Introduction

Judaism is the religion of the Jewish people, centred on the covenant between God and Israel set out in the Torah. This section follows its history from the ancient Israelites and the First and Second Temples through the rabbinic Judaism of the Mishnah and Talmud to the Orthodox, Conservative, Reform and other movements of today. It covers the Hebrew Bible, Jewish law and ethics, prayer and the synagogue, the festivals and Sabbath, philosophy from Philo to Maimonides, and the folk beliefs about demons, amulets and the evil eye that sit beside the mystical tradition treated in our Kabbalah section.