But I'm not like them…

The Jewish community has every right to be protective of its ingrained, God-given concern for ethics and compassion. The problem among Jews and Gentiles alike, however, is the tendency for those who observe and comment upon wrongdoing to separate themselves from the category of ungodly perpetrator. This is the universal human way. It is our means of shoring up our dearly held conviction that we, the godly, are in a different position from the ungodly. This self-protective stance is enshrined in Jesus’ parable of the Pharisee who prayed, “God, I thank thee that I am not like other men,” contrasted with the tax collector who cried out, “God, be merciful to me a sinner.” It is the tax collector who “went down to his house justified rather than the other” (Luke 18:9—14). The thrust of Luke’s parable of justification is extended ad infinitum by Pau1’s cosmic conception of what the dikaiosyne of God can accomplish.—Fleming Rutledge, The Crucifixion, 588