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Halakha (Hebrew: הלכה) — also transliterated Halocho (Yiddish pronunciation) and Halacha — is the collective body of Jewish religious law, including biblical law (the 613 mitzvot) and later talmudic and rabbinic law, as well as customs and traditions.
Judaism classically draws no distinction in its laws between religious and ostensibly non-religious life. Hence, Halakha guides not only religious practices and beliefs, but numerous aspects of day-to-day life. Halakha is often translated as "Jewish Law", although a more literal translation might be "the path" or "the way of walking." The word is derived from the Hebrew root that means to go or to walk.
Historically, Halakha served many Jewish communities as an enforceable avenue of civil and religious law. In the modern era, Jewish citizens may be bound to Halakha only by their voluntary consent. Under contemporary Israeli law, however, certain areas of Israeli family and personal status law are under the authority of the rabbinic courts and are therefore treated according to Halakha.
Reflecting the diversity of Jewish communities, somewhat different approaches to Halakha are found among Ashkenazi, Mizrahi, Sephardi, and Yemenite Jews.
The name Halakha is derived from the Hebrew halakh הלך, which means "to walk" or "to go"; thus a literal translation does not yield "law", but rather "the way to go". The term Halakha may refer to a single law, to the literary corpus of rabbinic legal texts, or to the overall system of religious law. The root may be Semitic aqqa, meaning "to be true, be suitable".
The Halakha is often contrasted with the Aggadah, the diverse corpus of rabbinic exegetical, narrative, philosophical, mystical, and other "non-legal" literatures. At the same time, since writers of Halakha may draw upon the aggadic and even mystical literature, there is a dynamic interchange between the genres.
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