tefilla - how do Jews pray?

I am an Indian (from India) and there are hardly any Jews here, except for some Israeli tourists. There are more than 150 million Muslims however.

I want to know if the Jews pray and how they pray. I have read that Muslims and Jews pray in similar style with most of the chants and reciting being almost identical but for the language. I am not able to find the exact details though.

If you can draw a comparison with the Muslim namaz (I am familiar with it) it would be very helpful but just describing the Jewish way of prayer would be as helpful. Any link to English language sites describing the same would also do.

Answer

To supplement, not supplant, Gershon Gold's good answer, I might add that we have:

• prayers with a fixed text that everyone says (morning, afternoon, and evening, as Gershon Gold notes);


• additional prayers that individuals can compose and add into the aforementioned set prayers;


• short prayers with a fixed text said on a variety of occasions, including each time we eat; and


• individually composed prayers (though there are some that have become semistandardized) that can be said at any time.

The first and third of those — the set-script prayers — are preferably said in Hebrew, though can also be said in other languages; the others can be said in any language. The first type is mandatory for all men, and in some cases for women, too; many of them must (for men) be done in a group (so, generally, in a synagogue). The third type is mandatory also (when circumstances dictate, e.g. when one eats), but can be done in private; the second and fourth types are not compulsory.

More info is at Jewish Prayer - Prayer in Judaism.