From the combination of inanimate matter comes life -- an idea echoed in the story of the Golem. Although many Golem tales exist, the most famous tells the story of the sixteenth-century Rabbi Judah Loew ben Bezalel of Prague. At the time, Jews in Prague suffered under the rule of the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II, who exiled or killed anyone practicing the Jewish faith. As the story goes, the Rabbi, wanting to protect the Jewish community in Prague, constructed a Golem out of clay from the Vltava River then, through Hebrew incantations, brought it to life.

The Golem, however, turned on its creator, wreaking havoc throughout the city. The Emperor, promising to stop persecuting the Jewish community, begged the Rabbi to stop the destruction; the Rabbi agreed. On the Golem's forehead was written the word "emet," meaning "truth" -- wiping out the "e," the Rabbi left simply "met," or "death." The Golem turned back into a lump of inanimate clay.

The Golem's body was storied in the synagogue's genizah -- a depository typically reserved for used papers.