The moral imperative was not disclosed for the first time through Abraham or Sinai. The criminality of murder was known to men before; even the institution of the seventh day was, according to tradition, familiar to Jews when still in Egypt. Nor was the idea of divine justice unknown. What was new the idea that justice is an obligation to God, His way not only His demand;* that injustice is not something God scorns when done by others but that which is the very opposite of God; that the rights of man are not legally protected interests of society but the sacred interests of God.
* (f.n no. 4) " The ways of God differ from those of man; whereas man directs others to do a thing whilst he does nothing, God only tells Israel to do and observe those things which He himself does." Exodus Rabba 30, 9. See Jerushalmi Rosh Hashanah 1, 3, 7a
A.J. Heschel, God in Search of Man, FSG, pp. 287 -288, 292
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