Let My People Know

"Torah signifies that which instructs and enlightens"

 

In many respects, tradition in Judaism is called Torah. 

And this is one of the words that have no exact translation.

The accepted translation, law, is certainly incorrect. 

Torah, even in its verbal meaning, includes the Bible as well as the law, philosophy, dream, legend, and everything else that constitutes human life. 

The one word, Torah, signifies that which instructs and enlightens.

It is much broader and more dynamic a concept than simply the teaching. 

And the subject of Torah, that which carries it, or the medium through which it is manifest, is Knesset Yisrael

The translated concept is "the assembly of Israel," but it is not at all a statistical totality or a numerical sum of a particular group of people. 

It is that which one may loosely call the soul of the people. 

–Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz
 
 
From On Being Free by Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz