III.  The Facts Underlying the Ezra Tradition.  The later records make it clear that during the latter part of the Persian period the attitude of the Jews in Palestine toward their neighbors became more and more exclusive.  Nehemiah appears to have given a great impetus to the movement which ultimately resulted in the Samaritan schism and the high wall that henceforth separated Jew and Gentile.  The emphasis on the strict observation of the sabbath grew stronger and stronger, until at the beginning of the Greek period the Jews of Jerusalem preferred to fall before the sword of their foes rather than fight on the sabbath day (cf.  Section CIII).  The ritual of the temple became even more elaborate, and its income was greatly increased during the latter part of the Persian period.  The extension of the territory of the Judean community implied that its numbers were increased by the return of loyal Jews attracted by the security offered by its walls and by the new spirit that animated the Jews of Palestine.  The priestly laws which were formulated to meet the new needs of the Judean community appear to have been written in Palestine and by those closely connected with the temple service, but in the emphasis upon the sabbath and in their endeavor to prevent marriage with foreigners they suggest the presence and influence of Jews who had returned from the land of the dispersion.  It is possible that among those who thus returned was the priest Ezra, and he may have been at the head of one of these groups of returning exiles.  In the days of Josiah the code contained in the newly discovered Book of the Covenant was presented to the people in a public assembly and adopted and enforced by the king, who acted as the representative of the people (Section LXXXIII:iii).  It is probable that in the small Judean community new regulations gained acceptance in the same way, except that the people were represented by their nobles and priests rather than by a king.  The tradition of Ezra, therefore, is typical of the great movement that shaped the life of Judaism in the century immediately following the work of Nehemiah.

IV.  Origin and Aims of the Priestly Laws.  The late priestly laws which moulded the life of Judaism are found in the books of Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers.  They do not constitute a unified code, but rather are made up of a series of smaller groups of laws, the older nucleus being the Holiness Code found in chapters 17-26 of Leviticus (cf.  Section XCIII:iii).  In some cases variants of the same law are found in different groups.  Certain of these laws simply reiterate in slightly different form those already found in the primitive and Deuteronomic codes; but in general they supplement these earlier codes.  The formulation, collection, and codification of these later laws apparently continued until toward the latter part of the Persian period when the Samaritan schism (Section CIII) fixed them in their present form.