President of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, Josef Schuster, described the new venture as a major milestone for the Jewish community.
He said for the first time in a very long while, a textbook series was being created that was specifically aligned with the curriculum, and offered comprehensive supplementary material.
All this meant that Jewish religious education in Germany was now “on equal footing with Christian religious subjects”, he said.
Josef Schuster, President of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, attends a press conference on September 30, 2025, to present a research report on antisemitism in Germany since October 7. (Photo by Maja Hitij/Getty Images)Getty Images
The books are not restricted to Jewish schools. They are designed for pupils studying Jewish religious education, whether it is taught in a Jewish school or an ordinary German state school.
The series is intended for teachers and pupils across all German federal states.
The books are being written specifically to fit the official curriculum for Jewish religious education in Germany.
That means each volume takes the subjects pupils are already required to learn at particular ages — such as Torah, Jewish law, prayer, festivals, ethics and history — and organises its chapters, exercises and teaching materials around those curriculum requirements.
Schools therefore do not have to change their curriculum to accommodate the books.
Instead, Da’at Hadorot has been designed to provide the textbooks and supplementary materials needed to teach the existing curriculum.
This is significant because Jewish religious education has lacked the kind of modern, curriculum-aligned textbook series long available for Christian religious education.
Eight workbooks for Years 5–10 are planned, together with teachers’ materials and training.
The project aims to tackle a core practical problem facing Jewish education in Germany, whereby teachers have previously relied on a patchwork of available materials.
This has left teachers having to largely rely on translated primary-school worksheets, an upper-secondary ethics book and materials they developed themselves.
The new series will provide a systematic resource which can be used both in Jewish schools and communities across Germany.
It is primarily intended for teachers of Jewish religious education across Germany’s federal states, with accompanying teaching guides also planned, and will also be interactive.
Children can solve picture puzzles, follow Moshe’s life through a dice game and use QR codes on their phones to test their knowledge of religious vocabulary.
Hebrew terminology is deliberately woven throughout the books as part of an effort to strengthen Jewish knowledge and identity.
Translations and transliterations are nevertheless included so children without Hebrew knowledge are not excluded.
The new books are designed for non-Jews and a diverse generation of young Jews, which includes everything from Orthodox and secular families, fluent Hebrew speakers to children who can barely read the alphabet, and youngsters who regularly attend synagogue alongside those who identify as culturally Jewish.
The work has been produced by the Central Council of Jews in Germany in co-operation with major educational publisher Ernst Klett Verlag, one of Germany’s largest educational and schoolbook publishers.
Seven further volumes are planned, with the ambitious target of publishing one each year, and will cover the Tanach, prayer, ethics, halachah, festivals, the Jewish life cycle and Jewish history.
Before the Nazis came to power, Jewish religious education was firmly established in Germany.
Jewish pupils received formal instruction, and there were dedicated Jewish schools in major cities across the country.
The Nazis excluded Jewish children from German schools in 1938 before closing Jewish schools and prohibiting their education altogether in 1942.
Post-war Jewish education then had to be completely rebuilt from a devastated community.
