The Greek term for heresy, αἵρεσις, originally denoted "division," "sect," "religious" or "philosophical party," is applied by Josephus to the three Jewish sects—Sadducees, Pharisees, and Essenes.
"[8] Rabbi Akiva says, "Also one who reads external literature" (Hebrew: רבי עקיבא אומר אף הקורא בספרים החיצונים).
[12] In summarizing the Talmudic statements concerning heretics in Sanhedrin 90-103, Maimonides says:[13] The following have no share in the world to come, but are cut off, and perish, and receive their punishment for all time for their great sin: the minim, the apikoresim, they that deny the belief in the Torah, they that deny the belief in resurrection of the dead and in the coming of the Redeemer, the apostates, they that lead many to sin, they that turn away from the ways of the [Jewish] community.
The following three are called 'koferim ba-Torah': (1) he who says the Torah is not from God: he is a kofer even if he says a single verse or letter thereof was said by Moses of his own accord; (2) he who denies the traditional interpretation of the Torah and opposes those authorities who declare it to be tradition, as did Zadok and Boethus; and (3) he who says, as do the Nazarenes and the Mohammedans, that the Lord has given a new dispensation instead of the old, and that he has abolished the Law, though it was originally divine.However, Abraham ben David, in his critical notes, objects to Maimonides characterizing as heretics all those who attribute corporeality to God, and he insinuates that the Kabbalists are not heretics.
In the same sense all biblical critics who, like Abraham ibn Ezra in his notes on Deuteronomy 1:2, doubt or deny the Mosaic authorship of every portion of the Pentateuch, would protest against the Maimonidean (or Talmudic; see Sanh.
The Talmud states that the punishment for some kinds of heretic is to be "lowered into a pit, but not raised out of it",[14] meaning that there are types of people who may legitimately be killed.
[16] Maimonides wrote that "It is a mitzvah, however, to eradicate Jewish traitors, minnim, and apikorsim, and to cause them to descend to the pit of destruction, since they cause difficulty to the Jews and sway the people away from God.
"[17] The heretic was excluded from a portion in the world to come;[18] he was consigned to Gehenna, to eternal punishment,[19] but the Jewish courts of justice never attended to cases of heresy; they were left to the judgment of the community.
[39][40] Tinok shenishba (Hebrew: תינוק שנשבה, literally, "captured infant" [among gentiles])[41] is a Talmudic term for a Jew who sins inadvertently due to having been raised without an appreciation for the Judaism practiced by their ancestors.
[42] As with most instances of Talmudic terminology, derived from a specific scenario[43] but applied to wider metaphorical analogies, an individual does not literally have to have been "captured" as an infant to fall within the definition of a tinok shenishba.
That it applies to the many unaffiliated and unobservant Jews in contemporary society[44] is the basis for the various Orthodox Jewish outreach professionals and organizations; even non-professionals make efforts to draw them closer.