Polyglot (book) Polyglot (book) A polyglot is a book that contains side-by-side versions of the same text in several different languages. Some editions of the Bible or its parts are polyglots, in which the Hebrew and Greek originals are exhibited along with historical translations. Polyglots are useful for studying the history of the text and its interpretation. The first enterprise of this kind is the famous "Hexapla" of Origen of Alexandria, in which the Old Testament Scriptures were written in six parallel columns, the first containing the Hebrew text, the second a transliteration of this in Greek letters, the third and fourth
Who is a Jew? Jews see being Jewish as predominantly a matter of ancestry and culture, rather than religion. The definition of who is a Jew varies according to whether it is being considered by Jews on the basis of religious law and tradition or self-identification, or by non-Jews for other reasons, sometimes for prejudicial purposes. Because Jewish identity can include characteristics of an ethnicity, a religion, or peoplehood, the definition depends on either traditional or newer interpretations of Jewish law and custom. Israel's Law of Return stipulates that a Jew is someone with a Jewish mother or someone who has converted to Judaism