ir sense of justice. As a matter of fact, it was
the consciousness of the Jewish people of its priestly mission that has
made it a pattern of loyalty for all time.

7. Moreover, the fear of profaning the divine name became the highest
incentive to, and safeguard of the morality of the Jew. Every misdeed
toward a non-Jew is considered by the teachers of Judaism a double sin,
yea, sometimes, an unpardonable one, because it gives a false impression
of the moral standard of Judaism and infringes upon the honor of God as
well as that of man. The disciples of Rabbi Simeon ben Shetach once bought
an ass for him from an Arab, and to their joy found a precious stone in
its collar. "Did the seller know of this gem?" asked the master. On being
answered in the negative, he called out angrily, "Do you consider me a
barbarian? Return the Arab his precious stone immediately!" And when the
heathen received it back, he cried out, "Praised be the God of Simeon ben
Shetach!"(1125) Thus the conscientious Jew honors his God by his conduct,
says the Talmud, referring to this and many similar examples. Such lessons
of the Jew's responsibility for the recognition of the high moral purity
of his religion have ever constituted a high barrier against immoral acts.

The words, "Be ye holy, for I the Lord your God am holy" form
significantly the introduction to the chapter on the love of man, the
nineteenth chapter of Leviticus, placed at the very center of the entire
Priestly Code. "Your self-sanctification sanctifies Me, as it were," says
God to Israel, according to the interpretation of this verse by the
sages.(1126) In contrast to heathendom, which deifies nature with its
appeal to the senses, Judaism teaches that holiness is a moral quality, as
it means the curbing of the senses. And in order to prevent Israel, the
bearer of this ideal of holiness, from sinking into the mire of heathen
wantonness and lust, the separation of the Jew from the heathen world,
whether in his domestic or social life, was a necessity and became the
rule and maxim of his life for that period. All the many prohibitions and
commands had for their object the purification of the people in order to
render the highest moral purity a hereditary virtue among them, according
to the rabbis.(1127)

8. It is true that the accumulation of "law upon law, prohibition upon
prohibition" by the rabbis had eventually the same injurious effect which
it had exerted upon the priests in th