Torah means “To provide instructions” in Jewish interpretation and it consists of the five books of Moses namely Bereisheet (Genesis), Shemot (Exodus), Vayikra (Levictus), BaMidbar (Numbers), and the D’varim (Deuteronomy). Torah is the Jewish law that is written in authoritative Hebrew text and contains all biblical laws of Judaism. Torah is also referred as the Chamush and the Pentateuch, and is known as the Old-Testament in the community of non-Jews.
Moses is considered to be the messiah of Jews who led the Jews out of slavery on the command of God. He is worshipped as the rescuer and the mediator between god and the Jewish people. He was floated in a basket in the Nile River by his mother after birth to save him from being drowned in water by Pharaoh, the ruler in Egypt. Moses spent lot of years traveling and educating people in the deserts and created a group of people on the basis of justice.
Tanakh In Judaism
In Judaism, Tanakh is the authoritative scripture of the Hebrew bible. Tanakh is an acronym that is derived from the square script of the three traditional categories, the Torah, Neviim, and the Ketuvim.
Mishnah is the initial written record of the Torah and is known as Oral Torah in Judaism. Moses received Mishnah and Torah from God. Mishnah consists of six orders namely Seeds (Zeraim), Women (Nashim), Festival (Moed), Holy things (Kodashim), and Purities (Tohorot). God explained Torah in a verbal form to Moses and he spread the laws to the other people. Talmud is another form of Mishnah and is usually related to the additional commentaries called Gemara that describe more about Mishnah. The combination of Gemara and Mishnah is known as Talmud. The Jerusalem Talmud and the Babylonian Talmud are well known Talmud’s. The Talmud also includes the discussions on the nature of god, religious beliefs, and punishment for bad deeds and honoring for good deeds of Judaism.
In Sabbath it is believed that God worked for six days and rested on the seventh day. There are various notions related to Sabbath in Judaism and Christianity. The Jewish people give lot of importance to Sabbath and they consider it to be a day that gives them spiritual enhancement. Sabbath starts at sunset and ends at nightfall after forty minutes after sunset.
Covenant is the holy agreement between the God and the Jewish people. It is believed that the first covenant was between Abraham and God that was later followed Abraham’s generation. In the Covenant it was agreed that Jewish people would follow the laws laid down by god and in return god would provide them with lot of sacred land and live a long life. The important factor in the covenant was that the men must be circumcised.
Halakha -The Jewish law
The Jewish law, Halakha describes some rules and regulations for the kind of food to be consumed by the Jewish that is known as Kosher food. The laws made for the kosher foods are derived from Vayikra (Levictus), one of the books in Torah. Kosher foods are considered to be healthy and are of good quality, and consumed by many people.
Judaism consists of the following stages namely the Pre-Mosaic, National Monaltry, Prophetic Revolution, Babylonian and the Post-Exile. The people in pre-mosaic stage communicated with the dead and sacrificed themselves. In the National Monaltry it is believed that God controlled all people. The prophets are supposed to have created the religion and community in the Prophetic Revolution stage. The Babylonians held the Jews as slaves in the Babylonian stage and in the Post-Exile stage the Jewish were prejudiced by the Zoroastrianism. The various forms of contemporary Judaism are the Conservative Judaism, Reform Judaism, Reconstructionist Judaism, Humanistic Judaism and Orthodox Judaism. The followers of Orthodox strongly believe in the Jewish laws and do not deviate from the laws. In Conservative Judaism it is believed that the Jewish laws must be followed and it must also be flexible to adapt the leading culture of different traditions. Reform Judaism believes that the Jewish laws were not written by God, and the laws created were a combined effort of many people. The Reconstructionists argue that they believe in the Jewish laws and blindly follow it as it was culturally injected in them. The creators of Humanistic Judaism want to lead a high profile, dignified life in accordance with the Jewish cultural and humanistic values. Though the Reform Judaism identifies the same sex marriage, it is the Reconstructionist Judaism that supports and persuades marrying couples of same sex. The Reform, Reconstructionist, Conservative and the Humanistic Judaism allow ordaining women and in these forms of Judaism the women have been granted equality and ordinance as similar to those provided to men.
The Jewish religious traditions believed in Monoetheism in which the people trusted only one god, however the other religions believe in Polytheism where the followers believe in more than one God. Judaism believes that the laws were given to them in the form of Torah by the God and it must be followed religiously. Many religions contribute to a general set of religious customs and cultures. It is a widespread understanding that the Jews, Muslims, and the Christians follow Monoetheism but if the roots of these religions are to be investigated then there will be differences in the manner each religion perceives God. Though each religion may argue that they follow one god, but when questioned, we may get different names of God who they believe in. The Jews mostly believed in a single god till the Babylonian stage, after which there were major changes in the belief towards a single god as Polytheism captured people’s mind.
