Nicole Richie and High School Musical star Zac Efron, Lauren Conrad are big on the red kabbalah string Madonna made famous a few years ago.

Zac Efron wears kabbalah string?

Richie’s and Conrad’s strings each have a charm of a hand on them called a “hamsa,� explains Rabbi Shmuley Boteach of TLC’s Shalom in the Home.

“It’s a kabbalistic symbol. Wearing it is meant to bring down God’s mercy and kindness.�

But a rep for Efron, 19 , tells Us his bracelet “is not a kabbalah string. “There’s no religious meaning to it.�