When Maimonides — Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon, known to Jewish tradition as the Rambam — fled the persecutions in Andalusia and reached the court of Egypt in the late twelfth century, the king appointed him to the staff of royal physicians.
The learned men of the court, the story goes, were ranked in seven grades, each grade occupying a corresponding position near the throne on state occasions. The monarch considered Maimonides so far superior to any of the others that he ordered a special eighth position created for him alone, higher than the rest.
Moshe, who once wrote that humility is the trait most beloved by God, declined it. He would not sit above his colleagues. He would not accept a position invented specifically to exalt him.
The other physicians were not softened by this. They had expected jealousy to be their own emotion, and yet they felt it more sharply. Unable to damage him openly — his reputation as a healer was already too great — they set about plotting his ruin in secret, trying to find some fault in his practice they could bring before the king.
The teaching the anthologists draw is simple. The righteous man does not accept even well-meant flattery, and the wicked are not satisfied even when the righteous refuses honor. Excellence attracts envy whether or not the excellent one dresses it up.
(From the 1901 Hebraic Literature anthology, Proverbial Sayings section.)