The commentaries ask: what is the meaning of the command to “be holy” as a unique obligation? Is not the objective of every mitzvah, and of the entire Torah, for us to be sanctified?
Ramban explains that the Torah’s directive to “be holy,” or in a broader sense to set ourselves apart, indeed refers to a distinct effort to sanctify ourselves—independent of the inherent sanctity that we achieve through the observance of the Torah’s commands and prohibitions. Here the Torah warns us not to be “a hedonist with the Torah’s permission,” i.e. not to indulge excessively in the pleasures of the world even when they are technically permissible.
“Therefore,” continues the Ramban, “after enumerating the things that it forbids entirely, the Torah adds the general directive: ‘Be holy.’ Constrain yourself and resist even that which is permissible.”
Upon honest self-reckoning, however, one might assume that the Torah’s directive to “be holy,” to sanctify oneself even with that which is permitted, is directed at people who are already perfect in their observance of all the Torah’s explicit commands and prohibitions. But can it be that a person who is still struggling to abstain from the things the Torah blatantly prohibits is instructed to refrain even from indulging in the permissible?
G-d therefore prefaced His command with the somewhat unusual introduction, “Speak to the entire congregation,” thereby emphasizing that all Jews, regardless of their weaknesses or spiritual struggles, are expected to—and therefore certainly have the capacity to—not only observe the Torah’s laws, but sanctify themselves even beyond the letter of the law.
—Likkutei Sichos, vol. 7, pp. 323–324
