hand, Israel “had to” see here something much more serious than a violation of this or that commandment, namely, the injuring of that basic obedience, of the actual core of its revelation and faith: Hear, O Israel, your God is one God. Here obedience clashes with obedience, leading to the conflict that had to end on the Cross. Reconciliation and separation appear thus to be tied up in a virtually insolvable paradox. In the Catechism’s theology of the New Testament, the Cross cannot simply be viewed