The Jewish People are first and foremost that - a People united by common ancestry, history, culture, language and geography. We are an ethnoreligious group, meaning an ethnic group with a shared religion - Judaism.
Ethnicity refers to a group of people who share distinct ancestry and culture.
Culture refers to characteristics of a particular group of people that includes language, religion, food, dress, music, art, and social behaviors.
Religion refers to a set of beliefs, practices, and systems of a particular group of people, often involving a higher power/s.
Judaism is the ethnic religion of the Jewish people. Ethnic religions are inherited from generation to generation within a specific ethnic group, and are deeply entwined with that ethnic group’s culture, ancestry, and geography. Ethnic religions do not proselytize or seek new members from outside of their ethnic group. However, one does not have to practice Judaism to be Jewish. According to Jewish law, anyone born to a Jewish mother is Jewish.
Anyone can choose to convert to Judaism through a difficult and lengthy process into the religion, by which they also become a member of the ethnic group. Jews who convert to another religion are considered an “apostate,” meaning they have renounced Judaism. Apostasy is a complicated topic, but the general consensus is “once a Jew, always a Jew” - one can renounce Judaism the religion but cannot renounce their Jewish ethnicity.
The Jewish people originated in the Land of Israel, also called Canaan (roughly modern day Jordan, Israel, Palestine, and the southern parts of Syria and Lebanon). We are the descendants of the ancient Canaanites, some of whom became the Hebrews, some of whom became the Israelites. The Israelites divided into two kingdoms, Israel and Judah. Those in Judah became known as Judeans, who later became known as Jews.
The Jewish people experienced numerous persecutions in and expulsions from the Land of Israel over the millennia. This is why there are Jews all over the world - the people spread, not the religion. Jews who left/were forced out of Israel are known as the Diaspora. There are many sub-ethnic groups of Jews who developed their own distinct cultures, the most well-known being Ashkenazi (Jews who settled in Eastern Europe), Sephardic (Jews who settled in the Iberian Peninsula) and Mizrahi (Jews who settled around the middle East).
Hebrew is the ancestral language of the Jewish people. Hebrew is a Semitic language and the last surviving Canaanite language. It was used in daily life from roughly the 13th-2nd centuries BC. When Jews became increasingly persecuted and forced to flee the Land of Israel, Hebrew died out as a daily spoken language but was kept alive through religious practice. After 2000 years, Hebrew was revived as a spoken language in the late 1800s and is now the official language of Israel. The most well-known Diasporic Jewish languages are Yiddish and Ladino. Ashkenazi Jews developed Yiddish, which is a Germanic language that uses the Hebrew alphabet. Sephardi Jews developed Ladino, or Judeo-Spanish, which uses Soletreo, a slightly different script of the Hebrew alphabet.
DNA alone does not make one Jewish, though throughout our history Jews have often practiced endogamy - marrying only within the Jewish community. This was done for cultural and religious reasons, but there were also often laws prohibiting conversion to Judaism or intermarriage between Jews and gentiles, which is why there is distinct Jewish DNA (particularly amongst Ashkenazi Jews). Though there are varying degrees of admixture between the different Jewish Diasporic groups and their host countries, whether due to sexual assault, intermarriage, or conversion (though as stated above, the latter two were often prohibited), studies have shown that most ethnic Jews have a shared ancestry that can be traced to the historical Land of Israel.
There are 3 major movements within Judaism - Orthodox, Conservative, and Reform.
Orthodox Judaism is the most strictly observant of Jewish law. There are many different groups within the Orthodox community. Some Orthodox Jews live in insular communities, some do not. Haredi is an umbrella term often meaning “Ultra Orthodox,” though many view this term as problematic as “ultra” is often conflated with “extremist.” Hasidic Jews are a spiritual revivalist movement of the Jewish mystical tradition. Yeshivish/Litvish Jews are intellectual scholars of Torah and Talmud. Modern Orthodox Jews are often less insular, receiving a secular education in addition to a Jewish one, as well as having jobs within the secular world.
Conservative Judaism (not to be confused with politically conservative) is often thought of as the midway point between Orthodox and Reform. Conservative Jews tend to be more observant of Jewish law than Reform Jews, but less strict than Orthodox Jews.
Reform Judaism tends to value ethics and social justice over Jewish law, and believes Judaism can and should be adapted to modern times. One notable aspect of Reform Judaism is the recognition of Jews of patrilineal descent, whereas the Orthodox and Conservative movements require formal conversion for Jews born to a Jewish father but not a Jewish mother.
Keep in mind the above definitions are broad examples - religious observance is very personal and will vary from person to person regardless of their affiliation. At the end of the day, a Jew is a Jew is a Jew. Many Jews identify solely as secular. Just as DNA alone does not make one Jewish, neither does religious observance.
Judaism is not just a religion, but rather a way of life for the Jewish People. Or, as Jason Harris of the Jew Oughta Know podcast beautifully puts it, Judaism is “the cultural expression of our Jewishness.” Halakhah, Jewish law, can more appropriately be translated to “the path one walks” or “the way.” One aspect of Halakhah is to turn everyday tasks into spiritual ones, so we are ever reminded of our relationship to the Divine.
Almost every Jewish holiday has a spiritual as well as a land-based aspect. Judaism uses the Hebrew calendar, a lunar calendar that is adjusted to follow the seasons and agricultural cycles of the Land of Israel. Each new moon signifies the beginning of each Hebrew month.
In closing, I’ll quote straight from Chabad:
“G‑d wants Judaism to be ingrained in the pattern of our lives. He does not want our festivals to be abstract exercises, divorced from our daily activities. He wants the two to be interwoven; our lives suffused with religion, and our religion etched into life. In plain words, this means that He wants us to be aware of the approaching festival without needing to consult a calendar. He wants us to see our festivals in the change of the seasons, and to think of the season as we consider the festival. He wants life and religion to be seamless.”
Sources:
https://jewishstudies.rutgers.edu/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=159:yiddish-faqs&catid=102#:~:text=Yiddish%20uses%20the%20same%20alphabet,letters%20that%20serve%20as%20vowels.
https://www.babbel.com/en/magazine/how-many-people-speak-hebrew#:~:text=Hebrew%20is%20the%20last%20surviving,Canaanite%20languages%20Aramaic%20and%20Amorite.
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