Lessons - The Ancient Principles That Create Modern Success | Dennis Prager - Radio Host & PragerU Founder

In this lessons episode discover why wisdom not just knowledge or good intentions is essential for building a moral society learn how ancient texts like the Torah remain relevant to modern life learn why doubt and debate are central to faith and learn how seeing existence itself as a miracle can transform our understanding of belief why do you think and I have I have ideas but I I need to understand yours obvious your interview not mine but I do believe that society is increasingly getting more secular and there's less God in society and I think there's a whole host of problems that come with that for a variety of reasons the most basic of being if there is no traditional version of God and people's mind is the most important part of the world is the most important part of the world is the most important part of the world is the most important part of the world is the most important part of the world is the most important part of the world is the most important part of the world and they replace that God with some other version of God but why do you think or why did you think that it was very important to draw these rational analyses from Torah to show this bridge between a biblical text and how we sort of live our day to day so in order to answer you I have to first make the case for wisdom wisdom is is infinitely more important than knowledge and infinitely more important than IQ infinitely more important than good intentions a good heart wisdom is everything and without wisdom no good can be done we can't rely on good intentions the number of people who supported the greatest mass murder movement in history communism with good intentions is very large so intentions mean nothing why did why did anybody in the west support Stalin the one of the two greatest mass murders in history the other one being Mao Hitler's in third place and at least in terms of numbers and the answer is they were fools and a fool is the opposite of a wise person that's the opposite wisdom foolishness they are the polarities so if you have if you don't have wisdom you can't do good if you rely on your heart or even your conscience the chances of you're doing good are very very small you need wisdom and there's more wisdom in these five books than anywhere else in the history of the world in my opinion and my my job is to is to explain it because if you read it on your own you will get obviously something out of it but somebody somebody needs to it's like I have a trainer I work out three days a week if I didn't have a trainer I would do some exercise but it would be a joke if it weren't for the trainer I would do it wrong I wouldn't do it as hard I wouldn't do it as consistently you know she's like all trainers she's somewhat of a sadist and and that's a jokey I know exactly yeah because yeah there's no pain no pain it's as simple as all but I don't I'm not good at inflicting pain on myself I could a trainer could do it it's so on so anyway you need a you need a trainer if you read this stuff and I'm your trainer as it were I I make sense of it all and on the rare occasion that something doesn't make sense I say I cannot explain this this doesn't make sense and by the way one of the biggest one of the few I did come I didn't have an explanation in volume two but I did have an explanation that I came across for volumes three and four so I explain just about everything it's interesting because I do believe that everything we're trying to figure out all the wisdom in the world is already the majority of it has already been sourced maybe less you know Elon trying to get to Mars maybe there's some maybe there's some new things we have to discover there but a lot of the wisdom that we that that would help us figure out our day-to-day it's it's there it's in it's in it's in Bible it's in Torah it's in things that that's right yes yeah exactly that's the reason that wisdom is eternal whether it's from Homer or Aristotle or or Genesis or or what have you wisdom is wisdom and that's why I say of course look that the musk I believe does have wisdom and the reason musk has wisdom is that the pursuit of truth is essentially the same thing is the pursuit of wisdom and we don't have a pursuit of either truth or a wisdom I if men give birth is an example of we have contempt for truth you can't become the other sex you can gain my you can gain all I would say respect but you can gain my acceptance of of you that's as a human being you're a man you say you're a woman you dress like a woman you you you you don't have facial hair you or it's you look like a woman dress like a woman I'll address you as a woman son of my business what you were born or what you are biologically but I if you ask me can a man become a woman you're asking me a stupid question it's not possible because we're not just genitalia even if you if if you could change genitalia and you can't you could change the cosmetics you can't change the genitals but even if we could we can't change the chromosomes and we can't change the brain the male brain I have a funny line on this I always say I'll believe that a man can become a woman if a trans woman all of a sudden starts finding things because any married man knows that his wife finds things that and he can't find them do you know it this is a really funny story I was I think was in Pittsburgh and I and I couldn't find my tablet and you know the the electronic thing that you you all right okay fine so I couldn't find my wife that's right I called my wife in LA and I go honey I you know here I am in this Pittsburgh hotel room and I can't find the tablet she said oh well I'm all sure it's under the sheet in the other bed and that's where it was so my wife finds things when she's thousands of miles away anyway my only point is you can't become a man you can't become a woman but it doesn't mean that I don't address you as whatever you appear that's but that's that's that's fine that's not an issue so but back to my point the pursuit of truth and the pursuit of wisdom are almost anonymous now when somebody reads your work they're going to they're going to they're going to see a couple things about because you address both doubting God and arguing with God so somebody's listening to this you're saying hey wait a second you just made the argument for there should be more God there should be more religion it's a net positive in society that idea without understanding conflicts with the idea of doubting or arguing with God so where does the doubting and arguing with God come into this narrative well the name of the of the the people God chose to bring him into the world Israel it's the name of the Jewish people in the Bible it has a definition and it's it's not my definition it's not King James definition it's the definition given in Genesis when God changes Jacob's name to Israel he the name is explained it's in Hebrew Yisrael El is God and Yisraq Lehasri is to struggle with so the name Israel means struggle with God and therefore by the way the first Jew the first monotheist is Abraham and he argues with God it's an extensive argument over God's desire to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah for their evil arguing with God is actually a healthy thing I don't like meeting robotic religious people I don't like meeting robotic secular people so you you're not only it's not only okay to struggle with God or argue with God it's sort of baked into the formula of belief and as regards faith and doubt it is I don't know how it's possible to live life and never doubt God I don't know some people it may be and I quote an orthodox rabbi I quote a lot of Christians but in this case it's a rabbi he said God created doubt I thought it was a very intelligent line and he goes on why God would if God wanted us to be absolutely certain about his existence he could he could have made it that he could have made that when you think about faith and and miracles because you speak a lot about faith and miracles where does this place where does faith and miracle play into the concept of God and religion and the Bible because I think that if somebody if somebody feels that they want to if somebody feels that they want to start to believe or start to read into the wisdom of the Bible they feel like there should be some miracle associated with God and their belief in God they feel like there should be something that should happen in their life because they're putting their energy into into God for somebody who's secular for example so where does faith and miracle play into this whole to this story well first you're probably right but it's not my premise if God didn't do any of the biblical miracles I would believe in him just as much as I do now the the the greatest miracle is that you and I are talking that you and I exist that the universe exists that's if you don't if one doesn't see that as a miracle then one doesn't understand biblical faith that's the miracle that anything exists so the thought that I need another miracle like a split C or 10 plagues or or for Christians Jesus walking on water or or the lobes and fish I mean the or wine this is look that since you converted to orthodox Judaism you may have heard the phrase I know it in Hebrew Al-Tis-Muhalaneis do not do not rely on miracles the ultimate miracle is our existence and if one doesn't see that as a miracle then I don't understand the nature of one's faith thanks for tuning in if you found this valuable don't forget to hit that subscribe button so you never miss an episode and if you want to dive deeper into this conversation check out the links in the description to watch the full episode see you in the next one