Hibernate is a powerful, high performance object/relational persistence and query service. Hibernate lets you develop persistent classes following object-oriented idiom, including association, inheritance, polymorphism, composition, and collections.

Hibernate allows you to express queries in its own portable SQL extension (HQL), native SQL, or with an object-oriented Criteria and Example API. Unlike many other persistence solutions, Hibernate does not hide the power of SQL from you. It guarantees that your investment in relational technology and knowledge is as valid as always.