general contemporary distribution of the world's dominant religions Sources: Map: "Modern Distribution of World Religions", http://religion.wadsworth.com/student/maps 1. "Major Religions of the World" www.adherents.com/Religions_By_Adherents.html 2. Univ. of Georgia Dept. of Religion <www.arches.uga.edu/~godlas/home.html

      A semite, or semitic person originally meant one of a people believed to be descended from Shem, the son of Noah. The Hebrew people are believed to be descendants of Heber, a great grandson of Noah. From this lineage of Noah, Shem and Heber come Abraham, Ishmael, Isaac, and Jacob. Jacob’s name was changed to Israel and his descendants are called the Israelites.
      The founders of Judaism, Christianity and Islam were all semitic people.
      The ancient semitic populations were nomads who as early as 2500 BC began to migrate from Arabia to Mesopotamia, the Mediterranean coast, the Nile delta and southern Palestine.
      Semitic has now come to describe any of the people speaking a semitic language, which includes Arabic, Hebrew, and Aramaic.

Commandments to the House of Jacob, the Children of Israel according to Moses *

1 And God spoke all these words, saying
2 I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.
3 You shall have no other Gods except Me.
4 You shall not make for yourself any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above,
   or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.
5 You shall not worship them nor serve them; for I the Lord your God am a zealous god,
   visiting the offenses of the fathers upon their children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate me;
6 And showing mercy to thousands of generations of those who love Me and keep My commandments.
7 You shalt not take a false oath in the name of the Lord your God; for the Lord will not declare him innocent
   who takes an oath in His name falsely.
8 Remember the sabbath day to keep it holy.
9 Six days shall you labour and do all your work;
10 But the seventh is a sabbath to the lord your god; in it you shall not do any work, you, nor your son, nor your
    daughter, nor your manservant, nor your maidservant, nor your cattle, nor the sojourner who dwells in your towns;
11 For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the seas, and all things there are in them, and rested on the seventh day;
    therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and sanctified it.
12 Honour your father and your mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God gives you.
13 You shall not kill.
14 You shall not commit adultery.
15 You shall not steal.
16 You shall not bear false witness against your neighbour
17 You shall not covet your neighbour’s house, you shall not covet your neighbour’s wife, nor his manservant,
    nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor anything that is your neighbour’s.

* from the translation from the Aramaic bible — Exodus 20:1–17

There are over 600 other rules and regulations elsewhere in the Hebrew scriptures (Old Testament).

"A gentile came to Shammai and said to him, 'Accept me as a proselyte on the condition that you teach me the whole law while I stand on one foot.' Shammai drove him away with the measuring rod that he held in his hand. Then he went to Hillel, who received him as a proselyte and said to him, 'What is hateful to you do not to your neighbour. That is the whole Torah; the rest is commentary. Now go and study.'"
   -   Talmud, Shabbat 31a