TRANSCRIPT
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The Rabbi Daniel Lapin Podcast
Episode: Get Thin By Wanting Less & Eating Less. It Works.
Date: 03/17/23 Length: 1:46:53
Daniel Lapin 0:02
Welcome, everybody. Welcome to the Rabbi Daniel Lapin show where your rabbi, that would be me reveals how the world really works. And that is especially for you. And one of the ways the world really works is that, as is often said, One can never be too rich or too thin. Well, of course, like all attempts to compress vast wisdom into a single slogan or one sentence, it obviously falls short in many ways, including the fact that you can be too thin, you can be unhealthily too thin. And you can certainly be too rich, if too rich means that you sacrificed vitally important parts of your life. By overemphasizing the significance of wealth. We've spoken a number of times on the show about wealth, I have a number of books and audio CD programs on the creation of wealth and on increasing revenue. And I'll remind you later on of my website, you can go and explore that if you'd like. But today, in this show, I want to speak about thin, I want to speak about losing weight. As a matter of fact, I want to speak about the only way to reliably lose weight. There are so many diet programs and exercise programs and gym programs, and, and they all promise these extraordinary results. But as most of you have probably discovered, they all fall short. Eventually, they don't work. And yes, you can certainly watch infomercials on late-night television and encounter before and after pictures of individuals who've gone through these programs. And it's very possible that for those individuals, it did work, but it doesn't work for the majority of people. And the reason is because the truth is everybody knows how to lose weight, right? exercise more, eat less in the story. That's all you got to do. And so it sort of seems as if the problem with those of us who could stand to lose a few pounds, it seems as if the problem is simply just a case of lack of willpower, no self-control, we eat and eat and eat. And we sit in front of the blasted television set. And we don't exercise so guess what the belly bulges. When what do you expect? That's what it sounds like. But it's not quite as simple as that. Yes, it may be true that I do know that the secret to losing weight is eat less exercise more.
Daniel Lapin 3:27
But weight loss isn't the only area where failure to follow through is the problem, not lack of information. You know, whether it's Bernie Madoff, the notorious financier who engaged in a massive fraud and Ponzi scheme, or whether it's the very colorful Alan Stanford, the Texas good guy, nice guy who became a Caribbean-based financier and banker, and was convicted of charges of fraud and Ponzi schemes and so on. And so, you know, he's serving a prison sentence that that ends sometime after the after the year 2100. And Bernie Madoff is serving a sentence that also is going to go on for much longer than he can possibly live for. But it's also folks who who have carried out far less notorious and far smaller schemes that have come to grief. In all of these cases, whether it was Madoff or Stanford, or all the smaller people. Everybody knows that what they were doing was wrong, right? That's almost never in question. And so if one would have gotten to them and said, Hey, look, you know, the secret of staying out of jail, just don't defraud and don't do Ponzi schemes, that's all and you're fine. That's, it's all you got to say. The trouble is, they knew that they knew that. But the desire to do it, the emotional pull to do it exceeded the intellectual restraint. And the same could be said to be true of a weight loss as well. The emotional desire to eat and the emotional reluctance to exercise, defeat, the intellectual knowledge of what it is one should do, which is simply drives home to us the very simple reality that human beings are not computers. And we're not cause we're not machines. Yes, if you want your car to perform a little differently, perform a little more dramatically more exciting acceleration, perhaps a better top speed, at the cost of wearing out more quickly and using more fuel, then all you do is you hack the chip. And there's because cars today are computer controlled. Very often, different cars made by the same manufacturer with different performance ratings have exactly the same engine, but it's just programmed differently. And so it's not hard to either buy a suitably programmed chip to replace the one in your car, or to learn how to reprogram the one in your car. This People do this all the time. Folks, it does void your warranty. So I just wanted to let you know about that. But the fact is that it's not that hard to hack a car, you can hack your computer, you can use their tricks and, and little dodges you can use when it comes to machines in which you can make changes, yes, you can. But people are not cars, or computers or any other form of machine.
Daniel Lapin 7:33
And so you know, imagine a guy saying look, you know, Rabbi Lapin I really want to learn how to, I want to meet a woman and get married, I really want to do that. And I'm just I'm shy, I don't know how to meet girls. And, you know, I talked to him a little bit. And it turns out that he's been singing the same song for 25 years already. At this point, I'm thinking to myself, he thinks that there are a few little tricks, he thinks that there are some little sentences or opening chat lines or pickup lines that I can teach him and that all he needs is an upgrade of his wardrobe. And he's got to learn to look a little cooler. And by the time he has had a makeup of his appearance and a makeup of the his opening lines, he is set to go. And there's no reason why he won't be married in a year's time, right? Wrong. That's entirely wrong. Because it's not the little tricks you have, it's what you are. That's what makes all the difference. And and when he he tries his little pickup lines in wearing his new cool outfits, it's not gonna take any woman you know very long at all to discover that this is all veneer. This - there is no substance underpinning what what is projecting on the outside. The only way that works is to change your very nature you actually have to you'll pardon me using this phrase because I don't mean it in a religious sense, but I mean it in a spiritual sense. You have to kind of be reborn is really what it's all about. And and so thepeople who who defraud the people who, who make these mistakes, they knew about all of that. The problem wasn't what they didn't know. The problem was what they were not.
Daniel Lapin 9:39
Do you really think? Do you really think that when teenage girls get themselves pregnant and have babies? Do you really think they had no idea of the perils of our physical relationships is that likely, after all the time and money They're silly High School. They're silly, pardonme GIC. They're silly government indoctrination camp spends on teaching sex education. Don't you figure that by now they kind of probably got that figured out again, when girls get pregnant in high school, it's not because of something they didn't know. It's because of something they were or were not depending on how you want to look at it. When, when their brothers engage in theft and robbery, is that because they don't know that that's illegal? Is it because they have no idea that that starts you on a road to a lifetime, doomed career as a petty criminal? No, of course, they know that. The problem is not what they know or don't know. The problem is what they are or are not. And so similarly, my friends, the reason that the overwhelming majority of weight loss programs don't work for most people out, there are some people for whom they do is no question about there are the outliers, they're the occasional people, who for either certain body type or certain metabolisms, or with superb self-control, do somehow manage to lose weight on as others programs. But do they keep it off different story entirely. And I think everybody knows how frequently that part fails. Where you undergo on a frantic pre-summer diet and exercise program, you're really going to get in shape. An you pretty much are for for the summer, you you spent three months, January, February, March, April, four months, oh, you really work hard, you starved yourself. You exercise comes spring and then the summer and oh, you're terrific. And then comes October, November, December. And guess what? For most people, the weight pops right back. I shouldn't laugh This is It's terrible. It's painful. People really suffer. And everybody, most moslts go through this. And so the problem again, is not what you know, you don't know, I there's not a single one of us, who doesn't know that the avenue to weight loss is eat less exercise more. That's it. And you can play around with your protein diets and your carbohydrate diets and this and that all of these are designed to make it easier for people with inadequate willpower. And so yes, you can eat. And then there are kinds of there various drugs and medications to take that fool your stomach into feeling that it's full. And again, if if these things really worked reliably for everybody, they would be widely known, and the manufacturers or inventors would be regular features on the celebrity circuit. But the bottom line is that these are all hopeless and an inadequate solutions to the weight loss problem.
Daniel Lapin 13:24
This show, I'm going to share with you the secret of losing weight, it's the only effective way of reliably losing weight and keeping it off. And the reason that it's is quite unique is because it focuses not on the hacks and the tricks. It focuses on the reality of changing not just what you know, not even just what you do, but what you are, or perhaps more grammatically who you are. Okay. That's by way of intro so you know where we're going in this particular show. I want to thank you for your loyal participation in the show. And particularly for the successful way that so many of you are promoting the show by getting other people interested in the show. And and that way we've become a like minded community that today is very large, over a quarter of a million people listening to this show with some degree of regularity, which is incredible. And really, I've done no promotion at all at all been you telling your friends and associates and relatives about the show. So thank you very much for that. And recently several of you have also been asking, what can you do? What should you do? If you want to make a major gesture of affiliation with The Show and with the project of making ancient Jewish wisdom, accessible to a broad range of people in the areas of faith, family finance, fitness and friendship? And the answer is, what you should do is you should buy the digital download library pack. There is more than 35 hours of practical wisdom and our America's real war ebook, you can hear and see me and Mrs. Susan Lapin as we teach on the five F's. And so, how do you do that? Well, first of all, I should tell you what's, what's more of what's in it. There are 12 separate audio teachings. There's three downloadable DVD programs, there's an ebook, and there is a 10 hour video course on financial prosperity. And if if you were to buy these things separately, as people do, it will be just under $500 for the whole lot. Obviously, with the sale price, we're not talking about anything anywhere near that. And not only do you get the 10 hour video program of the financial prosperity collection, and not only do you get America's Real War, the ebook, but you also get the Biblical lueprint, which is five audio teachings and, by the way, really worthwhile listening to at very least, I mean, let me tell you, instead of watching television, or or a video, listening while you go to sleep, you'd be astonished how much you're actually able to recall. And so these five are let me go. That one is about Egypt in the Exodus, the 10 commandments is about that Festival of Lights, insights on the holiday of lights, Hanukkah, December time of the day of atonement is the fourth one and the fifth one is perils of profanity. And I'll be telling you a little bit more about the perils of profanity in today's show. Then there is also the four Genesis Journeys programs. These are each one is about two hours of audio teaching, along with a PDF study guide. And one of them is called Madam I'm Adam decoding marriage secrets from Eden. Second is Clash of destiny, decoding the secrets of Israel and Islam. The third one is the Gathering Storm. And that's about the deteriorating social conditions that brought about Noah and his flood, and then Tower of Power, decoding the secrets of Babel. And here, you see the origins of socialism, right. Socialism didn't start recently, it didn't start on American universities. It didn't even start with the French Revolution. But it goes back much longer than that. And it is a passionate drive for secularism that burns deep in man's heart. And that's all described in Tower of Power. We've also got the audio teaching on Boost your Income. We've got another one on Prosperity Power, connect for success. We have another one on the Passover Seder. Why is the Passover said it's such a big deal, three audio lessons, and along with the Passover Haggadah, and then finally, the Ancient Jewish Whalf-hourisdom DVD collection, it's three DVDs, each containing I believe four programs, I think it's about 12 half hour programs of Susan Lapin and I teaching on video. And anyway, we we think it's terrific and people love it. So for all of those of you who would really like to connect with us on a deep and meaningful level, please go to Rabbi Daniel lapin.com. And take a look at the details on the digital download library pack special sale. I think you'll find it extremely useful.
Daniel Lapin 19:29
Back to the rabbi Daniel Lapin show, where I remind you that everybody needs a rabbi right? Because who else would reveal for you how the world really works? Well, there was a considerable consternation on social media a few weeks ago, where Glenn Beck had mentioned that I was his rabbi and everybody needs a rabbi I, and, and people, when I say people, I mean four or five people, but there you know, there were comments that went on into the hundreds. But some people got a little indignant at that. Insisting why? Why does Glenn need a rabbi? Or why does everybody need a rabbi? Oh, what's that about all? For many devout Christians, the response was, I already have a rabbi and you know who his name is. But and then, of course, a number of other people said, calm down, calm down. Oh, there were a number of Jewish people who responded as well, you might, you might think that your rabbi that's me, has a little too much on a little too much time on his hands to even be familiar with what's going on on social media. But so be it. I do. Keep a watch on it and participate every now and then. But yes, there were even some Jewish people who got extremely upset, oh, it's very anti-semitic to say that everybody needs a rabbi, it's stereotype Oh, it's anti-semitic, it's bigotry. Well, one of the three recurring themes that I speak on when I speak in Jewish synagogues and congregations around the country, and I, it is true, I speak at far more churches than I do at synagogues, I probably speak at about gonna say about 1010 synagogues, 10 or 12 synagogues a year. I speak at about 30 churches a year. And one of the themes that keeps recurring is that we Jews need thicker skin, we are so Prickly, and so quick to jump onto anything that we can possibly attribute to anti-semitic bigotry, stop it already. Gosh, not everybody is apt to kill you. So and, I wrote on that as well on social media explaining that, that I'm not in the least bit offended by the term because I initiated it. And it's been a catchphrase of mine for many years already. And obviously, it's tongue in cheek, I mean, of course, not everybody needs a rabbi. But when I say everyone needs a rabbi, what I mean by that is that in order to understand reality, to get a sense of how the world really works, we do need to make sure that we use both our eyes, both areas, in other words, we need to keep a focus on the physical material. And also we need to keep focus on the spiritual. And by spiritual, I don't mean the pious, the religious, the godly, the divine, I don't mean that at all. Spiritual does not mean virtuous, spiritual does not mean holy, spiritual, doesn't mean godly, spiritual just means those important characteristics in human life, that do not lend themselves to measurement and physical circumstances, like in a laboratory or something like that. And so things like the length of an object, or the weight of an object, or the color of an object, or the how loud are particular noises. These are, in fact, a physical phenomena, and are easily measured in a physical environment, such as a laboratory. But so many of the other things that are vitally important in human life, such as love, and loyalty, and resilience, and perseverance, and so many other things are spiritual in nature. And so it is very important that as we try and understand reality, that we fully understand the role that is played in our lives by spiritual objects. And I tend to say, although this is obviously not true, I say only a rabbi can tell you that well, I know far too many rabbis, who know as much about spiritual things, as the Marx Brothers know about brain surgery. And I know many people who are not rabbis who have a very deep and full understanding of spiritual reality. So it's simply nothing other than a self-promotional and obnoxiously self-promotional phrase that, that I use. Everybody needs a rabbi. That's right.
Daniel Lapin 24:26
Because we're talking about as we always do, the confluence of the spiritual and the physical, and nowhere is that more apparent than in the area of eating, and that's, of course, what we're talking about. But in order to be able to tell you a little bit more about that. I also have to just give you a little bit of a picture on Sigmund Freud. What's that got to do with anything? Well, this Freud is a guy who was born Jewish, his dad was Jacob. He was a businessman. And then he married another lady Jacob Freud's father was brought up in Judaism. His grandfather, Freud's grandfather, Jacobs dad, was actually the person after whom Sigmund was named after. In Hebrew, his Hebrew name. His given Hebrew name was Shlomo, which is the Hebrew for the English translation, Solomon. And whether Sigmund is the German translation of Solomon in any way at all that I have no idea, and I made nothing more than a contemplate of guests. On the show a few episodes ago, I was speculating on whether Dostoyevsky's first name, feed, or was related in any way to Peter. And one of the things I love about doing the show is how many of you contact me how many of you stay in touch through the Contact Us tab at our website? I'll tell you about that in a little while. And, and I love that because what happened is that I got four very erudite responses from people explaining some explained the origin of Theodore the difference between PETA the connection with Theodore and and I learned a great deal from that. So I'm not I'm not speculating now with a segment is Solomon at all, I'm just telling you that he when he was born, he more than likely had a bris a circumcision at eight days old, at which time he was named more than likely, however, the born and grew up in Freiburg in Germany. And sometime later, I think, I think Sigmund was already born, Jacob and his family moved to they had a stop off in Leipzig, and then they settled in Vienna. As soon as they got to Vienna, Jacob abandoned all religious tradition and basically severed his relationship with Judaism as a faith. And he became connected at that point with the reform movement and Reformed Judaism. Okay. people joke about Reformed Judaism being the circumcised wing of the Democratic Party. And, and that's it's an unfair characterization, because there are people who identify as reformed Jews who are deeply religious, although usually not observant of Jewish tradition and law. And, you know, and there are people who not, but at any rate in general, certainly in Vienna, in Austria, in the 1820s, and 1830s, excuse me, the 1920s and the 1930s. There was certainly absolutely no no religious association with or let's say Reformed Judaism at that point, had severed its connection with with religion and with God, and had tried and was trying to constitute a new form of Judaism based on ethnic affiliation. And so for instance, one of the things that we can find is that in prayer books of that era, and this is true for Germany, as well as for Austria, and again, Germany and Austria were very closely connected.
Daniel Lapin 29:03
Large numbers of Austrians welcomed the Anschluss. They welcomed when Hitler and his Nazis essentially took over Austria in a bloodless coup. And, and in prayer books of that era in Germany, a reform excuse me, just there was Orthodox Judaism, alive and well in Germany and Austria at the time. But as in the United States of America, the numbers are very different. The overwhelming majority of people were reformed, affiliated, and it's not at all an inaccurate statement, to say that for many people, Reformed Judaism was the last station on the train out of Judaism, and for other people, often the first station on the journey on the train journey into Judaism. And that's not a an inaccurate depiction of what Reformed Judaism Minutes. But in prayer books of that era, it was quite common to find that all references to Jerusalem and again Jerusalem shows up in, in in the Jewish prayer book and has for a very, very long period of time. And it shows up consistently. You're not going to turn to many pages in a Jewish prayer book in an Orthodox Jewish prayer book without finding the word Jerusalem. Well, interestingly enough, I actually, with my own eyes, have seen prayer books of the early 20th century from Germany and also from Austria, in which the word Jerusalem has been replaced with the word Berlin, Berlin. That's right, the city, the capital of Germany, or, in some cases, Vienna, and, and that's exactly what you know, Jews used to say we are already in it's hard to believe, right? Because the Holocaust had not yet happened. It was far away from anyone's imagination, nobody could even dream of such a thing. In fact, even once it did begin happening, many, many Jews in Germany were incapable of relating to this, it was like, the love affair that German that Russians had with Stalin, that even when Russians were being executed on Stalin's direct orders, they insisted that, you know, if, if only Stalin knew what was happening, he'd stopped this when he was the one who actually caused it. So interesting area of study, by the way, if for people are interested in how a man like Stalin, and for that matter, Hitler also But Stalin to, to a greater extent, is able to perpetrate such limitless and monumental evil, and retain the love and affection of the people whom he is tormenting. How many Russians lost their lives directly because of stolen millions. But for the most part, they continued loving him to the last day. And, and so this, this was the reality in Germany and then in Austria, before the war, reformed Jews spoke about the promised land being Germany. The the aspiration of Jewish dreams and hopes, was not Jerusalem, but it was Berlin. And, and, and so that became more and more the part of the life. Eventually, Freud's family abandon all of that as well, I very much doubt that he had a bar mitzvah, most likely not because by then, the family was pretty dissociated from any religious observances. Matter of fact, when Jacob Freud married the woman who was going to become segments mother, he refused to have a Jewish ceremony, he wanted a civil marriage in the registry, the government or in a government office, he wanted absolutely nothing to do with a religious ceremony. Anyway, later on, in so Freud, Freud was very, very disconnected, and, but not only disconnected, actually hostile. And I'll explain that to you in just a moment.
Daniel Lapin 33:17
The rabbi Daniel Lapin show, you're listening to it, and I'm grateful to you for that love for you to visit my website this week. And I'll tell you why. Because, because of what I'm talking about, and the importance of some of the things, we actually have a 15% discount on anything on any of the resources that we carry in the store, Rabbi Daniel lapin.com. There's a lot of information on transforming your finances. There's a lot of information on transforming your family, both relationships between spouses and between spouses and children. There's a lot of material on faith. There's a lot of material on understanding the development of socialism, liberalism, communism, that's a product by the way called Tower of Power. And particularly in the context of the subject matter of today. There's something called the perils of profanity. You are what you speak. Yeah, everybody needs a rabbi, and I humbly submit my candidacy to you for your consideration right. Now we'll start another firestorm of protest. I'm Rabbi Daniel Lapin revealing how the world really works.
Daniel Lapin 34:39
And, yes, Sigmund Freud, and how relevant is his Jewishness to his psychiatry? A great deal far more than most people realize. Let me explain. I will say this. Not in any way to diminish To the God-given brilliance that Sigmund Freud was blessed with. And not to say that absolutely everything he ever said was wrong, that that wouldn't be true. As a matter of fact, I for those of you who actually do want to get a sense of the man, instead of reading about him, let his own words speak for him. Do you know what I mean? You know, and this is also true of in politics, and in so many other areas where people will tell you all about the candidate or there will be articles about the cat well there, you know, either written by people who love him or people or hate him, and beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Why don't you just let the person speak for himself. And Freud does that in a book sometimes published in one volume, sometimes in two volumes, called the introductory lectures, and I think they're 19 of them. If I remember correctly, I don't have the book right here in front of me, but I do have it on my shelves. And I think it's the introductory lectures in psychiatry. And, and I think, I think they're terrific. I've often said that, my only regret about time travel, not being practical is that I cannot go back to Vienna, and sit in a lecture theatre, listening to Freud speaking, I wasn't able to do that. But soon after the Nazis took over, took over Austria. Sigmund Freud, of course, was was regarded as Jewish. And he wanted to get out and the British authorities intervened with the, with the Germans, and they actually got special permission for Freud and his family to escape Austria at that point. Now, a lot of smart people knew long before this that they needed to get out of there. But they were also smart people who thought that this was just a period of hooliganism, in the Hitlerian excesses of the Nazi party, that as soon as he'd got into power, and as soon as he'd regularized things and got the disastrous economy of Germany and Austria back into shape that he'd settled down into normal Germanic, competent management and governing. They couldn't believe that the hooliganism which they'd suffered and again, you know, their children being molested on the streets. And elderly Jewish men being accosted in the streets by Nazi hooligans and being forcibly held down while their beards were cut off, and in some cases, pulled off painfully. And this was going long before the war started, all this was going on Jewish shops and businesses being vandalized.
Daniel Lapin 38:02
All kinds of things that were really shockingly horrible things, I mean, things that, you know, if if, if they were happening in, in American society today, most people would would be horrified. I mean, if they were happening to, you know, Irish people, or people with red hair, or people with black skin, or, you know, whatever it is, I mean, if there was a group of people being treated with this kind of brutality, and you saw it in the streets, you know, most people wouldn't be able to take it. But it happened gradually it it grew and grew and grew and people were getting more and more accustomed to it and and as I say people believed that it was not going to last and that they'd be okay that eventually get out and everything would be fine. Anyway, Freud came to London and and I will tell you this that my father, Rabbi, ah, Lapin, who was my, one of my most influential teachers, probably my most influential actually went to the Royal Albert Hall in London, soon after Freud arrived in London, and listened to us to a lecture given by Sigmund Freud. So I envy that but he told me about it as well. Anyway, with all that having been said, How significant was Freud's Jewishness? Very significant, because here's the funny thing about we Jews, we are either absolutely dedicated and devoted to God and His Bible. Or alternatively, for the most part, we are resentful, hostile, rebellious, and an extremely negative. And so this is why it is that you know, there are many, many people who are not deeply committed or devout Christians, and neither are they hostile to Christianity. They're sort of indifferent to it. And wouldn't you agree that that's kind of the normal position to take Hey, you know what? I'm I like like trains, I love trains. I even this, you know this. I mean, who today likes playing with model railroads like, right? Well, I don't have time to but I've got my whole model train set. I mean, I've, I've literally got my whole model. I've got beautiful locomotives in the H O gauge. I've got all the rails. I've got the switches, I even digitized my layout. I was a very early adopter of digital control of model railroads, who touches model railroads, right? I mean, it's hard to believe that, you know that it's not that long ago, the world has changed so quickly, that people have lost interest in that anyway, my point is that people who are not interested in model railroads are indifferent to them, right? I could bore the pants off somebody just talking and talking and talking about model trains, or full size trains for that matter. That doesn't mean that those people hate it. They just don't love it like me as matter of fact that we should shut up about it. Because they could care less about model trains. Jews aren't like that with God in the Bible and religion, Jews are either for or against, with very few exceptions. As a matter of fact, I'm telling you, it's, it's almost kind of refreshing for me to run into people who tell me they're Jewish, and have no religious hangups at all. For the most part, we tend to be either committed to the Torah committed to the Bible committed to God, or alternatively, aggressively strenuously atheistic. And there is a surprisingly large number of people who will tell you, they are atheists, and they're Jewish, which, to my Christian friends, sounds completely preposterous, because you're either Christian, or you're an atheist, you can't possibly be both. And I'm sure the same is true for most other religions. But Judaism is different. And part of it is because Judaism struggles, as it were on a tightrope between religion and peoplehood. You know, so Hebrews and Jews are referred to as a nation in the Bible, but it's also a faith. And it's not a nation, such as, shall we say, the Swiss nation where it's very difficult to become a Swiss, and anybody who wants to can become Jewish, you know, you can, you can, you can join. So on that basis, it's obviously a religion. But on several other bases outside the scope of this discussion, it's, it's actually a people. And so part of the the sort of people who have of Judaism has been a very strong attempt to try and strip it of religion. And one of the great cries of the early days of the State of Israel, actually, before the State of Israel, the early days of Zionism, in the 1800s already was that we've got to become a people like every other people, which when you think about it is exactly the warning that God gives to the Jews in the Bible, that if you do try and become like all the other people that I have no more use for you. And so all of these kinds of tensions were roiling, and trying to understand Sigmund Freud and, and the development of psychiatry, he was his, his aggressive hostility and, and very ardent hatred of religion in general, Judaism in particular, obviously, stemmed from Judaism. And He then spent his later years writing the making of any lusion, which is one of his books on on essentially, the, you know, the distraction of religion. And so, there is no way that you can understand not only Freud's central concepts, but even the entire origins of the psychoanalytic movement, without understanding the Jewish connection. And again, many people used to protest in the early part of the 20th century, you know, psychoanalysis and psychiatry, these are not Jewish topics, but the fact is, they were a very high proportion, then as now by the way of psychiatrists were Jewish, they really weren't. And so why was that what was really going on? Well, what was happening was that, up till that point, approximately, it was well understood that we have a body and then we have a soul, that our lives are driven by physical factors as well as by spiritual factors, as you've heard me speak about quite often. And it used to be generally understood. Today, I could speak in many circles in the United States of America along these lines and, and be lynched out of the auditorium with the With Rotten Tomatoes being flung at my departing figure, because the idea that there is a soul connected to our body would be viewed by many in America today as completely primitive and nonsensical, and really something that needs to be stripped from the thinking of any educated, sophisticated, modern intellectual. But it didn't always used to be that way. And it was understood really all the way up into the 19th century, it was understood that we were bodies and souls, and that in the same way, that there are things that can go wrong with your body, there are also things that can go wrong with your soul. When things go wrong with your body, you need a body doctor, when things go wrong with your soul, you need a soul doctor, or in other words, a rabbi, or a priest, or a pastor, and surely, one of the most significant functions that was carried out by religious leaders back then, as now was spiritual counseling, helping people solve problems. Now, these problems are very serious, because there is such a thing as a psychosomatic disease, there is a disease which is entirely spiritual in nature, and manifests itself physically. And I've told you in an earlier podcast, I've told you about a case after World War Two in which my father was involved, were a psychosomatic disorder, where something that happened spiritually caused the actual paralysis of a gentleman's arm, and how my father as a clergyman, as a religious leader, was able to cure him in a way that
Daniel Lapin 46:44
medical specialists was simply I mean, neurologists were in on it, orthopedic people were in on it, every kind of doctor was in on it. But doctors were trained and are trained today to be strictly materialistic to only look at the physical. Big mistake, of course, by the way, different topics and other conversation. But that is part of medicine today. And, and psychiatrists are well, before I get to that, the spiritual side is not usually a part of the training or the practice or the experience of most doctors, understandably, specially, specialists have to specialize and yet that, but these this realization, that holistic health is a reality that the health of your soul can very often impact the health of your body more so that way than the other way. In other words, there are people who have horrible physical health conditions and suffered terribly physically, but who spiritually are beacons of light. The other way is very rare. You very, very seldom find somebody who is in very bad shape spiritually and whose body is oh, just fantastic and terrific, you find it, it is there, less so than the other way around. point being that Freud's commitment Freud's entire life was, we've got to find a way to deal with the non physical side of the human being without touching religion. This single sentence I've just said, is the full depiction of understanding the motivation and the life and the entire career of the late Sigmund Freud. And that's why, at the climax of his life, he was writing books like a Moses and monotheism, and, and books like The Making of an illusion. And in in Moses and monotheism, I mean, it's really important to understand that, like, really, we're talking about very, very, very wacky, crazy stuff. Really, it's just so strange. He spoke about he basically read the whole Moses story, it's as if the Bible didn't exist for him. But no, it's weird. And this is the specific Jewish ambivalence I've been talking about that you can't be indifferent to the Bible, but neither can you accept it. And so you're resentful of something you don't believe in. That's the weird thing, which just goes to show that deep in the heart, deep down in the Jewish soul, there must be this conviction that God and His Word are there and are true. And that today, anybody reading the Moses and monotheism, which is I mean, absolutely not recommended. It's complete garbage. The the central argument of the book is that Moses was really an Egyptian, and that monotheism originated in Egypt and had Moses was actually murdered by the Jews. It's so fanciful and so insane that it embarrassed supporters of Freud when he wrote it he the people who had bought into his theories of psychoanalysis, were embarrassed by it because it was indefensible on any intellectually valid level. Anyway, what what was it all about? He was determined to find a way of this is the central theme.
Daniel Lapin 50:31
I mean, you want you want to know what Freud is all about. His life was devoted to finding a way to explaining the spiritual without resorting to God or religion, certainly not the Bible. So he couldn't help acknowledging the fact that there are parts very important parts of the human being that are non physical, right in a way that isn't true for cows and cats and camels and kangaroos, you look at animals, the physical as the physical, right? In spite of the fact that on New York's Upper East Side, there are a few people who make a living as animal psychologists, alright, spare me. But I just put that in, because I know that some of you are going to write and tell me about it, I know about it, it doesn't change the argument. It's, it's complete nonsense. The idea you just have a you need a veterinary surgeon you write for any animal, even animal as a problem, you get a veterinary surgeon animal gets cured and the story, you don't the animal, you know, the veterinary surgeon never says, well, it's nothing wrong with him physically, but he's suffering, his his psyche is just complete rubbish. With human beings, Freud couldn't escape the obvious reality that with people there is such a thing as an inner, spiritual aspect. And Freud's termination was to find a way of dealing with that without touching on religion. And so it was essentially the beginning of the field of psychiatry, which essentially turns everything into an organic problem, you got you depressed, you need tablets, you have a mood problem, well, we have a psychotropic drug for a drug for you. And so never tackling the underlying spiritual anxieties, which usually will have something to do with a failed connection with our Creator. The result is, and again, you know, you can go through life curing symptoms, and not dealing with the underlying problem, you can do that with the on the physical side as well. It's just sad. And, and, and an inadequate way of dealing with things on that basis. Anyway, all of that is going to be useful as I move on, to show you how it is that food has a spiritual dimension, something that may be shocking to you, maybe completely new. And that's why I want to make certain that I give you enough of a background. So as you can see, not only where this is going, but where it came from, as well as the materials. As I've said, a lot of the materials on which I'm basing, much of what I'm telling you in this program, can be found in full on my website at the store. And you would be helping yourself as well as my work by equipping yourself with that. In other words, many people write to me and have a heart folks, people email me sometimes with long, complicated questions, based on angles, or based on issues or topics that I raise in the show. And these are things I answer in my books, they are things I answer in my audio programs, they're there. And it would for me to answer that email would be a lengthy proposition. And I'm sure you understand, I can't do that my answers those of you get answers from me. And and many of you have, you'll see their brief I write an answer of four or five lines max. And that's it. And that's the choice. I mean, I obviously can't do more than that. And, so that's why I say, you know, if you do have further questions, I really want you to go to Rabbi Daniel lapin.com. And check out the store there, particularly because this week, the week you're listening to the show, and if you're listening on time, the week of the release of the show, it is everything that is on sale, 15% off everything, you just have to type in the code, the promotional code, save sav as part of the checkout process. And, and so if there are areas that you want to probe a little more deeply and get in a little more. Listen, don't ask me about those things in an email. It's not reasonable, I can't possibly respond. It is there. It's there. And it's inexpensive, and it's available and it is of enormous, enormous value. And just recently I was talking to a A young man and an issue he was consulting with me personally on a marriage matter. And I explained something about that. And I said to him, I just want to tell you this. This is a million-dollar idea, I'm telling you, he said, you know, what do you mean? I've said that over the years, teaching this particular idea, both in marriage programs, and particularly in business programs, have made me the recipient of over a million dollars of funds. In sometimes it's by way of grateful gifts, sometimes it's by way of negotiated fees. But whatever it is, the value of this material to people obviously, has exceeded a million dollars, Otherwise, they wouldn't have given me that money, they wouldn't have voluntarily partnered with that money over the years, if they didn't feel they were getting something of greater value. That's the point. ancient Jewish wisdom has real value in changing people's lives. So that's why I feel nothing but enthusiasm for telling you about it and enthusiasm encouraging you, if you have a need for it, if you don't, obviously, you'd be silly to do it. But if you have a need or an interest, then it would be simply reckless not to engage.
Daniel Lapin 56:25
So head over there, Rabbi Daniel lapin.com, and head to the store, and moving on with our overall discussion of food, overeating, and providing you with what I believe to be perhaps the only legitimate, reliable and effective way of losing weight. And in order to do that, obviously, you need to understand not only the physical aspects of eating, but also the spiritual aspects of eating. And that's why it is that I explained earlier on a whole lot about Sigmund Freud, because, in many ways, his influence and his influence has been extensive. I would say that in the great debate, of the that period, the great debate between the two psychiatry, psychiatry, fathers of psychiatry, Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung, where, first of all, what they argued about and what ultimately ended their friendship, again, not because of Carl Jung, but because of Sigmund Freud, which is that Jews who are atheistic cannot be friendly with Jews who are religious, to another reasons that there is considerable tension less so today than previously for a very interesting reasons. But there used to be considerable tension between Jews in Israel, between religious God fearing Bible-believing Jews on the one hand, and Israelis, people who were Jewish, born in Israel, and were subjected to a religion free education. It's not as if there could be a live and let live, it doesn't work that way with us Jews. And, so sure enough, when Sigmund Freud realized that his colleague, Carl Jung, was deeply religious, and saw the soul for what it was the essential, most important pocket in a human being, and that is much more the soul that governs the body than that it's the body that governs the soul, although there are aspects of it that do, for instance, when you see people who lives completely depraved and degenerate lives, and then becoming dissolute, in not only in body but in physical appearance and in soul as well. That's one of the ways that body does impact the soul. So I'm not saying it doesn't, but it's far more the soul that impacts the body. Freud couldn't tolerate it and ended the relationship ended the friendship all gone. Because Jews who are atheistic are not just indifferent to Jews, or anybody who is religious. I should say anybody I shouldn't say Jews, the Jews who are atheistic or not just indifferent to Jews who are religious, or to anybody who's religious, they get very worked up, they get agitated, sitting in the same. I'm not exaggerating, I understand this. It's I'm a rabbi, I've lived through this. I know that sounds completely weird. I'm thinking of how the sounds to a Christian listener, how the science sounds to an atheistic listener. And I mean, I know many, many non-Jewish atheists I do. And I think very highly of some of them and, and they're completely fine. They're fine with with Orthodox Jews, but Jewish atheists are not they're all fine with believing Jews or believing Christians, okay, it's really important to get that. And so, because Freud one over Carl Jung, today, psychiatry in the United States of America is far more Freudian than it is union. And, and I've told people in general, all things being equal. And again, I don't give advice
Daniel Lapin 1:00:23
to you for specific cases over the air on radio or television or, or anywhere like that. But in general, all things being equal, if I had to consult a psychiatrist, I would seek out a union psychiatrist, not a Freudian psychiatrists, but it will be hard. Because Freud, one, Jung lost and as a result of that, the world today, both in medicine and psychiatry is now seen just as a part of medicine. It's all physical, everything can be resolved. On a chemical level, everything can be by be sorted out, by physical therapy, or by a drug of one kind or another. The notion that your relationship with God could be impacting could be impacting a physical problem you have, like your weight, is completely rejected by shall we call it the medical mainstream, or the mainstream medical world, the MSM completely rejected I and I understand that and you need to understand that as well. But and by the way, also don't think that just because somebody says he's an atheist that, that he doesn't have some connection with God, he may phrase not everybody, not all I mean, some atheists are solid, but many atheists are have a relationship they prefer thinking of it as some kind of being or a sometimes pagan mystically think of it as being nature or the world. It's fascinating talking to thoughtful and open minded atheists. I enjoy that. But I don't believe I know any open and open minded and thoughtful Jewish atheist. So I'm going to put a pause on that particular thought, because I haven't really thought about it, it's sort of sounds a little bit excessive, doesn't just say that I've never met a thoughtful Jewish atheist, open minded. It sounds it sounds too far fetched. So I'm going to take that back and say there probably have been over the years but whereas I can easily think of people I'm in touch with who are thoughtful, non Jewish atheists. Offhand, I'm having trouble thinking of a thoughtful, open-minded Jewish atheists. This is just part of what makes us Jews different. I'm sorry, we just all as much as we try to fit in and we try to be the same as everyone else doesn't quite work. And so, understand then that that there is an aspect to eating which is profoundly spiritual and God-centric, let me explain. I said I was going to talk about a toilet and what am I talking about? Nothing scatological nothing. You have to send young people out of the room for but you know, that toilet system behind the place you sit at? It's it's where the the chrome handle comes out of it to flush. Now some of the new ones that again, why on earth government has to be involved in how many gallons of water I want to pay for to add, I pay for my water, right? I presume you do, too. I'm not allowed to elect how much money I want to spend on flushing. The government tells me I have to use low flush toilets, and they have all kinds of mechanisms in there. But, you know, I remember when, when when we didn't build a house, we did major renovations on a house twice. I actually went to junkyards I went to I sought out places, and even had somebody drive me one from Canada. To seeking out all the toilets, I like the full flush toilet, I'm sorry, either. I just I there is something significant about being able to move your bodily waste off your premises quickly and easily. This is a fundamental part of Western civilization. And I don't like having the government deprive me of that, right? I'm willing to pay for it. I do pay for it. I'll decide how much water I want to use. I say all this because I'm gonna recommend that you take a look inside your system, if you don't know what I'm talking about. And if you don't see what I'm describing, there would be because you have a new type of toilet that substitutes all kinds of dreamy ideas of water pressure, replacing actual water, they don't work. You know what I'm talking about. You have to flush two or three times to get the same effect that as simple five gallons would have given you in the first place. And so what you see is that water comes from the water pipe comes pouring into the system. And while it's doing that a ball on the end of an arm rises because the ball is hollow at floated might be made of foam, the old ones used to be beautiful things made out of copper, hard to get these days, but I go on. And you, you watch as the water level rises, and you can even see a mark on the side of the system because the waters has been coming up to that level for years. And it's left the mineral in the waters left a mark as it begins to approach, you can hear the ball rising, and you can hear the arm operating a valve that is gradually turning off the water, until finally the water reaches its level. And at that point, the floating arm has turned off the water and that's the end of it, right? No, no more water, and no water coming in, you've now got a sister. As soon as you flush, the water drops through the flap valve at the bottom of the bowl drops. And that opens the valve motor comes in. Okay, now, I tell you all of that, because I want you to imagine the water filling two systems simultaneously. So the water comes in on a y valve. And it's filling system a and it's filling system B but only a has the ball valve, okay. And the way they figured it is that the same amount of water is going into both systems follow this, this is not real, you won't find this in your bathroom. This is a thought experiment. So the same amount of what is split by the Y valve, same amount of water going each of the two systems, they thought why make two separate valves, we'll just put one valve before the Y valve and before the Y distributor. And as the water level rises in System A it will cut off the water flow at the right point. And by that point, the water level will be up in system B as well. Now, let's imagine that somebody drills a hole in cistern a where the ball valve is and now the water pours in, but it also pours out and it never gets to the point where it raises the floating ball and turns off the ball valve. So now what happens to system B, system B goes ahead and overflows you follow my situation system A has the ball valve and a bad hole that somebody drilled in it system B net just overflows because the water never gets turned off. Alright, okay system A is a spiritual. So system if you like spiritual A is the spiritual satisfaction that food provides spiritual system B is the physical part of your tummy. And so what happens, somebody has made drilled a hole in SR and a somebody has made it impossible for you to feel spiritually fulfilled from food. And therefore what happens the food keeps on pouring in because the terminal valve which is operated by the spiritual part of our beings never operates. And so it keeps filling system A and B until when until your belly bulges until you've got thighs like oak trees. Until you are so big and so heavy you can barely move. I mean, it's it's not joke worthy. It's sad and tragic. But this what is going on my friends, here's the most important thing to understand that eating provides a feeling of physical thrill fullness, but it also provides spiritual fulfillment. And if something is interfering with the spiritual fulfillment, you keep on eating, because we all eat to satiation. But satiation is caused spiritually and if something is wrong, and with that part of the ball valve not working, the spiritual side, not ever filling up. You just keep eating way beyond way beyond anything your body actually needs, and for that matter, anything beyond what your body actually wants. And this is what unfortunately, Sigmund Freud destroyed the understanding of in society. We eat not only to be filled, but also to be fulfilled. Food provides fill and fulfill. That's the key thing to understand. And
Daniel Lapin 1:09:46
I want to again, remind you and you know, you'll pardon me but but there is a valid business aspect here which is that when a business is providing an important and needed service or a needed goods, they, they'd be stupid not to tell you about it and you'd be stupid to block your mind from it. This is one of the reasons that we don't mind advertisements of a certain kind, we really don't. If they are telling us about things that can improve our lives, you know, we're smart enough, we can know what to buy and what not to buy. It's one of the reasons that people who are secularists attack, advertising, exploitive, it forces people, that's a view of people that is patronizing and elitist. The idea that advertising is so old, powerful, that I cannot defeat it, I cannot resist it. That's an elitist, patronizing secularists stick view of humanity. I don't see it that way. I believe that those of you who have no need for the products and resources that I create and market will know not to avail themselves of it. I mean, that's all I'm not a Svengali I'm not a hypnotist. All I have to do is tell you it exists. And in this case, I tell you not only exists, but this week, it's at a 15% discount. So now you can make a different sort of calculation, it might not have been worth it to you at, you know, at $50. But at 15% off at $42.50, it might be worth that you, every one of us makes our own calculations of how to utilize our financial resources. That having been said, Rabbi Daniel lapin.com, head over to the store on that website. And know that this week, use the promo code sav. Save, and, in fact, save 15%. So back with you then in a moment, as we now take a look at what the spiritual fulfillment of food is, and what you can do in order to enhance that as best you possibly can. In order to have your entirety your body and your soul, send a ball valve message, stop eating your full. Instead of which, when that's defective, when that's defective, we carry on eating in this desperate hope that by stuffing ourselves with food, we're going to reach a point where we actually feel satiated, you won't. Because satiation comes, the feeling of satiation comes from the spiritual side of our beings, not from the physical. And as we continue exploring, How peculiar it is that human beings have one organ for communicating and also for absorbing nourishment. Isn't that odd? Wouldn't you have thought that there'd be specialization, for instance, you know, we don't use our eyes for seeing and smelling. Right? There is specialization of organ use. And whether you prefer to view the world as a product of random, long term materialistic evolution, or, if you prefer to view it, as the concretized will have an all powerful creator. Either way, either way, you really have a question, Mark. Now, if you prefer the former approach, then the question mark is what possible evolutionary purpose is served by having the mouth serve both communication and eating, if anything, it's negative, because if you're in the middle of eating and trying to swallow, and danger shows up on the horizon, you have no way of communicating that to the person you're with, because your mouth is engaged in eating. But if you had another orifice in the middle of your forehead, that was used for communicating, and your mouth was just used for absorbing nourishment from the world, it would work better. And if you take the approach that we are here, because a creator created us in His image, then we have to ask ourselves, what is it that the good Lord wanted us to understand? From giving us one organ to do both these functions? Well, the verse that is of interest and again here, this part won't be interesting to those of you who are not Bible enthusiasts, but that's fine. You know, the fact is that the the book regardless of what you think of it has been the most significant volume in the shaping of Western civilization. And so, no harm if I tell you that in the The Book of Ecclesiastes, we have a verse that sort of very relevant to all of this. And Ecclesiastes, chapter six says the following, would you like to hear it in the Hebrew, I mean, I know that very few of you know, the Hebrew read the Hebrew, and that's fine, but it has a certain resonance to it and certain music to it, I think. And that is, in Hebrew, it says [Hebrew spoken]. And that means that all a person, if a person works, and laborers only for the purpose of his mouth, then his soul will never be satiated.
Daniel Lapin 1:15:46
Okay, in other words, all the labor that a person does if it's only for his mouth, in other words, he the entire aspect of his life, is just to be able to feed his mouth. When you think about it, obviously, that's the most basic survival function of the human being, no, eat, no live, it's as simple as that. And so if now, again, you know, we have built up an infrastructure, you like your car, while its main purpose is to get to work so you can work and get paid so you can eat, you know, you like your television set. Well, that's one of the functions of being able to expand your your appetite in a sense. And it's, it's part of what you have rewarded yourself with, regardless of whether that's a good idea or not, but says, Ecclesiastes, chapter six, verse seven. If all your work is for your mouth, then the soul will never be satiated. And that is one of the Paramount verses from which ancient Jewish wisdom understands everything I'm explaining to you. And I'll lay this out in much greater detail in a new resource, I will soon have available on the store at my website, Rabbi Daniel lapin.com, where all of this will be presented in greater depth along with the various exercises and programs. But for practical usage, I'm going to give you enough right here in this program now, that will enable you to begin employing some of these things in order to live healthier and lose weight in the only way that really works. So as I said, the key to it is understanding that if you leave the spiritual side out of it, and all you're doing is eating to feed your mouth, you will never be satisfied, which I've already explained. Now. The the fact that the mouth serves us double duty, as I've spoken about is very interesting, because I, I have wonderful experiences through broadcasting. And talk radio is great. And while I was broadcasting on ksfo, out of San Francisco, which was was a great station, I was there for a number of years, and I really enjoyed it. And, and one of the things that happened was that I was talking a little bit about the dangers of speaking carelessly using your mouth carelessly, and I get a phone call and it's a guy driving back in the car from camping in Lake Tahoe, California border of California, Nevada. And he had two young guys in the car one was his son one was a friend of his sons they had taken these two boys camping and and that sounds like a great time they're driving back. And on the way back, they got the the radio on, and the boys had a station they wanted to hear and at one point they, I guess something came on the station they weren't interested in. So one of the boys gave him a CD to pop into the player in the car pops it in. And out comes the obscene lyrics of a rap song. Lyrics the guy says to me, Look, I would have been embarrassed even if the boys were not in the car. But having my son and his friend in the car. This was it was intolerable.
Daniel Lapin 1:19:20
I didn't want them to know that I could hear that sort of stuff. And he said I didn't want to hear it. So they he turns it off. And he says that they the boys say, okay, you know, like what's happening? He says, Listen, guys, I don't want you to hear these obscenities. I don't want you listening to that vile language. And I'll tell you something else. I don't want to hear it myself. What's more, I wish somebody had told me when I was your age to never listen to this stuff. And one of the boys and this is all the father's explaining to me what's just happened the boys are in the car. And and then he says, and one of the boys says why not? What's wrong with it? And he says at that point I told you about, I knew you're on the head this time I flipped the radio to, to your station. And I'm now calling in. So I thought, Okay, this is this is very interesting. And by the way, what I told him, then, was the genesis of the audio program I've been telling you about called the perils of profanity. The you are what you speak. And I explained that, that there are very good reasons, you know, and you don't have to fall back on it makes God mad or anything like that. There are very good reasons why using obscenities and profanities are really destructive, they're destructive for your business life, they damage your ability to communicate. And on the my program, the perils of profanity, I explain it in full detail, obviously, to him. You know it because there was a limit to how much you can cover in a conversation on talk radio, I wasn't able to go into the whole thing. But at least I did enough. So that when I said, Tell me, do the boys in the call, if they can hear me, or ask them, I want to know, are they able to at least begin to see that this is not because you're just an old fuddy duddy, or that you're not with it. But this is actually harmful. And he spoke to them. And and I heard everybody say, it's given us something to think about, which is as much as I could hope to do under those circumstances.
Daniel Lapin 1:21:38
But since then, I have put the entire lesson all the teaching on the damage you can do by allowing your mouth to become familiar with expressing obscenities and so on. Now put it on the program, perils of profanity, and by the way, I want you to go take a look at that at the website, Rabbi Daniel lapin.com. And you should know that it's very inexpensive to begin with, but there's a 15% discount, as I've told you on the show, this week, so just put in during checkout, put in the code, save sa ve to be able to activate that on that product or anything else that I produced. This is the week of Passover. And Passover is very much connected with this whole topic. Why What am I saying? Well, the the holiday of Passover is, is very interesting because in Hebrew it's called PESA, which as you can hear sounds a little bit like other languages whereas Pascal, you know, you hear that PSC or Pete, PS CH sound taking out the valves, as I've explained. Well, the word pasa or the word for Passover doesn't actually mean Passover in Hebrew, just by itself. It actually means talking mouth. Talking mouth. That's right. And what's more, the Exodus takes place that says if the the redemption from slavery, transports them into a desert, that's where they go, they leave Egypt and they go into the desert, the Sinai desert. What is the desert in Hebrew, it's called a mid bar or a middle bear. In Hebrew, that means a place of speech. So it says if part of being enslaved, was not communicating, having their ability to communicate deprived, and they move out into the desert, and the very first place they come to in the desert, and mentioned in in Exodus, is of course, it's called p half he wrote in Hebrew. That's mentioned in Exodus chapter 14, verse two, and it's mentioned in Numbers, chapter 33, verse seven, what is PRP Rodman is not just a place name. In Hebrew, that means the mouth of freedom. And so redemption from troubles of almost any kind, depend upon effective communication. And so the only time during the entire Jewish calendar year with all the festivals, the only time you actually need your mouth is on Passover. Because you have to do a speaking the Passover Seder is all about speaking but wait. It's not only all about speaking, it's also all about eating. And that's very interesting because the only time you are obliged to eat is unparsed. Over where you have to eat matzah. It's that dry indigestible, unleavened cracker, called matzah. And, and you can see it in almost any market in the country this time of the year. It's you have to eat it. And what's more, we have to eat better herb. So when we sit at our Seder, which we did on on Friday night and on Saturday night, what happens is That, speaking just about the year 2016, of course, but other years, it's on different days, we are obliged to eat certain things. So there's a lot of focus on the mouth here. The idea is that the mouth is for eating and communicating. And in the same way that the mouth can be used correctly, for what goes out of it, and it can be used incorrectly points go forward goes out of it. One can be very destructive to one's life by using our mouth incorrectly. Okay? In the same way, using it incorrectly for speech has a parallel using it incorrectly as a portal for nourishment and nurturing. And so for instance, the book of Proverbs has numerous references very, very similar to this I'll just give you one. Because again, this the the essence of the show is how the world really works exposing you to ancient Jewish wisdom and biblical verses is like taking you into my workshop. And I don't really want to do that I want you to stay out front. And you'll see in the store, you'll see all the the products, but my woodworking craftsmanship takes place in the shop behind the store. And that's where all the Biblical verses are. But the biblical verse I'm talking about is one who God's his mouth and his tongue, Gods himself from troubles. One who Gods his mouth and his tongue. Well wait a sec, ancient Jewish wisdom points out that there are no redundancies in Scripture could have said he'll God's his mouth saves himself from trouble in life, which is what the verse says. And we'd understand that to mean that. That he doesn't use his mouth badly in speaking. But one who God's his mouth and his tongue, we now got a problem. There's a redundancy. And ancient Jewish wisdom explains here as elsewhere, that the mouth is an organ used for two things. And King Solomon in the book of Proverbs is pointing that out right here. You can use your tongue incorrectly for speech, and you can use your mouth incorrectly for eating, use your tongue incorrectly, you could be slandering and gossiping, you could be using profanities and obscenities that destroy your ability to communicate. You could just be inarticulate, non eloquent, and leave it at that not take seriously obligation to work on your communicative abilities. All of those things are bad for your life in the same way. One can make mistakes with our eating, with the with the mouth, not the tongue, what happens there? Well, what happens there is we become bloated and fat. And that's what happens there. We're using our mouth badly. It's very, very simple.
Daniel Lapin 1:27:58
And think about, again, a parallelism, a sort of very nice symmetry in understanding this interesting organ, the mouth, putting out and we're communicating putting in, and we're nurturing the body. Well think about that for a second, what is speech actually, isn't speech, the mechanism by means of which the human being can bring ideas into the physical reality. Right. In other words, if you've got a business plan, if you cannot express that to your partner, or to your investor or to your friends, if you can't express that, then no business will ever come out of their business plan, you first got to be able to communicate it and then afterwards, you might write it down, but speech is the beginning. And so the word is what converts abstract into reality and into practical, or if you like, the spiritual gets converted into the physical by means of speech using the mouth in that fashion. What about when you use the mouth for ingesting nourishment? Well, now you're doing the opposite. You're taking physical and converting it to spiritual. Why because the human being is primarily a spiritual reality. And so when we take food, we're taking something that is materialistic and physical in the world, absorbing it into our body. And now that becomes a spiritual part or part of our spiritual existence. Our whole ability to eat and breathe and talk depends on that food we brought in. So the mouth when it's in mode, one, namely speech is taking the spiritual and converting it into the physical when mouth is in mode two, namely eating now you're taking the physical and converting it into the spiritual. And what can we do with all of these ideas? While I'm sure you're beginning to see the picture emerging? I'd point out that there are two ways I can think of of showing you To the spirituality of eating. Well, one of them, of course, is unfortunately, the whole area of eating disorder, anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, binge eating disorder, and so on and so forth. And all of these food disorders all coexist. When they present, it's almost always with depression, substance abuse, anxiety disorders. As a matter of fact, the highest mortality rate of any psychiatric disorder are the fruit of the eating disorders, they are really serious. And everybody recognizes that for repairing helping somebody with an eating disorder. You don't go to a doctor to get a shot, you have to go to a psychiatrist. Again, thank you, Sigmund Freud. But the truth is that in a Bible believing religious communities, more often than not, eating disorders are very rare. And when they do occur, they're quickly solved spiritually, almost always. Okay, it's, you know, obviously, difficult, difficult area, but who would have thought that food is mental? Me, I would have thought that because I know ancient Jewish wisdom, and now you do too. And so it's no surprise that eating disorders are psychiatric, or spiritual, as we should really more accurately think of it. And another aspect of it is that, throughout the Torah, throughout all of Jewish life, it is very clear that no spiritually significant event or occasion takes place without eating, you know, from which you get the, you know, the old joke, they say that the way to celebrate any Jewish holiday, is to simply make the statement, they try to kill us, God saved us, let's have dinner, because everybody knows that Jews celebrate by eating. But that's not just for a party. That's because the act of eating when done properly is spiritual. And when the act of eating is done properly, and it becomes a spiritual action, then it becomes fulfilling long before it becomes filling. In other words, you can quit eating in time. And so instead of thinking that overweight, over eating is simply a result of lack of willpower and no self control, realize that there's a lot more to it. And that is that there is a spiritual dimension. And that the person who's eating so much is eating in order to be spiritually filled. But you'll remember the toilet cistern example, all that, that spiritual energy is running away to waste, because the person is not aware of it. And so he keeps on eating and eating and eating in in a desperate desire and attempt to reach a point of feeling satisfied, of harmonious totality shall Amen, he just feel complete. And he can't, because that spiritual dimension is still missing. And so it's more in the hope of getting it. But you can eat endlessly. And if you don't know how to absorb the spiritual dimension into your soul, it's not going to do anything for you and therefore you continue eating naturally. So, so whether it is Jewish holidays, Passover is a conspicuous one, of course, where the eating is, is absolutely required and mandated because of the relationship between eating and speaking. So it is with with all other Jewish holidays, there is a meal. How about weddings, a wedding isn't complete until there's been a wedding meal. And it's called that the official ceremonial wedding meal. And people sit down and eat the meal together with the bride and the groom. And they have special marital blessings that are said Then how about a circumcision baby boy given a circumcision and given his name on the eighth day after birth, that requires a meal following it, even the most solemn and holiest day of the year, which is Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. Even that day, which is a fast day, it's the most solemn fast day of the year, even that day requires that just before sunset just before the fast begins. One actually has to have a formal celebratory holiday meal because we accept we're not allowed to eat on the Day of Atonement, but you can't possibly have a spiritually significant day like Yom Kippur like the Day of Atonement. without eating, and so the eating just before sunset constitutes the actual eating for the day itself. That's the idea. And so we we wrap ourselves around this, this this principle that eating and spirituality go together. And one of the ways we alert ourselves to that is by doing a grace, saying a blessing before the meal. Although in Deuteronomy, chapter eight, verse 10, it says, And you shall eat and be satisfied and Bless the Lord, that's talking about once again, eating physically and being satisfied spiritually, and then bless the Lord. But you also have to say, a grace before the meal. What's the idea? And again, for those of you who are not religious and, and are not biblically or godly centric in your lives, that's fine. That's fine. Don't worry, it's all it's all good.
Daniel Lapin 1:35:59
No, I mean, it's a little harder for you. But it doesn't mean you cannot benefit from this principle either. In other words, diving into a meal, when you're hungry is a big mistake, you're going to eat more than you should, what you got to do is you got to pause. And you've got to have a little bit of a ceremonial spiritual moment. Now I do it by saying a special blessing before I eat, I'm sure many of you do the same. But the truth is that if there's any way at all, that you can sit down to the meal, and not tuck your napkin and slap your tummy and say, I can't wait to dive into this, that's destructive. If you can pause and take 30 seconds on a spiritual moment, that sets you in the right mood not to eat more than spiritual satiation requires. And another thing is to avoid eating by yourself. But everybody knows that, that you eat more when you're by yourself. Part of it is you're taking away the communication idea. And so the, the the biblical way of eating is, first of all, always with other people, number one, number two, always to make the conversation, just as important as the food. And number three, once there is conversation, that helps you attain the third level, the third point, which is to savor the food. In other words, if you watch how some of us have learned or trained ourselves to eat, it's very negative, we spoon a fork full of food into our mouth, we are hurriedly chewing it, we can barely wait to swallow it. Why, because the next four full is on the way to the mouth already. Slower down, just slow it down, savor it, chew, which it's okay to do if you're in the middle of a conversation and you're listening to somebody talk, you chew with your mouth shut, please. And that's if your mother went to the same mothering school my mother went to, then you're slowing it down. And again, there you are allowing the satiation message, in this case, both physical and spiritual, to reach your control centers. It's very important. So much so that this is indicated in the certain language of, of the Lord's language of Hebrew. And that is, for instance, you know that in English, there is absolutely no reason at all to suppose that words that have different meanings have related meanings. So for instance, if I say I can't bear this, or watch out, there's a band coming. Those two words have nothing to do with one another, right? Or if I say what a fluke, you know, you just managed to hit the bull's eye on a on a shooting range. And I don't think your shooting is so good. And you say what a fluke. Or somebody is boating in the beautiful waters of British Columbia, and a whale surfaces. And he says, quick look at the whale. And then you'd look but by that time the whale is has sounded. And he says up, you just saw the fluke, there it goes the tail of a whale, the fluke of a well, what are those two got to do with one another? Now they control right? Come back from the bow of the boat, you're putting too much weight up there in the bow of the boat, the front end of the boat, right? Or what a certain President enjoys doing to foreign dignitaries, namely, bowing to them. What are those two things? No, nothing. But in Hebrew, it doesn't work like that. In Hebrew, the word for word is exactly the same as the word for bees, words and beads. And Matt as a matter of fact, the fifth book of the Five Books of Moses is Deuteronomy. And in Hebrew it's called Devarim, which means words or bees. Now what are bees and words got to do with one another. They both can produce honey, or stings, get it? Again, that has to do with using your math correctly in mode one, namely putting out communication, words, bees, that's right, and your stings. Another example is the word for bread. Now bread is always used as you know your nourishment you already earn your daily bread, what we it's an expression not only in Hebrew, but also in English. And in Hebrew, the word for bread left ham doesn't only mean bread, it also means battle or war. What's the idea? And this brings us to exactly the point to realize that every meal is a mini battle. Every meal I enjoy is a tiny little moral war going on, between well between the pool of just the physical which says, eat, eat, eat, eat, eat, and the spiritual, which says, try and derive maximum satisfaction, satiation, and yes, pleasure, from every mouthful, thanking the Lord for making that possible. Recognizing that in eating each and every mouthful, you are drawing in physical sustenance from the world in order to maximize spiritual potential yours. In other words, you're almost playing a role in elevating that stake, and allowing it to fulfill a higher purpose, namely, the nurturing and sustenance of a human being. Now, obviously, for a human being that thinks as, as Ecclesiastes said, you know, person who thinks only of his mouth will never be satisfied. That Well, then, you know, then he's not doing much good to creation by eating that steak, because he's not raising it to a higher level. But somebody whose language is going to be refined and whose language is not going to be vulgar and demeaning and obscene, let obscenity laced or profanity laced, that's a person who's using his mouth correctly on the outs on the out, put, therefore, on the input as well, he's more capable of using it correctly. And as we as we begin to approach the end of today's show, it's also worthwhile remembering that the very first time that God speaks to humanity, the very first time God speaks to his child, to his creator, to his creation, is the very first two times I should say, addresses man's fundamental appetites. The very first time, the very first time God speaks to humanity and to man says, he says, Be fruitful and multiply. And again, in Hebrew, the fruitful and multiply, but are not just synonyms. Remember, I said, there are no redundancies in Scripture. So it might be poetical to say Be fruitful and multiply. But in the Lord's language, actually, in the original, it says, bond through sex, and have children. That's what it's really talking about. So the very first statement that God makes to humanity is have sex in others connect with one another, sexually and have children marry. And, and so that's acknowledgement of the physical drive for sex. And then the second one is where, where it says that God put a man and put him in the garden of Eden. And, and what did he say? He said, here are the trees that I've put in the Garden of Eden for you. And of these, you should eat. And we're, I'm looking at chapter two, verse 16, all the fruit tree all the trees of the garden, you may, you must eat now, in in the English, it very often says, you may freely eat or you must surely eat nuts because the word eat gets repeated. In Hebrew, it's a whole Taco Bell, and the the word is repeated. And so translators don't always know what to make of the repetition of the word eat. But now we get a very good idea, don't we? Which is eat and HMS eat physically and you must eat spiritually. Right, very, very important observation you should be aware of chapter two verse 16, in, in the book of Genesis, and, and that, again, establishes this basic principle, make the spiritual dimension, a part of your meal, a part of your eating. And that'll be the surest way to make sure that system B doesn't have a hole drilled into it, so is that it can fill up properly, and the ball valve can be turned on. If so is that your desire to continue pushing food into your face diminishes because the satiation that comes from being spiritually fulfilled by that food occurs and is able to end the meal as it were, at the right time, instead of far too late. Well, my dear friends,
Daniel Lapin 1:45:24
thank you so much for staying with me throughout this, this this complicated program and make make no mistake about it. Today's show is not easy, and particularly difficulty here for those of us who can indeed and should indeed lose a few pounds, but nonetheless really effective, because it is a way that actually does work. So this time, in this show, what we really emphasized was fitness, right? Just really focused on fitness. But nonetheless, as you know, all the five F's are an integral part of a unified and comprehensive life of completion and fulfillment. And so yes, fitness has to do with family and finance. It has to do with friendship, and yes, even with faith, as we covered during the show. So thanks for being part of such a long show. Thank you for helping to promote the show. Tell folks about it. And thanks for visiting the website at WWW dot Rabbi Daniel lapin.com. So until next week, and our next opportunity to be together, you are in my thoughts and I pray for your progress and success in your fibers, in your fitness in your family, in your finances, in your faith, and in your friendships. I'm Rabbi Daniel Lapin. God bless you.
