Judaism is a religious tradition with origins dating back nearly four thousand years, rooted in the ancient near eastern region of Canaan (which is now Israel and Palestinian territories). Judaism traces its heritage to the covenant God made with Abraham and his lineage — that God would make them a sacred people and give them a holy land. The primary figures of Israelite culture include the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and the prophet Moses, who received God's law at Mt. Sinai. Judaism is a tradition grounded in the religious, ethical, and social laws as they are articulated in the Torah — the first five books of the Hebrew Bible. Jews refer to the Bible as the Tanakh, an acronym for the texts of the Torah, Prophets, and Writings. Other sacred texts include the Talmud and Midrash, the rabbinic, legal, and narrative interpretations of the Torah. The contemporary branches of Judaism differ in their interpretations and applications of these texts. The four main movements within Judaism today are Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, and Reconstructionist, respectively ranging from traditional to liberal to religiously progressive in their application of Torah. While diverse in their views, Jews continue to be unified on the basis of their common connection to a set of sacred narratives expressing their relationship with God as a holy people. Judaism tends to emphasize practice over belief. Jewish worship is centered in synagogues, which completely replaced the Second Temple after its destruction in 70 C.E. Jewish religious leaders are called rabbis, who oversee the many rituals and ceremonies essential to Jewish religious practice.
The Hebrew bible is the first recordings according to the Israelis who trace themselves back to Abraham. Through these stories in the Hebrew bible, it has influenced the western culture on laws, art, literature and the way of living.
In the story of Adam and Eve, God wanted to create order, where light is separated from darkness and land is separated from water. Within six days, God created the Garden of Eden and was satisfied with the results of his labor. Afterwards, according to the Bible, God rested on the seventh day. The Garden of Eden was flourished with fruit, trees, birds, exotic animals, a central fountain and streams of cool air. In the story, Adam was created by God's own breath and was made to take care of the garden. Essentially, Adam is a copy of God. To accompany Adam, God created Eve from Adam's rib. The main rule that God gave Adam and Eve was to not eat from the forbidden tree, but unfortunately Eve was the first to eat from the tree and then convinced Adam to eat it as well. Thus, original sin was created, which disappointed God and asked both of them to leave the garden. With that said, Adam and Eve's exile left them to work and suffer for the rest of their lives.
Other stories include the story of Cain and Abel, which revolves around a sibling rivalry. In the story, the rivalry lead Cain to murder, which created the great flood because of God's anger towards immoral human population. Essentially, God floods everyone to "clean humanity." Only Noah and his family survived the flood because God warned him to build an ark for him and the animals. Once the flood ended, God makes a "covenant" with Noah to never flood the earth again, which was represented by a rainbow.
Adam, Eve, Cain, Abel and Noah are seen as historical figures in Judaism, but now some scholars see them as symbolic figures due to these stories. Nonetheless, the Israelis took these stories and made them history.