The sanctification of God’s Name is a duty incumbent on all mankind, but it is incumbent on us Jews in a higher degree, for we are called the people of the Lord, the chosen people, a holy nation, and a kingdom of priests. We sanctify the name of God by remaining faithful to Him and to His Word, resisting every kind of force or temptation to turn us away from our faith, making sacrifices for our holy religion, and conducting ourselves in such a manner that our fellow-men may become convinced that the tree of our Law bears good and holy fruit. Every action that brings disgrace upon us as Israelites, and causes our neighbours to despise “the people of the Lord, who profess to be the guardians of the revealed Torah,” is ‏חלול השם‎ “Profanation of the Name of God.” “And ye shall not profane my holy name, but I will be hallowed among the children of Israel” (Lev. xxii. 32). “Profanation of the name of God is a greater sin even than idolatry” (Babyl. Talm. Sanhedrin 106a). Imitating the Ways of God.—We know that God is perfect, and that all His ways are perfect; we are conscious also of our weakness and of the impossibility of ever becoming perfect. But this conviction must not deter us from seeking perfection as far as our nature permits it, or from setting before us the ways of God as an example for us to follow, as the aim which should direct the course of our life, the balance in which to weigh our actions, and the test by which to determine their value. “Ye shall be holy; for I, the Lord your God, am holy” (Lev. xix. 2). “I set the Lord always before me” (Ps. xvi. 8). “‘Ye shall walk after the Lord your God’ (Deut. xiii. 5). Is it possible for man to walk after the Lord? Has it not been said, ‘The Lord thy God is a consuming fire’? (ibid. iv. 24). The meaning of the verse, however, is this: Follow the ways of God: He clothes the naked, as we are told, ‘And the Lord God made coats of skin for Adam and his wife’ (Gen. iii. 21); do the same. He visits the sick, as is indicated in the words, ‘And God appeared to him in the plain of Mamre’ (ibid. xviii. 1); you must also visit the sick. He comforts the mourners, as appears from the passage, ‘And it came to pass after the death of Abraham, that God blessed his son Isaak’ (ibid. xxv. 11); do the same, and comfort mourners,” &c. (Babyl. Talm. Sotah 14a).