Fundamental Information about Juidaism

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Fast Facts on Judaism

These are basic facts and statistics on Judaism :

Date founded: C. 1300 BC
Place founded: Mesopotamia
Founder: Abraham
Adherents: 14 million
Main location: Israel, Europe, and USA
Major sects: Reform, Conservative, and Orthodox
Sacred text: Tanakh with the Talmud
Original language: Hebrew
Spiritual leader: rabbi (rebbe in Hasidism)
Place of worship: synagogue ("temple" in Reform Judaism)
Day of worship: Saturday (Shabbat/Sabbath)
Theism: monotheism
Ultimate reality: One God (YHWH)
Human nature: created good
Purpose of life: obedience to God
How to live: obey the law and atone for sin
Afterlife: views vary: Gan Eden, Gehinnom, nonexistence, or reincarnation

Read more: Fast Facts on Judaism


What Do Jews Believe?

This is a far more difficult question than you might expect. Judaism has no dogma, no formal set of beliefs that one must hold to be a Jew. In Judaism, actions are far more important than beliefs, although there is certainly a place for belief within Judaism.

The closest that anyone has ever come to creating a widely-accepted list of Jewish beliefs is Rambam's thirteen principles of faith. Rambam's thirteen principles of faith, which he thought were the minimum requirements of Jewish belief, are:

1.   G-d exists
2.   G-d is one and unique
3.   G-d is incorporeal
4.   G-d is eternal
5.   Prayer is to be directed to G-d alone and to no other
6.   The words of the prophets are true
7.   Moses' prophecies are true, and Moses was the greatest of the prophets
8.   The Written Torah (first 5 books of the Bible) and Oral Torah (teachings now contained in the Talmud and other writings) were given to Moses
9.   There will be no other Torah
10.   G-d knows the thoughts and deeds of men
11.   G-d will reward the good and punish the wicked
12.   The Messiah will come
13.   The dead will be resurrected

As you can see, these are very basic and general principles. Yet as basic as these principles are, the necessity of believing each one of these has been disputed at one time or another, and the liberal movements of Judaism dispute many of these principles.

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