TRANSCRIPT
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The Rabbi Daniel Lapin Podcast
Episode: How Pirates Purloined the Skull and Crossbones From Me
Date: 05/19/23 Length: 1:14:30
Daniel Lapin 0:01
Greetings, happy warriors. And thank you for being tuned in to the rabbi Daniel Lapin show where I, your rabbi, reveal how the world really works. Thank you for being part of the show. And thank you for all you do in spreading the good word of the show. Our numbers continue to grow, which fills me with delight. And this particular show, I am actually recording in my hotel room in Zurich, Switzerland. Because I am doing two days of speeches for a conference being held for about 6000 young men and women from 15 different European countries. And they're all gathered together at the International Christian fellowship. And I am speaking about the five F's and I'm finding it extremely interesting to be in this capital of Switzerland. I've not been here since before COVID. And I'm astonished by the way I'm astonished at what good shape the city appears to be in, compared to New York, which I was I was in Manhattan, when was it would have been last to Tuesday, I was in Manhattan on Tuesday. So Zurich, I gotta tell you, not only does the city look to be in very good shape, both economically and also socially, in terms of, you know, the streets are full of people. Crime seems to be a non issue completely. And above all, I gotta tell you, the shower in my hotel room made me remember the good old days, because the water comes gushing out. It's like a veritable hot Niagara Falls. This, unlike the legally restricted water flow in American hotels, that sends out a feeble trickle. Here in my Zurich hotel, pleasure, the water just comes pouring out hot and plentiful.
Daniel Lapin 2:38
So I feel as if I will be getting on a plane very shortly in order to return home. I hate to say this, but to what feels increasingly like a third world country. Now, you know, I've spoken in the past about the parallels that exist between the physical and the spiritual, right. And that there are many laws and principles that apply in the physical world which have a parallel in the spiritual world. For instance, gravity, right, physical gravity causes any object in the vicinity of the Earth's surface, to tend to fall down to be attracted towards the Earth's surface with for those of you who are interested, an acceleration of 10 meters per second squared. And that, that has a parallel spiritually as well, which is that without the injection of spiritual energy, we all have a tendency to decline in our moral and spiritual commitments. We, we feel the pull downwards. Well, another parallel between the physical and the spiritual is we all know what a physical pandemic is, we all know what a virus is physically. But there's such a thing as spiritual viruses also. And I got to tell you, that the one virus that's really threatening you more than any other, and this is true wherever you live, it's true in Switzerland. I've spoken to a lot of people about this trend here. And it's true almost anywhere you live, and that is the virus of socialism. And it is spreading like an out-of-control wildfire, from one human heart to the next. So a lot of people ask me when I discuss this, and I this has not been the topic I've been talking about at this conference in Zurich. But when I do speak about this, people say to me, Look, why can't you just go about your business and ignore it? And the answer is for exactly the same reason that if more and more families living in your neighborhood become literate, just dropping their garbage on the street, you can't just ignore it. Because if you do, you'll soon be living in a filthy slum. If you like your home in your neighborhood, then you'd better try and end the popular practice of dropping trash on the streets. In the same way, imagine if more and more families in your neighborhood start divorcing with the dads moving out and going to live elsewhere. Why can't you just go about your business and ignore the virus of divorce? Well, because if you do, little by little, the children in those broken families are going to start showing the pathologies of being raised by single moms. Not every single one of them of course, but enough of them to actually change your neighborhood for the worse, there will be a rise in juvenile delinquency, and your children will become victimized. The local school will have to start devoting more and more resources to behavioral problems rather than to education. Because these, there just isn't enough resources of time and energy in most single-mom homes to take care of all the children's needs as well as helping with homework. Inevitably, educational standards in your local school will decline.
Daniel Lapin 6:43
Demographic evidence from every state in the United States and from every European country confirms that broken homes and single mothering correlates perfectly with increased incidence of mental problems among young people. So as your neighborhood loses normal families, eventually juvenile delinquency will escalate into crime. And you will be astounded when little Jimmy down the block. You remember that cute little 11-year-old boy you remember so well. And now six or seven years ago and by and you look at him and he's morphed into a thuggish and intimidating 18-year-old. With the start of a pretty healthy rap sheet with local law enforcement. You won't like the kinds of young men who start frequenting your once beautiful and stable neighborhood as they're hanging around, preying upon the fatherless girls with their sad self-image problems. Now, you cannot afford to ignore the spreading of destructive pathologies in your neighborhood, your city, state, or yes, even your country under the circumstances of a spreading pandemic of socialism, which you cannot afford to ignore, because the impact will make itself felt on your house, on your family, on your property values on everything that is important to you.
Daniel Lapin 8:18
So what can you do? Well, let us start by examining the antidotes to socialism. The things you can and must focus upon in your life in order to render yourself and your closest friends and family. Immune to social norms, seductive allure. I guess we should ask ourselves firstly, what is socialism? And second, to whom does it actually appeal? You see, we all live in a world filled with abandoned pleasures, delights and wonders. The paradox is that without some form of restraint, overindulgence will destroy both individuals and groups. That's the paradox. However, the good Lord created us and put us in the world along with his book, which is really an operating manual for how humans can coexist. And one of the crucial messages is the message of self-restraint. It's perhaps best to take a glimpse into a thought experiment, where we will create a mini social system. And with this little mini social system, we'll be able to carry out experiments So let's go ahead and enjoy this little thought experiment.
Daniel Lapin 10:06
I want you to imagine 50 high school boys, their high school seniors, they're 17 or 18 years old. And they get marooned on a remote desert island, along with this is just to make it even harder with 50 High school girls. And one of their teachers, you know, let's imagine they were going on a, nature expedition by boat and the boats got wrecked, and they got washed up onto this desert island. 50 18-year-old boys and other 50 18-year-old girls and a teacher. Turns out, they are going to have to be there for about three years. So they're going to have to find a way to survive for three, maybe four years, before they're going to be rescued. Now, before I get into the thought experiment of the island, since I'm going to be speaking about aspects of the Bible. I want to explain why I think it's really, really important for everyone to gain at least a little adult-level understanding of the Bible. And I'm going to give you three reasons for that.
Daniel Lapin 11:41
The reason I mentioned it is because if you were to go to my website, Rabbi Daniel lapin.com. And you were to look for Scrolling through Scripture, you would find the first unit of Scrolling through Scripture is over 10 hours of teaching on video about the first 34 verses of Genesis. That's nothing but chapter one, verse one to chapter two, verse three. That's it just 34 Little verses. And it takes me more than 10 hours to explain that on an adult-level with some degree of depth. So reason number one that I think it's important for regardless, whatever your own condition of faith is, the reason I think it's important that you know a little bit about the Bible on an adult level, is that the system of social organization described in the Bible is the system that built Western civilization in general, and the United States in particular, up until 1962. It's the reason that Switzerland is a nicer place to live in then Somalia, and why England is a nicer place to live in then Indonesia, and why America and Israel are nicer places to live than Afghanistan, and Iran. In my teaching course, Scrolling through Scripture, which I really want you to go and take a look at, maybe watch the first free lesson. And this is at the website, Rabbi Daniel lapin.com. Just look for downloaded courses or downloadable courses, and look for Scrolling through Scripture. And on that Scrolling through Scripture course, I explain why it is that the Bible produced what we call civilization. And why the Quran and the Bhagavad Gita, and the book called Das Capital by Karl Marx, have never produced happy, successful civilizations. They just haven't. But the Bible has. And if you understand how it is, that the Bible is what distinguished the west from the rest, if you begin to understand how it is that the Bible transformed primitive Germanic tribes, into Germany and France, and Sweden and Poland and Lithuania and Latvia. And you get that, then you will begin to understand how it can similarly effect huge transformations of you in your life.
Daniel Lapin 14:50
So that's the first reason the Bible describes a system of social organization that just plain works better than anything else? Reason number two that I think everybody deserves and needs to gain an adult-level understanding of the Bible is that we all been indoctrinated to see the Bible as an endless catalogue of mindless mythologies and laughable laws with no modern relevance at all. In my detailed, exciting, and if I may say, entertaining video, teaching scrolling through scripture, you will see through the lens of ancient Hebrew wisdom, exactly how this mysterious and majestic volume is not an anachronistic narrative. No, it is a practical and compelling operating manual for a society.
Daniel Lapin 15:53
And the third reason I want to say, here's why you should go to Rabbi Daniel lapin.com, go to my website and look for an online course called Scrolling through Scripture, which really will introduce you to a new look at the Bible is because having heard the familiar Bible stories many times since childhood, you and me both, it is simply hard to penetrate beyond that childish depiction of the most read book in all of human history, to see the genius guidance and mind-blowing insights to how the world really works. This, in fact, can best be won by discovering how to access the secrets embedded in the Lord's language, the Hebrew in which it was originally written. And that is why it will take us over 10 hours. As I said, just to get through the first 34 verses Genesis. I bet, it usually takes you not much, much more than 34 seconds to read the first chapter, and the first three verses of the second chapter.
Daniel Lapin 17:12
Well, happy warriors, get ready to be amazed. Get ready to be enlightened, and above all, guided and inspired to move beyond your comfort zone, and really take your life to new levels of performance. You can even stipulate a sort of cultural amnesia, okay, back to our island now, where we've got a teacher responsible for 50 18-year-old boys and 50 18-year-old girls. And somehow this teacher's got to find a way to make sure that when the Coast Guard comes to rescue them in three years time, that there are still 100 young people and a teacher waiting to be rescued. And so let's say that somehow or another, these 100 young men and women will have a sort of cultural amnesia, whereby they won't remember anything of their earlier lives in system of values. That being the case, on the very day that they all washed up, washed up onto the beach, wasting no time, the wise teacher will gather them all together, and he will allow a system of rules that are going to sound very much like those implicit in the Judeo Christian biblical worldview. Actually, that teacher in our thought experiment will inevitably sound much like Moses. Go ahead. Let's listen to him, shall we? Here's what the teacher might say.
Daniel Lapin 19:03
As the adult here committed to you all still being alive and healthy when the Coast Guard discovers us and rescues us in three years' time. I have some rules for you. First, you need to pair up and form lasting couples, I will conduct official marriage ceremonies. Without that, we would soon have social chaos that will doom us. They will be unavoidable random coupling within evitable babies born with no particular man taking responsibility for them. And while pregnant or nursing 18 or 19-year-old mom is unable to do a full day's work, who would care for her and provide her with food? Should we take a little from everyone who's working to support and sustain those who are not working? How that work anyway. And would some of the men become predators, assembling harems with other men having no access to any bills? Quite possibly would demand fight? Of course they would. Would some of the men be indolent and lazy and do no work? Sure. Yeah, absolutely. In a group of 100 people, absolutely. No, my students, this is what the teacher would say. I'm sorry, but there is no answer alternative, we will not survive as 100 single boys and girls, our only chance is to become 50 couples, and to form a society that is stable. What is more, I want to tell you that each couple will be assigned a piece of land. If you work it successfully, you will be comfortably fed, and if not you want but if you choose not to work, you have no claim at all, on the food grown or hunted or caught by any other couple. You may not steal, but you may trade. Any harm administered from you to another will be remedied by the power and force of the group acting together. You may form voluntary associations for welfare and mutual insurance purposes. So that if any member of the collective suffers misfortune, say through fire or illness, his family's needs will be taken care of by the other members of the collective membership and involvement in such collectives is entirely voluntary. But anyone who is not a member of any such welfare organization has zero claim on anyone else in the event of his own misfortune. Others may choose to assist, but they are certainly not obliged to do so. Should we encounter hostilities on our island, every male will be expected to join our self-defense militia, while the women remain home to care for the children and the fields. We shall set up tribunals to adjudicate the inevitable disputes and squabbles that always arise when people live and interact together, even people of unimpeachable goodwill, we should all agree to be bound by the rulings of those arbitration panels.
Daniel Lapin 22:47
As I said, any wise teacher regardless of background, under these circumstances that I've described, will speak words very much like what I've just said, there is no alternative. Nothing else will work. Now, let's continue the thought experiment for just a little bit shall we? Turns out that one of the boys is chafing under the rules, and sees an opportunity to better himself by fomenting a revolution against the teacher, and against those who back the teacher, and the teacher's rules and norms. By this time, in the normal scheme of things, some of the couples or families are doing significantly better than some of the others. And there are even a few, who for reasons of sloth and perhaps misfortune are barely making it struggling along our young revolutionary finds willing ears among those less inclined to self-sufficiency, and perhaps among those whose natural natures tend towards the lazy and the unmotivated. After all, even Karl Marx about whom I'll tell you a bit later, never held a job in his entire life. Our revolutionary also chafes under the sexual sanctity rules, and readily finds fellow travelers who have forgotten why they originally subscribe to these rules in the first place. Socialists resent rules derived either from the Bible or from the school of human experience. That places limits, restrictions and structure on human affairs. In exchange for power and prestige, some of the students will promise the gullible, all the advantages prosperity and progress with none of the costs. These will always be more by someone opposing the revolution trying to give you a little workable model of how socialism starts and spreads. The reason socialism has always seduced low-character people. Is that because it provides them the moral framework that legitimizes them trying to live off the work of other people. Do you hear that? Socialism always seeks to seduce low-character people, because it offers people like that, a moral framework that legitimizes them trying to live off the work of other people. It sanctimoniously sanitizes theft and is not. I repeat, it is not a legitimate political doctrine, but a sick pathology for diseased and larcenist egos. Socialism is a parasite that emerges to prey on every successful society. But because it plagiarizes the language of piety, and employs the language of religion. It appeals to many. Do you know who coined the phrase socialism? Henri de sainte Simone, he was a French 18th-century intellectual. And he called it the new Christianity. Isn't that interesting? What he saw as socialism he didn't invent socialism was there, but he called it the new Christianity. Like many early socialists, Henri de Saint Simone, envisioned envisaged, envisaged the ideas of socialism as a tool for turning to primitive Christianity. Other 19th-century historians explicitly made the comparison in writing.
Daniel Lapin 27:14
If you want to get an idea of what the first Christian communities were like, take a look at the local branch of the international working men's association. The association is better known as the first international, one of his members was Karl Marx, the original name of the Communist Party that Karl Marx would go on to head was the League of the Just whose stated goal was the establishment of the Kingdom of God on earth based on the ideals of love of one's neighbor, equality and justice. That's right, listen to what they sound like the same essential principles, some of the ideals of the religious left today, which defines religion in terms of social justice. Of course, the end result of this process wipes everything from the blackboard, including God in the Bible, which become nothing more than props for socialist preaching. Socialism, in fact, opposes everything the Bible encourages. Faith in God is replaced by institutional atheism, financial independence of each man, the idea that every man will sit beneath his grapevine and beneath his fig tree, and nobody will fear because the Lord has spoken. This is in the biblical book of Micah, chapter four, verse four. But in socialism, their idea of everybody having their own home and their own grapevine and fig tree to sit beneath, is replaced by dependence on the state. Traditional family based on an eternal male-female commitment is replaced by no rules and endless experimentation. Voluntary friendships and associations are distrusted, and replaced by relationships with arms of the state. No longer does society resemble the brain-like structure of countless inter neuro linkages, but it is replaced by a hub and spoke arrangement. Every citizen at the end of his own spoke communicates for all things only with the state at the center of the wheel. Socialism does encourage bodily health, but never as a holistic part of the entire human being. So how do you combat this virus of progressivism, or socialism? It doesn't much matter what you call it. But it's something which attacks reasonably successful societies, again and again and again, you know, whether it's Canada or whether it's Europe or the United States or so many other countries, when they reach a certain level of affluence and material success, you find a growing class of people in that society who catch the virus, of wanting other people's money, of wanting other people's stuff, of believing deep in their hearts, that it is only because of the failures and flaws of other people, that they do not have all that their heart's desire. So how do you combat this virus?
Daniel Lapin 30:55
And the answer I think, is you must pursue a happy and fulfilling life. And you encourage other like-minded people to do exactly the same thing. After all, people happily engaged in increasing happiness, by building up their five F's are seldom attracted to the basic dissatisfaction of socialism. Remember, socialism is always about revolutionary change how we'll improve this and how we will fix up that and how we'll repair the other thing. Socialism always implies deep dissatisfaction with how things are with pretty much everything the way it is, we can do better, we must do better. And if in doing so, we break much of what is functioning, and we break the familiar. Well, you can make an omelet without breaking a few eggs. Or as Vladimir Lenin put it, in the early 20th century, when you chop down a forest splinters will fly. They promise us that by chopping down the forest, that will be able to make us an even better forest. But as the famous, great Bible-believing English writers Samuel Johnson wrote a long time ago. How small of all that human hearts endure that part, which laws or kings can cause or cure. But which you meant to say that governments which is what he described, but as laws or kings can do almost nothing to give you greater happiness? Yet, as grim malcontents, they know everything that's good. There is so much that is beautiful and good, but socialists never mentioned that. They never even see it. They focus on curing all kinds of ills, capitalism, racism, sexism, poverty, war, climate change. They're big on sentiments like hope and change. And they're very big on phrases like we must make the world a better place. But by contrast, my dear happy warriors, you and I, we are filled with a warm affection for the world, and for life around us. And I think we are suffused with a deep sense of gratitude for it all. Because as Samuel Johnson says, happiness cannot come from government grants. So where does it come from? And I think you know the answer. It comes from growing your five F's. You know, if, if, like me, you dance a lot, like the way a drunk tries to stamp on cockroaches, you can still have a happy and fulfilling life. If you cannot drive, or cook or sharp, no worries, you can still have a happy life. And you can still have a fulfilling life. Because Uber or DoorDash, and Amazon will take care of you. If you don't even know what a government grant is. If you've never even met a community organizer or a community activist, you can still have a happy and fulfilling life. But there are five areas of life which every single person absolutely needs to master in order to have a happy and fulfilling life. And I'll go further than that. I'd say if you are deficient in any of these five areas, you are doomed to a lesser life than you could otherwise have enjoyed. If there are no online services that exist, that can make good for you on the failure in any of these five areas, there is simply is no choice. If you are hoping to live happily and fulfilling only, you need these five areas to be in good shape. And it's so crucial for every happy warrior to grasp purpose. That, in a way, the very definition of a happy warrior is somebody who is constantly focused on improving their five F's. That's what a happy warrior is. Because very few things produce as much happiness as forging ahead in these five areas.
Daniel Lapin 35:46
And since it's never easy, in fact, it is a fight. We all happy warriors. So for those of you who might be new to the rabbi Daniel Lapin show, I'll tell you again, what the five is. So but before that, I want to emphasize that we're all accustomed to think in terms of lists, right? Checklists, top 10, lists, lists a favorites list of the worst movies, songs and shows. And they all go from you know, like one to 10 with 10 being the biggest or the best or the worst. With a list, you know, you're either going in ascending or descending order. So if I gave you the five F's in a list, you would automatically find yourself wondering if the most important one is the first one I mentioned number one, or maybe the most important one is number five, the one I build up to arriving finally at the climax. So which is it? How should I list them? Look, I want you to try just for now to lose the list concept. Okay, this is very useful in many situations. When I used to fly a little single-engine Cessna, I never ever started a takeoff roll without meticulously going through my pre-flight checklist.
Daniel Lapin 37:16
In boating, the only time I can remember nearly pulling away from a dock in Mill Bay in British Columbia, with forgetting to disconnect my big fat yellow short power cable was when I dismissed my pre-departure checklist and I just tried to do it on the fly. And some kind of disaster would have ensued at a kindly dock water walker passing by not sort of called out in urgent alarm and said, Hey, your power cable still connected? Yeah, lists have their uses. And a certain lady I know very well does her market shopping very efficiently. Because she arranges the items she needs in a list arranged in order of how the store is laid out. So that's, that's how it works. The 5 Fs, however, are not in a list, they're in a circle. And so for a sort of, do a long demo with me, take a nice piece of paper and draw a nice circle, you can take a can of baked beans and put it on the paper and draw a circle around the base of the baked beans, I'll give you an nice circle. Or you can use a compass. Now place five equidistant points on the circumference of your circle. Now, if you wanted to do this really, really carefully, then you'll make sure that each one is 72 degrees from the next, because a whole circle is 360 degrees, and 1/5. A 360 is 72. But basically, you know if you just want to eyeball it, that's okay. But anyways, mark your five points f1 through f5. And now draw a straight line from f1 to f3, and another one from f1 to f4. And now draw a straight line from F two to F four, and another one from F two to F five. And now finally draw another straight line from F three to F five. These five lines together with the curved segments of the circumference. Now connect each one of the five F's to every one of the other four. And you'll probably notice I mean, I can't not mention the fact that it's going to look like you've drawn a pentagram and so I beg you to please bear the issue right now. Any superstitious thoughts you might have had. Let me say it this way happy warriors are not subject to superstition, we just not okay. Deuteronomy, chapter 18, verse 10, there shall not be found among you, anyone that makes his son or his daughter pass through the fire, or that uses superstition, or charlatans or soothsayers or witches, we don't go in for that sort of stuff. And so I say this because if you've been following along with me at home, you're now looking at the picture of a pentagram in a circle, or a pentacles, that sometimes called look, please believe me, when I tell you it has absolutely zero spiritual significance. It does not mean anything religious or cultish. It's not good. It's not bad. It's just a drawing. This is all it is a graphical depiction of five concepts, five qualities, five aspects, all of which are equally important. And that all connects to all the others. Okay, that's really all it is.
Daniel Lapin 41:02
So now, and next to each of the places where you numbered an F, place the words that are vital to your happiness and fulfillment, fulfillment, write down friendships by f one, or two, or three or five doesn't make any difference. Write down finances, next to another F, write down faith, next to another one, write down fitness. And next to another one write down family. Okay, and you realize that makes no difference where you put anyone. And you can see each one is connected to the other four. So it's all very simple and very straightforward. And so, you know, now that finances are anything to do with how you serve your fellow human beings, and how you bring money into your life. It is also your relationships that revolve around finances might be customers or clients. It might be vendors, it might be your employer, or your manager, or your supervisor or your boss. And it's your bank accounts, and it's your possessions. All of those things fall under finances. If you're a car sort of person, and you really like your car, well, your relationship with your car comes under finances as well. friendships. Friendships are well let me do family first, okay, family is your relationship with everybody connected through and I'm going to say this in a strange way. Because more conventionally people say, you know, your family, other people, you're connected through the through blood. But fundamental to family relationships are male, female sexual relationships. That's what produces family. And so a man marries a woman, and they have children, and then those children, marry and have children, and now they're our grandchildren. And those grandchildren have uncles and aunts, and they have cousins. And that's all because years earlier, grandpa and grandma joined together, enjoy. That's, that's what it is. And so to just clarify, family is every part of your life that comes about through these fundamental relationships, based on marriage and male-female polarity. Which brings us to friendships, friendships are all relationships that have nothing to do with finance or with family. If you are politically associated.
Daniel Lapin 43:53
You know, I told you I'm recording this in Switzerland, and I had dinner at the only kosher restaurant in all of Zurich. Listen, I'm grateful I'm not complaining at all. It was it was just fine to be able to eat. But I had dinner together with my friend from Zurich, who hosted me and he is on a his politically conservative. Switzerland is like every other successful country I was telling you about is being engulfed by a rising tide of socialistic thinking it is. He is a very strongly committed political conservative. And he serves on a commission that has something to do with supervising the running of the management of the city of Zurich. And so all of those relationships that he has his fellow commissioners and all of those fallen under friendship because they have nothing to do with finance and have nothing to do with family. Your Fitness is obviously everything to do with your body. And, and I think that's it, we've covered friendship, we've covered finances, we've covered faith, our faith, your faith, that everything to do about with your relationship to God, your relationship to your church or your faith family, basically the people with whom you connect through faith. And, and these are the five things look, they're, they're essential. If you if you as I said, if you've never learned to dance, you can still have a very happy, fulfilling life. If you cannot play tennis, you can have a very happy and fulfilling life. If you do not have a hobby, you can have a very happy and fulfilling life. Those things are all nice, and they can all add. But the five essentials, your friendships, your finances, your family, your faith and your fitness. That's it. And that is what is it lies at the core of the happy warriors credo.
Daniel Lapin 46:11
And, again, I stressed the lines that join the five Fs, it is impossible to overemphasize how interdependent all of these five Fs are upon one another. For example, family breakup, or the non-formation of families in the first place, is one of the key reasons for why poverty rates are not falling in many countries in the world today. A key reason for income inequality is because the people who are living, normal, healthy, married, family lives are doing much better than people are not. So of course, there's an income inequality. But of course, the culture leading towards socialism, is absolutely unwilling to concede the critical importance of marriage and family. So they have to find other reasons for poverty. Like maybe Hello, racism, maybe? No, it's break up a family. Does anyone seriously believe that a child raised in an intact normal family, with two loving parents, a mother and a father raised in that crucible of tradition raised to believe in ambition, and hard work, and values? Don't you think such a child will end up doing far better economically than a child raised in the hell of today's counterculture? And you don't really believe that they could possibly exist any government program that could actually level the playing field for those two very different children. Right? I mean, do you? You see, all of these things we're talking about? Well, they flow from family, there's no question about it. But you cannot study family without noting the correlation between faith and marriage formation. In other words, people who have a relationship with faith and God and the Bible tend to marry much more than other people and to stay married much more than other people. So Now faith is tied to finance through the link of family, you can't avoid it. And it damages as faith declines and family declines, then finances decline. When buisnesses vacate inner cities because they don't like being shot at or having the goods shoplifted, or when the costs of policing and courts and prisons raise taxes and diminishes after-tax income of everybody, isn't it obvious that health care costs much more because of corrosive social conditions, drug abuse, teenage pregnancy, injury by crimes of violence, crack babies, sexually transmitted disease, alcohol abuse, smoking, mental the growing the growing catalogue of mental disorder. Medical economists calculate that about half of the country's total healthcare bill comes about because of self-destructive apparent behavior. You could actually say that society's bills are being paid for by hardworking, traditional families. Yeah, that's true.
Daniel Lapin 49:46
So everything I'm telling you, you can see for yourself by just looking at your five F pentagram diagram that you did. Finances connected to family directly by a line either curved or straight. It's it's virtually impossible to make money effectively if you're not part of a functional, healthy family. And it's just as true that it is difficult to maintain a healthy functional family without making money. You notice didn't do that I did not say without having money. Because winning money lottery does not help your family very much, or for very long. The many, many sad stories that surround lottery winners have pretty much established that it's often said that money cannot buy happiness, right? This is largely true, merely getting money is not going to bring you happiness, but making money earning it while that contributes greatly to your happiness. Because deep down deep in your soul, you know that every dollar is a Certificate of Good performance, a guarantee that you must have done something that another human being another one of God's children valued enough to pay for. So I hope, I hope you can see that the line between faith and finance is is real, a lot of people and when I say a lot of people, a lot of religious people, a lot of believers in both Judaism and Christianity. And I know quite a lot of people in both those groups find it hardest to reconcile in their philosophical outlook, that God and money faith and finance have anything at all to do with one another. You know, people believe that these are two entirely separate and disconnected zones. Well, one of the ways I like showing that this is not true, is by reminding you that no capital market ever emerged indigenously in a non-Christian society. Now today, you have stock exchanges in in Accra, and in Biafra. And in I mean, all are everywhere, you know, their stock exchanges everywhere now. But they were established the concept of building up a capital market that came from London from Amsterdam, it came from solidly Christian societies. And remember that no atheistic society has ever developed a durable and successful economy. You know what, I know what some of you are thinking, What about China? Look, China is actually no exception to this rule. China is undoubtedly governed by a pretty tyrannical, socialistic regime, the the CCP, the Chinese Communist Party, however, it has undoubtedly failed in turning its population into one and a quarter billion secular socialists. They haven't done that. There are undoubtedly between one 100 and 200 million Christians in China today. And Christianity is classified even by the Chinese government as China's fastest-growing religion. The British economist, which is a magazine, I try and look at fairly regularly, they claim that there are probably now more Christians in China than members of the Communist Party. Play that part again, what I just said, That's it. It's really unbelievable. But it's true. The Wall Street Journal had a piece a little while ago, that said that, universities in China, the religious studies departments of Chinese universities have been ordered by the CCPs propaganda department to re emphasize atheism. Some local governments are threatening rural Christians with fines and jail if they attend unauthorized prayer meetings.
Daniel Lapin 54:28
And, and I'm very aware you that as I told you right now, I'm in a beautiful, functioning, effective little country called Switzerland just for a couple of days. And I'm teaching about five or 6000 Young, dedicated Christians. I cannot tell you what optimism it fills me with for the future of Europe. These young people have come from 15 different countries around Europe, and they're here for two days. By the way, a funny thing in Switzerland, the day of ascension, which is a Christian religious holiday was May the 18th. It was this week. This is the day on which the conference is held, and it's a Swiss public holiday. This has to do with the foundation of Switzerland. Even I keep on telling people, and I get met with incredulity, but European countries are all founded on a Christian basis. And if you know anything at all about the founding of Christian of Switzerland, you will understand why the day of ascension is a public holiday in Switzerland. But anyway, that's the day they chose to start this conference for young people. And so you walk around Switzerland, you read the paper, you get a sense what's going on. And you think to yourself, This is a country moving towards secular socialism. And then right here in the heart of Zurich, 6000 young people, deeply committed to their Christian faith, to the biblical belief. And to God, that means it's a very interesting dichotomy, and it's replayed in many countries around the world. And it is certainly read being replayed also in China of all places. And now to bring us in for a landing, I would love to tell you a little bit about how the pirates symbol of the skull and crossbones came into being what what is this got to do with a discussion on family and finance and faith? Well, as it turns out, a great deal a lot. So I'm explaining, you're talking about how in China, the connection between faith and finance is very, very real, and how this creates a bit of a predicament for Xi Jinping. Because there is an awareness that the desire to repress Christianity is not healthy for business. In China, it's very much like it is in Taiwan. When I gave some speeches in Taiwan for their business community, it was impossible to ignore that almost all of the very top of Taiwan's business pyramid, the best known names in construction, finance, semiconductors, telecommunications, and other major industries in Taiwan, were all active in the Christian church. It was unbelievable, but very, very real. And so while Zhi Jing ping is nationalizing more private enterprise, and incorporating them into China's Belt and Road initiative designed to bring more countries in Africa and Asia, into the Chinese orbit. But there's this understanding that if you kill Christianity, you're also going to kill capitalism. And if you want to kill capitalism, well, then you must kill Christianity, and you have to kill its Jewish mother. One could call that almost a saying of Chairman chi. Anyways, look, if you look at the connection between faith and finance, it's also impossible to overlook the disproportionate success with money enjoyed by the Jewish people as a whole. And it's, it's more significant, even when we realize that none of the popular explanations for Jewish financial achievement hold any water. It's nothing to do with intelligence. It's nothing to do with racial theories of a Jewish managing.
Daniel Lapin 59:07
And when all is said and done, you know, the bottom line is Jewish success in business comes chiefly from the connection between Judaism and God's message to mankind, the Torah, the scriptures. So this helps to explain one of really the most fascinating mysteries of economic history. And I'm sure you familiar right with how starting in the ninth in the tsunami in the 1500s, the center of world economic activity began shifting away from Southern Europe. Countries like Portugal, Portugal, Greece, Spain, Italy, these are countries which enjoyed huge financial prosperity. I mean, Venice was a massive financial capital. We saw banking really grow phenomenally. You In early Venice, anyway, these countries in southern Europe began to lose financial influence and ended eventually ugly vanished to this very day in the European Economic Community, and I'm more aware of it where I am right now, these countries are disrespectfully known as the pigs countries, right? Portugal, Italy, Greece and Spain. And they are regular recipients of large cash subsidies and grants, mostly from Germany, in order for them to get through each fiscal year without crisis. So why did these countries inexplicably have declining economies while the more northern regions of Europe began to thrive? Well, there are a number of foolish and easily discredited attempts at explanations. For instance, they say that the period corresponded to the opening up of the Americas to suggest somehow that traveled to North America was sort of much easier, from London or Hamburg or Amsterdam, then Genoa, or my say, or Lisbon, right nonsense makes no sense. The economics and the history departments of universities continue to grapple with the strange mystery of why Frankfurt and Hamburg Germany. In fact, all the Hanseatic League cities, supplanted venison, Livorno and why Amsterdam and London replaced Madrid and Lisbon in becoming these new centers of financial power. The answer is simple, but very politically incorrect. As simple because it's self-evident. As soon as I tell this to you, you won't feel any need to inquire as to which academic authorities agree with us know, you'll hit your head with your hand and say this is so obvious how come those dummies with letters after their names didn't realize it? They didn't realize it because of cognitive dissonance in the light of their politically correct theories based on secular socialism. They simply could not countenance the possibility that world economies were shaped by Jews, and God's Word, the Bible and the Christians who followed it. They loathed and they still loathe the unthinkable truth that armies and politics, the rise and fall of nations, and the great rivers of trade and commerce, are incredibly and disproportionately influenced by a few million people with whom God entrusted his word over 3000 years ago. The blindingly obvious but very politically incorrect answer as to why the centers of economic creativity shifted away from those countries of southern Europe just then, is because just then, vast Jewish communities that had been there for centuries were expelled, and they were expelled with little more than the clothing they wore, and a few possessions they could carry with them into exile. Jews were thrown out of Sicily in 1492. They were thrown out of Naples in 1540, out of Genoa, and Venice in 1550, the great German economist who I really liked this guy, by the way, Werner Sombart, not Jewish. He lived until just about two World War Two into the 20th century, just about World War. I think he died in 1941.
Daniel Lapin 1:03:53
Werner Sombart says that when the Senate of Venice decided to expel the Jews in 1550, all the Christian merchants of the city protested, and they declared that throwing out the Jews would mean financial ruin. And they may as well leave Venice along with the Jews. They turned out to be absolutely right. They were ruined, as wcity-stateity state. Jews were thrown out of Spain in 1492. They were thrown out of Portugal in 1495. Fascinatingly, you must remember that in those days, cities were more important than states. You heard of the phrase right city-states, certain cities became Jewish refuges, and not surprisingly, they prospered almost alone among Italian cities. Luevano on Italy's western coast, prospered in the 1500s, because it alone offered haven to Jews, who were thrown out of the Iberian Peninsula, Spain and poor judo. While many of the displays Jews eventually made their way to Luevano, where by the way the city's Great Synagogue was opened in 16 103. And it's it was a busy functioning, thriving synagogue until the Nazis destroyed during World War Two. And I'd love to visit this I've never been to Luevano but in the middle 1950s Right in the aftermath of World War Two, they rebuilt the synagogue in lovano on the ruins of the 400 year old Great Synagogue that had been destroyed a decade earlier by the Nazis. Frankfurt, Germany, Frankfurt and Hamburg, major cities in Germany. Welcome Jews who fled Spain and Portugal, and those two cities began to experience unprecedented financial success. While cities that banned Jews, such as cologne, Strasburg, Nuremberg, went into decline. Munich's rise as a tremendously important commercial center of Bavaria, dates back to the late 1700s. When Jews were welcome back into that part of Bavaria. Jews were thrown out of England in 1290. England languished financially for a few 100 years, until the middle 1600s, when a Dutch Rabbi whose work I've studied very, very diligently. His name is Manasa Ben Israel. He traveled to London, and He interceded with Cromwell. This is off to the the the the the the the English Civil War. And Cromwell, of course, was a Bible-believing religious Christian, and Menasha Ben Israel easily persuaded him to let the Jews come back to England. And he did this.
Daniel Lapin 1:07:02
And not surprisingly, there was an explosion of capitalism and commerce that ran parallel to the influx of Jewish immigrants. And as you can imagine, this led to the accumulation of capital and the availability of credit, which I'm pretty sure laid the foundation for the industrial revolution of the early 1700s. Exactly in England. Holland, a huge economic boon begins in the 1500s. Why? Because Portuguese and Spanish Jews arrived in Holland. And they made Amsterdam this huge center of World Cannabis. And here comes the skull and crossbones, and I hope, hope you enjoy this as much as I do. During the 80 Years War of Spain and Holland, which ran 1568 to 1648. Right so that war of Holland and England against Spain, many former Spanish Jews that were now established in Holland, obtained what was called letters of marque from Holland and England, allowing them to become privateers. privateers are nothing but licensed pirates. And they were allowed to plunder the rich Spanish sailing galleons that were returning from Central America through the Caribbean, carrying gold back to Spain, and Jewish pirates. Jewish pirates from Holland attack these Spanish ships. And then the deal was they share the gold they took with the Dutch and English governments. Even the chief rabbi of Amsterdam, spent half the year on his beautiful pirate ship working in the Caribbean. And I love this whole Jewish pirate thing because I always think to myself that from a career point of view, just in case this Rabbi thing doesn't work out for me, I do have an alternative career path. But bottom line, okay, so here's the skeleton crossbreds it was a custom in the Spanish Jewish community. Remember Jews are in Spain for hundreds of years very well-established Jewish community until 1492. And it is the custom in the Spanish Jewish community on Jewish gravestones in addition to the name of the departed and, and the dates and some words of praise, prays. They will also put a picture of a skull and crossbones. That's right. It was a Jewish symbol, meant to bring about two to bring about or remember to remind you of the book of Isaiah chapter 50, the valley of the dry bones. And this whole section of the book of Isaiah speaks about the revival of the debt, the resuscitation of the dry bones, and the coming back to life that God will bring about. And so, obviously on the, on the gravestones, as if to say, these bones buried here, in accordance with the book of Isaiah will come back to life and the skull and crossbones are these dry bones that'll come back to life. There it's okay. So obviously, between the Muslims in Spain and the throwing out of the Jews, a lot of the Jewish cemeteries were destroyed. That's that seems to be a normal pattern, the the Mount of Olives, which is the old, Venerable many, many, many centuries-old Jewish cemetery in Israel, in Jerusalem was absolutely destroyed by the Muslims in the 20th, middle of the 20th century. And after Israel recovered that part of Jerusalem in 1967, one of the first things they started doing was restoring the cemetery of the Mount of Olives. Anyway, back to the Jews of Spain and Portugal. They found refuge in Amsterdam. In fact, one of the beautiful great synagogues of Amsterdam is very old synagogue is the Spanish Portuguese synagogue. And it's it was built by the Spanish and Portuguese Jews who are thrown out of Spain, ended up in Amsterdam and in Holland. Meanwhile, Hamburg by the way, a you'll find there are in the Jewish cemetery, the old Jewish cemetery in Hamburg, Germany, you will see skull and crossbones. Why? Well, because Jews that came from Spain and Portugal to Amsterdam, brought the skull and crossbones custom. And then Hamburg welcome Jews, Hamburg wanted to revitalize its commerce and business. They invited Jews from Holland to come live in I think about 20 or 30 Jewish families moved to to Hamburg Germany in the 1500s and did exactly that and they had a lot to do with the revitalizing and of the of the Hanseatic League cities. But as I said, the cemetery in Hamburg, you can to this day see skull and crossbones. Now here comes the best part. And that is that in the old Jewish cemetery in Jamaica, and in some other islands of the Caribbean where Jewish pirates who died were buried, you will see their skull and crossbones. Turns out that other pirates, other pirates who, who saw the value in plundering the Spanish galleons bringing the gold back to to Spain. Some of those pirates, they saw the Jewish graves, the skull and crossbones I do say, they were friendly with some of their Jewish colleagues.And they adopted it for a flag. Isn't that beautiful?
Daniel Lapin 1:13:21
So it turns out that is actually the origin of the skull and crossbones flag on pirate ships, beautiful and fills me with personal delight. So there it is, for now you happy warriors. Thank you for very much for being part of the Rabbi Daniel Lapin show spread the good word. I love getting more and more listeners to the show. Visit my website Rabbi Daniel lapin.com. Take a look at Scrolling through Scripture. Yes, because it all comes out of the Bible. It really does. And that's a really good place to begin developing a new and fresh adult outlook on the Bible. Scrolling through Scripture is what it's called on the website Rabbi Daniel lapin.com. So I want to wish you a fabulous week of growth and excitement and passion, in your faith and in your family and in your finances and your friendships and your fitness. Until next week. I am your rabbi. God bless.
