Timeless Wisdom - The Jewish Family in the 1990s

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Morning out, and I thank you all for coming out. Pleasure to be here, actually, once again. This is not the first time that I've been to Birmingham. Do any of you recall actually the last time? That was about a decade ago, wasn't it? Obviously I went over well. There are 4 people here who heard me then. It's always encouraging to know that you made such a hit. I guess they all moved, is that it? I hear it's a somewhat transient Jewish community, and many young couples or something. It's not that. It's that they just didn't come again. All right. It is good to be here. The only thing, with your permission, I'd like to change one word. I would like to have longer than a brief question and answer period. Is that okay with you? Remember, I'm on Pacific time. You have to understand. So for me, what is it? It's now 6:15. I am very raring to go, and as it gets to 10, I really wake up. So just as you go to sleep, I'll be ready to take more questions. All right. It's an important subject and one that I had to think through a great deal. I've actually never given a speech specifically addressing the subject. Subject of the Jewish family in the 1990s. For one reason, it's only the second month of the 1990s. But actually, I did not give a speech of the Jewish family in the 1980s either, so I'm not being literal. It's the truth. Your hosts asked me to develop something new in this regard, and I'm very happy to do so. It's a great challenge to me to think systematically through a given issue. And for reasons that you will see in the course of the talk, it also hits me personally, this issue, on a number of grounds that will become clear to you. So it will truly be my privilege, as well as hopefully your interest, to have a lot of dialogue afterwards. All right, ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to offer 4 or 5 areas where the Jewish family of the 1990s is different from the generation ago. Let's say a half century, 50 years ago, when not few of you were living and indeed making families. It seems like a long time ago, 1940. It's even before I was born. But it's not that dramatic in terms of Jewish history. But my God, is it dramatic in terms of the Jewish family. There is almost nothing they have in common. The typical American Jewish family of 1990 and an American Jewish family of 1940, or for that matter, 1950, and even perhaps of 1960. Let me give you a few of these examples. Number 1, and perhaps most dramatic, the average Jewish parent, whether this Jew was religious, very religious, nominally religious, or even just ethnic in his or her identity, had a sense that society stood behind his or her values. I cannot, I cannot overstate the importance of this particular area. This is a colossal change in life, not only for Jewish families, but for all families that have had what we would call today in any way traditional ethical, moral family values. It is what the philosophers would call a sea change, and the sea change is really this simple. In the past, and I'm now talking about America, I'm not talking about Europe, I am not talking about Latin America, we're talking about the Jewish family in America. A generation ago and two generations ago, Our parents and grandparents basically could feel that society was in sync with their values. I don't mean obviously Jewishly specifically, clearly not. America was never a Jewish society. But let me give you a classic example. My own father, who is 71 years of age. When my father grew up, and it's interesting that this just was revealed to me maybe in the last 2 years, very, very recently. It's not a family secret, it's just something we would never have thought of discussing, but now with my own children and talking about family life, it came out. At any rate, this is very simple. He was explaining to me, he was raised an Orthodox Jew in Brooklyn, New York, both parents immigrants from Russia. So this is classic. I mean, this is about as typically Jewish as you can get in America in the early 20th century. And he went to Jewish school till 8th grade and then went to Boys High in Brooklyn. Boys High School, public high school, uh, for high school. There was really no Jewish high school to even go to. His parents, Orthodox East European Jews, had absolutely no problem with him going to public high school, and with him having all sorts of friends on the street to play with. He told me, and this is the thing that was so remarkable, and he wasn't philosophizing, he was just telling me about his upbringing. I asked him, "How much time did you see your parents?" He said, "Well, outside of Shabbat, outside of Shabbos," he said, "almost never saw them. I would eat and then immediately go into the street, play all night, come back in, they were both asleep." So I said, "When did you get values from them?" He said, "We didn't have to. Nobody was conflicting with them." That was it. My eyes opened. No wonder our grandparents did such a good job with my parents' generation. They weren't battling anything. It was effortless to raise a decent kid 2 generations ago. You weren't battling school, television, movies, radio, peers. That's the most important thing I could come across this country to tell you. Today, to raise a good child, forget Jewish, just decent, just with some basic values that you and I probably share, is a colossal task because you are not supported by your society. My grandmother from the shtetl didn't have to worry about my father getting drugs. Drugs? What were drugs? Remember drugs? Drugs was deodorant, shampoo, uh, stick of aspirin. Drugs? I want a joke? My grandmother was worried about my father having drugs at that boys' high, which today still exists and is infested with drugs. Or how about guns? Guns? Can you imagine my grandmother being worried? "You, Menachem Mendel, they're going to shoot you in school." It's inconceivable. Who's bringing guns to school? Guns to school? And I'm giving those, so you'll say, "Well, those are dramatic." What about television? What did my father, when he was being raised, know about transvestites? The latest issue of Newsweek, you don't have to go to public school to learn that, pick up the last issue of Newsweek, the one on the newsstand now about addiction. It's got a picture of men cross-dressing. Big color picture of 5 men in stockings sitting around talking to each other. Now, I may be very behind the times, but as far as I recall, Cross-dressing was not a traditional Jewish value. Okay, I know one hastens in these days to always add all sorts of qualifiers, but I think most of us can generally say, without God forbid saying I don't hold that any man who cross-dresses is evil, the issue is not evil, but it's not a Jewish value, it's not holy. The Torah itself very strictly prescribes men from wearing women's clothing, as it happens. Men's sexuality is a fragile thing, and clearly Jewish tradition knew this, and so it did not want to tamper with it. It is much more worried about male sexuality than female sexuality. There's nothing on lesbianism in the Torah. There certainly is about male homosexuality. Were any of these things an issue a generation, and certainly two ago? Not, not at all. Did you care if your kid walked in the street? It didn't occur to my grandparents that my father would be mugged or that our daughter would be raped. These are new things. We live in a new world that is a battle. We have turned the television off in my home except for Saturday night. Because television is an intrusion, it is the opposite of everything we want to say. We don't want our daughter to think of herself as a sex object. It is not possible for a girl today to watch television and not regard being female as being a sex object. It is not possible. If the shows don't do it, the ads will do it. And my boy, he can easily become a sports addict. I'm telling you, it's gonna be the next thing. There's Gamblers Anonymous, Crossdressers Anonymous, soon to be Sports Anonymous. It's the next addiction. I am convinced of it. An addiction is something you cannot say no to that controls you and is in no way productive. If that describes an addiction, then sports qualifies for millions upon millions of men. And I am not holier than thou. I have had to curb it in myself. What I did, by the way, just parenthetically, is I am very brain-centered. I know I love sports too. So what I did was, Years ago, I chose one sport. I simply dropped interest in other sports. It was difficult not to watch football, not to watch basketball, not to watch hockey, not to watch tennis. I watch baseball, only baseball. I have, I have season tickets to the Dodgers. I pick my one sport, end of issue. Another thing that helps is not to have the television on on Friday night or Saturday, period, because it's Shabbat. And so that is an extremely great help. And I don't say that at all halachically, I say that in terms of a Jewish value, not in terms of a Jewish law. Peers. My father— did my grandmother have to worry about my father's peers? Who is he going to bring home? Basically, a kid like him. Maybe the kid was irreligious, maybe the kid wasn't Jewish, but he was very much like him in terms of basic values in life. That is just not the case today. Kids who show up are very different. None of my father's friends had earrings. I don't want to condemn all men who wear earrings, but I have to say it is a different value. I mean, we have to at least recognize these are different. There are good men who wear earrings, okay? I am well aware. I live in LA, alright? I understand, okay? I live at the other end of the world. I am aware of different things. Nevertheless, it's a different world. What one is trying to inculcate, even to the extent of, you'd figure, if there's one bottom line, it's that the society would like to inculcate the value of monogamous marriage. Is that a radical idea? Is that retrograde? Is that reactionary? Ladies and gentlemen, the California State Assembly, 2 years ago, try to pass a bill that at least let's try to teach one value in public schools, it'll be the worthiness and worth of the monogamous family. The ACLU wrote a scathing letter to the California State Assembly protesting this. I have a copy of the letter, I read it on my radio show, that is totally opposed to such a thing because there are traditions in America that are polygamous and therefore it is not right. And also there are homosexuals who have different values. End of issue. So you cannot even teach in an American public school in the state of California, the most populous state of this union, that it is an ideal to marry a member of the opposite sex, I hasten to add, and have children and, and not fool around with other people. Okay, you may not teach that. It is forbidden because it might cross the boundaries of church-state separation. In other words, ladies and gentlemen, I'll put it to you very bluntly and directly. A parent with traditional Jewish values— and I don't mean Orthodox, I don't mean any denomination, just basic traditional Jewish values— is at war with American society today, with the peers, with the schools, with the television, with the radio, and with the movies. And the less you know that, the more you have given in, and that in and of itself is problematic. If you don't realize this, then clearly you don't know the, the difference between the two values. And I don't say this, God forbid, to accuse you. I say it descriptively, not argumentatively, and certainly not accusatorily. That's number one in the difference between the Jewish family of 1990 and the Jewish family a generation ago, and certainly two generations ago. Today we are in constant conflict. Number two, generation or two ago, nearly all families were the, the classic intact nuclear family. Mother, father, children, same mother and same father for both children. I don't say that the change— I don't condemn those who are part of the change. I am a living example of it. My home is, uh, what, stepfamily, whatever you wish to call it. Both my wife and I are divorced, and, uh, obviously, well, let me My present wife and I are both divorced. My ex-wife is also divorced, obviously. Uh, gets very confusing, actually, uh, all these things. And we each have a child, so we have a classic new type of family. So I am— I— please understand, I'm hardly here to say, well, the nuclear family was great and we're ruining it. It was great. I am for it. You know, it is an interesting thing in life, very important thing in life. Can one be something, can one do something, and still hold that there is an ideal that one has not been able to do? I have no problem in saying I have a reformed, reconstituted stepfamily which I love, which is actually working out quite lovely, and hold that the ideal is not to have such a family but to have the same mother and father getting along together with the children. I mean, I don't have a problem with that. The fact that I did X doesn't make X the ideal. In America, nobody says that. The fact that you're X, X is an ideal. If you're gay, therefore gay is as good as heterosexual. If you're cross-dresser, cross-dressing is as wonderful as not cross-dressing. Now, I mean this very sincerely. Can people say that what they do may not be the ideal without condemning themselves or others for doing it? Having said that, we also have to recognize something that is very important. When I got my get, my Jewish divorce, from the Orthodox rabbi who was the head of the Beit Din of Los Angeles, of Southern California, this man is East European born, East European raised, long gray beard, classic quite orthodox Eastern European rebbe. He's the head of the Beit Din that gives gittin, that gives divorces, and also does conversions in Southern California. Well, I came in to get the papers for the get. We just made a little small talk because he listens to my show on the radio, is the first thing he told me. So, which took me aback. It was the last thing I wanted to talk about. But, you know, he does so many gets. He was much more interested in talking about my radio show. At any rate, then I changed the subject back to divorce. And I said, you know, and this was really in effect almost to make small talk, but thank God I made this point for what he then said. I said, you know, it must be a little difficult for you, an Orthodox rabbi, traditional home, and living in Southern California with all these Jewish divorces. And he looked at me and he said, "Mr. Prager, to tell you the truth, there were so many miserable marriages in the old country, it's too bad a lot more of them didn't get divorced." It is very hard to shock me. Doing talk radio in Southern California for 8 years, I tell you, I am numb. I am absolutely numb. This shocked me. Here I have this absolutely traditional Orthodox rabbi making such a comment. He didn't even say, "Yeah, you're right, it is tough, but..." He just went straight into his point, how many miserable people he remembers from the old country in the shtetl, the good old days. My point today is more complex than the good old days. I am not here to say to you, despite what I said about conflict with society, that the past was wonderful. Oh, if only we could go back to the good old Jewish past. I am not saying that. That is not my speech. My speech is let's be honest about what is good, what is bad, what is a problem, and then I am very solution-oriented. Let's look towards solutions. In some ways it's better, some ways it's worse. It's an interesting thing. I always hear from people, only incidentally, from people who've never divorced. The line, "Ah, today people have few problems and they immediately get divorced. People get divorced much too easily today." Then I always ask them, "Can you name somebody?" I've never gotten an answer to that question. Everybody who says people divorce too easily never think of the people they know who are divorced. Thank God they had a stinking marriage. They, they were right in getting divorced. Everybody, everybody knows who got divorced, should have gotten divorced. But if we have this generalization, people get divorced too easily. I did this with clergy once on one of my shows. Most of my shows I'm alone, but one show of mine a week, I have a priest, rabbi, minister, different ones each week as my guests. So one night I talked about divorce. I said, gentlemen, you're all opposed, you know, general, to divorce. You're all for intact. In fact, the Catholics don't even allow you to remarry unless you get permission from the Vatican. That's how strong they are. Fundamentalist Christians are not too dissimilar, though they will allow it, they're profoundly opposed. So I said to them, you all think that people get divorced too easily today? Said, yes, yes, yes. I said, can you think of anybody in particular? No. In fact, the priest's parents were divorced, the Protestant minister's parents were divorced, and the rabbi's brother was divorced. I said, do any of you think they were wrong? No, they had to. So the next time you hear the cliché, everybody gets divorced too easily today, try to think about somebody who actually fits that, that example. It'll probably be a lot more difficult. Nevertheless, it's not good. The best is a good marriage intact. And I'll have thoughts on that. But this is a whole new thing, and I know that Jewish Family Services here is well aware of it. I just saw the thing about questions that, that people are asking. How does a single family have something Jewish? After all, Judaism is so family-oriented. And it is. There's no denying that. See, again, here's a classic example of what I said. People live X, so they want to change something to become like X. Judaism is family-oriented. That is its great strength. The fact that a lot of people don't have the same families in the past doesn't mean therefore we change Judaism. It means that we try to do is we certainly try to do whatever possible to make one live a Jewish life, even though Judaism, it happens to be family-oriented. When I was single, I did not enjoy Shabbat. Being alone on Shabbat is a lousy experience. Being with others on Shabbat is the greatest experience that is continuous in one's life. I say that with all sincerity. I go crazy for Shabbat. Crazy. But when it's alone, it stinks. Christianity is much more individual. My relationship with Jesus— there's no equivalent in Judaism. You've ever met a religious Jew? My relationship with Jehovah, huh? God walks with me. Where? Where does he walk with you? Everything in Jewish life is plural. It's communal. It's family. That's a great strength. It's also a problem. It's a challenge. But that's, that's true, and that's the way it is. What we have to do is integrate the single and the single family into Jewish life. But I can't go to a single and say, you know what, being single and trying to make Shabbat, sure you can do it. It's very, very hard. You can do it physically. You can't do it spiritually. You're not going to feel it. You must go to people's homes, and I will have a lot to say about that in the solution time. 3 generations and 2 generations ago, there were a lot of differences between Jewish families and non-Jewish families. You could tell differences. It was obvious which was a Jewish family. It was obvious if it wasn't a Jewish family, uh, whether it be in terms of practices, whether it be in terms of certain values. Jews were noted a generation ago as the most charitable group in America. That is no longer the case. Mormons now have that distinguished title. They are. It's a fact. As Jews leave Judaism and Jewish identity, they get cheaper. Okay? And not just because they all became doctors. It's a joke. It was a joke, my friends. It was a joke. Number 4: Generation or two ago, there were very few intermarriages. Today, between a third and a half of Jews marrying marry non-Jews. And I am not talking— and it pains me to even have to add this, but unfortunately it is still necessary for some Jews— I'm not talking about converts. Converts are as Jewish as any Jew in the world. I'm talking about people who never became Jewish. That is a major, major change. Not a good change. There's nothing good about that. There may be one possible positive thing about it, and I will come to it in a moment. And number 5, in the past, ethnic identity, secular ethnic identity, was enough to keep Jews Jewish. You didn't have to be religious a generation or two ago to feel Jewish. I'm Jewish, that's all. I don't need— don't give me Shabbos, don't give me kosher. I don't care about trichinosis. We have refrigerators today and other profound reasons for not keeping kosher. It was enough to be ethnic. I feel Jewish. Feeling Jewish sufficed a generation ago. Today there is no such thing as feeling Jewish without religiosity, and I will explain that too. All right, let me talk to you about solutions. Number 1, remember, was parents are in conflict with society today as they were not a generation or two ago in America. The answers are clear, unambiguous. The answers are to reinforce in every way possible the Jewishness of our children and the Jewishness of the adults. Many comments on this. Number 1: Contrary to public Jewish opinion, Judaism is an adult religion. Most Jews do not know this. Basically only 2 groups: adults and children. Other Jews are all aware of this fact. Judaism is for adults. In this regard, and those of you who heard me or read me before know that I have very positive feelings towards many Christians and to American Christianity today, Nevertheless, there is a contrast here. There is much, especially among Protestants, and as well as Catholics, who cite this from the New Testament, of coming to Jesus like children. There is nothing in Judaism that asks us to be like children. Nothing. Judaism is overwhelmingly adult-oriented, to the point that it has a statement in the Talmud that is actually probably offensive to many Jews, Except happily, the Jews who would read it would agree with it, and the Jews who wouldn't read it wouldn't read it, so they couldn't be offended. But the statement is, for those of you who never read it, an ignoramus can't be a pious person. What? You mean if I actually have to know about Judaism to be a good Jew? It's not enough to feel it? That's right. You actually have to know it. Judaism is not intuited. You don't intuit algebra. You don't intuit democracy. You have to learn how it functions. In Eastern Europe now, it is a terrible problem because you can't intuit democracy. You've got to learn about it. What does a bicameral legislature mean? What does a parliament mean? Who runs against whom? Who runs? What do you mean run? Can you say anything? These things, I mean, my God, there are sex manuals, and sex is much more natural than Judaism. There are manuals on how to live Jewish life. You don't agree with Reform, you're Conservative, you're not Conservative, you're Orthodox, do whatever you like. But all agree you've got to learn. It is for adults. It is a rational religion. It is a deep religion. It is for adults. Nevertheless, adults want their children— most Jewish adults, at least that are in this particular auditorium, would like their children to be Jewish. In this regard, there are answers that answer partially the problem of television, radio, movies, peers, and public school. And they are different peers, different schools, different inputs. That's what they are. Like, as I just, uh, talked here. Jewish day school, the single most important institution in Jewish life. I would sell every synagogue in America of all denominations if I could take all that money to build schools and pay teachers. Not only that, so would every rabbi of those synagogues, because every rabbi studied in seminary that if the Jewish community only has funds for either a beit tefillah or a beit midrash, first you build a beit midrash. If you only have money for either a synagogue, a house of prayer, or a house of study, First you build a house of study because you could pray anywhere. But first you need people to teach because Judaism is in here. It starts in the brain and then goes to the heart. It doesn't go from the heart to the brain, it goes from the brain to the heart. You've got to study, you've got to know what it is. The nicest way to make sure that our kids have peers that we can trust more is to have them in schools that have analogous values to us. That is why I'm— one of the reasons I'm so passionately pro-day school. That is a subject unto itself. A recording was just made of it. I have my own, which I'm happy to make available to you, making a very long and elaborate rational case for sending one's child at the end of the 20th century to a Jewish day school. As indeed I am for Catholics sending their children to Catholic day schools. And for those of you who have that knee-jerk worry, "Well, if Catholics send their kids to Catholic schools and Jews to Jewish schools and Protestants to Protestant schools, what kind of society will we have?" The answer is: a better one! That's the answer. Espenay-Britt, the Anti-Defamation League, published a study that Catholic children who went to Catholic schools were less likely to be anti-Semitic than Catholics who went to public schools. In Los Angeles, I am invited constantly to Christian and Catholic schools to lecture on values. Almost never was I invited to a public school. Only once by a religious Christian who works in public schools. They don't want to hear from this. There's a Holocaust curriculum in Catholic schools. There is none in public schools. And they're now making an even greater curriculum, just signed last week in Los Angeles between the American Jewish Committee and the Catholic Church in America. There is also Jewish camps for your children. The greatest experience emotionally for Jewish children is Jewish camping. There are two types, however, of camps. There are camps for Jews and there are Jewish camps. They are not the same. Camps for Jews that have only tennis and volleyball and basketball, and the only thing that is Jewish about it is all the kids are named Bernstein, Gernstein, and Kernstein, is not Jewish. Okay? You might as well send your kid to another camp. You might as well at least learn ecumenism. By Jewish camp, I mean one thing only: Reform, Conservative, or Orthodox. The pride and joy of the Reform and Conservative movements are its camping. I don't say it's the pride and joy of Orthodoxy. Its pride and joy are its day schools. But for camping, it is the— what Conservative and Reform Judaism has done is is absolutely remarkable. Get your kid to a Jewish camp this summer. And by the way, I'm a big believer in bribing children. Big believer. In LA, it takes a BMW. I'm sure it takes less here. Also believe very strongly in having your child go for a year to, uh, to, uh, Israel, to college or to high school, to a kibbutz, to volunteer, anything. Hitchhiking in Tel Aviv can be a more Jewish experience than all the Sunday school they had. All of a sudden they see people speaking Hebrew, they see places closed Friday afternoon, they see Jews struggling to keep a Jewish state alive, even secular Israelis. It'll still have a powerful impact on their Jewish identity, even if it doesn't have a particularly strong one at that moment on their religious practices. And of course, the other answer to combat television, school, peers, and so on is your home. I have made my home that much stronger Jewish as the world outside my home weakens in its values. My home must be that much stronger, and my impact, and my wife's impact on our children has to be that much stronger as the world outside weakens. My grandmother didn't have to teach my father values. There was nothing competing with her. I do. I have no choice. So if you're parenting today, it is a much tougher job even though you have oodles of money compared to your grandparents. Than it was for them. The temptations are so vast, you need to be strong. And strength means adopting the motto that I used earlier in my talk, and is worth always repeating, and that is: "Your children are gonna hate you anyway, so you might as well do the right thing." This must be your motto in life. Too many educated parents, Jews and non-Jews, want to be loved by their children at all times. That is a recipe for a miserable human being, namely the child. You want to be loved by your spouse. That's why people should get married. You, you do not make children in order to have them love you. You make children in order to produce good adults, in our case, good Jewish adults, not in order to have love factories to supply you with. You didn't do it for your parents, and they didn't do it for theirs. Why the hell should yours do it for you? That's not the way love works, parental-child. It goes parent to child to child to child to child. Of course it's great when my kid hugs me, of course, but that's not why I'm a parent. I'm not a parent to be hugged. I am a parent to give certain things that no one else on earth can give, from teacher to friend to TV. If I try to be TV, be the permanent entertainer and pal, then the child is as if the child is an orphan. The child may have a biological father but has no parenting father. It is important to make peace with the fact that they will not like you when you live by these values. You'll say, "Stay home Friday night," and they will go crazy. They are entitled to go crazy. That is part of being a child. You are not entitled to say, however, "Well, gee, Heather didn't like it. I will change my mind." Okay? Heather and Sean may not run a Jewish home. Number 2. Said that nearly all families were— Jewish families were intact in the past. Today, with divorce, stepfamilies, single parents, and so on. I told you the story about the rabbi who gave me the gett, so you will understand that this doesn't mean that all those families were happy. That's very, very important. Intact is not synonymous with happy. Intact is not synonymous with healthy, even though I told you the ideal is intact and healthy, but they are not at all. That is not something that is redundant. Intact doesn't mean healthy. So the past had problems. Nevertheless, given the proliferation of divorce, a few words. First of all, I am told— I read and I am told, and this bothers me beyond description— that too frequently fathers either opt out of fathering after a divorce, or the mothers, in anger over the divorce, use the children as their revenge and deprive them of a father. I would literally like to imprison women who do that. They are as cruel as any man who refuses to pay appropriate child support afterwards. This society, for reasons that I will not get into now, hears women's complaints far more than it does men's complaints. One of the reasons is, one of the reasons are women have more complaints. Another reason is women complain more. And another reason is that the men don't complain. Some men are just quite happy to see their kid. They'll, you know, take out the kid to the zoo on Sundays, and that's in some cases a lot, 4 Sundays a month. Unless there are absolute reasons, like the child doesn't want to and is old enough to decide, or it is an abusive parent, obviously it is evil to deprive a child of a father. I say that to the fathers who quit, and I say that to the mothers who prevent the child from seeing the father. The motto that my ex-wife and I have had, which thank God has thus far proven to be true with regard to our son, is We wanted to make it so that the one change in his life was that his parents do not live together any longer. That was our motto. That was the change. Everything else stayed the same. Grandparents, friends, school, amount of time with each, to the extent possible obviously, frequent with both, and obviously the basic rule of nuts not fighting in front of the child. For a lot of divorced people, this is apparently too, too much to do. I am very liberal on the issue of divorce, and I am very strict on the issue of what you do with the children after the divorce. I do not believe in staying together for children's sake, but I do believe that once you don't stay together, you do a vast amount of other things for those children's sake They did not ask to be in a family that broke up. These were the cards that were dealt to them. In this regard, since so many fathers are absent in single-parent homes, and for reasons that are beyond me will not take a more active interest, either because they're prevented by the ex-wife or because they themselves for some reasons don't find it important to to raise a child, something I just, I simply don't understand. But in light of those two facts, it is incumbent upon the Jewish community to take up the slack that his absence has left. It is critical, therefore, that men come into the lives of those kids being raised by a single mother, whether they are big brothers, whether they are uncles, whether they are male cousins, whatever it will be, male teachers, it is absolutely critical, especially for boys, but certainly for girls too, that there be a male figure present. It is not right otherwise. And as a community, we must think of ways to do this. Is there something like Jewish Big Brothers? Is there? I'm just asking. Do you have? There might be something you just might want to set up. I bet you, I bet you, you could find men here who would love to be a Big Brother to a Jewish kid in a single-parent home. Just to visit and to take the kid out sometimes. What a beautiful thing. I just know people would do it. People are dying to do good things. There are no vehicles. People want to know vehicles. I find this out on my radio show all the time. People want to do good things, but they don't know what to do. Because when they think good things, how am I going to cure the homeless? How am I going to bring democracy to Hungary? So they give up and they go back to work. You can't cure the homeless and you can't bring democracy to Hungary. But you know what you can do? You can change one kid's life around. That's massive. That's absolutely massive. Those of you who have Shabbat dinners, for example, invite that mother and child over for dinner. Have Shabbat with them, with singles. With other couples. That is what makes Judaism alive. A couple can be as lonely Jewishly as a single. A couple could be as lonely existentially as a single, not just Jewishly. Couples need couples just like singles need singles or couples. People need to be with each other. An Israeli once made an made a great point to me. He said, I come to America and I see homes with 6 rooms and nobody sleeps in them. In Israel, we have 2 rooms and they're always filled with people sleeping in them. Aunt Rivka's coming in from Haifa, why should she drive back? She'll sleep over. 6 rooms and nobody's sleeping there, but they're very clean, very clean. Boy, have we Jews taken seriously cleanliness is next to godliness. We must have people over. Other couples, singles, single mothers, single fathers, kids. Make a kid or a girl a ben bayit or a bat bayit. It's a beautiful notion in Hebrew where somebody is just the son of the house. Not our biological son, just the son. A Jew who really believes in Judaism doesn't believe in the importance of biology in determining responsibility for the next generation of Jews. This is very important. Somebody was telling me here that Chabad in Birmingham send their kids away from 3rd grade, 4th grade to go to a yeshiva elsewhere. Now, I have no judgment to make. That is their policy. I truly have none. All I want to make is this point. Here you have extremely religious people people for whom their children's Judaism is more important than being with them. That's the point I'm making about biology is less important if you believe in Judaism, and it becomes more important if you don't believe in it. The more religious you are, the more Chaim Yankel's kid means to you and, and becomes an issue for the future. That's why I always beg people whose kids— you, even if your kids— you have no— let's say you had no kids, Let's say your kids are intermarried, couldn't care less about Judaism. I have something wonderful to tell you. It doesn't matter. Jewish survival is not dependent on your kids. It's dependent on mine, on hers, on hers, on his, on his. Every Jewish kid is your kid. That's how you have to look at it. Biology isn't what counts. That's why there is a halacha. If your teacher, if your Judaism teacher and your father are drowning, Who do you save first? Now, obviously it's meant to teach, it's not meant to be followed, okay? But it says your rebbe is first. If that's not a statement of biology secondary to values, what is? Those of you who can have kids, take 50 kids into your house. They need your home, they need your warmth, they need your Jewishness. That's how we have to think. And the dividends are so overwhelming, both emotionally and Judaically. In this regard too, I appeal to those of you who are grandparents to understand something. You have an immediate entrance into your grandchildren's hearts that your children do not have. Nothing is as lovable as a grandparent. Nothing. Not teddy bears, nothing. Grandparents are A number one. Part of the reason, as one cynic put it, is they both have a common enemy. That's one reason. It's true. I mean, that is one reason. But it's not a conscious reason in a 10-year-old. Grandparents can do massive amounts with their grandchildren. Never give up. Never give up about the Jewish identity of your grandchildren. How do you know that seeing Grandma light candles Friday night will not be the memory that moves a child when the child is 20? How do you know? There's a good chance you were deeply moved by grandparents. I was. Not Jewishly. I was raised traditionally in Jewish ways. But emotionally, they were absolutely essential to my well-being. Absolutely essential. I don't care if they're 2,000 miles away. The power that you can have— and I'm speaking, we're talking here the Jewish family— so the power you can have Jewishly, let alone in other ways, is significant if you decide to. If you decide to take them to Israel, bring them something Jewish, let them see you on a Shabbat together, have them over and do stuff. Do stuff even if you don't normally do it. You're not a hypocrite. Everybody does things for children that they don't do when they're not with children. Does that make you a hypocrite? I immediately snap my seatbelt on when my son is in the car. I usually wait a few minutes, an hour. Am I a hypocrite? And finally, with regard to divorce. The best thing is to prevent it. The best thing is to try to make good marriages at the outset. Obviously, as open as I am and believer in divorce when necessary, and it frequently is, unfortunately, especially with people growing much older— I should say living much longer, you know, till death do us part, which was never a Jewish value in any event. Judaism is the single most liberal religion on divorce that I am aware of, interestingly enough. Jews aren't, but Judaism is. It's the only case I know where Jews are more conservative than their religion. But it is still worth preventing it. And in this regard, one of the things that can cement— help cement marriages is religion. When people share not only love Love is not enough. Love is critical, but it is not enough. And to share, to have a religious commitment together, the bonding through religiosity, the very strong bond that is worth profoundly cultivating in people and is helpful immensely in a family life. 3. 3 is very simple. I remember The difference between family a generation ago and now is the obvious differences like tzedakah, Jewish identity, and so on. The answer is obviously to inculcate those values today in a Jewish family. And I will develop that in a moment as I come near the end of the talk to the fourth and fifth areas. Intermarriage. Far more intermarriage today than a generation ago. As I said, remember, intermarriage is overwhelmingly negative. The only positive thing— this will strike you as actually there are two possible positive things, but it is overwhelmingly negative. I just want you to understand that. I'm simply trying to find something positive in a very bad situation. And by the way, if it's not clear to you why it's bad, please understand why it is so. How do you make a Jewish home when one of the two pillars of the home refuses to even be a Jew? How do you raise a Jewish child when the Jewish child asks, "Well, why isn't Daddy Jewish if it's so important?" What do you say? "Well, he happens not to believe in it." Well, then why the hell should I? Or Mommy? It's hard enough with all the influences to have any Jewish continuity in an intermarriage, in a regular one, let alone in an intermarriage. But there are two things I will cite. One is just a matter of interest, and there's nothing really to be done about it, and that is this: I've been studying somewhat assiduously Who rescued Jews during the Holocaust? I have always said, another subject, I've always said that I am more interested in studying how to make good people than how to make evil people. I'm more interested in rescuers of Jews than in torturers of Jews. And one of the interesting things I found in this book on altruism, that the Professors Ohlener wrote on this very subject was that the more contacts one had with non-Jews before World War II, the more likely that person, or more likely the non-Jews who had those positive contacts with Jews, would be to be a rescuer. Leo Baeck, the great, great, great reform rabbi of Germany, and martyr to the Holocaust, said— I believe these are his words, but if not, they're an accurate paraphrase— if we had had a Jew in every German family, there would not have been a Holocaust. Now, he was not obviously talking about intermarriage. He was talking about convert-seeking. That's very important. He was not pro-intermarriage, and I fully agree with him that Jews should in fact Be active in telling the world that you are welcome to become Jewish. Jews think it's a mitzvah to close the gates when— and that is a very, very sad thing in Jewish life. That's another speech. Nevertheless, the Jews being in so many non-Jewish families, I do believe, will— is in some way likely to reduce the chances of massive outbursts of antisemitism. It's very hard to advocate a pogrom if your son-in-law is a Jew. But the real thing that I would argue that we have to do once there is an intermarriage is to try to interest the non-Jewish spouse into becoming Jewish. The overwhelming majority of non-Jews who marry a Jew are not Christian. The reason is obvious: Christians marry people who share their faith. Religious Jews marry Jews. Religious Christians marry Christians. It's those Jews who don't care about Judaism generally, and those Christians who don't care about Christianity generally, who intermarry. Jews for nothing marry Christians for nothing. So it is very important to try, and I am not only— I am talking to two groups: the Jewish in-laws and spouse, of course, although the spouse may not be all that enthusiastic about it, and the Jewish community. We must have an outreach program to intermarried couples. Come hear a Jewish lecture, see a Jewish film, have a Shabbat meal, come to a Passover seder. No pressure, no sales. We're not going to sign you up. You're not doomed if you don't become Jewish. Nothing like that. But it is healthier to have a family that is united religiously than not. See what it's like to have a community and not just be another couple in America with 220 million other people. See what it's like. Maybe you'll like it. End of issue. Such an outreach is critical. Probably the best people to be involved in it are converts, who are our secret weapon to touching the non-Jewish world, and must be used. Must be used. They are a precious, precious resource. They are profoundly positive on two groups of people. Jews and non-Jews. On non-Jews, for reasons I just noted, and on Jews, because it is so exciting for most Jews to meet somebody who actually wanted to be a Jew. Most Jews figure, "All right, you're born it, you're stuck." But you wanted it. Why? That's the first question most Jews ask converts. "How come, jerk?" That's the subtext. Jerk. Fifth and finally, in the past it was enough for an ethnic identity, to have an ethnic identity, to be a Jewish family, to have Jewish feelings and identity. Ladies and gentlemen, that was only good for one or two generations. Jewish ethnic identity without Jewish religiosity is nothing today. Today is meaningless, pointless, and worthless. There are very few Jews of my generation, let alone today's college or high school generation, who feel Jewish, strongly Jewish, without any religious identity. This was something good for 1920, 1930, '40, '50, and forget it. It was a fluke. One generation, usually the children of Orthodox Jews, thought it was enough to be ethnic. Ladies and gentlemen, gefilte fish lasts one generation. It doesn't keep Jews Jewish after that. There's no such thing as a cultural Jew. It's one of the silliest terms I have ever heard. There is not a single thing, not a single thing that unites all Jews that isn't religious. Not one thing. The only things that all Jews share are religious things. Yiddish? Dead. Sorry, dead. And even when it was at its height, only half the Jews spoke it. It didn't unite Jews. A Yiddish-speaking Jew couldn't even talk to a Spanish Jew. He was talking Ladino, You were talking Yiddish. Half the Jewish world never had gefilte fish. They had couscous. So, my friends, there is no alternative to religiosity, to making a Jewish home. There is none. I don't care if your religiosity is Reform, Conservative, or Orthodox. But there is no such thing any longer as secular Jewish feeling. You can have it, but no one else will get it from you. Judaism is passed on through Jewish religious values. There is no such thing either as, well, I believe in Jewish moral values, but I don't believe in the practices. A very simple challenge for you, my friends: name me a single Jewish moral value. That is unique to Judaism? Charity, goodness, justice? Oh, Christians don't believe in that? Ask a Christian if he believes in justice, what do you think he'll say? Nah, we believe in injustice. It's racist. It's actually supremacist. It's ethnocentric in the extreme for a secular Jew to say we have distinctive Jewish moral values but no practices. What are they? I can't think of one. Well, maybe not buying retail. That's possible, but it's not a moral value. There is one thread that goes through all of these things, and that is religiosity. Ladies and gentlemen, that which will keep the Jewish family a Jewish family, a healthy family, and a wholesome family. There are many things, and it is not just Jewish, but it can't be done without a religious foundation. Secularism is a dead end. What is the purpose of life if there is no religious meaning? Making a good living? Well, it means a lot if you grow up in the Depression, but I didn't. For the generation of Jews that grew up in the Depression, The purpose of life was finding a good meal and a roof. For my generation, raised with at least one roof and many good meals, no such question. My generation doesn't ask, "Will we have a meal?" We ask, "Will it be Chinese? Will it be Italian?" Gee, we're sick of Italian. We just had ravioli yesterday. For my generation and Jews younger than me, the question is far deeper. Now that we do make a good living, what the hell are we here for? And there is only one answer to that question, and it's religious. And a family that is bereft of that and has to rely more and more on entertainment, TV, and clowns, and magicians, and MTV, and and music and God knows what, is not a healthy and wholesome home. So there are answers to the challenges of the '90s, and in the final analysis, I actually have some optimism. Because Jews who will opt to be Jewish and make a Jewish home now will do so utterly voluntarily. And that to me is the greatest thing. I'd rather have a million Jews be Jewish because they want to than 3 million Jews be Jewish solely because they were born into it. We are entering the age of option, and it's a very, very exciting age. Thank you very much. Well, I know that each of us will take away something very special from Mr. Prager's remarks tonight. But he did tell me earlier that he would like to have people ask lots of questions and answers. So I'll just leave it to him. Thank you. Thank you. And I'll just make one short advertisement for myself, if I may. A major reason that I go around the country talking is to stay in touch with people like you through the quarterly journal on life and Judaism that I publish, and through the tapes and so on, and in the hope that you can and get these ideas to people who wouldn't come to such a lecture. If you would like to subscribe, can I just ask that 2 of those be given on this side and 2 there? There's information in there. Just sign your name and I'll send you your issue when I return to LA tomorrow. And it's our way of staying in touch with each other, including if you'd like a tape of tonight as well. Okay, let me open up for questions, comments, and alternate speeches. It's always a lull. This is why it's good to have the time for my ad. Anybody like to raise anything about children, themselves, God after the Holocaust? Anything you'd like to raise? Today Zionism is almost a religion in itself. Would you comment on that? Excuse me. Today the question was, uh, Zionism is almost a religion unto itself. Would I comment on it? Actually, it was true a generation ago. I wish it were still true. I would say that the number of Jews who could even define Zionism is so small today that it hardly qualifies as a religion. If what you're saying is that for some Jews Israel has supplanted Judaism as the focus of all of their Jewish passion and commitment. I would say that for some Jews that's true. But let me tell you an interesting thing on that. Judaism, it consists of three components: God, Torah, Israel. God, law, and peoplehood. I have come to realize that to a certain extent Jewish life has Jews who specialize in any of them. Some Jews specialize in God, some specialize in observance, some specialize in Israel, and that is just part— that is part of the way it is. I would— my ideal Jew is equally committed to God, observance, God, law, and peoplehood. But I know that some Jews will be overwhelmingly attracted, or at least devoted to one of them. Ben-Gurion only cared about Zionism, not about God and Torah. But if Ben-Gurion had been more balanced, he may never have founded Israel. So we need a few imbalanced Jews, just like society needs a few imbalanced people. Had Beethoven done what Benjamin Franklin suggested—not to Beethoven, but in general—8 hours of work, 8 hours of play, and 8 hours of sleep, We would never have more than 2 symphonies. He would have stopped right before the Eroica and gone to play. Thank God Beethoven was imbalanced. We got a lot of great music. I want a handful of Jews to be imbalanced. 90% of us should be balanced between God, law, and peoplehood. But I'm prepared to have a few meshuggeners in certain areas. So that would be my answer. For the general Jew, I certainly agree that there has to be a balance. I would just add one other thing, though. Let no Jew here forget for a moment that we support Israel overwhelmingly for the most primal of selfish reasons. Our security as Jews and humans depends to a large extent on Israel's strength. I hope no Jew in this building does not realize that, but sometimes you forget the obvious. God forbid if there were no Israel. I love America. I trust America. But I've also written a book on antisemitism. Very beautiful places where Jews have had golden ages turned very badly at a certain point. And if you don't have an Israel, or as I write in my latest issue of Ultimate Issues, actually the last issue, Reflections on the Holocaust, one of my reflections was the need for a strong Israel. And I wrote in there, ask the Kurds what it's like to be a nation without a nation. Okay? That's very important. They were the ones that Iraq just used poison chemicals on. How come Iraq doesn't use poison chemicals on the Jews of Iraq? Because there's an Israel. There's no, there's no Kurd land. So my friends, while I strongly believe that Judaism— I haven't even mentioned Israel in my talk except to send your kids to visit. Nevertheless, I never for a moment lose sight of the instrumentality that Israel plays in our lives. Yes, please. Could you speak loudly, if you would? I'd like to hear more comments on the issue of safety as a community and an individual. You'd like to hear more comments on the issue of safety as individuals and a community? Do you mean physical safety? You mean what I just spoke out now about Israel being a guarantor of our safety? Well, there's not much more to say unless you want to flesh out a specific point that you'd like me to address. I simply, as I said, while I feel very secure in America as a Jew, knowing Jewish history, Jews have been secure when things have become bad. I also know that I am not the only Jew I care about. Soviet Jewry was profoundly dependent on Israel. Iranian Jewry profoundly dependent upon Israel. And we are also dependent upon Israel, at least the last generation was, for a lot of our Jewish identity. The Six-Day War changed a lot of non-Jewish Jews into Jewish Jews. We shouldn't have to rely on Israelis dropping dead, however, to keep American Jews Jewish. That's very important. I think what I'd like to hear a little bit about is psychological safety, you know, interest psychic safety being a new word after the war. I think it's had a fairly important impact on me in terms of feeling safe in the world. Oh, you mean post-Holocaust? Oh, this is different. You said psychic safety, is that what you said? You don't feel it, right? Listen, if Jews were not traumatized by the Holocaust, then we are a very sick people. You— a Jew who was not traumatized is sick. It's clear that that Jew doesn't know what happened and wishes not to confront it. So I join you in being among those— I lost no relatives and I am traumatized. It is probably the one area that a non-Jew can never identify with a Jew regarding. I would say in every other area there is a real ability of a sensitive non-Jew to relate to Jews' feelings. With regard to the Holocaust, I suspect there isn't. To know that in the modern world, in this century, The world gathered to gas you for being Jewish. That's all you needed to be. And to know what happened is a scar on the Jewish psyche. What I ask Jews to do, though, is not to learn the wrong lessons. That's why I wrote an article, and if you do get my Ultimate Issues, please try to get the back issue with Lessons from the Holocaust. Because I believe Jews have learned the wrong lessons from the Holocaust. For example, this is an entire other lecture, but for example, I am amazed that there are still Jews who believe that people are basically good. To believe that after the Holocaust, I will say this, and I know I don't mean to antagonize someone, but in that regard, you have to be a fool. And it is the only appropriate term I could use. Either that, or you don't know what happened. To know what happened and to walk around with that immensely foolish and dangerous belief that people are basically good— and un-Jewish belief, there's nothing in Judaism in 3,200 years that ever made such a silly claim— is an example of something that needs to be learned. What is to be learned? You need to teach goodness. That is why I now understand that Jews could value value-free education after the Holocaust. That's what I mean by learning nothing from it. One of the lessons I learned from the Holocaust is goodness has to be taught. And yet Jews are in the vanguard in every city in this country, are in the vanguard of fighting for value-free education. That to me is incredible. All right? That's just one example of what I think was not learned from the Holocaust. Yes, sir? When you speak about building a Jewish home, what are the steps that you would recommend for building a Jewish home? You don't have a vested interest in that question. I love it, I love it. I'm with you all the way. That's fine. This gentleman in the back whom I never met asks, when I say build a Jewish home, what exactly do I mean? Is that correct? Is that— that's what you would like me to expound on? Well, very briefly, I have one— as one good rule, my friends, If I walked into your home on a Wednesday, not on Passover, but on a Wednesday, how would I know it's a Jewish home? That is a very important question for you, especially raising children, to ask. Now, sometimes the answer is, "Well, we have a picture of a dancing chassid in our house." Now, I always get a kick out of pictures of dancing chassidim. On two accounts. First of all, I immediately know that I'm in a pretty secular Jewish home. I never was in a religious Jewish home with a dancing Hasid hanging on the wall. Secondly, I want you to know that because I am very truly pluralist and ecumenical in Jewish life, I have been begging Hasidim to put pictures of Reform Jews dancing in their walls. I just feel that that is the appropriate thing for Jews to do. At any rate, that is a question that I think is worthy of reflection. How do we live a Jewish life on a Wednesday, Tuesday, and a Monday? I hope there's no question about Friday night or Saturday, or at least Friday night. So Here are some very quick, quick rules of thumb. This too is an entire other lecture. First of all, the Shabbat is in the Ten Commandments. I'd infinitely prefer that you ate all day Yom Kippur, in fact partied, and kept 52 Shabbatot to fasting on Yom Kippur and ignoring Shabbat. There's no question in my mind which I prefer. There's no question in my mind which God would prefer. God has common sense. He gave us common sense. He too has common sense. One of the things people don't attribute to God. And the way to make Shabbat is to answer the following question: am I elevating and separating the day from the rest of the week? That is why I am a big believer in shutting the television off when Shabbat enters. I'll tell you the classic story of my own home that I've told frequently. I told you I'm a baseball fan. One of the advantages of living on the West Coast, if you're a baseball fan, is that you can get to watch— if you are an observant Jew— you can get to watch Friday night games on the East Coast before Shabbat starts. Unbelievable advantage, major. A lot of religious Jews have moved to California solely for that reason. So here we were 2 years ago. The Dodgers, as you recall, won the pennant and the World Series. And the Dodgers are playing the Mets in August in New York, Friday night. It's a major game, and Dodgers-Mets, great rivalry. And it's 8th inning and it's tied. And my wife calls up that she's about to light candles. I wanted to turn the TV off every bit as little as my son, who was 5, wanted it off. Eh, I'll light them a little later. Who knows the difference? Nobody's watching. And to make a long story short, of course I turned the TV on. I wasn't thinking I wasn't thrilled. My son wasn't thrilled. But I want to share with you the following. Number 1, within 5 minutes, I couldn't care less about the Dodger-Met game. It had left my mind so quickly. The house was into that Friday night quiet that only Friday night has. That it was dramatic. Secondly, my son couldn't care less 5 minutes later either. You know what a 5, 6-year-old boy in America learns from that? That there's something more important than sports, it's a very important lesson in America today. His wife won't be a baseball, football, or basketball widow, as my wife isn't, partially because my parents shut their TV on on Friday nights. All that involved in just doing that is a very powerful lesson. Not only that, by not having TV, radio, stereo, telephone. There's so much quiet in the house on Shabbat that we do something that is just not possible the rest of the week. We talk all night. There's nothing else to do except, as I explained to the group before, make love with your spouse. It is most, you know, it is a mitzvah to do so Friday night. It's not a sin on other nights, I want to make that clear. But, but it, you know, it's a traditional mitzvah to do on Friday night. And I, I finally come to realize why. And as I said, I was not being sarcastic. There's nothing else to do. It's one of the beauties of having to be human. There's nothing else to rely on. You know, I'm writing, I'm writing an essay on the, on the brilliance of Shabbat. I am coming to realize that not having electronic entertainment on Shabbat is so brilliant, it will make the Jewish home that doesn't have it very different from other homes, Jewish and non-Jewish. The Wall Street Journal, one of the world's great newspapers, had an article 2 weeks ago I beg you to get. It's on the front page. It's about a nut. A nut. An eccentric nut who is also a computer genius. He is developing what he calls electronic LSD that without ingesting any drugs, purely through electronic fields and touching of screens and doing things, you will, in effect, get a high. And the article was interesting. For example, some of it is good. For example, for architects, people will be able to see the layout of their house on the computer screen, and they'll say, "I don't like the window there. Let me see how it would be over there." And with a touch of the hand, you'll move the window and have the entire house reformulate itself on the screen. It is now done, by the way, partially for plastic surgeons. This is how your nose will look if you get this nose job, and so on, which is fine. It also mentioned in passing that this will have a real impact on pornography. It said nothing else about it. It just had the words "and pornography." And it let the mind imagine, and I can exactly imagine, well, if you could move windows, you could also move dresses. Hey, let's undress all those women in the screen. Let's do other things to all those women in the screen. As sure as I am speaking to you, that will be in existence in your lifetime if you are my age, and probably within 20 years in any event. People will be able, especially men who are more machine-oriented, more object-oriented, And in any event, are much more— 99% of the purveyors of, uh, of consumers of pornography. They will increasingly be able to retreat from the world into electronic cubicles, and it will become apparent that the only homes that can truly be immune to this are those that say no flat out, or a traditional Jewish home that says no at least for Shabbat and holidays. And I realize it in a simple way in another manner. I have to say no to my baseball games Friday night and, much more important, because I very rarely watch TV, much more important, in fact I don't watch TV except for baseball games. As a news commentator, I assiduously avoid television news. That's the only thing on TV I would never watch. That's another speech for another time. Um, but what is important is my stepdaughter, who loves, uh, heavy metal and plays guitar, she gives up her heavy metal and guitar for Shabbat. There would be no possible way without having a destructive parental-child relationship that I could have asked her not to have this if it were not for religion. I— what else could I say? I said so? What am I giving up? But I don't have my Haydn on, and I love Haydn as much as she loves Guns N' Roses. But a day of the week that is just human and not electronic What a profound change. When I am on the road and I'm back to tuna fish and tuna melts and the few things that I can eat because of Kashrut, very powerful. It's a very good thing. I eat anywhere but very few foods. As I've always said, when people have invited me over and said, uh, Mr. Prager, we'd love to have you over. We will have kosher food, but our dishes aren't kosher. I said, it's all right, I never eat dishes. So I do eat, I will eat anywhere, but I will not eat non-kosher foods. And, uh, this enriches our children's lives and our home. That is what a Jewish home is. You think kashrut is for trichinosis? I hate giving 17 different speeches here, but it always opens up. It's almost inevitable. Let me just tell you one thing about kosher. I didn't keep kosher for years. The more I learned about it, the more in love I fell with it, and as a result, with Judaism. Ladies and gentlemen, I'll tell you one very simple— the basis of kosher. Judaism does not want the Jew to be able to kill and eat every animal, fish, and fowl, period. It is not a Jewish value to be able to kill everything that flies, walks, and swims. In fact, vegetarianism is the Jewish ideal, even though it's not legislated. That's why some of the greatest Jews of the 20th century, religious Jews, have kept it. Like Rav Kook, the great chief rabbi of the Yeshiva in Palestine, right before the state was a vegetarian. But Judaism didn't say you have to be vegetarian. What it did say was, you can only eat certain types of meats in certain ways. It's not a Big Mac, it's a cow. That's what Judaism wants you to remember. How else is our home Jewish? We say a bracha before we eat and after we eat. You know how long it takes to say a bracha? I've actually timed the kids. Actually, it can be done in under a second. My stepdaughter has been able to do hamotzi in under a second. I have one of those stopwatches that goes to the hundredths of a second. It is incredible. Ladies and gentlemen, one second it takes to acknowledge that God gave you the food and that your home is Jewish. Not a terribly big demand to ask of a Jew to make a bracha before and a bracha after. And you know what? I started making brachot solely because of the kids. This is a good example of a parent doing something for the kids. I can't stop. Now I'm in a restaurant and the words go through my mind every time I eat. I, you know, what is it, I turn off when I leave the house? No, it's affected me too. It is not possible for me to eat anywhere without the bracha going through my mind or even mumbling it. And it's powerful. That's what a Jewish home is. You don't just sit down, eat, and leave. It now seems to me to be somehow— it's not just not right. Eat and leave. Acknowledge, acknowledge, and then eat. And then acknowledge the thank you and leave. That's what part of a Jewish home is. That and the tzedakah box in the kid's room. They got a present, you put 10% in the tzedakah box. Let them learn. They got $25 from a grandparent, put $2.50 in the tzedakah box. Nice thing, nice thing to remember. I don't even care if the tzedakah is not a Jewish charity, but a tzedakah box. Okay, I think that we'll call it an evening for now. I thank you all very, very much. Thank you.

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.