ABSTRACT
The Rabbins, expounding the words, say that they are an appeal to the Israelite’s conscience—“a plea addressed to the heart.” These sins of oppressing the poor, of taking advantage of the weak and the helpless, are especially to be shunned because the feebleness of the would-be victim constitutes an especially strong temptation to commit them. Hence the exhortation, “Thou shalt fear thy God”—thy God, in whose presence thou are for ever standing, whose eye discerns the most hidden things, and pierces every disguise. For such fear of God is the only worthy fear of Him. It is the fear of the free man who consciously crowns his freedom by obedience, not the terror of the slave who obeys because he is afraid. In short, the fear of God, rightly interpreted, means a vivid and abiding sense of the Divine existence, a sharing in the Divine fellowship.
