Abstract

At its core, Judaism is a religion of performance. This is to suggest neither that there is no performative element to other religions nor that there is no interior spiritual aspect to Judaism. But there is a certain irony in the fact that this tradition, perceived as the foundation of Western monotheism—the belief in one God—has since before the destruction of the second Holy Temple in Jerusalem (70 ce) been predicated upon the willingness of its adherents to perform some, most, or all of 613 mitzvot (positive and negative behavioral commandments). ² Performance has shaped the Jewish experience; periods of persecution have been punctuated by prohibitions on Jewish behaviors, while Jewish survival has often depended on the performance of ritualized or commanded acts.