Timeless Wisdom - High Holiday Services - What I Learned in Yeshiva

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Okay, my friends, time for the sermon. What I do really is I give a lot of mini sermons, which is the way, because then everything becomes relevant. That's my whole point of having a service like this. So, I want to talk to you about the impact that a few Jewish ideas can have on a person's life. And what I'm going to do is tell you about 6 or 7 things that were drummed into my brain as a child in yeshiva and how they have impacted my life as an adult. A few words about that before I get to the specifics. Just a note to parents, and I guess grandparents too, the earlier things are drummed in, the better. Bad things drummed in early stay, good things drummed in early stay. In fact, my theory, and I wish I had known this, I'm not wiser than anyone else in this regard, but I have learned, well maybe I'm wiser now, I wasn't wiser at the outset, and that is if you do your heavy lifting in child rearing the first 6 years, you could basically cruise the next 50. That— and— but we don't think that way. We think— our natural instinct is to think, ah, he's only 3, let him do it. And as usual, the natural instinct is wrong. 3 is exactly the time to not allow him to do stuff you don't— we will not want him to do when he's 8. And then when he's 8, you can just lie back and go with your spouse to the movies because you have already done the heavy lifting. And the beauty is they don't even remember being disciplined. So you get only advantages by being tough when they're 3. But we don't think that way, and then we pay the piper for having that line, "Oh, she's only 2, she's only 4, he's only 5." But that's exactly the time, and this stuff was drummed into me in elementary school. Everything I am about to teach you, I learned before I was 10. Now, this is, uh, it comes— I wrote this piece, and of course I'm expanding it here. I wrote this piece, "What I Learned in Yeshiva and What I Didn't," when many years ago, and a great, great Christian, John Neuhaus, published it in his journal First Things. He was so taken with it, which is another example of how these ideas are applicable to people of every faith, obviously. But, uh, it was, uh, I wrote the other half, what I didn't learn at yeshiva. So I don't— I'm not here to tell you I only learned wonderful things. There were things I didn't learn as well. But I did learn wonderful things, and I want to show you how a few basic teachings can change your life, and as I said, as an adult. And they are absolutely in not any order of importance, except perhaps the last one is the most important, but it's debatable. So I'll begin with a concept that if you hadn't been to yeshiva, you probably haven't learned. and it's called Bittul Torah, or as they say, Bittul Tora. Bittul Tora is, it literally is invalidating the Torah, but what it really means is wasting time you could have been using to study Torah. So if you'd ask my Orthodox Rebbe, you know, can I go to the movies? He'd go, no, it's Bittul Tora. Should I listen to popular music? No, it's bittel Torah. Everything was bittel Torah unless it was study of Torah. Believe it or not, it changed my life. Because every time I did something, these rabbis' voices would resound in my brain, is this bittel Torah? So it had one immediate impact in my life, starting in my teens and continued forever, the most was not wasting time. And God knows I waste plenty of time. The amount of time I play hearts, read classical music reviews, go to photography websites, only the Lord and I know, and only the Lord and I should know. So I am not a paragon. If you want a paragon of not wasting time, it is Alan Estrin. He embodies the human who does not waste time, and I pale before him. And I mean that with— he's here and I say it with great love and respect, it's true. But nevertheless, it had a big impact on my life. In fact, to the point that I wrote an essay in my second year. We just found it, by the way, cleaning out our garage, I found it. My handwritten essay, second year high school, how I want to prove George Bernard Shaw was wrong when he said, "Youth is wasted on the young." I'm going to prove him wrong. I'm not going to waste my youth. I'm going to actually use my youth years for worthwhile stuff. So, this was all from Bittel Torah. But the biggest impact was television. I could never reconcile a lot of TV watching with the concept of Bittel Torah. Because then the voice of this rebbe would be coming, "You could be studying Torah." and you're watching this crap. That's what would happen. I would hear this voice. By the way, don't you— we all hear voices from teachers and parents. The recordings, that's the beauty of talking. It's not enough to be a model. It's very important to be a model as a parent, but it's not enough. If you model piano playing, your kid won't play piano. You still have to teach them. It's not enough to be a model. Oh, I'm a wonderful man, I'm a wonderful woman, my children will turn out well. It doesn't work that way. It's like, I'm a wonderful violinist. It doesn't mean your child will be a violinist. At best, they'll appreciate the fact that violin is a good thing. That's all. So you have to be taught. That's why the great law of Shemot, you all know it. Well, not all. Many of you know it by heart. Right? You will talk about these things when you rise up and when you lie down and when you walk by the way, and you will put them in the teeth of your children. One thing comes from shame, from the word tooth. As their teeth grow in, you will teach them these things. So you— and anyway, none of us are perfect models anyway, so we better teach stuff. So this is a voice that has always come to me. Is this bittel Torah? Are you wasting time? Now, I never took it literally as I could be studying Torah now. He was literal, but I took it, are you doing something worthwhile now? Because after all, my rebbe would have thought listening to Beethoven was bittul Torah. And I didn't. I thought that was a good use of time. So this was the first teaching that I'm bringing to your attention that is very basic to Judaism and very powerful. What are you doing with your time? And there's no more appropriate time, of course, to talk about it than these present days. So, p'til Torah. What are you doing with your time when you could have been doing something valuable? Next, I'll put this in the— use the story of my older son. Elementary school, also a Jewish, a traditional Orthodox Jewish day school here in Los Angeles. Mine was in Brooklyn. And I said to him one day, I didn't normally ask this question because I didn't normally care. I was derelict in this way. But I asked, so Dave, what'd you learn in school today? But I had a good day. He said, "Ayel, Dad, I learned I have a yetzer hara, and I was so happy." What did he learn that day? He learned he had a bad inclination. Basic, basic fundamental Jewish teaching that you have it, we all have a yetzer hatov and a yetzer hara, a will to do good and a will to do bad. He learned that day that he has a yetzer hara, as they say it in common parlance, yet said hara if you actually say it correctly. So why was I so happy that my son in elementary school learned he had a bad side? Think about it. Why would I be— I was thrilled. I was thrilled on two completely separate levels. One was moral, one was psychological. So I'll tell you the moral because you may not— that you'll be— it'll be clear that you can guess, but I'll— then I'll tell you the psychological. The moral was, wow, my son now knows what I learned in elementary school. I have built into me a bad side. I'm not basically good. I'm a mixture. That's the Jewish teaching. You're not basically good. This drives, as I've told you, drives Jews crazy. I wrote this as one of my first columns when I was signed up as a columnist for the Jewish Journal of Los Angeles, and I got hate mail. It's published. You don't have to trust me. It's published hate mail. Now, it's fascinating. Why would people hate you for saying people aren't basically good? It's not a political position. Why would they hate you? But they do. Because it's a false god, and people who believe in false gods don't like to have their gods shattered. It's also one of the most— aside from God, it's the single most important question you can ask people. Because if you believe we're not basically good, you have totally different political views than if you believe people are basically good. Or social— forget political— social, social views. If you don't think people are basically good— if you think people are basically good, then you blame society for all the evil there is. It's not the individual's fault, he's basically good, he was screwed up by society, by his parents, by economics, by society. And if you believe that people are a mixed bag, then you blame people for the bad that they do, and you don't blame society for the bad that people do. Nobody rapes because of society, they rape because they are bad, or they chose evil. Period, end of issue. No poverty has ever caused a rape. So, it's a very big deal. So back to this. My son and I learned, and kids, the next generation, as in every generation before me, kids learn you have a yetzer hara. You have a will to do bad. This means that you must spend your life fighting your yetzer hara. And again, what did I imagine? Because early memories are so powerful, I did imagine, and you can see this actually enacted. We have the famous actor, who is it again? With the two voices when he's stealing a VCR? Who is the famous actor? Jason Alexander, yes. We made a film on goodness. You can get it through Amazon. Alan and I made a film on goodness. It's very funny. We have big, very big actors like Jason Alexander in it. And he's a guy, he asks for a video machine at a store. And he asks for a certain model, and by accident the salesman gives him a model that's a few times the price of that. So you see him walking out, and there were two Jason Alexanders talking to him. The Yetzer Hara Alexander and the Yetzer Hatov Jason Alexander. This one's the Yetzer Hara, why do they care, what will they know, I didn't do it, it was their mistake, what difference will it make in 100 years, what's the difference? And then there's the other Jason Alexander saying, come on Jason, you know better than that, you're stealing. That's not the one you paid for. You gotta return it and take the one you paid for. What we did in that scene is reenact what I learned and my son learned and any child does in traditional Jewish learning of the conflict and it's constant. I have not grown up, so to speak, from that picture. I still have it in my life where there were two voices talking to me. Saying unbelievably persuasive things. Why would you let that guy in? You have been in this lane so long. What are you going to let that guy in for? Dennis, wouldn't you want to go in that lane if that guy, if he was out there? Dennis, give me a break. You're nuts. And I— it is constant. And it's a very healthy way morally healthy. I will show why it's psychologically good, but it's a terrific moral thing. But we don't teach that. It's not taught in secular schools. At the most expensive secular school you can send your kid to, which now in elementary school is in the $30,000s, I am told, they will not learn what matters. They'll only be prepped to get into a great college. Whoopee-doo. But they're not going to learn the most important things of life, how to be a good person. They won't learn wisdom. And this is classic Jewish teaching, that you have a Yetzer Hara and a Yetzer Hatov, and they're in conflict all the time. On every issue, they're in conflict. There's no day that I don't get the two voices on some subject. And then there's the psychological reason that it is so good for a person to know that they have a bad inclination. And that is, you make peace with yourself. It's fantastic. I never ever ever felt guilty for my bad desires or my bad inclinations. It gave me such peace. Ironically, teaching you that you have a bad side is not only morally good, it's psychologically good. It's good for self-esteem. Believing you're basically good isn't self-esteem. Everybody's basically good if you believe that. It's when you realize that you have a bad side and you've conquered it. That's self-esteem. It's a very— it's impossible, actually, for me to overstate what a positive role this has played in my life, because as I even wrote in the article published by Pastor, then Father, Newhouse— he converted from Protestant to Catholic later in his life and became a priest, a Catholic priest— so he was obviously okay with printing this. And I wrote something to the effect— I wish I had line in front of me, but rereading it, I basically remember I said, look, let me be honest. I wrote in the article, I don't fantasize walking on a beach holding hands with the girl of my dreams. Okay? My fantasies work in darker arenas than hand-holding at sunset. Okay? So we'll leave it at that. But every male here, and A good portion of females can relate to what I just said entirely. So I had total peace with all— I wanted to cheat on tests. I had peace with the fact that I wanted to cheat on tests. I had no peace with cheating on tests, so I didn't cheat. It's a very wonderful thing to teach your child you have a bad side and a good side. And that they're in conflict. And then you conquer it. Eizeh haGibbor, eizeh hu haGibbor. This I also learned in elementary school. It's from Ethics of the Fathers, which you guys have studied, I think. Ethics of the Fathers, a tremendous chapter in the Talmud, and one of its lines is, who is the Gibbor? You know what a Gibbor is? Gibbor is a hero or strongman. Either, both are correct translations. Hakoveish et Yitzro, the guy who conquers his yetzer. Not the guy who beats up 50 people, not the guy who lifts 500 kilos. Well, that— nobody can lift 500 kilos, 500 pounds. Uh, it is the guy who conquers his urges. That's the strongman. I learned that too. So this was an unbelievably good Jewish teaching that has totally affected my life. Number 3: To Judaism's great credit, and this is also universally taught, that one of the worst sins you can engage in is gossip and slander. Lushon hara, as it's called. There are most Jews here who have had any contact with Jewish teaching have heard the term Lashon hara, or lashon hara. Lashon hara literally means bad tongue or bad speech. There are two forms of this. Rabbi Joseph Telushman has written a whole book on this, and he's been the foremost advocate of working oneself on this in our generation. And there are two types. There's lashon hara and rechilot. There is where you You tell the truth about someone behind their back, but it's bad. That's gossip. Then there's slander, where you've made up a lie about someone and said it. Obviously, the second is worse than the first, but Judaism doesn't want you to do either as a general rule. Now, some rabbis went, I think, as usual— as usual meaning in every good thing there are always extremes— and, you know, said you can never talk to to anybody about anybody else, which is not right. I mean, you should be able to talk to your spouse or your closest friend in confidence about someone. That's quite all right. I think it's a little too severe. But as a general rule, it is a very powerful teaching. And I learned this phrase which did change my life, and it changed my radio. It totally affects how I do radio. It's a powerful sentence. I know it by heart from elementary school. Whoever humiliates his friend— it says friend, but obviously it would apply to anybody. Whoever humiliates someone, bar abim, in public, ki'ilu, it is as if, shafach damo, he spilled his blood. It's a play on words as well as a moral insight, because the Hebrew for insult insult is lehalbim. Lehalbim means to whiten because the blood drains from the face of the person who was insulted. So an insult is to make white. So hamalbim et p'nei chavero, whoever whitens the face of his neighbor, bar abim, in public, it is as if he has spilled his blood. Isn't that profound? It is so deep It was so deeply embedded in me that I have mentioned this even on the radio. Because I like to give Judaism credit for how it's formed my values. And I remember specifically when I addressed this publicly. It was during the Clinton-Monica Lewinsky scandal, and I announced on the radio that I— if you— you are not allowed to call my show and tell a Monica Lewinsky joke. And I said, why? Monica Lewinsky is created in God's image just as much as I am. Whatever you think of the scandal, you cannot humiliate a person. She's a human being, which she was not— which she was not depicted as. She was not depicted as human. She was the butt of jokes, and that was it. As if she had done the worst possible things conceivable. And obviously there's no defense of what she did, but she was not worthy of the public humiliation and jokes about her humanity that were made. And I forbade anyone, and I said why. I was taught in my Judaism that if you humiliate someone publicly, it's as if you have killed them. So it has always affected, and that's why I am very adamant, and I can't stop it. It's funny, it's not a battle. I can't help myself. I don't allow it on my show among callers, and I don't allow me to do it. And so even when I have people I differ with tremendously on, I try to protect their dignity. Protecting their dignity is because they are, they, even if they're wrong, are also created in God's image. And all of this is from elementary school. And therefore, I can't laugh at a lot of the comedy in America because so much of it is based on humiliating people. I mean, I love ribbing. I rib my friends all the time. I rib people. I love it. But that's very different from humiliate. And there is a humiliation form of humor in our country that is not a good thing. And I know it's not a good thing because of this teaching. So there was another one that was life-shaping from my life. And you know, when I first encountered it, I'll never— I remember it vividly because I learned this teaching, but I didn't know how rampant it was in society. And then in high school, I came across— we don't have this now, uh, this term, though those of you my age and perhaps a little younger may know this term gossip columnist, right? There were people paid to be gossip columnists. And I remember thinking, what, there's a Lush and Hora columnist? That was my first reaction. I can't believe somebody got paid to give Lush and Hora. You know, my whole life I was told gossip is forbidden, and then people are making money out of it. I was, you know, I was naive. But I remember that was when I I first encountered the conflict between what I'm learning at yeshiva or what I've learned in yeshiva and society at large. The fourth teaching has also deeply affected the way I work. He who, uh, uh, see, it's so deep in the Hebrew, I gotta think it now in English. Whoever cites a source brings redemption to the world. You would think, huh, whoever cites a source brings redemption to the world? And it's an awesome, awesome phrase. What does it mean? It means you don't take credit for an idea or a quote, you must cite who it is. The rabbis of the Talmud were so emphatic on this that you will have frequently Rabbi so-and-so said in the name of Rabbi so-and-so who said in the name of Rabbi so-and-so until you go back to the originator of the idea. And, and that— and this is the reason. And why do you bring redemption to the world? Why does citing a source bring redemption to the world? Because it means you are more interested in truth than in ego. And when the world is more interested in truth than in ego, we will bring redemption to the world. I have to tell you, again, it blows my mind, just as it did with gossip columnists. I will get letters from distinguished people, including clergy, of various denominations who say, Dennis, I read your this, or I heard you on the radio say this, I am stealing your idea. People say this frequently. I'm going to steal your idea. You've heard that statement. I'm going to steal your statement. I'll steal your idea. And you know what I do usually now say? Well, go right ahead. But you're right, it is stealing. And they don't know what I'm talking about because, you know, it's a very interesting thing that people have come up with the phrase, "I'll steal your idea," but they don't take the phrase seriously. You really are stealing. And so, if those of you who listen to my show know how adamant I am, I will even say, "I don't even know who came up with this idea, but I need you to know it wasn't me." I just don't want you to think— and again, It's the early voice of this yeshiva statement that's working on me. I, I'm not here to tell you I'm a good guy. I have plenty of sins. But I'm telling you to tell you the power of early teachings. And this is another powerful teaching. You must cite a source. I, I remember, what is it, there was, uh, I'll give you an example of one that I'm, I, I am adamant about. It is, uh, what was it, the pastor who came up with with an idea of not good for man to be alone. And what was it again? Oh yes, I got— I saw somebody sent me some pastor, some Protestant minister somewhere wrote a piece on the great phrase in Genesis. It is that where God says it's not good for man to be alone, and he makes an unbelievably powerful point, especially so given that he is a member of the clergy. And he said, look at what God is saying. God is saying, I, God, am not enough. Humans need humans. Isn't that a powerful point? Because God could say, what do you mean? Or Adam could say, well, I'm not alone, I have you. Very few humans in history had the contact with God that Adam did. So Adam would say, I'm not alone, I have you. But God is saying, no, you are alone. Of course it's important to have me. I'm necessary but not sufficient. People need people. I hate quoting Barbra Streisand. It's bad. This was very hard to do now, I have, but I had to do it. People do need people. And yes, as politically incorrect as it is, a man needs a woman. So how is this related to my point? I don't know. I don't remember who the minister is. But every time I tell the point, I say I got it from some Protestant minister. I don't know who he is. So again, it's a voice from my pre-adolescence of a principle taught to me that has shaped the way I live. Next, and I've quoted this only recently on the air, and it's unbelievable the number of people who have written in, please give me the exact quote in Hebrew even though I don't know Hebrew. Lo habaisham lomeid. I learned that in early elementary school where they told us you better ask questions because it says in the Talmud, "Lo habaishan lo med," the easily embarrassed one doesn't learn. How did this change my life? I'll tell you one simple way, and there's someone who can vouch for this here when she hears me speak Russian. I have no embarrassment in speaking foreign languages incorrectly. Because if I did, I never would have learned anything. So I want to be corrected. And by the way, nobody laughs at you. Do you laugh at somebody who came from another country who makes a mistake in English? Of course not. You're so— on the contrary, you're grateful and you are admiring of the fact that they can speak as much as they do. Nobody laughs. I've never met anybody, even French taxi drivers, did not laugh at my French. Or at least not out loud. I mean, inside they may have said, "Another American screwing my language," but still, they said nothing. They would answer me in French. And so I have learned languages overwhelmingly because I live by this. I'm not easily embarrassed. My God, am I not easily embarrassed. The mistakes that I have made, I'll never forget. I went, the first time I went to Israel, I was 18 years of age, still in high school, or just graduated, and I spoke Hebrew, but I spoke mostly biblical Hebrew, not spoken Hebrew. So when I would talk, they thought Jeremiah was reincarnated. The prophet Jeremiah. So here is a mistake I'll never forget I made. Those who know Hebrew will know how funny it is. The rest of you will appreciate how funny it is. There's a difference. And, uh, so here's the way it works. So I was in the, uh, the Tel Aviv Central bus station, and I wanted to take a taxi to Jerusalem because it's a public taxi. It's you and others. They still have that. And so I knew the word for taxi in Israel was sherut, which means service. So I walked around and I pluralized the word sherut, which is correctly sherutim. So I'm walking around the Tel Aviv bus station going, "Eifo ha'sherutim lirushalayim, eifo ha'sherutim lirushalayim," which in Hebrew to It meant, where are the toilets to Jerusalem? Because the plural of sherut is services, and services means toilets, not taxis. So when they started laughing, I asked, "Lama atzo heket?" Why are you laughing? She said, "Sherutim." You don't know what sherutim is? It's where you do what you have to do. And then I realized, oh my God, I'm asking where the toilets are to Jerusalem. And I thought it was hilarious. I wasn't embarrassed. I thought it was the funniest thing I ever heard, walking around Tel Aviv asking for toilets to Jerusalem. This is my point though, and it's all thanks to this terrific phrase. You're not going to learn a damn thing if you're easily embarrassed. On the radio, if somebody says a word I don't know, I will often say, "What does that mean?" Right? Now talk about not being embarrassed. I'm supposed to be a guy who knows all of English. If I encounter somebody says a word and I don't know, we will then look it up. We have a ball with it. What it is, we have everybody guess. But it doesn't matter. I'm not going to learn that word if I don't ask what it means. Just from one phrase, probably learned it in 4th grade. Lo habaishan lomeid. I have two more. This is what I learned. It's not a phrase, but there are two words: aser and mutter. Prohibited, permitted. Prohibited, permitted. Prohibited. You go around in yeshiva world, is that aser or is that mutter? Or is it mutter? Is it us or is it mutter? It is a great way if you then enter the world, which was my problem a lot with a lot of Orthodoxy, at least at that time, is that it didn't enter the world. But if you take this teaching into the world, you are a different human being. Where you go through life asking, is that permitted or is that prohibited? Prohibited? How many kids today think that way? Is that prohibited or is that permitted? It's being instinctive. And I'll give you one example, obviously, was in the realm of Kashrut. And I said this so many years ago and I forgot about it. Joseph Telushkin, who has a phonographic and photographic memory, reminded me that I used to tell people in speeches that the first thing Among the first words I learned after "see, spot, run" was "pure vegetable shortening." Because at yeshiva, they said, "If you buy a candy bar, you must look for pure vegetable shortening." This was in the pre-O.U. days. They were better days. Because you could eat more things, you just looked in the ingredients. But in any event, that's what they taught us. If it was shortening, might have been gelatin, not kosher, But pure vegetable shortening, you could eat it. So at about the 3rd grade, I already knew I had to control myself. Some things were permitted, some things were prohibited. What a wonderful thing to know in life that some things are prohibited to you. And that too, it has stayed stuck in my brain since then, and you can't get it out. This is the sort of thing you just You can violate it. I have done certain things that weren't permitted, but you can't get it out of your brain. And finally, and as I said, perhaps the biggest, and they're all very big, is this: Kiddush Hashem. I learned what the greatest mitzvah was and the greatest sin. The greatest mitzvah in Judaism, it's clear. I think if you ask any religious Jew, you will get the same answer, I think. What's the biggest mitzvah and what's the biggest sin? The biggest mitzvah is kiddush Hashem. The biggest sin is chilul Hashem. Kiddush Hashem is sanctifying God's name, and chilul Hashem is violating or debasing God's name. Desecrating is the term that's usually used. So there's honoring, or there's sanctifying, and there's desecrating. And the best story I could tell you to show you again how early this is and how I learned the concept, because they never gave us concepts in Judaism. Concepts are secondary to the rubber hits the ground. That's why the Talmud is all about laws. This is what you do, this is what you don't do, this is what you do, this is what you don't do. So I don't remember what grade it was. Since it did not happen in high school, I suspect it was in 8th grade. And the rebbe says to us, "Boys, you should not go to a dirty movie." That's what it was called then. Nobody says dirty movie today. It dates you to the time of Lincoln. And so, nobody says it. I know Lincoln didn't have movies, but still. So, this was— so what did he say? He said, "Boys, you should not go. I'm a Jewish boy, you should not go." 'Go to a dirty movie.' You know, it's set in that song-like thing. 'But if you go, take off your yarmulke.' That made a much bigger impact than the first part, I have to admit. But it made a huge impact. What is wrong? Why is it bad to wear a yarmulke if you go to a dirty movie? Because you bring ill repute to Judaism and God. And so I learned that that is so big. If you are known as a religious Jew, then you very much have to watch your behavior so that you can be a kiddush Hashem, so that you can sanctify God's name. Name rather than mechallel Hashem, and to desecrate God's name. And that has been unbelievably large, loomed large in my life. And I will give you two examples, and I'm only afraid of number one because I have not been a saint, but I was a saint in this one regard, I will admit. I was the director of an institute, Brandeis Brody Institute, from 1976 to 1983. '63. Some of you actually attended. And I was only a few years older than those attending. They came for a month, boys and girls, ages 19 to 25. And I was, those 7 years, I was I think 25 to 32. So I was practically their age and single. And you live a month together with these people. And I remember, obviously there were many attractive young girls there, and I was, you know, available and the director of the whole thing. So, you know, I could have had an irresponsibly good time, but I didn't. And I'll tell you the reason. It was Kiddush Hashem. Because my task was to try to bring these 90 kids to take Judaism seriously. And if I even flirted, forget did anything, if I just flirted during that month, it would have undone the whole message. And that's what kept me totally responsible in that job. The sense that if I do that, then I have killed kill the message. And so these things, if they take root in your life, they're very big. And, and the other area— I mean, there are many areas, but another area is my radio. I'm known to all my listeners as a religious Jew. And so that every day I think in some fashion or other, can I be a kiddush Hashem in my show today? Will I bring— will I bring glory and credit to my faith and to my God in some way? Now, it doesn't mean I can't joke around and horse around. I mean, I'm very human on the show, as many of you know, but it does play a role. Why do I tell you all this? I tell you all this, I, I— first, because teachings early on really make an impact, so just as no teachings early on make an impact. Secondly, that if you take this seriously, it changes your life. And where, where in the most expensive schools today, in elementary schools, forget high schools, are any of these things conveyed? You know, we pay all all that tens of thousands of dollars, but what do we get for it? We get a great art class, that's lovely, and they're already studying calculus in 8th grade, but so what? I think so what are two of the greatest words ever invented. You should ask that about everything, and if there's no answer to so what, then you might want to rethink the priorities that led to a certain decision. Bittul Torah, wasting time. Yetzer hara, we have a bad inclination and a good one, and it's very good psychologically and morally. Lashon hara, gossip and slander, and the worst, humiliating someone publicly. Citing the source of something you've learned and not being embarrassed embarrassed. If you ask questions, you don't learn if you're easily embarrassed. The words you can't or you can, mutter and osser, prohibited and permitted. And finally, the concept of does that desecrate God or not. So I'll end with a sweet little story. Some of you may have read, or I told you about the the story of the tallit that I ordered from Israel. I actually printed up my dialogue with— I'm not going to tell you the name of the company, and I didn't in my article. May 1st, we are now 5 months, 5 and a half months later, right? May 1st, I ordered a tallit from a company in Israel. Because I need an extra-long tallit because of my height. So they had a huge selection, and I ordered a gold— excuse me, a silver and red tallit. Two weeks later, I get a beautiful tallit. It's not silver and red, it's gold and red. I send back an email. It's clearly a— it became clear, though I wasn't surprised, it's very religious Jews who run this. I send them back, dear sirs, or whatever I wrote, you sent me a gold and red, I ordered a silver and red, as you can see from the order number on the email. I get back an email, send photo. That was the email. I mean, again, with the boilerplate Wonderful to hear from you. If you have any further questions, please feel free to ask. So I, this was a very funny response. And I, so I realized, you know, what kind of question is that? Either they think I'm lying, but nobody would lie. Even if you are a liar, you wouldn't lie about it, because you're still going to return it, right? Then they'll see, why would you lie? And the other, the only other possibility is they think I'm colorblind. Okay, so fine, I take a picture and you have no idea what a picture I took with a full-frame camera. You could blow the photo up to this wall. That is how big a picture I took so there could be no doubt this was a gold and red tulip. So I send them the photo. Next I get back What is your order number? I show it to my wife, who realizes we're now entering Twilight Zone. What is my order number? It's on the email. It says RE Order Number 77, which made me think maybe they've only had 76 other orders in their life, the way they're running their business. Anyway, you have no idea how it became As I wrote in my article, like the famous Monty Python routine of the guy returning a dead parrot to the store that he just bought it at, and the storekeeper telling him, "You're wrong, it is not dead." And it's one of the great skits, it's one of the funniest skits you'll ever see. I felt I was living a Monty Python skit. Finally, I won't tell you the rest, you can read it, it's on the internet. Finally, Well, finally, it's only just happened. That's the only reason I'm telling you this story. So what happened was they told me, they gave us a huge list of things to do to send it back. They would only pay X amount in postage, which never covered the postage. But so I finally, my wife sent it to them. We didn't hear from them for a month, and I just assumed that, you know, my $220 was lost. Then right before, right after Rosh Hashanah, I get an email. Oh God, I have to remember this. Did you receive, I guess, did you receive a tallit or your refund? Shows they don't know what they're doing, obviously. So I wrote back. This is why I'm telling you. So I wrote back, did you ask out of curiosity or because Yom Kippur is approaching? The next day I saw a full refund on PayPal. What does it show you? It's a very— I think it's very telling. I truly believe it was the approach of Yom Kippur that got them to refund the money in total within the same day of receiving that question that I asked. Are you just curious, or is it Yom Kippur? And that was it. These things work. The human being is a difficult creature, but when you think that there are teachings that matter, and if you think God is behind it, it's life-changing. And that's the purpose, obviously, of these Holy Days.

This has been Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager. Visit DennisPrager.com for thousands of hours of Dennis's lectures, courses, and classic radio programs, and to purchase Dennis Prager's Rational Bibles.