Salvation

Salvation (Latin salvatio; Greek sōtēria; Hebrew yeshu'ah) is being saved or protected from harm or being saved or delivered from some dire situation. In religion, salvation is stated as the saving of the soul from sin and its consequences.

The academic study of salvation is called soteriology.

Meaning

In religion, salvation is the saving of the soul from sin and its consequences. It may also be called "deliverance" or "redemption" from sin and its effects. Salvation is considered to be caused either by the grace of a deity, by free will and personal efforts through prayer and asceticism, or by some combination of the two. Religions often emphasize the necessity of both personal effort—for example, repentance and asceticism—and divine action (e.g. grace).

Abrahamic religions

Judaism

In contemporary Judaism, redemption (Hebrew ge'ulah), refers to God redeeming the people of Israel from their various exiles. This includes the final redemption from the present exile.

Judaism holds that adherents do not need personal salvation as Christians believe. Jews do not subscribe to the doctrine of Original sin. Instead, they place a high value on individual morality as defined in the law of God — embodied in what Jews know as the Torah or The Law, given to Moses by God on Mount Sinai, the summary of which is comprised in the Ten Commandments. The Jewish sage Hillel the Elder states that The Law can be further compressed in just one line, popularly known as the Golden Rule: "That which is hateful to you, do not do unto your fellow".