Justice or righteousness (they translate the same Hebrew word: tsedek) is that by which Israel lives, that by which it maintains its existence as Yahweh's chosen people. To act righteously, or justly, is to act in such a way as to maintain the covenant.

When Yahweh intervened to deliver the Israelites from Egypt, he set them apart from all other nations; and on Mount Sinai he bound them to himself by a perpetual contract. They became a nation set apart for Yahweh, who although Lord of all the world freely chose them for his own through no merit of theirs. By this act Yahweh revealed his righteousness to Israel, and even imposed it on them too through the law, as the charter of the covenant. So the Hebrew law is quite unlike the law of other peoples: it is entirely theological, and is not the expression of the will of the people or of their ruler.