''Hebrew Bible, collection of writings that was first compiled and preserved as the sacred books of the Jewish people. It also constitutes a large portion of the ChristianBible, known as the Old Testament. Except for a few passages in Aramaic, appearing mainly in the apocalypticBook of Daniel, these scriptures were written originally in Hebrew during the period from 1200 to 100 bce. The Hebrew Bible probably reached its current form about the 2nd century ce.''
Jew, any person whose religion is Judaism. In the broader sense of the term, a Jew is any person belonging to the worldwide group that constitutes, through descent or conversion, a continuation of the ancient Jewish people, who were themselves descendants of the Hebrews of the Bible (Old Testament).
In ancient times, a Yĕhūdhī was originally a member of Judah—i.e., either of the tribe of Judah (one of the 12 tribes that took possession of the Promised Land) or of the subsequent Kingdom of Judah (in contrast to the rival Kingdom of Israel to the north).
The Jewish people as a whole, initially called Hebrews (ʿIvrim), were known as Israelites (Yisreʾelim) from the time of their entrance into the Holy Land to the end of the Babylonian Exile (538 bce).
Thereafter, the term Yĕhūdhī (Latin: Judaeus; French: Juif; German: Jude; and English: Jew) was used to signify all adherents of Judaism, because the survivors of the Exile (former inhabitants of the Kingdom of Judah) were the only Israelites who had retained their distinctive identity. (The 10 tribes of the northern kingdom of Israel had been dispersed after the Assyrian conquest of 721 bce and were gradually assimilated by other peoples.)
The term Jew is thus derived through the LatinJudaeus and the Greek Ioudaios from the HebrewYĕhūdhī.
The latter term is an adjective occurring only in the later parts of the Hebrew Bible and signifying a descendant of Yehudhah (Judah), the fourth son of Jacob, whose tribe, together with that of his half brother Benjamin, constituted the Kingdom of Judah.''
