"One may observe all the laws and still be practicing a disguised polytheism. For if in performing a religious act one’s intention is to please a human being whom he fears or from whom he hopes to receive benefit, then it is not God whom he worships but a human being.
“Such a person is worse than an idol-worshiper … . The latter, paying homage to the stars, worships an object that does not rebel against God, whereas the former worships beings some of whom rebel against God. The former only worships one object, but there is no limit to the number of human be- ings whom the perverse in religion may worship. Finally the inner attitude of the idolator is apparent to everybody; people can guard themselves from him—his denial of God is public knowledge. The hypocrite’s denial, however, is unnoticed … . This makes him the worst of the universal evils.”
Disguised polytheism is also the religion of him who combines with the worship of God the devotion to his own gain, as it is said, There shall be no strange god in thee (Psalms 81:10), on which our teachers remarked that it meant the strange god in the very self of man.“ [רבינו בחיי]
