LEV264 In the biblical rationalization of Israel's conquest of Canaan there are a number of ethical implications. (a) It rejects the self-glorification of the conqueror, the spirit of "My power and the might of mine own hand has given me all this" (Deuteronomy 8:17). (b) It sets up an objective standard equally applicable to all. Israel was ultimately rationally compelled to apply to itself what it believed to be a divinely ordained principle. God, who permitted and even commanded Israel to dispossess the Canaanites, could summon others to exile Israel if it sank to the spiritual level of the inhabitants it replaced (this and previous verses). Israel applied the same measuring rod to itself when it was expelled from the land first by the Babylonians and later by the Romans. On every Sabbath and Festival the synagogue liturgy reminds Jews that it was not the power of the Babylonian or Roman armies which deprived them of their homeland, but their own sins. Sabbath and Festival Prayer Book, pp. 140, 150. They failed in their responsibility to do their share as God's partners in maintaining the integrity of the foundations of His throne, and he acted through His appointed messengers to compensate for their failure.

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LEV265 People are moved [to repentance] in four different ways: ... 3. By witnessing the punishment of others... When a person observes the testing and severe punishment inflicted by the Creator on one who took the route he himself had taken in deviating from His service, he learns a lesson from [the plight of] his fellow and turns back to God, for fear of His punishment and fierce vengeance. He is like a servant who flees from his master and then hears an account of the punishment inflicted on another who also had fled. He takes the lesson to heart and returns to his master, to beg his forgiveness and pardon, before he too should suffer punishment. Scripture therefore says, “So that the land not vomit you out for defiling it, as it vomited out the nation that was before you” Vayikra 18:28).

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LEV266 See [[LEV230]] Leviticus 18:6 nakedness DORFFLOV 174-5

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LEV267 See [[LEV230]] Leviticus 18:6 nakedness DORFFLOV 174-5

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LEV268 (Continued from [[DEUT416]] Deuteronomy 10:12 request GATES 167). The Rabbinic decrees and the restrictions are the basis [for following] the path to fear of Hashem. They create a fence and a distancing, preventing one from contact with a prohibition of the Torah, just the way an owner of a field fences in his field, because of its prized value, for he fears lest people enter his property and turn it into a place for the grazing of cattle and the roaming of sheep (Yeshayahu 7:25). [The above stated concept] is similar to what it says: "'You shall safeguard my restrictions' [this verse]--make a safeguard for My safeguards" (Yevamos 21a). Extreme vigilance, a fence, and distancing from prohibitions is fundamental to fearing Hashem; one who expands on his vigilance will come to the great reward, as the pasuk says (Tehillim 19:12), "Moreover, Your servant is careful with them; in safeguarding them there is abounding reward."

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LEV269 Something fundamental happens at the beginning of Parashat Kedoshim, whose story is one of the greatest, if unacknowledged, contributions of Judaism to the world. Until now Leviticus has been largely about sacrifices, purity, the Sanctuary, and the priesthood. It has been, in short, about a holy place, holy offerings, and the elite and holy people--Aaron and his descendants--who minister there. Suddenly, in chapter nineteen, the text opens up to embrace the whole of the people in the whole of life: "The Lord said to Moses, 'Speak to the entire assembly of Israel and say to them: be holy because I, the Lord your God, am holy'" [this and preceding verse]. This is the first and only time in Leviticus that so inclusive an address is commanded. The sages said that it meant that the contents of the chapter were proclaimed by Moses to a formal gathering of the entire nation (hak'hel). It is the people as a whole who are commanded to "be holy," not just an elite, the priests. It is life itself that is to be sanctified, as the chapter goes on to make clear. Holiness is to be made manifest in the way the nation makes its clothes and plants its fields, in the way justice is administered, workers are paid, and business conducted. The vulnerable – – the deaf, the blind, the elderly, and the stranger – – are to be afforded special protection. The whole society is to be governed by love, without resentment or revenge. What we witness here in other words, is the radical democratization of holiness.

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LEV287 The maxim, "To love the neighbor as thyself, I am thy Lord," (Leviticus 19:18) lays down a positive command that is unattainable in practice. The conclusion of the order, "I am the Lord," indicates that it must remain a goal, even if it cannot be reached. We are called upon to "walk in His ways," and to act as He does, though we shall never achieve that consummation, "Holy shall ye become, for I the Lord am holy." [this verse].

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LEV284 The commandment, "Be ye holy, for I am holy," [this verse] articulates one of the basic motivations in the Jewish tradition. We are to become that which God is. Since God is beyond and above all our experience, we can fulfill ourselves only in the striving to transcend our own being. Creatures that we are, we are bidden to become like the Creator. Our "accidental" situation as children of nature is somewhat insufficient--we must rise above ourselves, as it were. Indeed, nothing is so characteristic of human nature at its best as our many-sided endeavor to push back the existential boundaries that hem us in. We rebel against the finality of death and seek to grasp Eternity; we realize that human satisfactions are illusions, and we yearn for the delight that we will not sour; we resent the bitter and manifold evils of life and we long for the realm of perfection. All these longings are blended together by the Psalmist in the one affirmation, "and I, the nearness of God is my good." Psalm 73:28.

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LEV271 … there is a special kind of holiness that Jews are commanded to fulfill: making God's name holy. God equates Jews becoming holy with His holiness, and the commandment to be holy stems from God's Holiness. Thus, part of a Jew's holiness is attained by making God's name holy [this verse and Leviticus 20:26]. In addition, there is both a positive commandment to make God's name holy and a negative commandment not to desecrate God's name (Leviticus 22:32). This is achieved in the way in which a Jew behaves on an individual basis in daily life. If, by a Jew's action, people will think better of the Jewish God, that is a sanctification of God's name, making it holy. If, however, people will think worse of the Jewish God because of the action of a particular individual, that person has desecrated the name and holiness of God. (For further development of this mitzvah, see the chapter "Purpose of Life.") Thus, holiness of a person is also reflected in how people perceive God because of that person.

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LEV274 Another approach to holiness is the one most people think of when asked to describe the concept. This is the view of Rashi, who describes holiness in his commentary to [this verse]. Rashi says abstain from illicit sexual activity. It seems from Rashi that one achieves holiness by abstaining from those things forbidden to the Jew. This is classic Christian definition of holiness as well. The more one denies the bodily pleasures, the more one becomes holy. Long before Christianity existed, this concept existed in Judaism. As noted earlier, the illicit sexual activity with a prostitute is associated philologically with the Hebrew term for holiness. Similarly, the Torah states that the purpose of the laws of kashrut are to attain holiness (See chapter "Food" for a further examination of this idea). Thus, abstention from the two basic physical drives of man, sex and food, leads a person to holiness, according to this idea of holiness.

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