to proclaim the priestly holiness of the people by a
blue fringe at the border of the garments.(1111)

Whereas from the time of Ezra to Simon the Just priestly rulers endeavored
to promote the work of educating the people for holiness, the pious men
from among the people made still greater efforts to assert the claim of
holiness for the entire Jewish people as a priest-nation.(1112) The
repasts of these pious fellowships should be in no way inferior in
sanctity to those of the priests in the Temple. New ceremonies of
sanctification were to open and close the Sabbaths and festivals. Symbols
of priestly consecration should adorn forehead and arm in the form of the
phylacteries (_tefillin_), and should be placed at the entrance of every
house in the so-called _mezuzzah_. "God has given unto all an heritage
(the Torah), the kingdom, the priesthood, and the sanctuary"(1113)--this
became the _leitmotif_ for the Pharisaic school, who constantly enlarged
the domain of piety so that it should include the whole of life. Whoever
did not belong to this circle of the pious was regarded with scorn as one
of the lower class (_am ha-aretz_).

5. The chief effort of the pious, the founders of the Judaism of the
Synagogue, was to keep the Jewish people from the demoralizing influences
of pagan nature-worship, represented first by Semitic and later by Greek
culture. The leaders of the Pharisees "built a fence about the law"(1114)
extending the prohibition of mingling with the heathen nations so as also
to prohibit eating with them and participating in their feasts and social
gatherings,--not for the preservation of the Jewish race merely, as
Christian theologians maintain, but for the sake of keeping its inner life
intact and pure.(1115) "God surrounded us with brazen walls, hedged us in
with laws of purity in regard to food and drink and physical contact, yea,
even to that which we see and hear, in order that we should be pure in
body and soul, free from absurd beliefs, not polluted by contact with
others or through association with the wicked; for most of the peoples
defile themselves with their sexual practices, and whole lands pride
themselves upon it. But we hold ourselves aloof from all this"--so spoke
Eleazar the priest to King Ptolemy Philadelphus, according to the Letter
of Aristeas, thus giving expression to the sentiment most deeply rooted in
the souls of the pious of that period.(1116) They strove to build up a
nation of whom