than the doom he
pronounced came upon those wicked men. But then spoke the Lord God to the
heavenly charioteer Michael: "Stop at once, lest My righteous servant
Abraham in his just indignation bring death upon all My creatures, because
they are not as righteous as he. He has not learned to restrain his
anger."(291) Thus, indeed, the wrath kindled at the sight of wrongdoing
would consume the sinner at once, were it not for another quality in God,
called in Scripture _long-suffering_. By this He restrains His anger and
gives the sinner time to improve his ways. Though every wicked deed
provokes Him to immediate punishment, yet He shows compassion upon the
feeble mortal. "Even in wrath He remembereth compassion."(292) "He hath no
delight in the death of the sinner, but that he shall return from his ways
and live."(293) The divine holiness does not merely overwhelm and consume;
its essential aim is the elevation of man, the effort to endow him with a
higher life.

2. It is perfectly true that a note of rigor and of profound earnestness
runs through the pages of Holy Writ. The prophets, law-givers, and
psalmists speak incessantly of how guilt brings doom upon the lands and
nations. As the father who is solicitous of the honor of his household
punishes unrelentingly every violation of morality within it, so the Holy
One of Israel watches zealously over His people's loyalty to His covenant.
His glorious name, His holy majesty cannot be violated with immunity from
His dreaded wrath. There is nothing of the joyous abandon which was
predominant in the Greek nature and in the Olympian gods. The ideal of
holiness was presented by the God of Israel, and all the doings of men
appeared faulty beside it.

But its power of molding character is shown by Judaism at this very point,
in that it does not stop at the condemnation of the sinner. It holds forth
the promise of God's forbearance to man in his shortcomings, due to His
compassion on the weakness of flesh and blood. He waits for man, erring
and stumbling, until by striving and struggling he shall attain a higher
state of purity. This is the bright, uplifting side of the Jewish idea of
the divine holiness. In this is the innermost nature of God disclosed. In
fear and awe of Him who is enthroned on high, "before whom even the angels
are not pure," man, conscious of his sinfulness, sinks trembling into the
dust before the Judge of the whole earth. But the grace and mercy of the
long-