The Crown of Sinai

Hi,

"If you do not lead a godly life, if you live in a manner unworthy of the Name you bear, if you harbour lies and selfishness in your mind and heart, if you possession is unjust, if your pleasure is mean, if your deeds are heartless, if you profane the Crown of Sinai, just to indulge a mood, a liking, a preference – if your life shows that the all-holy G-d and His holy will are not sacred to you, that you do not hold them as the highest and that you hold other things above them – possessions, pleasure, worldly honours, or anything else – to which you would sacrifice the former, see, then, not only do you kill in yourself the Holy Name, so that it no longer educates you to holiness, but you also destroy its sacred acknowledgment in the mind of your brother, you show that one can be a Jew and yet be unjust, and profane, and heartless – and invite others to be the same. Do not profane the Holy Name."

(Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch, Horeb, paragraph 611)

Have a great day,
Mordechai