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March 24, 2020 - Dennis Prager Show
08:29
God Wants us to be Good
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Okay, everybody.
So I've got a today's Ultimate Issues question.
I'm going to present to you the essence of my own theology and ask you to react.
Am I right?
Well, not even am I right.
Because there's no right or wrong in theology.
There's faith.
So I don't ever say others' theology is wrong.
I will judge others as theology morally, but not theologically.
Anyway, here is my theology, and whether you're secular or religious, tell me whether you agree or disagree.
Would you amplify it?
Would you change it?
Here it is.
Ladies and gentlemen, Dennis Prager's theology in one sentence.
Wants us to do good.
There you go.
That's it.
It's been one of the true constants of my life.
There is a God.
God is good.
God judges us.
God wants us to do good.
I've never believed that God wants us to be perfect because he created an imperfect being.
How could God make demands?
That are impossible to realize.
I've never quite understood that.
We're never asked to be perfect.
We're just asked to walk in God's ways.
And that's repeated.
It's in Deuteronomy 10. It's in Micah 6. It's what God wants from you.
1-8 Prager 776. It's a challenge to the secular.
It's a challenge to the religious.
The challenge to the secular is they don't think God is necessary.
And all I can tell you is that the post-Christian world has not been morally impressive with its communism and its Nazism.
The most secular institution in society is a joke.
It is a bad joke.
It's called the university.
It is an intellectual fraud.
It is a moral cesspool.
I'm sorry to say it because I love learning.
I love it.
I still have about 5,000, 6,000 books.
I love books.
I love the life of the mind.
Precisely because I love the life of the mind, I have contempt for the modern university.
And now it's seeping down to high schools and elementary schools.
So don't tell me, oh, we don't need God.
Really?
Really?
Look at the great success of the secular university and the secular high school.
Look at the great success of the secular world in terms of happiness.
Okay, not to mention wisdom.
And it's a challenge, my theology, to many religious people.
Who believe that the list of what God wants from us is longer than what I just said.
I don't know any religious Jew or Christian who denies that God wants us to be good.
But they would add theology or ritual.
And I'm not against adding.
I'm just saying that this is the essence.
That's my question.
On today's Ultimate Issues Hour.
That is my theology.
That is my mission in life.
Everything else is commentary.
Great story in the Talmud.
Phone number, by the way, is 1-8 Prager 776. It's a great story in the Talmud of the two greatest rabbis of the time.
When did Hillel and Shammai live?
About 200?
And they were the greatest scholars, rabbinic scholars of the time, and a pagan came to each of them and said, explain to me Judaism while standing on one leg.
Very famous story among Jews.
110 B.C. 110 B.C. I missed by 300 years.
But then those, you know.
You know, when you're back that far, what's 300 years, you know?
110 B.C., no kidding.
It's a little bit weird because it says born in 110 B.C. Yeah.
Died 10 A.D. in Jerusalem.
He lived 120, theoretically.
That's pretty good.
Is that Hillel?
Yeah.
Yeah, that means whenever they say 120, they really like the guy.
All right, anyway, so good, even further back.
All right, so tell me your religion, standing on one leg, and Hillel, the great rabbi, Hillel says, Do not do to others what you would not want done to you.
The rest is commentary.
Now go and study.
It's a very famous response.
Went to Shammai.
Explain Judaism on one leg, and Shammai beat the guy off with his cane.
That has always cracked me up, that story.
I have no idea if it's literally true, but it's a great story.
They clearly sided with Hillel on that one.
You've already had a soft spot for Shammai.
Yeah, because, well, Shammai was basically, are you kidding?
I'm going to summarize all of this wisdom and learning and morality on one leg?
Take a walk, Jack.
No, hit the road, Jack.
Hey, Sean, let's play Hit the Road, Jack.
It's one of my favorite songs, actually.
This, you don't know this, folks, but Hit the Road, Jack.
...comes from Shammai.
You didn't know that, did you?
Your man, Shammai.
That's what he started singing to the guy as he hit him on the head with his cape.
Ray Charles picked it up.
Ray Charles picked it up, exactly.
Are we good?
That's right.
This was what Shammai sang to the guy. - Oh no.
Now the question is, did he sing this while standing on one leg, or was he standing on both legs?
Okay, thank you very much.
This is a true innovation in religious history.
What did Shammai sing to the pagan?
The poor guy.
I understand that you would have some respect for Shammai's view.
Tremendous respect.
You're cracking me up.
It is not often that the living martyr cracks me up.
He is cracking me up.
Anyway, I'm presenting you on this Ultimate Issues Hour during virus time with my theology.
I could do it standing on one leg.
I could do it while in the air jumping.
It's that brief.
God wants us to be good.
Take your calls.
Dennis Prager, Ultimate Issues Hour.
The Dennis Prager Show.
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