Dennis & Julie: White Lies and Dark Thoughts

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Hey everybody, Dennis Prager here with Julie Hartman. Dennis and Julie, what number broadcast is this? Do we know?

35, I think.

You're kidding.

I don't know. That's, that's an estimate. Am I right?

What number, Sean? Sean doesn't know. Do you realize I opened up with a dramatic opening and it's 37?

Oh wow, that's so cool.

Well, you know, this is Alan Estrin's theory. If you— not only his, but he's really adamant about this. Anything you do regularly, the accomplishment is enormous.

Yeah.

If you devote, you know, 20 minutes a day to learning another language, by the end of the year, that's not a lot, 20 minutes.

But by the end, you will know another language. Yes. I can't— that means we've been doing this for 37 weeks.

I know.

Gosh, when did we start this? February?

We were in high school.

It kind of seems like I was. My life in college seems like a long, long time ago, and it wasn't.

Isn't that eerie? Yes, I'm sure it does.

And you know what's also scaring me a bit? I feel like I'm losing memory of college. My roommates and I— I see, I— you know what's sweet? I still refer to them— these are the roommates— as my roommates forever. And my current roommate, who Dennis met, uh, who I live with in an apartment here, sometimes I'll say Oh, my roommates were texting, da da da da, and I'm referring to my college roommates. And Kira, my roommate in Los Angeles, she'll go, I'm your roommate now.

That's true. She's right. Anyway, what I was going to say before I got sidetracked, which is we should really call this the Sidetracked Podcast. Oh yeah, that's the constant.

Oh, totally.

That's the one constant here. I just want to say to you folks who are watching or listening, so if you're watching, I'm looking straight at you now. And you didn't expect me to say this, let alone ask me to say this, but this podcast, this Dennis and Julie project, is unique. Unique is an overused word, like awesome, completely overused, but it is unique in every way possible. Just the openness about life, about ourselves, I mean, I'm very public, but there's nothing that I do that's like this. I just, I just needed to say that at the opening.

Well, I want to echo that. And also I want to bring in our listeners a bit more to this podcast. I was talking to you about that before the show because I get— I know at the end of every show it's a routine. I publicize my email address, julie@julie-hartman.com, and I thank you all. And I really mean it, but I want to say here, it is just astounding to me, Dennis, how many emails I get from people and the content of the emails are so rich and they are so open with me about things that are going on in their lives. In fact, I had a woman the other day, her name is Caroline. I hope she doesn't mind if I'm sharing this, but I won't say her last name.

There are a lot of Carolines.

That's true. There are a lot of Carolines.

Yeah.

And she, She wrote to me and she said, Julie and Dennis, I so appreciate your openness and sort of not in exchange, but because you guys are so open, I wanted to be open with you and I want to send you a picture of me and my family. And she sent me a picture of her and her husband and her 4 boys. And she wrote a little bit about her life and her involvement in her church. And I was so touched by that. And I get so many of those.

You sent me that one, right?

I did send you that one.

I love that you get this.

And so our openness in our talking about all things pertaining to life in turn has motivated our viewers to reach out to us with things about their lives. And I just think that's another mark of how unique this is. I couldn't agree more.

So thank you all. Yeah, that is exactly right. So I just, I felt it important to say that.

Yes.

So by the way, you folks should send this stuff to other people, especially young people. And especially young women.

Yes.

See, I'm a, I'm a good model. I don't care if it sounds like I'm bragging, that's fine with me. I'm a good model for young men, but, and, and it's important for young women to have good male models, very important. But they need a woman they can relate to, and, and I think you provide that. So I want to say one thing before a biggie about bad thoughts, which we promised to talk about last week. Correct. But I wanted to say one more thing about my trip to Denmark.

Please.

And I asked you how— if I said it, and it— you, you are a, a living recording device, there's no question. So if you say we didn't talk about it, we didn't. So I, I don't remember uh, where maybe— oh yeah, maybe on my fireside chat actually for PragerU, I mentioned this. So everybody talks about how happy Scandinavians are. They're always on these lists of the happiest countries. So you have Denmark, Norway, Sweden. People throw in Finland even though it's not technically part of Scandinavia, but it's in the area, and their language is completely different, but nevertheless, okay. So first of all, anybody who has been to Sweden or lived there has, or spent any time there, and does not think of Swedes as particularly happy. This is not a knock on Swedes. It's just I don't know why they pick Sweden. Well, I think I have a theory why they pick Sweden along with Denmark and Norway. But being in Denmark for 5 days, it occurred to me that what people are calling happy— and have you heard me say this? No. Oh, I love when you haven't heard me say something. It is such a thrill. So you will like this, I think. I, you know, because I think everything through. I'm thinking, are they happy? Are they happy? Are they happy? And my theory is they're content. But I'm not sure they're happy. They're not the same. My dogs are content, but it's a bit odd to say they're happy. If you don't know you're happy, you're not happy. But they are very content. Cows grazing are content. I'm not comparing Scandinavians to cows. I'm merely noting that contentment is not the same as happiness. And I am convinced that the reason they're constantly voted happiest, or a big reason, is that they are the model for the people who do these polls for the UN or for whatever think tank it is, because they're so filled with big government taking care of people. The assumption is among both liberals and leftists, in this case they think similarly, most cases they don't, they just vote similarly, that if the government takes care of you, you'll be happy. They're projecting their view of what makes a human happy, whereas there's no comparison in the happiness of people who take care of themselves and who are taken care of.

Right.

Isn't the nightmare of every human being who gets older I don't want to be dependent upon others. So why is that the dream of every progressive on earth? I want to be taken care of. You want to be taken care of. It's the nightmare of people being taken care of, right?

So I want to ask, to you, what is the difference between happiness and contentment, and what do you think that creates each?

That's why I used contentment is there, you know, you don't have any serious problems. Right, right. And I do have a motto: if nothing's horrific, life is terrific. That is true. However, you need more than that. It is a great motto. Oh my God. Hey, Sean, play the jingle, will you? If nothing's horrific, life is terrific. Yes, I came up with this phrase and some great listener made it into a jingle.

Oh my gosh. If nothing's horrific, then life is terrific.

Is that awesome? I love what my listeners make jingles out of some of the stuff I come out with.

So believe it or not, I can hear it because I don't have earphones on, right?

Oh, you didn't hear it?

No, I can actually because I can hear it through your earphones.

Okay, good. I'm glad.

Just, I didn't want to confuse the viewer. I didn't want you to think I was faking it, but I could hear it through your, your earphones.

That is so Julie-esque. Well, I love, I love you for it.

An astute listener would go, she doesn't hear this, she doesn't have earphones on.

Nobody, not one person. That's funny. But I know I, I love— I have the same commitment to honesty.

Yes.

I, I was— tangent number 13.

Oh, this is a total tangent.

I, I was, I was actually mentioning during my radio show that I'm so committed to always telling the truth to the best of my human ability When I receive scripts from sponsors, which I have all of my life basically, if there's something in there that isn't true, and there almost always is, I'll give one example, I omit it. So for example, almost every script that I have to read says, so you contact my friends at Billy and Jerry Plumbing, and, but they're not my friends, I don't say it.

I have learned from you hugely in that regard with the adver— I mean, In so many other ways, but with regard to advertising and omitting things that are not—

I always get a kick out of that. By the way, tangent again, this is a fun one. So not only do I not say it because it's not honest, I'm not sure it's effective, right? Because if I say contact my friends, it's nepotism. Well, not only that, maybe people think, oh, the only reason he's endorsing them is because they're his friends.

That's what I—

oh yeah, the nepotism. Okay, fair enough.

Yes.

Why is that an effective line?

You know, on, on this point of honesty, and again, you're so right that this is just so Dennis and Julie to go off an exit ramp and come back on. It is, it is so important. This is something I've really learned, especially in the past year. If you want to live an honest life, you have to live an honest life in every arena, every single one. I think I said on this podcast that I have—

How many 23-year-olds would say that? I'm not embarrassing you.

No, I understand.

I'm just pointing out a 43-year-old, if said that, we would think it's admirable and we'd move on. That you think about that is why you're you.

Oh, I think about it all the time.

I know, I know.

I'll give you two examples and then I promise we will, we will go back to contentment versus happiness. Um, but the first one, I believe I've already talked about on this podcast. I do sometimes have the urge when driving to go against the arrow, the turning arrow, if, if I can, you know, if there are no cars coming and I have to wait in air for an arrow to go green to turn left, I just wanna go. Or sometimes, you know, in my, in my neighborhood, um, that my parents live in, in Los Angeles, there are all these stop signs and there are usually no people or cars out and I wanna blow through the stop sign. And I've really tried to practice, you know what, Julie, Good behavior, as I've said many times on this program, good behavior comes through habit. It is built through habit. So if I run that stop sign once, I'll get the idea that I can do it again, and I will do it again, and I will do it again, and I will do it again, and one day it's not gonna work out so well for me. So that's one example. The other—

Well, don't forget your other example, okay?

Okay, I won't.

Make a mental note.

I won't.

So we may have a different view on this one.

Oh, interesting.

And because I thought about this a lot too.

Shocking.

So it's right, it's midnight in this, you know, in an area where there's no traffic essentially. First of all, I believe there are way too many stop signs in the United— in the United States. In Europe, it's roundabouts. There are almost no stop signs. They're just roundabout, roundabout, roundabout, which makes far more sense and helps traffic much better. There are stop signs in LA at a T where it's useless. It's just useless. But somebody once complained, oh, it's safer. So there's a fixation with safer. If it's midnight and it's dead, and I check out both sides. I, I don't— I never zoom through a stop sign. I always slow down. But do I slow down completely? Often not. So, okay, I'd rather drive with Julie than—

No, I will be honest about this. I, I don't fully stop, but I would sometimes feel the urge to just blow through it.

Oh no, I don't blow. I never blew through a stop sign.

I, if I— obviously, if I can totally I totally see that there are no— there's no one coming. Like, I'm very clear that it's safe. I will not fully stop. So maybe I have to work on that. I will go to like 2 miles an hour. I'll just barely stop and then go.

Okay. All right. What was the other?

So maybe I'm not so honest.

I don't know if that's not an honesty issue. What's the next?

The second one is that I, throughout my life, I think like most people, would sometimes white lie. Never about anything significant, thank God.

What, like you're looking great? Telling somebody to make them feel good?

Well, that's interesting. I've certainly done that before.

Well, that's a white lie.

It is a white lie. I mean more that if I made plans with a friend and it turns out I'm way too tired to go.

Right, so you might go, but it's for you.

Sometimes I'll say I have a doctor's appointment.

Right, so if the purpose of the white lie is not for you, it's to protect the other from hurt.

Yes, but what I have found is that it always comes back to bite you in ways that you may not expect because someone will go, how did that doctor's appointment go? And then you'll go, what? I didn't have a doctor's. And then you go, oh, you know, so you have to make up lies to cover up the lies.

That's true.

And I just, I really think, and then I'll shut up about this. Thank you for enduring the tirade. I believe that everything in life has a ripple effect. And if I practice honesty at a small level, it will be much easier to practice honesty at a large level and vice versa. You have to, it has to start from a granular level. You can't, and a lot of people think, oh, I can just white lie. Oh, I can just, I just can do this.

I know I told you.

It bleeds over into the big stuff. That's right.

I know I told you this in the beginning of my radio career. It's a long time ago. I realized that if I used curse words in private, they may well come out while I'm broadcasting.

Well, you know that, and everyone knows that's something I'm trying to work on, right?

So, uh, I mean, I— and it's true, I, I, I will occasionally use such a word because it's so, it's so merited at the moment.

Yes, but I think I've heard you curse in private.

Same with grammar.

Yeah, you, you rarely—

right, but when I do—

but when you do, it's hilarious.

Yes, exactly, that's the point.

Yes.

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Okay, back to contentment and happiness. So I asked you, what's the difference?

All right, so I—

how do you achieve it?

Yes, well, look, I think pursuit of happiness is one of the noble pursuits of life. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness is in the Declaration of Independence. These people were brilliant, they were right. All I'm saying— I'm not aching to spend a lot of time on it, but I I thought I needed to add that point, that you can't be happy if you're taken care of. So just by definition, you can be content, and they may well be, but I, that's why, how do you reconcile that the nightmare of any individual is having to rely on others, and yet that's the whole dream of the entire progressive world from the United States to Australia to Belgium. How do you reconcile the two? Is it a nightmare or is it a dream?

[Speaker] Right. Well, I think one of the best points that you make in your happiness book, and it's so important because it's so contrary to the common knowledge that we have today about happiness, is that happiness isn't just achieved in a moment. I mean, certainly it can be. When I eat a candy bar, I'm happy. Or when I watch television, I have moments where I'm happy. But in order to be a happy person, it's really more of a long-term pursuit. I think the example that you gave in your book is, you know, if you learn a new instrument along the way, when you're practicing that instrument, there may be moments when you're not happy or you're tired or you don't wanna do the work. But at the end, when you know how to play the violin, you will be happier.

Well, it's, that's right. It's all of life. No pain, no gain. Isn't that the motto? I work out 3, 3 days a week, right? I can't stand it, but, but I'm happier having done it. I have a great line, if I may say, in the Happiness Book: fun is what you experience during the act, happiness is what you experience after.

I think happiness— and I know where we should move on to our next discussion, but I just want to quickly say I do think a lot of happiness is building a robust internal infrastructure so that you can react appropriately to situations that may make you unhappy. And I have found this as I've becoming more religious and more spiritual and building that internal infrastructure for myself, that when I have disappointments or things that annoy me in everyday life, I now see it in a different way. I don't let it get to me as much because I have a stronger infrastructure than when I was secular and sort of non-religious, I would let the everyday world get to me because that's all you have is the everyday world.

So I like the internal infrastructure.

Yes.

Well, that's like you have a strong edifice now.

Yes.

Stronger.

Well, that, those are the terms that I've been thinking about it with my building my own internal infrastructure. That's how I've been talking to myself about these things in the past few months.

So you have a lot of girlfriends, which I find very helpful. I do.

I'm very lucky.

So do you, do you talk to them about these things?

It's very interesting you bring that up because I was thinking lately that I wish I could more. The answer is yes and no. With some of them I do, with some of them I don't, but with all of them, I can't talk to them about it at the level that I talk to you about these things. For instance, religion. Almost all of my friends are secular, but unlike most people who I went to high school or college with, they have respect for religion. They don't disparage it. But still, I can't talk to them about my favorite passage in Genesis. I can't talk to them about some of the more spiritual things that I've been learning because, A, for some of them, it doesn't interest them, and B, for all of them, they haven't either grown up in a house or gone to schools or been in an environment where those things are valued in the way that it's valued in the environment, the work environment that I'm so lucky to be in. So that can be lonely, Dennis, even though you know how much I love my girlfriends.

Yeah, you've met many of them, and they love you. So you don't really have any religious girlfriends?

No, I don't. I have one religious male friend. And honestly, you and the people at the Shabbat dinner table, even though many of them are twice, three times my age. Those are my religious friends.

We ought to talk about that age issue.

We, we touched on it. We, we should, but we touched on it a little bit in the last podcast where I was saying that I am determined to find people regardless of how they come, whether they're old, young, whatever race, whatever gender, it doesn't matter.

That's so built into me that I, I don't, it's not even an effort.

Right.

You're terrific, you're terrific, and end of issue. And if you're not terrific, you're not terrific.

Well, that's why we are genuinely friends.

Genuinely. That's— I think that's come through to a lot of people. So I just want to end that, that thing again, because it's, it's, it's amazing to me.

It's both—

it's both— which is another great subject, but I won't develop it. I'll just say I am astonished at how many new important ideas I have. I would have thought that by now all the really important ideas I had, or nearly all, had already occurred to me. And so it's both encouraging and discouraging. You mean I didn't know that? Like I didn't know Until a few weeks ago when I answered a question on my, on my PragerU fireside chat. How do you know who's lying and who's telling the truth between the left and the right? And I came up with this incredibly important thing, which I wrote my column on even.

Well, Joe, you did know it if you, if you were able to respond, but maybe you haven't articulated it well.

All right. Not articulating, right, is to me the same.

Right. I understand.

Right. So. The ones who censor are lying. It's just, it's so— and, and then, so I read comments to my articles. I read comments on everybody's article, not just my own. But it was interesting to me to read comments on my piece about this. How do you know who's lying? The ones who censor speech, the ones who suppress dissent.

It's so true.

But, but, and, and so many wrote, yeah, I hadn't thought of that. Which is my own reaction to my own self.

Right. Right. I mean, I have those all of the time, but I think for you it's that, again, to use this idea of an infrastructure, you throughout all these years have kept building and enlarging and refining your infrastructure. So it's a good thing that these ideas, because they're higher quality. I mean, I don't know if I wanna say that because—

But I wish I had been able to say some of this stuff 25 years ago.

I totally get it. And I'm probably hopefully going to feel the same way way in 25 years.

On the other hand, this is why every older person is, is morally obligated to give wisdom to younger people, right? But we don't, right? We don't give anything worthwhile to younger people, my generation.

Why do you think that is?

Do you think because we're stupid? Because my baby boomer generation came up with the idiotic idea, never trust anyone over 30. Arrogant idiots characterized my generation, but they were raised by foolish, well-intentioned, terrific parents. Terrific human beings, not terrific parents. They didn't teach them anything from the past. What they were preoccupied with—

The good generation, I'm sorry to interrupt you, didn't teach them anything from the past?

The one that's called the greatest generation.

Well, why, if they're so great, did they not teach, did they not pass those values?

Because they were great in sacrificing for America. They were, they were great.

No, they were, of course.

And they're not complaining when they had the horror of losing a child or a brother or a spouse. This is all correct. They were great in that way, but they were very foolish. All they gave their kids was material benefits.

Well, I think it's because they so badly wanted to give their kids what they didn't have.

Oh, I know why, I know why. Right. Right, so that's the famous French phrase, tout comprendre, c'est tout pardonner, to understand everything is to forgive everything. But it's not true. Understanding and forgiving is not the same. I understand why they did it, but I don't forgive them for doing it.

Yep. See, I think a lot of it is— I mean, yes, of course it's true that that generation did not teach their children the wisdom that they had. I also think there's an element of deadening that I talk about a lot. Uh, you, you talk a lot about the consequences of secularism. I talk a lot about I've noticed how so many people nowadays live a diminished existence. And I really think, I don't know, this is opening a whole other can of worms in the conversation, but I think the advent of television and the kind of boom in technology and globalization that we've seen in the past 50 to 60 years has contributed hugely to this deadening. Where people used to, before TVs, people, they had to know how to do things. They had to know how to play cards. They had to know how to play a sport. They had to play an instrument.

Every house practically had a piano.

They literally had no other choice. In order to have a rich life, they had to do those things. They had no choice but to rely on one another.

And books.

And books. And then technology. And I don't want to totally blame technology, but then all of this comes in and people have this— people don't even know to value wisdom because they have a TV in front of them that for their whole lives has taught them that this is the fun thing in life. They don't even know, they don't even have the vocabulary to talk about something like wisdom. So anyway, that's my, that's my shortened hypothesis.

Yes. Well, my, I have a related, not different, just related theory. The two things that happened after World War II that wrecked the country? Television and widespread college attendance.

Yes.

I'm not joking.

I know you're not joking.

I'm laughing, but I'm not joking.

You know, I was thinking a few days ago because— so I wrote this article about energy in the Epoch Times last week, which I encourage you all to read. It's called Soon Is the Winter of Our Discontent. Or I think it's called, God, it's, I wrote another article this week in the Daily Wire. And so I think I'm getting the titles confused. Oh yes, of course the energy article would be called, so it's called Wake Up America, Soon Is the Winter of Our Discontent. I encourage you all to read it if you haven't already. And I wrote it because, and I talked to Dennis Prager about this off air, I wrote it precisely because 2 or 3 weeks ago, I knew nothing about energy. And when I say nothing, I mean really nothing. Like if you asked me basic questions about where gasoline comes from or what the Strategic Petroleum Reserve is or our relationships with Middle Eastern countries or what OPEC is, I could have given you really pathetic answers. And so I'm proud of myself that I wrote this article, but I was reflecting on, you know, why is it that I know nothing about energy? I went to the most prestigious university in the college, or in the, in the most prestigious university in the college, most prestigious university in the country. And some would say the world. And I'm not saying that as a brag. In fact, I'm saying it as you would think it going to a prestigious school like Harvard, I would know basic facts about our day-to-day energy-consuming life, but I don't. And you wouldn't believe how many people I have gone to school with who can tell you very specific facts pertaining to kind of niche subjects. But if you ask them basic questions like, what are, can you name 2 out of 6 branches of the United States military? Or what are the 3 branches of government? Probably Harvard students could get that, but I don't know. I bet there would be a large percentage of Harvard students that could name that.

That I don't know. That's interesting. The questions I ask are sort of— not sort of, they're more historical, like who was Pol Pot?

Right.

If you don't know who Pol Pot is and you graduated Harvard, right, you're—

From Harvard.

Truly, thank you. Graduated from Harvard, your education was defective. I always ask you this one. What percentage of your classmates would identify what Leviticus is?

God, that's a great example.

That is a great—

it is. It's a great example.

It's obviously, you know, it's the third book of the Bible.

Less than 20%.

I believe that. And it's quoted on the Liberty Bell.

Right.

It would— in other words, the founding generation, everybody, the illiterate farmer's kid knew what Leviticus was.

Right. Well, It's certainly true, Dennis, about history, but also just basic everyday facts like the way that, you know, our electricity works, or even, you know, a lot of people don't know what the Fed is. By the way, again, no shade. I didn't really understand the Fed in the past few weeks. I've been trying to learn these things, but I've noticed that it is, it is sort of a referendum on my education that I can— I, you know, as of a few weeks or months ago, could not tell you basic day-to-day facts about the world. And it just shows we've lost wisdom, certainly. But we've also just— I don't know if this would even count as wisdom. This is, again, just kind of common sense or daily understandings of how the world works. So it begs the question, what has entered that space?

Yep.

What is it that people now know about the Kardashians? Well, Unfortunately, unfortunately, I do know a lot about the Kardashians.

We're going to go to the, uh, thought, thought issue.

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He found your question amusing. Oh yeah, you're right, you didn't hear anything I just said to Jules. She wants to know why it was amusing to us, but I said it was not. It was amusing to me, and then it was amusing to you that she asked it. I know exactly what was going on. It is amusing to me because it is a combination of annoying and absurd. Well done.

You know, I'm acting like it's so outrageous. I do stuff like this. All of the time.

No kidding. And we've had enough of it here.

It's unprofessional. I just finished an ad and I didn't do—

That is the reason I made noise. He doesn't know when the ad is over until there's noise. See, he's nodding. Look, he's nodding. Yeah, he just said thank you.

Working with men is so fun. It really is.

Exactly. This, though, this could not happen with 5 women.

No, it's not possible. But you guys need me to focus you.

Oh God. Oh, one of these self-serving female comics.

We would be doing this until 2 o'clock.

That's true, actually. Yes, you're right. And enjoying it. That is entirely right. Do you know what Sean does during this podcast? He's playing a video game. I know it.

That's why whenever we forget something, we go, Sean, Sean, he has no idea.

That's right. Which video game are you playing now? Ships and Sailors? Mario Kart.

You guys just go on and on. You know, like in normal workplaces, there's like 1 minute of workplace banter and then it's done. You know, then you move on.

No, no, the ratio here is the banter to serious ratio is 50/50. That is correct.

Can I tell the viewers about Zilla?

Yeah, why not?

Okay, so this is actually really fun.

Are we back on?

I think a lot— I think we should air some of this.

We've been on.

OMG, this shows how real it is. He didn't know if we were on or off, and it's true, it's literally the same whether or not we're on and off.

That was wrong, Sean. Okay. All right.

I need to tell everyone about Zilla.

Okay. So yes, Zilla. Yeah.

So when obviously I have been in this office many times when Dennis is hosting his show, sometimes I've been lucky enough to be on the show and other times I just sit in the controller's booth and I annoy Sean. And so whenever Sean is giving Dennis the cues that he's almost out of time. He'll say 2 minutes or 1 minute, and Dennis will hear it in his ear. And then when it gets to 30 seconds, instead of saying 30 seconds, he says Zilla. And I didn't understand this. I thought that it was because Dennis is so intellectual, supposedly. I thought that Zilla referred to 30 in Greek or Hebrew or something, and you instruct your child to say— so finally, I've been working at this show for what, a year and a half now almost. And finally the other day I just asked Sean, I said, what is this Zilla thing about? Like, what is it? What language does it mean 30 in? Like, of course that's what it is. And he goes, oh, you don't know the Zilla story? And apparently, viewers, it's because Dennis didn't want Sean to say 30 because there are ads that have 30 in it or something.

Oh no, I think the original reason was I wanted him to say something distinct. 30 could have meant the ad is 30 seconds. It could— it wasn't fully clear to me what 30 meant, right? And the word 30 wasn't distinct because I am talking and intensely concentrating. So he has to say something that is clear and not in any way ambiguous.

And by the way, that's true. When I have guest hosted, it's not Sean's fault he needs to count us down, but when you hear in your ear 2 minutes or 1 minute, it's hard not to get thrown off. You really got to— anyway, so I asked Sean, so what is this Zilla thing about? And he goes, oh, Dennis didn't want me to say 30, so he suggested that I say Godzilla. And then it turns out that Godzilla was too long, right, to say, right? So then they just shortened it to Zilla.

That's how it happened.

That is the level of intellect that is displayed at the show.

Oh yes, and Sean's comment just now.

What did he say? I can't hear him.

He said, remember, you're the one who took God out of Godzilla.

Boom.

That's right, it is worthy of a boom.

Okay, now on to Dark Thoughts.

Good, it's a very— so from Godzilla to Dark Thoughts, I am going to do something a tiny bit wrong and say something about the dark thoughts even before you open up with it. Is that okay?

No.

I'll do it anyway. Okay.

Okay, I'll make an exception.

Thank you. One of the 10 most memorable calls of my life in this 40 years of radio came in my first 10 years when people called in on anything. Which I love, but it obviously doesn't work for a national show. You have to address issues. I have an open hour on, you know, Friday, the last hour. But anyway, so a guy calls up, and remember, I was in my 30s and he was in his 30s. So he says, Dennis, I just want you to know I am an awful son. This is an odd thing to say. So I said, why are you an awful son? He said, well, for the last 10 years I have been the sole financial support of my mother, who's quite sick. Not just financial, but always there taking care of her. So physical and financial. And Dennis, there are times, I'm embarrassed to say, that I wish she would succumb to her illness and die. And I said, I wish I remembered his name, I said his name and I said, I want you to know that I think you are a great son. And I'll never forget his reaction. He said, You're making fun of me, aren't you? He actually thought I was making fun of him, and I was as serious as I could be, right? He said, didn't you hear what I just said, and you're saying I'm a great son? I said, yes, because all I do is judge what you're doing, not what you're thinking.

Well, it shows what a deeply introspective person he is in order to He's so hard on himself that he really thought that you were kidding.

Yes, but he's hard on himself for what I came to understand, and I wondered later if this is one of the few instinctive Jewish-Christian differences.

Oh, I think it is. I think we've really hit on it.

Because I grew up immersed in Judaism. Half the day my yeshiva till 19. Half the day in Hebrew, religious subjects. Half the day in English, secular subjects.

I envy you.

Well, for good reason. It was, it was the greatest, the greatest gift to me. And I, I don't, I don't remember 10 minutes on sinful thoughts. I remember 15 years on sinful behavior. And, and yet when I came to know Christians whom I know really, really, really well Now I realize this is a huge issue in Christian life.

It is, and it's a huge issue in my life nowadays because I, as I told the viewers last week and as I've told you ad nauseam off the air, I'm really struggling to shed myself of my determination to be upstanding and perfect in every realm of my life. And when I think bad thoughts, I use it as a, you know, I was reading The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown. Did you ever read that book? Oh my gosh, it is an incredible book.

I know.

Da Vinci Code fans write into me because I will entertain a conversation all day about The Da Vinci Code. And he was writing the beginning of the book about this Catholic group, Opus Dei. And how some of the more— That's what I said.

I said they.

I know, I'm just kidding. How they would—

By the way, I only correct you.

No, I love it. I love it.

Yes, she does.

I love it.

And I do.

Okay, I know you do. That's why a few minutes ago I said from college.

That's right, exactly.

We enjoy learning. Opus, what was it? Dei.

Dei.

Dei. Okay. They, their more militant members did this practice called corporal mortification. Where they would inflict harm upon themselves. There's this really gory image. Yes, pain, where they would put this like chain around their, their thigh and kind of tighten it so as to have it dig into their flesh. It was just— I just will never forget it because I know it was such a gory image. And I thought, at the risk of sounding dramatic, I thought, you know, I do the practice of corporal mortification to my brain a lot. When I have dark thoughts, I punish myself by relentlessly beating myself up, relentlessly telling myself that I'm— I don't believe I'm a terrible person, but I tell myself that was really terrible or you succumbed to something horrible and you should be so ashamed of yourself. I really make myself go through that shame process. And it's interesting, Dennis, because when we brought this subject up last week, I had a lot of viewers write in because, A, they were excited that we were going to pick it up this week, but also most of them were Christians and they were taking sort of my stance where they do believe that your thought— having bad thoughts does matter.

It's sinful.

It's sinful. Can I read to you some of them?

Sure. Yes.

I think it would be very—

this is worthy of 10 broadcasts. I have such an opposite view, and I will explain it, but I want you to continue all the time you need.

Okay, well, thank you. I'll quickly give just some very short comments from people. One of the emails is from this man Ed, all the way, as he says, from the South Island of New Zealand. That's pretty cool.

Totally.

So he says, hi Julie, I'd like to give a fresh perspective on your discussion with Dennis. I agree with Dennis on so many things, but the discussion about our dark side— sorry, in the discussion about our dark side, he overlooked something really fundamental. Here it is. God gave us free will. Genesis talks of the fall. This affected generations since, and this is our dark side. We need to fight our nature, as Dennis puts it. But not just in terms of our actions, but also in terms of our thoughts. If I entertained thoughts of another woman who is not my wife and made no attempt to banish them from my mind, that too is adultery. Jesus says as much. Yes, up to a point—

He doesn't say that. He says it's adultery with your heart. He did not say it's adultery. But go ahead.

Ed continues, yes, up to a point our thoughts are involuntary, but only up to a point. And this is the critical thing, and this is where I've gotten my idea that bad Thoughts are bad things. He says, our actions start with our thoughts, and that's the truth of it. We are our actions and our thoughts. That, that synopsizes the way that I have viewed things. I'll read to you one other email, and then there's so many, by the way. And thank you again so much for writing in. I benefit hugely from these. I learned so much from our listeners. Okay, so this is from a man, Eric, in Kentucky. So shout out to Eric. He writes a long paragraph about this, but I'll just read one or two sentences. He says, "What people think and what they believe is the source of why they act or behave the way they do." Okay, I guess it's just one sentence, but that's sort of in line with what Ed said. And then someone else wrote to me, Jared from, as he puts it, "the great state of Florida." I would have to concur, Florida is a great state. He writes, "It's not the thoughts of your head that Jesus was referring to." It's the thoughts of your heart where the core of your intention lies. Intrusive spontaneous thoughts that are dark, violent, sexual, and/or destructive are not a sin. To dwell upon them is. Structuring your life in such a way that leads you to temptations you eventually fall prey to is. Intending to think bad thoughts is sinful and turning away from God, most definitely missing the mark.

Missing the mark is the word— is the Hebrew word sin comes from missing the mark. Okay, that's what he means.

To be invaded in your mind, be an evil idea, is not a sin, particularly if you immediately turn away from that thought, being mindful and away of the darkness within it instead of turning toward it, embracing it, ruminating upon it, which is turning away from God.

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So I know I just read you a lot of emails, but the first two were basically saying your, your, your thoughts, it lead you to your actions. And then this, this one, again, just to quickly sum up, sometimes, sometimes—

no, no, no, that's the key. Sometimes. And this one is saying you determine whether your thoughts lead to your actions, right? They don't— your thoughts don't make you do anything. You, you allow them to direct you, or you don't.

I agree with that. But Jared's point here is a little different. He says it's not the thoughts of your head that Jesus was referring to, it's the thoughts of your heart where the core of your intention is. Intrusive spontaneous thought that are dark, violent, sexual are not a sin. Dwelling upon it is structuring your life in such a way to lead you to temptations and fall pray to them is. I think they're all kind of— I, I, you know, they all kind of prove your point.

Go ahead.

I think you're right with the first two emails from Eric and— oh God, Ed, Ed. They're saying that your, your thoughts lead to your actions, and you're saying that the key word there is sometimes.

Yeah, sometimes they lead to your actions, determine whether they do, and you determine whether they do. So let's go.

And that's exactly— that's sort of what Jared said too, how dwell— if you dwell upon your sinful thoughts and you incorporate them, as he was sort of saying, into the infrastructure of your life.

I don't know how much time is dwelling mean. Okay, so we'll get— we can get back to dwell, which is very imprecise, and I'm not being pedantic. I don't know exactly what that means. Is dwell 5 minutes? Is dwell all the time? But let's get back to the guy who called my show. He periodically, or more than periodically, wishes his mother would finally die. He's had this terrible burden of taking care of her for 10 years. I have a, I have a sense that this is not uncommon among caretakers who—

I have felt it with regard to my sister. I have, I have thought sometimes about how I wish for her peaceful death.

Okay, well, that's very open and honest. I know you do. I totally don't blame you. It's not even necessarily in this in your case, even a bad thought. It's— her life is not a happy life.

Yes.

And it can't be. She's burdened with this level of autism. And I have an autistic stepson, but they might as well be on different planets, as you know, because he is not a burden at all.

He's a joy.

He's actually a joy. That's right. So I would like to know if the people who wrote to you think that this guy is sinning. I'm sorry, my guy who called my radio show, is he sinning?

Well, I'd be very eager to hear their responses.

So here is my take, which is literally the opposite, the opposite of these wonderful people. And they know I know them because I, I deal more with Christians than any other single group, and I adore so many of America's Christians. So my view is that precisely because he has those thoughts, he is a particularly fine human being.

That's very interesting. Go on.

Yes, if you don't have dark thoughts, you don't get any credit for not doing dark actions. If you don't—

is that true?

I mean, let's take a non-moral arena— eating. Okay, if you have no sweet tooth, you get no credit for not having dessert. The only people who get credit for not eating dessert are the people who want to eat dessert, right?

It's a good analogy.

It's a perfect analogy. It— see, this is why I call my, my Bible commentary, The Rational Bible, in Judaism and Christianity, and equally in my— just different arenas— I have found that wonderful— and I'm not— I don't— I mean this sincerely, I know you do— wonderful religious Jews, wonderful religious Christians will so often abandon reason for the sake of theology. And it happens in Judaism, in Jewish law. Law is Judaism's gift, and faith is Christianity's gift to its adherents. Of course, Christians have laws and Jews have faith, obviously, but those are the symbols of each of the religions. And I don't believe in abandoning common sense, right, or wisdom. If you are a man married to a woman and you lust after another woman and do nothing about it, you are better than the guy who never lusts. What the hell credit do you get for staying faithful if you don't desire any other woman, right?

I think also your point really intrigues me because As we would all agree, we meaning Christians and Jews and people who, you know, follow the values of the Bible, we are a fallen people. Everyone has dark thoughts. And to your point, running away from or denying or hiding those dark thoughts, I think actually makes it more likely that you will act on those bad thoughts. Because you need to blow off the steam somewhere.

That's right, that's right. Blow it off in your brain, right? Not in your behavior. And that's right.

That's what I've realized.

You know, on, on, on— by the way, that the line of, of Jesus in Matthew about lusting after other women as if you've committed adultery with your heart, it's one of the few examples that I know of, of a, of a true Jewish-Christian difference other than theology. That's right, right. And that's fine. I don't have any problem with that. We're gonna have differences. But I don't, I don't see the issue. My wife, whom you know well and adore, and it's mutual, I might add, she adores you. My wife knows exactly what goes on in my brain. Do you know how liberating that is for me as her husband?

And for her too.

Well, I will get to that in a moment. I just want to say for me, yes, that I don't have to hide who I am as a man from my wife. By the way, I knew this. This is not my first marriage, and that was one thing I knew. I can't fake it with my own wife. If I can't level with her about how I feel on every single thing in life, then why am I getting married?

Right.

To hide myself from my— what should be my closest friend on earth, my wife. She knows how I react to attractive women in the street. She gets a kick out of it. She points them out to me. Did you— did you miss that one, by the way, walking by the way?

I've seen this.

Yes. It's It's really— she's not scared of it. She has no reason to be scared of it because I won't act on it, and she knows that, and I know that. So the idea that because I have this sexual, erotic, lust, whatever term you wish to use, reaction to a woman in a miniskirt is a non-issue. It means that I didn't hide me from me, and I didn't hide me from her.

So let me ask you a question that is a difficult one. A, because it's sort of maybe implicating a lot of people, and B, obviously it's hard to answer because you can't get in people's brains. Do you think those who say that they don't lust after other women when they're married, do you think that they're lying to themselves?

I don't think they're, they're lying on a conscious level. I think they're lying to themselves. I don't— if you are a normal male, by the way, homosexual as well as heterosexual, gay men are my proof because gay men are lusting after other men. That's why gay men, not having women to control them, have vast numbers of partners in most cases, right? So this is male nature.

Right.

And we are stimulated by the visual. See my PragerU video on men and the power of the visual. I sleep well in part because I don't hide me from me and I don't hide me from my wife. I'm not hiding me from my, from my viewers right now.

I know, I know. It's really unbelievable how open you are.

Well, about this particular subject, especially just for the record, I want to give my dad credit, my father spoke about sex as openly as he would speak about the weather. Sex was just part of life. He talked about it and it was a non-issue.

Right.

And I inherited that culturally. I have it instinctively, but I also got it culturally from him.

Like you, I am an endeavor to be a rational person. And it's been interesting to observe my own thought process as I'm trying to get out of this hole of just relentlessly, as I said, inflicting corporal mortification on my mind whenever I have a malignant or bad thought. And one of the things that my rationality tells me is that God implanted this nature. I believe you said this last time. God implanted this nature into us, right? And so, you know, we had a fascinating discussion a few weeks ago on this show about, you know, I read to you that line in Genesis that the serpent was the shrewdest of all the wild beasts that the Lord God had created. See, I do read it closely. And I said, Dennis, it says right here that the Lord God created. Did God create evil? And you said yes.

And Isaiah 45:7, God created good and evil. Go ahead. That's just important. That's pretty unbelievable that you can just, you know, I say it well, I don't know, I happen to know that, right? I don't want to take more credit, but it doesn't matter. That's an important verse.

But look, what I took away from our discussion is not only that God created evil, but that there was a reason, of course, why if he created it, there must be a reason for it. And similarly, if God created us and God created these you know, our dark sides, if you will. There must be a reason for that too.

So this will blow your mind. There is a statement, uh, which again is— I have a, I have a lot of problems, as, as everyone knows, with, with a lot of positions that my fellow Jews take. Mostly they're not religious, right?

And anti-Israel.

Well, anti-Israel, anti-American. It's, it's anti-liberty. I mean, it's a very sad thing. Okay, but it is what it is. I'm only saying that though because people shouldn't think that when I extol the virtue of Judaism in any given instance that I'm a chauvinist. That's the last thing I am. So, uh, virtually every kid, every adult who has studied Judaism in any Depth knows this. It's from the Talmud, the second holiest work in Judaism after the Bible. And it was codified by about the 5th century. And it's the size of a gigantic encyclopedia. It's volume after volume. I think it's, depending on how, I think 60 volumes. It's enormous. It's in Aramaic. It's about everything. It's about philosophy, theology, law, God, man, sex, everything. So there's a line in there, why did God make the yetzer hara? Why did God make the will to do bad? Because the Jewish view is that we are born with the will to do good and a will to do bad. And this is what the rabbis— I mean, these were you know, very religious men. This is what they answered: because if we didn't have the will to do bad— I've told you this?

No, but I can surmise what the answer is.

What do you think? All right, so go ahead. What are you guessing? I'm curious.

Well, how do you know what light is if there's no darkness?

Okay, that's a very excellent answer. That's not what they said. This will blow your mind.

Oh, okay.

They said without the will to do bad a man wouldn't marry, wouldn't make a family, wouldn't build a house, and wouldn't work for a living.

You say this in your Happiness—

Yes. So it's, it's fascinating. Yes. Okay, well, blessings.

I'm a human recording machine, and I'm a Dennis Prager specialist expert.

That's right. So I remember in high school when I heard this, and I thought, well, if all these great things happen because of the will to do What the hell is the good of the will to do good?

Can you, for our listeners and for me, can you explain the link between the will to do bad or why it gives—

it gives— well, for example, if you have no desire for material objects, you won't work, right? Well, you'll be a lazy slob.

What about marriage?

Marriage— look at what is happening today. How many kids are not getting married? And they, they think they're following their good urge. Oh, I don't want to pollute the world with more people. Oh, I don't want to have more carbon emissions. Oh, I don't want the burden of doing this. It's this desire partially to be immortal. People want children because they want— they don't want to die. They'll live through their children, which doesn't really happen, but doesn't matter. It's instinctive. Anyway, they were being hyperbolic in a certain sense, but they were right.

This, this— that's very interesting.

I'll go further than that. I know me. I know me really, really well because I knew at a— at your age, I knew if I don't know me, I don't know a damn thing about the world. So my first project was to know me because I assume I'm just like everybody else, not in the— in my behavior, not in my outlook, but in my, in my constitution, there's no difference between me and anybody, certainly any man. And so I really, really wanted to know me, and I realized that part of my energy is my sex drive.

You said this last time.

I have a lot of energy, as you well know. I have the same energy I had at your age.

More.

Okay, fair enough. I was asking— sorry to interrupt—

I was asking Dennis whether or not I should go to the Harvard-Yale game. Because it's a 6-hour flight and, you know, I'll— the next day I have to film. And I could just tell, and you weren't being— but I could just tell he was like, please, because you can fly around the world, do 8 shows, you know, do a circus act and run a marathon, and you're like, oh yeah, I'm very lucky.

And I— but, but I really do believe part of it is I am very energized, right? There's this— that is a battery You as a woman, I'll bet you have met men who seem to you to have a very low sex drive because they, they don't radiate passion, energy, masculinity. I mean, it comes with a price not to have this drive. It comes with a price to have this drive.

You know, maybe that's why a lot of women are A, not as energetic as men, and B, I think that's a good—

that's an interesting—

just my own anecdotal observation, women are more sort of depressed, or they take, they take things harder. Look what we were just talking about, how the joking around on this show, you guys are very light. Women are much more serious and complicated. And maybe there's kind of that dark cloud because we, we don't share the same sexual desire and drive that you guys have.

That's right.

So that, that's very interesting.

So, but a woman— I think a lot of women who are in touch with themselves, and, and a lot of women are not, just as like a lot of men are not today. But if you are in touch with yourself, I think more and more young women are meeting men who do not radiate energy and passion and drive and masculinity. And that's not a turn-on to women.

As a woman, I can tell you it is most certainly not.

That's right.

So when I have bad thoughts about other people, or honestly, I'm— I will be so open with the viewers, I'm truly right now trying to think about bad thoughts I have. I mean, I told you that one about my sister. I don't really know if that's a bad thought. It's just—

it sounds bad.

It sounds bad, but, but, but I actually don't feel guilty about that.

Good.

Because I know, because truly it is coming from a good place. It mostly, it mostly is not coming from like, I want to relieve myself of the burden. It is this poor precious sister of mine I want.

And also for your family.

And of course for my family.

Right.

But let's say I had, you know, let's say I'm annoyed at a family member and I think this person is so XYZ or this That's the extent of my really bad thoughts. Like, how does that fit into the paradigm that you're saying that the bad allows for the good? If we didn't have— what the rabbis were saying, if we didn't have the bad thoughts, then we—

No, no, that may not— no, that's a separate issue. I was just talking about the— that wasn't bad thoughts. That was the two wills that we're born with.

Okay.

So that is a separate issue. If you have bad thoughts about— go on.

Sorry, I thought that— I thought, yes, it was about the two wills, but one of the wills is the bad.

Yes. Right. But that's not the same as bad thoughts.

Okay.

So the bad thoughts issue was separate. You have bad thoughts about some relative, let's say. So what? My answer is, so what? Are you acting on it? Are you mistreating them? That's the only question I have.

See, I— here's what happens to me. If I have bad thoughts about a family member, I will think to myself, Julie, they've done so much for you.

Okay, that's fair. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, you— that's fair for you to do that, right? Maybe, maybe your bad thoughts are not warranted, right? I think it's completely good to check on your own self. You know, maybe I'm reacting in an irrational or ungenerous way. I think that's completely accurate.

Well, I don't—

well, what if they deserve the bad thoughts? What if you've— after you've done this trial inside of you you, you had a defense attorney and a prosecutor, and it turns out they really deserve these bad thoughts, then the only question is how do you act? If you don't mistreat them, then what's the difference? See, also, people pay a price. Your writers, I have no doubt, are fine. I have no doubt are truly fine people. I know this because I've met them.

And you can just tell in their writing. Yes, you can. You can just tell.

Yes, of course you You can tell. Anyway, I know such people so well, they're in my life.

I know.

So, but I think you pay a price by expelling thoughts that come to you naturally.

You—

I, I don't— I think you become less real. And I, I am.

How so?

Because it's not you.

Yeah, that's her.

That's That's why. Well, the guy who says to you— you asked me, what do I think of the guy says, oh, I see another one, I have no lustful feelings. So you asked me, do I think he's lying? I think he's lying. I said I think he's lying to himself, or he has trained himself, which is what he would say. I've trained myself not to think about it. Okay, so that's a very interesting thing about training yourself not to have a natural reaction.

Right.

So maybe that, maybe that is commendable. I don't know. I don't know what to say. Uh, it's hard for me to imagine what process that would have taken, that I could see a beautiful woman, uh, on a beach, uh, and, and think, gee, God made such wonderful bodies for the human species. I, I don't know why, why I would still be me.

Right. Well, this point about authenticity is really an exceptional one because I'll give an example rooted in real life. You know, I refer to these Shabbat dinners that I go to with Dennis, and they truly have become a highlight of my life. I mean, I love these people.

I— it is so much fun.

It so is, and it's now my secret weapon. And you said, I think at our Shabbat dinner, this past Friday, you said, you know, the Shabbat was my university. This is where I— and I thought, that is so well said, because there is— we talk about everything.

Now you know how true it is. Unless one experiences it, it seems like an odd thing to say.

Well, of course they have to experience the right Shabbat. I mean, I'm sure there are Shabbat, but this one in particular is so real.

Almost every traditional home— this I can say having been to so many Jewish homes on a Friday night, right? Almost— I'm talking about traditional Jews or religious— will have an almost endless dinner. It's 3 hours is normal. 4 hours is not abnormal. The talk will go from the most mundane to the most elevated. But there will always be some elevated talk, right? Because in Judaism, it's actually a sin to have a communal meal and not talk, quote unquote, Torah. There's another statement from the Talmud: 3 Jews eat together and did not speak any Torah, it's as if they ate from the altar of the dead.

I love that. I want to quote that. You were asking me in this episode, we're going on so many tangents. I want to tell my story about Shabbat dinner, but I want to respond to this because you asked me at the beginning of this episode if I can talk to my friends about these matters. The answer is really no. And I want to sort of, I mean, I wouldn't because I don't think it would be effective or appreciated, but I sort of want to bring that quote to them and go, we, we are sort of succumbing to the altar of— we are sort of eating from the altar of the dead if we avoid this stuff. Anyway, that I love that, that, that really moved me. But these Shabbat dinners are so fun. But I'll— you probably know this, but you may not. At the beginning, uncomfortable is the wrong word. I was taken aback by the amount that all of you at the table would joke about sex.

And we're all committed to Torah and God. I just want to make clear.

Of course, of course. Yes, you're all committed to Torah, God. You all have your wives sitting next to you.

Oh yeah, the wives are older. Of course.

And children in many cases. And the children, children are not young children, but you know.

But they're children.

Yes.

Right.

Are participating. And you know, it's not constant. It's not like, you know, every 5 sentences. No, but it happens. But it happens. And it's not, you know, unbelievably crass or crude, but it happens. And I just grew up in a home where that was just, my parents never talked about sex ever. And by the way, my parents listen to this podcast. Thank you for not talking about sex. Cause I think it would make me uncomfortable. I think it's better to go to a Shabbat dinner, at least for me, and like hear it from other adults than my own parents. But I've come to realize I have not only gotten rid of the taken abackness that I usually had, but I actually really appreciate it now when you guys do it because it is real.

Wow.

And precisely for what you just raised.

I am very touched that you don't react that way. It is real. It's real.

It's hard. And it's helped me. And again, I am bearing all here. With, with the viewers, but you guys have kind of destigmatized it for me. And look, everyone has sexual— it's made me realize everyone has sexual thoughts.

It's like, it's like it's not something to be ashamed of. It's real. It's like, I never think of money, I never think of food. I mean, what can't lead to sin? So you should think of nothing, right? And there are people who think that.

That's— that is a real— I know I've been saying really good points. Yeah, no, sorry, Juliette, but Yes, it is.

And that's why there is that sort of ideal within the Christian world. There had been, or has been, or is an ideal of the, the monk or the nun. And I'm not saying all monks and nuns are like this at all, but of certainly in the Middle Ages, of just a life of prayer that all you think about essentially is God. And I think God will look at them and say, I don't understand, I made all of these things in life. Food and material items and sex and all you could think about is me.

What you— it's so true what you just said, because literally everything will lead you to a sinful thought.

It's right. Does God, by the way, has God not led to sinful thoughts? How many people killed in the name of God?

Right. And it's just, it's just impossible. Not to mention it's not a good thing, or, you know, it's just impossible to have perfectly clean, perfect thoughts all the time.

But it's not desirable. Well, right, it's beyond not— it is not desirable. Think what you think. Now, if you dwell on molesting children, of course that is a very bad thing. You're sick because normal people don't dwell on molesting children. Children. That's a really bad thing. You need help immediately, and God forbid it should ever lead to action. So I'm not talking about that. But the most obvious is the one, obviously, the lust issue. But there were so many. The death issue. I wish my mom would finally die. That's what opened me up to this. 'Cause I said to the guy, what are you kidding? You're a great son. And the guy thought I was mocking him. I'll never forget that. He truly thought I was making fun of him. He calls up to tell me he's a crappy son, and I'm telling him you're a great son. One of us is wrong. That's clear.

Where do you think this comes from in Christianity? Why is there this divide?

So that's a very— that's a great question. So here is my theory, Prager Theory #84273, subsection B. It's so true, right? So here it is. So you'll get a big kick out of this, and so will our listeners. So I grew up an Orthodox Jew in a sort of Orthodox ghetto in Brooklyn, New York. I not only didn't know non-Jews, I didn't know non-Orthodox Jews.

Wow. It was a, it was a closed world in which I had the dead opposite. I didn't know any religious people.

Okay, that's right.

Maybe one or two.

Most people grow up in a cocoon. That's exactly right. Most people do. So that was my cocoon, but I knew it was a cocoon very early on because I remember as in elementary school, I would try to talk to the mailman. He was my one Gentile that I had regular contact with, and I would ask him about his family life. I know, it's very funny.

Not that you were in prison, please don't take this the wrong way, but I have this image of like some—

I know, that's right, that's right. Or solitary confinement. That's Yeah, so around high school, or even late elementary school, because I thought about things from a very early age, I thought, wow, Christians have it really, really easy. We, we can't eat certain foods, we can't do a whole host of things on the Sabbath once a week, we've got all these laws Christians have none of these laws. They just have to believe in Jesus. They're saved. What a great deal. And so I often have said I had Christian envy. What a deal, man. I got stuck with all these laws and all you have to do is believe.

I never heard this about you.

Oh yes, I had—

That's funny.

Yeah, oh, you'll love this. So I had Christian envy. I lost Christian envy much later. My first radio work was the host of a very, very popular show on ABC in Los Angeles, and it was called Religion on the Line for 10 years, August '82 to August '92. I was the host, and each week there would be a priest, minister, and a rabbi, different ones each week, and I had this 2 hours of dialogue. Every week with every type of Catholic priest and every type of Protestant minister. And well, and the rabbis, of course, because— but that I've had already. And around the 4-year mark, I lost Christian envy. And this answers your question. Ready? So Christians, unlike Jews, don't have any guilt over eating ham, or over, you know, they don't have to fast on Yom Kippur. They don't have to avoid any sort of work on the Sabbath and so on. And That's true, but they made a trade. Christianity, it's not guilt over, over behavior, it's guilt over thought. That was the trade Christianity made. Jews have guilt over behavior, Christians have guilt over thought. The very fact that you're only saved if you believe in Christ means thought is really important, right? Jews want you to believe in God, right? But if you have— if you have a very tough time believing in God and you, and you keep the law, you go to as much of heaven as the biggest believer in whoever lived in Judaism.

Well, Christians— and I know, I know you mean this— they not only have guilt over thoughts, but they have, they have double. They have guilt about thoughts and behavior.

That's right.

Jews just have guilt about behavior.

That's right.

There was— I was talking with a, uh, conservative Jewish friend, not, I mean, yes, conservative politically, but conservative as far as denominationally, Jewish friend from college. And yes, there is a conservative Jew at Harvard, believe it or not. And he was telling me, you would probably know where this is in the Old Testament, but he was telling me that there's some line somewhere that essentially conveys that not, it is not possible, we cannot expect that everyone will follow Judaism the exact way that we want them to, or follow all the laws. All the laws, right? But as long as people believe in God, essentially— I'm not saying this very well, but essentially, not that it doesn't matter how, but the primary priority is that they believe in God and accept the values of the Torah. I will ask him and get back to all of you on what this is, because it was fascinating how he described it. And he said, that's why I, as a Jew, have no problem with Christians. And I believe that Christians will go to heaven, even though they don't accept my Judaism.

Because God judges behavior, not theology.

Yes. And because I know it's not possible for everyone to be a Jew. And as long as there's, you know, I think of it as a Venn diagram.

It's not the aim. The aim, right, if Jews understood the aim, the aim is to bring the world to the God of the Torah, right? I have spent my life trying to do that. Whether you express it as a Protestant, Catholic, Mormon, ethical monotheist, that is not my concern. That, that is your concern. My concern— or Jew, by the way, you're certainly welcome to become a Jew— but, but since there is no reward in heaven for being a Jew that is not available to a non-Jew who is good, we don't have the same, right, compulsion to convert people.

Right, right. Well, when my Jewish friend was talking about this, it made me think of a Venn diagram. If you have Judaism and Christianity, you know, as the two circles, they need to— they— there's a critical point at which they need to intersect for, for—

that's why America was such a great place, right? The one truly Judeo-Christian world, right? And what the founders did was they took the best of both. That— and it is painful beyond words to see this unraveling under the, under the attack of the left-wing intelligentsia. It, it's— this, this is the Judeo-Christian country to the extent that the founder said Americans are the second Israel. Israel, not taking over. It's not replacement.

Oh, that's—

wow. Oh, that was a very big theme, the Second Israel.

Why didn't they call it the— I guess I'm trying to think of what number Rome it would be, but most, you know, business, right?

You know, it wasn't the Second Rome. Why not Second Greece?

That's, that's very interesting. Why Israel instead of Rome or Greece?

Because that was the foundational moral You didn't get morality from the Greeks and Romans. You got wisdom, you got insight, you got how to make a government, but you got your morality from Jerusalem.

You know the thought that just popped into my head? It is what you said last episode about how it pains you that your work cannot get out to more people. I just had that thought because in this conversation I have learned so much. This is an aside, obviously, that I learned so much from this podcast. I can't believe that I get to do this as a job. I said that to you coming in today.

So what do you think I feel? I feel the same way. I can't believe I get to do this as a job. It was a blessing from God. But that's not the point you're making. The point you're making, yes, I wish these ideas got to more people. So that is why, look, I was just in Denmark getting a big speech with a nice audience in the parliament, but I don't revel in that. I think, how many people in Denmark really know what I have to say? It's an infinitesimally small number. And it has nothing, and you know, and I think most people listening, zero to do with ego. It's not an ego thing. Thing. It's purely idealistic. If I have felt since high school I had a recipe, I had— I had no, not a recipe, though that's not, not improper term here, but I had a prescription. I had, I had an antidote to evil. By the way, the— it's interesting, again, the Talmud: the human being has poison in him, and the Torah is the to doubt. That is an exact phrase in the, in the, in the Talmud.

And the second part of that sentence is not, and that person should fret over the fact that they have poison in them, or that person should corporally mortificate their mind.

You truly can.

And, and also, that actually really brings me a lot of comfort because we know that every single word in the Torah, in the Bible, is— was specifically chosen and incredibly important. So it is no mistake that that is the way that the sentence is phrased. If they—

well, that's from the Talmud, but—

or the Talmud, excuse me. But, but still, right? You know, if, if the message— if it was really important to convey you have to constantly hate yourself for the poison, then that would have been conveyed.

That's right. You got it so clearly. It is so liberating to have this, this vision. And, and not only that, it helps, it helps you be a better human being, right? I know what I have to fight, right? If I've suppressed it, how do I know? If you've suppressed it the whole time, one day it's going to erupt.

Well, right, that's what I was saying earlier about the blowing off the steam.

Yes, that was a great insight.

So this makes me think of leftists. And the extent to which they reconcile with their—

well, do they acknowledge that the worst of all worlds, because perfect example, what Donald Trump said about grabbing women in their privates.

Right. We talked about that episode.

Yeah.

Episode 4, minute 15. Second.

Yes.

37. See, I think it actually was episode 4.

But that's a perfect example. What you say privately is more or less the same as what you think privately, which is by definition private, what you think, right?

Right.

What do I care what, what, what he said? I'm a Jew. I don't care if somebody spouts off against Jews in pillow talk with his wife. Episode 9, she was only missed by 5.

Corbel mortification in the brain. How dare I miss it by 5 episodes? Horrible, horrible, horrible. No, I'm not gonna do that. Hey, you know what? I knew it was in the first 10.

Okay, tell me when we're ready to return to Earth.

Let us return by that much.

Exactly. The The guy said it privately, or if somebody says bad things about a group privately and believes no one ever heard it. But my grandfather had anger at Blacks. A Black man murdered his father-in-law. I actually saw the piece from a New York newspaper. Wow. He was captured in the South somewhere and they brought him to trial. So he came from Europe. Eastern Europe, and his father-in-law was murdered by a black man. And so he had anger at blacks. And we, you know, it bounced off the rest of the family because nobody had similar anger. And he came from Eastern Europe. He had not seen a black person in his life in Eastern Europe. Anyway, we had a black housekeeper whom we adored. She was truly a member of the family. Ethel.

You racist had a Black housekeeper? Wow.

That's right. Well, today they have Hispanic housekeepers, right? And she, uh, he treated her so beautifully. And I learned a very important lesson from that. So fine. He was somewhat bigoted against Blacks. I knew it because he loved boxing. So when he was at my house for the weekend On Saturday night, we'd watch boxing. I was a kid, and he'd root for the white boxer. And I remember laughing. I don't give a damn who wins. I don't care about boxing. So I had none of that, but he did. And I remember being able to say, yeah, but look at how well he treats Ethel. I was able at such a young age to distinguish between his unfortunate bigotry, but his behavior was fine. And that's what matters. It was like in the Cheney family, I think, isn't one of the daughters gay? I think so. And she was very angry at her sister. She said, oh yeah, she treats gays really well, but she's not pro-homosexuality. So I thought, wait a minute. She treats gays well. What else matters? They're totalitarian on the left.

Right.

They want to know what you think. You know, many asked Dennis, do you, do you think that it was an honest election in 2020? I said, what's the difference what I think? I recognize Joe Biden as President of the United States. End of issue. What do you care what I think? I don't ask you what you think. I only care what you do.

Mic drop.

Yeah, it's a big deal.

It is. Yeah. I mean, I was just thinking as you were talking, imagine if we were all just, I look, I think that private talk is important because of course in life things need to be private. But imagine if we were just all so much more open about the fact that everyone in a sense has prejudices, even if they're small or As we're talking about bad thoughts, or why, why can't we just acknowledge it? And as you say, be authentic about it.

Because we living in the non-wisdom age, right? Where what you think or what you say privately tells us everything we need to know about you.

And these people are stupid, which is also just so stupid because even if you think you know what other people think, you really don't fully know. It's impossible to really know what other people think at all times.

If you were in my car all the time and in my brain, you would know I hate every group, because whoever is driving slowly in the left lane, I not only hate them, I hate their group.

Yeah, you especially. Dennis is a very fast driver.

That's true, but that's, uh, okay, that's true, right?

Okay, no, I—

but, but who cares? That's the point though. It doesn't matter. And I could laugh at my own thoughts at those moments. I remember, I'll never forget, I saw an Orthodox Jew slowly in the left lane. Orthodox Jews, you know, the one group of Jews that tend to support my thinking. Or I remember a nun, and I go, oh, nuns, they are the worst possible drivers. How many nuns have I ever seen driving car? 2, 3?

I don't want to humiliate my dad, but he— my dad is actually the most non-prejudice— I'm convinced that man actually has no prejudices. He is so pure, so lovely, like just the best. He, whenever he's driving, we're driving with him and there's a slow driver, he'll go, look at how slow she is. And my mom and I will go, oh, you're assuming that it's a woman.

He was caught.

And then, and then we go, and then what we always do is we zoom ahead and try to see if it's for everybody.

Yes.

And I have a very, very stark— a stark, excuse me, admission. 90% of the time they are women. 90% of the time they are.

That was my theory. My wife claims, because whenever we do it, she's as annoyed with slow drivers in the left lane as I am. She says it's more men than I think.

Oh, it's more men?

No, no, no. It's more men than I think. Oh, it's not more men than women.

Got it.

More men than I think. Yes.

My mom and I were always so determined to prove him wrong. And we say to him, that's the one area where you have— where you're sexist is when you're driving.

Yeah, you caught him.

I caught him. Sorry, Dad.

This has really been terrific. This, this, this is such an important discussion.

It is. And I want our viewers—

by the way, forgive me, did I tell you that I had a major dialogue with one of the, one of the greatest Christian theologians? And the, uh, the— I think— I wonder if it's on, on YouTube many years, many, well, maybe 10 years ago in Phoenix, Arizona. And I asked him this question because we got to the lust issue and Jesus's comment. So I said, okay, so Jesus says if you lust after another woman, you've committed adultery with your heart. Okay, we both know that you can only commit adultery if one of the two parties is married. Single people cannot commit adultery. So if a single man lusts after a single woman, is it a sin?

Well, when you say single, is that person—

can that person have a girlfriend or boyfriend, or you're just saying they're truly single? Oh, anyway, the boyfriend-girlfriend has no status in the adultery issue, right? You can't commit adultery against a boyfriend. You could cheat, but you can't commit adultery. So I returned to my question that I asked him. Is it okay for a Christian man to lust after— and he sees he's not married, he's not engaged. Engaged has a legal status in Judaism, at least. And she is neither engaged nor married. Has he committed a sin? And to his great credit, He said, I have— I've never thought about that, and I've never been asked that. He did not— he— but he did not say it was a sin.

I really admire when people do that one a day nowadays, especially when they're supposed to be an expert on something as that. Yes, I don't know. I haven't—

I would have no problem saying that, but I, I just want people to understand that's a very— it's a legitimate question.

It is, it is.

So then it's only a sinful thought if you're married? It's It's not a sinful thought if you're not married. Can't commit adultery if you're not married.

That's true. Wow. I would be very interested to hear from our Christian viewers, especially what they think of this conversation. I just learned— I want our viewers to know, and I want you to know, that I do, you know, think of the viewers first when I come here to talk, because I'm always thinking, you know, what would be the most interesting for them. And we, in other words, we take our job very seriously. But I just want to say, this has— this, this job of mine has had the dual benefit of just being so helpful to me personally.

It's meant to be. I come here and I bear all your Christian, uh, for our Christian listeners, I've read your Christian writers. I want to just show how it benefits Christians, my attitude that it's all about behavior. Most evangelical Christians think that I cannot be saved because I don't believe in Christ. Why doesn't that bother me? I mean, that, that's a big deal. I mean, basically, I'm They think I'm going to hell in most cases. It does not trouble me.

Why?

Because I judge them by their behavior, not their thought. They treat me beautifully.

That is a really perfect point. It's true. Wow. Well, do you— okay, this is— I know we're supposed to end right now, but I have to ask this question. Do you think they really believe that you're going to hell?

I do.

And, and so really, given how much they love you—

that's right. And that's why it bothers them a lot. They are pained by my non-salvation. I know this because so many Christians love me. Uh, I, I don't remember which Christian dear friend of mine said, Dennis, you're the most prayed for man in America.

I know you've said that before.

And, and many Christians at speeches will just come would say, 'I love you,' and, 'I pray for you.' And I know that they're praying for me for two things: to come to Christ and, and to live a long life and be well and continue. But the first comes from a good place. It doesn't— it, it doesn't in any way hurt me that, that they would make such a prayer.

Let me tell you, let me tell you my hypothesis for why I am not always convinced that they truly believe that. That meaning that you as a Jew are going to go to hell. It's similar to the point I brought up earlier about adultery. I don't think— I think that many Christians think that they truly believe that you're going to hell. But my hypothesis is that they actually deep down don't believe that you're going to hell. Because think about it, if they really thought that you were going to hell, deep down, and they love you as much as I know they do, wouldn't they just give all of their energy and time to trying to—

many do, right?

Right. I'm sure many do. That's right. Well, that's very fair.

I said to, uh, an evangelical Christian who was on— and not all the Christians were evangelicals, it was a mixed bag, which is beautiful— liberal Christians, Protestants, everything, LDS, the whole, the whole gamut of religion. I had Muslims on. At any rate, I said to him, uh, when it occurred to me about halfway, I said, the truth is your belief about, about me and my fate troubles you far more than it troubles me. Obviously, if I thought I, I was going to go to hell, I would become a Christian, right? So he said, that's right. And, and I had a real empathy and sympathy for Christians who love a non-Christian and, and yet are burdened by the belief that, that even though he's good— and, and not in my case, it's not just that they thought I was a good man, it's that They knew how many people I brought back to church, right? I mean, I have probably brought more people back to church, or I think I have, than any living Christian, or at least in America, any living Christian in America. And obviously Billy Graham is no longer with us and others, so there's no one having that mantle. And yet even I will, will go to hell in many views. By the way, Catholics don't believe that. Catholics believe God will decide in every case.

Oh, interesting. I didn't even know that. I was raised—

that's right, baptized in the Catholic Church. Catholics don't— they used to believe this. This, this is— this changed in the '60s. And by the way, my answer to, to Protestants, uh, so many of whom I adore, uh, is To believe that the way to salvation is through Christ, I don't know if that's identical to asserting that you have to believe that in order to have salvation. Christ may be the vehicle, but if someone doesn't know that, it doesn't mean that it is closed off to him. I also believe that another way in which a Christian can get around this, this burden in their life— and it is a burden in their life— is to say what the Catholics do. God will decide. I feel that because of my sincere belief in Christ, I am saved, but I can't say that I know that God will doom every single person who doesn't have that faith.

I don't know the New Testament well enough. Does the New Testament say that he will doom those who do not?

That's why I said, I am the way and the light, and no one comes to the Father except through me. That, that's, that's what is— but, but I don't know why that necessarily means that you have to—

Jesus said— I just want to clarify— Jesus said that, yes, no one comes to the Father, God, except through me.

That's right.

Well, that doesn't— to me, that doesn't necessarily mean you You have to believe in the divinity of Jesus Christ. You have to believe in his values or his—

Well, okay, all right, well, you're speaking of someone who has trouble with that idea. But even if you don't have trouble with the idea, every— I don't know why Christian can't say, and I'm sure Christians will say, of course we cannot say that. But okay, fine. So I'm just asking. I'm not— this is not a criticism at all, right? Why can't a Christian say that's true? Everyone who comes to the Father comes through the Son, but it doesn't mean that they are necessarily— they have to be aware of that fact. He still might be the vehicle, but whether or not I affirm that he is the vehicle might be a separate question. I just— I'm just throwing out a possibility that a person faithful to the Christian message can still, can still allow for that. As I said, the Catholic Church has more or less adopted something along those lines.

And I'm throwing out the possibility— and this is coming from my not, again, knowing the New Testament very well, so I'm very willing to be corrected— that maybe the vehicle is not necessarily believing in his divinity, but in believing in his values.

Okay, well, it would be interesting for you to bounce that off. You— I mean, you grow up in basically a non-Catholic Catholic home.

Yes, right.

So it would be interesting if you, if you know a believing Catholic who's knowledgeable, to bounce that off, or certainly if you knew a priest, to bounce that thought off them.

Well, you know the good thing, huh? I get to bounce it off of a lot of people who will write into me.

Well, that's right.

So please do at julie@julie-hartman.com. I know I've said it many times about this program, I love hearing from you, and I I thank you so much for when you write to me, and it pains me, as I know it pains Dennis, that I can't respond to every single one, but I read every single one. I promise. I've really come to understand you more. When you told me a year and a half ago, when I first started working for you, that it keeps you up at night sometimes that you can't respond to every viewer.

Well, because sometimes the letters are so heartfelt.

So heartfelt.

People pour their hearts out.

Oh, yes.

And I'm not being able to But look, I made peace with— there's no solution.

Yes. But please know that I really— I read each and every one of them. And even if I can't respond to you, I am thanking you and taking it in my head. And also, please follow us @DennisJuliePod on Instagram and Twitter and Dennis and Julie Podcast on Facebook. And we'll see you next time.

We will. And up on the wind it's carried over the cities and the plains. You got time, you're only man-made.

Your beloved dog and a stranger are both drowning. You can only save one. Who do you save? Every time Dennis Prager asks that question, his audience splits 3 ways. 1/3 chooses the dog, 1/3 chooses the stranger, and 1/3 aren't sure.

Why?

Because we live in an age where increasingly feelings define right and wrong. But if morality is based on emotion, then murder, rape, and theft are just opinions. And if people feel justified, why is rioting or destruction wrong at all? In his new In his new book, If There Is No God, Dennis Prager explains why civilizations cannot survive without objective morality and why Judeo-Christian values shape the moral foundations of the free world.

If you claim that certain things are good, certain things are evil, independent of how you feel about it, you are in effect affirming God.

If There Is No God by Dennis Prager, available now at PragerStore.com. That's PragerStore.com.