Dennis Prager Show - Ultimate Issues: Is it Natural to Love God?
Aired: 2020-01-14
Duration: 06:16


=== Loving God Despite Suffering (05:41) ===

[00:00:00]  Love God and not behave properly?
[00:00:03]  And can you behave properly and not love God?
[00:00:09]  How's this?
[00:00:09]  Are you ready for a confession?
[00:00:11]  I don't find it easy to love God.
[00:00:13]  I never did.
[00:00:16]  I am God-centered.
[00:00:19]  I want to do what God wants me to do.
[00:00:22]  I've always felt that deeply.
[00:00:24]  It is the animating impulse of my life.
[00:00:29]  But I don't find it easy.
[00:00:31]  The amount of suffering that is built into this world does not make it easy for me.
[00:00:38]  I've had a great life.
[00:00:40]  I mean, I've suffered, but everybody's suffered somewhat.
[00:00:43]  But compared to others, I haven't.
[00:00:48]  On scales that I know exist.
[00:00:53]  And, by the way, I think that...
[00:00:56]  I am a reason that there is a commandment to love God because if it came naturally, there would be no commandment.
[00:01:03]  As I said earlier, there's no commandment to love your child.
[00:01:07]  That comes naturally to normal people.
[00:01:11]  So, this is a very real question.
[00:01:17]  Believe me, there are people who think they love God and they don't act very well.
[00:01:24]  Alright, let's see here.
[00:01:28]  Tim in Detroit, thank you for calling.
[00:01:32]  Hey Dennis, I got a quick question.
[00:01:35]  You said earlier that a commandment that comes, something that comes naturally to you, God did not command us.
[00:01:44]  So I was wondering, right when you said that, I'm a yeshiva student, I study the Torah the whole day.
[00:01:50]  And so one question that came up to me is that, We are commanded to love our parents, right?
[00:01:56]  No, we're not...
[00:01:58]  We're obligated to honor them and love them.
[00:02:04]  That's right.
[00:02:05]  No, no.
[00:02:06]  Just honor.
[00:02:07]  Just honor?
[00:02:08]  Yep.
[00:02:11]  Okay.
[00:02:12]  In fact, I write about that in...
[00:02:15]  Take a look at my Torah commentary, The Rational Bible.
[00:02:18]  I write when it says, Honor your father and mother.
[00:02:22]  It's unique.
[00:02:24]  We're told to love God, love the stranger, love our neighbor.
[00:02:31]  But we're never told to love our parents.
[00:02:35]  So, too, we're never told to honor anyone except our parents.
[00:02:40]  Parents are unique.
[00:02:42]  Whether you love them or not is your business, not God's.
[00:02:46]  Whether you honor them or not is God's business.
[00:02:51]  Very important call.
[00:02:53]  Glad he did.
[00:02:57]  Okay.
[00:02:58]  Let's go to...
[00:03:00]  Let's see here.
[00:03:07]  David in Phoenixville, Pennsylvania.
[00:03:11]  Hi.
[00:03:14]  Dennis?
[00:03:15]  Yes, sir.
[00:03:19]  Long-term listener.
[00:03:20]  Thank you.
[00:03:21]  My favorite.
[00:03:22]  Very good question to ask, sir.
[00:03:27]  You brought up the issue of the Ten Commandments, and rightly so.
[00:03:34]  My perspective on that, from a 5,000-foot view and looking at the Ten Commandments, we use those as a measuring stick.
[00:03:48]  To see how well we're doing.
[00:03:52]  Now, looking at loving the Lord, we have to look above and get ourselves away from the world.
[00:04:04]  How do we do that?
[00:04:06]  We have to pray, spend time reading the Bible, because if we love the Father, we want to get to know Him.
[00:04:18]  All right, so let me ask you the questions that I posed.
[00:04:22]  Is it possible to love God and not do what he commands?
[00:04:27]  Yes, because we're sinners and we constantly...
[00:04:36]  No, no, okay.
[00:04:37]  Well, obviously, I understand.
[00:04:40]  Yeah.
[00:04:41]  Let's put it...
[00:04:41]  All right.
[00:04:41]  Alright, is it possible to love God and be a serial murderer?
[00:04:48]  I wouldn't think so.
[00:04:57]  Is it possible to do what God wants and not love him?
[00:05:03]  Thank you.
[00:05:05]  That informs some type of detachment from God, which...
[00:05:11]  No, it's an emotional detachment, not detachment.
[00:05:14]  It's emotional detachment, but it's not detachment.
[00:05:19]  Look, I'm a living example of that.
[00:05:21]  I admit it.
[00:05:22]  And it may be disappointing to some of you, but That's okay.

=== People's Real Convictions Matter (00:50) ===

[00:05:29]  We'll both have to live with it.
[00:05:33]  I just, by the way, my theory, and I know I've done this so long that I know this theory actually works.
[00:05:41]  The more real you are, the more people will take religion seriously.
[00:05:46]  A lot of religious people, in a well-intentioned way, but they offer some sort of Pre-written script About their religious convictions and it doesn't come across as real There's nothing quite as Influential that is influencing of others as real then people can