“The Haughtiness of the Priesthood” (Isa 65,5) 243 The speaker is warning the people for the latters’ sake: if the people came in contact with something holy, they would bring upon themselves God’s fatal anger (cf. 2 Sam 6,7) (25). The reading in the Vulgate suggests that the speaker expresses concern for his own holiness, that is fearing that if a common person touched him, he himself would become polluted (26). There are, however, objections to both interpretations. Concerning the second possibility, there is no textual evidence in the MT that the priests feared contact with others lest they themselves become profaned. The concern is always on the people around them. Even the Piel in Ezek 44,19 focuses on the people: the priests had to change clothes before leaving the temple for the benefit of the people outside, rather than for their own sake (cf. Ezek 42,14). Num 18,1-7 emphasizes God’s dangerous holiness, speaking about Levitical service: if a Levite touched any of the holy vessels or the altar, both the Levites and the priests would die (v. 3). Further, the Levites alone were allowed to touch the priests. No stranger was allowed in the priests’ presence (v. 4), lest he die (v. 7). Thus, the idea that the priests feared pollution of their own holiness is not likely and we may deem the second interpretation unlikely. There are also objections to the first possibility. First, the use of short imperatives in “ybAçgtAla” and “˚yla brq” does not seem to mirror any actual concern for the speakers. Rather, these expressions form brusque reprimands. Furthermore, we would have expected the following ˚ytçdq to be a Piel form, similarly to Ezek 44,19, to be rendered “because I will make you holy” which might prove fatal. Given that I deemed the revocalization of ˚ytçdq to a Piel unlikely on both linguistical and textual grounds, it is, however, difficult to accommodate such an exegesis. Hence, I maintain that the issue is not the contagiousness of holiness. Instead, the solution lies, in my view, in the comparative sense of ˚ytçdq. As already alluded to above, I suggest that the whole saying in Isa 65,5 is a direct quote of something a priest said in response to the prophet’s implied claim of equal holiness. Thus, the two expressions “ybAagtAla” and “˚yla brq” are yet additional expressions of the priests’ disdain for their opponents and their own sense of superiority and self-righteousness. * ** In this article, I have shown that the person speaking in Isa 65,5 is a priest. I have reached this conclusion by investigating both the grammatical and the contextual aspects of the verse in question. Taken together with its immediate context, 65,5 should therefore be understood as critical towards the Jerusalem clergy. The occurrence of a similar critique, i.e. that of unorthodox worship of YHWH and/ or other deities in 66,3, further supports such an identification. (25) E.g., DELITZSCH, Jesaia, 616. (26) E.g., J. MUILENBURG, The Book of Isaiah. Chapters 40–66 (IB 5; Nashville 1956) 748, who argues that the speakers have become holy as a result of the rites described in vv. 3-4, and fear that contact with others would render them profane.