Bat-symbol
Bat-symbolReuters

David Mazouz, who plays a young Batman on Fox's 'Gotham' television series, was honored on Sunday night for his accomplishments as an Orthodox Jew, the Algemeiner reported.

The 16-year-old actor was one of several people honored at the 5th Annual Jew In the City All Stars Awards Show in New York. During his acceptance speech, Mazouz, who attends a Jewish high school in Los Angelus, thanked his rabbis and his parents for teaching him “what a moral compass should look like,” and thanked "Hashem (God) for bringing all of this into my life.”

Mazouz called Judaism "the core of my identity.”

“If anybody was to tell me to write a list of the adjectives that I think I am, I could write pages and pages because like everybody here I could identify that I’m a member of countless institutions, but Judaism is always at the very top of my list.”

"Now more than ever I think it’s crucial to remember and reinforce the gravity of our unity as Jews. I am a proud Jew doing things in the world. To me a Jew is a person, among other things, that makes it his or her responsibility to go out to the world and to bring light. Someone who counteracts negative stereotypes by helping people everywhere and like my upbringing has taught me, I wear that badge with more dignity than I’ve ever worn anything.”

Mazouz described his love for Shabbat and learning Talmud, and how he skypes with a personal rabbi for help with his Jewish studies homework. He also recounted how he had become the "rabbi" on the set of 'Gotham.'

“One of our set dressers is named Ari. He came up to me and said, ‘You know I’ve talked to my family and they’re celebrating [the holiday of] Shemini Atzeret, can you tell me what that is?’…My rabbi was saying you’re gonna be in situations when you’re with others who don’t know [about Judaism] and you’re gonna be the authority and I was thinking, yeah, that’s already happened to me. That’s absolutely true.”