 100,000 in South Africa. These figures indicate that 42 percent of the Jewish population resides in North America, followed by Asia with 29 percent, Europe (including Russia) with 18 percent, Latin America with 8 percent, Africa with 2 percent, and Oceania with 1 percent.

As a rich and complex religious tradition, Judaism has never been monolithic. Its various historical forms nonetheless have shared certain characteristic features. The most essential of these is a radical monotheism, that is, the belief that a single, transcendent God created the universe and continues providentially to govern it. Undergirding this monotheism is the teleological conviction that the world is both intelligible and purposive, because a single divine intelligence stands behind it. Nothing that humanity experiences is capricious; everything ultimately has meaning. The mind of God is manifest to the traditional Jew in both the natural order, through creation, and the social-historical order, through revelation. The same God who created the world revealed himself to the Israelites at Mount Sinai. The content of that revelation is the Torah (“revealed instruction”), God’s will for humankind expressed in commandments (mizvoth) by which individuals are to regulate their lives in interacting with one another and with God. By living in accordance with God’s laws and submitting to the divine will, humanity can become a harmonious part of the cosmos.

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