Speaker 1: Welcome to Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager. Here thousands of
Speaker 1: hours of Dennis's lectures, courses in classic radio programs. And
Speaker 1: to purchase Dennis Prager's Rational Bibles, go to Dennisprager dot com.
Speaker 2: And welcome to the Ultimate Issues Hour on the Dennis
Speaker 2: Prager Show. This hour each week devoted to some great
Speaker 2: issue of life, and I figure, since it is June,
Speaker 2: it is the right time to talk about what happens
Speaker 2: a lot in June, and that is people getting married.
Speaker 2: And I want to make the case for marriage. You
Speaker 2: can't get much more of an ultimate issue than marriage,
Speaker 2: the basic building block of society, or at least of
Speaker 2: higher civilization as we have known it. It is under
Speaker 2: tremendous assault in the Western world, tremendous assault. The belief
Speaker 2: that that one doesn't have to get married, there is
Speaker 2: no reason to, is widespread. The recent candidate for president
Speaker 2: of France, the woman who is the candidate for the presidency,
Speaker 2: the socialist candidate, she was not married to the man
Speaker 2: who she lived with and who was the father of
Speaker 2: her children. This is incredible to us in America at
Speaker 2: any rate. It's just that it made no difference. I'm
Speaker 2: married not married, has kids with him, and I'm not married,
Speaker 2: doesn't matter. That's one of the areas of the assault.
Speaker 2: There are so many areas men who say, you know,
Speaker 2: why should I bother? I will get clubbered if there
Speaker 2: is a divorce, I may even lose my children, all
Speaker 2: of which, by the way, has some merit to it.
Speaker 2: The the divorce laws are are a bit perverse. Uh,
Speaker 2: I acknowledge that fact. But nevertheless, there there are arguments
Speaker 2: that are made against marriage, and therefore arguments need to
Speaker 2: be made for it. Everything that we have assumed was
Speaker 2: central and unquestionable has not only become questioned, but has
Speaker 2: become overthrown every almost every major idea, from patriotism, which
Speaker 2: is now regarded by by much of the elite as
Speaker 2: a form of chauvinism, if not in sipient fascism, to marriage,
Speaker 2: to even having children. Why bother with children? It's it's
Speaker 2: it's a polluted world, and then zero population growth is
Speaker 2: the ideal, and why bother with marriage? It's a it's
Speaker 2: a patriarchal institution. And of course God and religion, they
Speaker 2: just poison everything. To use the terminology of my guest
Speaker 2: of last week, Christopher Hitchens, whom I debated about God,
Speaker 2: and you will find that debate at Praegerradio dot com.
Speaker 2: Everything has not only been questioned, but in the Western world,
Speaker 2: in many instances, is simply overthrown inside of one or
Speaker 2: two generations. The argument for marriage, there are so many arguments.
Speaker 2: There are both micro and macro. In other words, there
Speaker 2: are personal arguments why it benefits the individuals, and there
Speaker 2: are arguments from a societal standpoint why it benefits society.
Speaker 2: And it is amazing to me that people don't care
Speaker 2: about those second arguments. We remember, I believe, contrary to
Speaker 2: the general assessment of the sixties, which was of a
Speaker 2: very idealistic period of time, I regard the sixties as
Speaker 2: the age of narcissism. And so when you make an argument,
Speaker 2: when one makes an argument, well, marriage is good for society,
Speaker 2: you go against the narcissism of that period with how
Speaker 2: what's in it for me? Man? What's in it for me?
Speaker 2: And I don't see anything in it for me, so
Speaker 2: I won't do it. But there is a lot in
Speaker 2: it for society as well as for you. So that's
Speaker 2: the subject of today's Ultimate Issues Hour, and I particularly
Speaker 2: dedicate this, though not exclusively at all but to men,
Speaker 2: because a lot of men have great qualms, although right
Speaker 2: now I must say that it is a lot of
Speaker 2: women as well. I believe that feminism, which has copied
Speaker 2: a lot of male attitudes, has taught women to in
Speaker 2: fact be quite like men, and to have attitudes like men,
Speaker 2: and to believe that they will gain at least as
Speaker 2: much satisfaction from macro success from a professional life as
Speaker 2: from a good personal life. You ask girls today, Ask
Speaker 2: a girl of college if you have a daughter, niece,
Speaker 2: granddaughter at college, ask her, if you could have a
Speaker 2: spectacular marriage or a spectacular career, which would you prefer.
Speaker 2: And a generation ago, certainly, prior to feminism, the question
Speaker 2: would have been would have been regarded by the vast
Speaker 2: majority of young women as absurd. The dream was to
Speaker 2: have a wonderful man and make and make and make
Speaker 2: a good home. That was the dream. That's been the
Speaker 2: dream of women throughout history. Not all women, of course,
Speaker 2: not all women. There's no such thing as all. Generalizations
Speaker 2: by definition mean you mean that you are generalizing, meaning therefore,
Speaker 2: of course there are exceptions. And that was a good
Speaker 2: dream for the female to have, finding a good man
Speaker 2: and making a home with him, it was a very
Speaker 2: good thing that at least one of the sexes had
Speaker 2: that as their as their primary dream, and that was
Speaker 2: knocked out. Ah, you're crazy for thinking that way. Now,
Speaker 2: there's much more satisfaction in being an astronaut, and I
Speaker 2: choose that because it's it was the most glamorous profession.
Speaker 2: And then we saw about an astronaut for whom being
Speaker 2: an astronaut, a female astronaut, for whom being a female astronaut,
Speaker 2: or being an astronaut was not exactly satisfying to the
Speaker 2: ache for love. It gives you an idea of how
Speaker 2: powerful the mind is that it could thwart the staggeringly
Speaker 2: powerful urge in a woman. It's also in men, but
Speaker 2: let's talk about women for a moment. The staggeringly powerful
Speaker 2: innate brain based urge for love. It gives you an
Speaker 2: idea of how powerful the mind is when it is
Speaker 2: incessantly bombarded with another message. It can thwart even what
Speaker 2: the primal brain wants. And so girls were taught that
Speaker 2: their primal instinct to want love more than anything else,
Speaker 2: to love and be loved was just nonsense. What they
Speaker 2: really wanted was professional success, and if a guy came along,
Speaker 2: that's what I hear all constantly from young women. Well, yeah,
Speaker 2: the right guy comes along, but I'm preoccupied with my career,
Speaker 2: and it sounds reasonable. She's not saying she doesn't want
Speaker 2: to have the right guy, But there was very little
Speaker 2: sense of that being very important. Ironically, and sadly, it
Speaker 2: does become very important to women as they reach their
Speaker 2: fortieth birthday in most cases, at any rate, and they
Speaker 2: have had professional success, and by golly, it doesn't really
Speaker 2: give them one fifth of the satisfaction that feminism promised them.
Speaker 2: They were promised happiness through professional success. But somehow you
Speaker 2: can't hug a pay raise, and it's nice to have
Speaker 2: a pay raise. Don't get me wrong, I have never
Speaker 2: poo pooed the importance of financial stability. I'm not an idiot,
Speaker 2: and I'm not counterposing it, because the truth is people
Speaker 2: who are married actually do better. So I'm obviously not
Speaker 2: anti having financial stability, since marriage is better for financial
Speaker 2: stability than being alone. That's for both sexes then, especially
Speaker 2: for women. But you can't hug professional success when you
Speaker 2: get home. That's just the way it is, and you
Speaker 2: don't you haven't built anything, and it's nice to have
Speaker 2: professional success. But what has been done to women to
Speaker 2: convince them that that is where their happiness lies. It's
Speaker 2: amazing the power of the mind to subvert the power
Speaker 2: of nature. Now, sometimes it's good, because happiness does come
Speaker 2: from the mind fighting the brain. But sometimes you outsmart yourself,
Speaker 2: which is what I think has happened with the feminist
Speaker 2: ideal here. As for men, well, men have an innate
Speaker 2: problem with marriage, and that is men are in fact
Speaker 2: variety oriented in their sexctual nature, and the idea that
Speaker 2: they will never be able to have another woman other
Speaker 2: than the women that they are married to scares the
Speaker 2: living daylights out of most men. This is it. This
Speaker 2: is it, And people have to appreciate that you can't
Speaker 2: make the world better. You can't do the right thing
Speaker 2: if you don't acknowledge what your raw materials are. And
Speaker 2: the raw material of male nature is not marriage oriented.
Speaker 2: It is variety oriented. So if you now have women
Speaker 2: saying that marriage is not important, well, then by gully,
Speaker 2: the guys are certainly not going to be the great
Speaker 2: force for marriage. Hey cool, you mean you women also
Speaker 2: on variety? Oh man, this is heaven. You don't have
Speaker 2: to die and go to heaven. This is heaven, this
Speaker 2: is male nature speaking. So there's a lot working against marriage.
Speaker 2: So I get married. That's the subject of this Ultimate
Speaker 2: Issue's hour, and I will take your CA one eighth
Speaker 2: Prager seven seven six one eight p R A G
Speaker 2: e R seven seven six and digitally that's eight seven
Speaker 2: seven two four three triple seven six the Ultimate Issues
Speaker 2: Hour on the Dennis Prager Show.
Speaker 1: This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.
Speaker 1: Now back to more of Dennis Prager's Timeless Wisdom.
Speaker 2: There's the Ultimate Issues Hour on the Dennis Prager Show.
Speaker 2: The hour each week devoted or at least this is
Speaker 2: absolutely devoted. I have some Ultimate Issues on other hours,
Speaker 2: but this one is devoted to some great issue in
Speaker 2: this one. Given that we're in June and there are
Speaker 2: so many weddings, I want to answer the question why
Speaker 2: get married? Because, as I summarized earlier, there is such
Speaker 2: a huge and organized either apathy or opposition. The apathy
Speaker 2: is even worse to marriage. Why bother? It's you don't
Speaker 2: need to you stay together. If you one day you
Speaker 2: both decide not to, then you don't have messy divorce proceedings.
Speaker 2: Who needs it? It's just a piece of paper. I
Speaker 2: always get a kick out of the it's only a
Speaker 2: piece of paper whenever a guy says that. It's usually
Speaker 2: the guy says that to a woman he's been with
Speaker 2: for six years. Well, honey, I love you, and it's
Speaker 2: it's why marriage just a piece of paper? I have
Speaker 2: a good answer for you women, Well, honey, if it's
Speaker 2: only a piece of paper, why do you oppose it?
Speaker 2: And I'd like I'd like some guy to answer that one.
Speaker 2: If it's only it can't be only a piece of paper.
Speaker 2: You wouldn't be so opposed to it if it's just
Speaker 2: a piece of paper. And then people argue, well, you know,
Speaker 2: there there's a there's a whatever percentage chance that you'll
Speaker 2: get divorced. Yes, that's right, there is. There's a percentage
Speaker 2: chance that you'll have a crash in an auto. It
Speaker 2: doesn't argue against driving. I know about divorce, and it's
Speaker 2: a very very painful thing, and it's and and life
Speaker 2: has pain, but it but it is still better to marry.
Speaker 2: So you know, people say, well, look, this guy makes
Speaker 2: the case for for for marriage and he's divorced, so
Speaker 2: what On the contrary, I have more more credibility because
Speaker 2: I so believe in it, even though I've gone through
Speaker 2: it and it is painful. Of course, of course it's
Speaker 2: a better thing. Of course, First of all, you grow up. Now,
Speaker 2: I know, growing up is not a big value for
Speaker 2: for a lot of people. It isn't. It just isn't.
Speaker 2: In fact, staying a child is a big value. Not
Speaker 2: only is growing up not a big one, not growing
Speaker 2: up is often a big one. I want to stay
Speaker 2: a kid. I want to dress like a kid, I
Speaker 2: want to talk like a kid, I want to look
Speaker 2: like a kid. So so it's it's it's not a
Speaker 2: very powerful argument, except if you do want to grow up,
Speaker 2: and that, to me is a very powerful argument for marriage. Now,
Speaker 2: does that mean that every human being who has remained
Speaker 2: single has not grown up? No, it doesn't. Does that
Speaker 2: mean that every human being who has married has grown up? Well,
Speaker 2: every human I'll ask you this on the second part.
Speaker 2: Any one of you who has married, you tell me
Speaker 2: if you are not wiser and more mature at least
Speaker 2: those two since you got married. I've never met anybody,
Speaker 2: anybody who has denied that they were more aware of life,
Speaker 2: that they were more mature, that they were more a
Speaker 2: lot of things as a result of getting married, even
Speaker 2: if the marriage was not a good one. Now, if
Speaker 2: your task in life is not too fully grow up,
Speaker 2: and I'm talking emotionally psychologically, obviously, there are very good
Speaker 2: people who have remained single that you could still be
Speaker 2: kind to the world and a wonderful uncle and a
Speaker 2: wonderful aunt. I recognize that fact and do a lot
Speaker 2: of good for the world. But the fact is that
Speaker 2: with regard to yourself and your emotional development, what is
Speaker 2: available in marriage is not available not getting married. It's
Speaker 2: just not available. So that's a big one. People always
Speaker 2: speak about companionship, and I will talk about that, but frankly,
Speaker 2: growing up is a big one, at least to me. Secondly,
Speaker 2: there is and this I made the point when my
Speaker 2: two older kids got married last year, and I did
Speaker 2: a number of shows on this. You immediately have a
Speaker 2: different relationship with your child's spouse than your child's live in.
Speaker 2: Of course you do. It changes from my son's girlfriend
Speaker 2: or significant other or partner or whatever term you wish
Speaker 2: to use, to my daughter in law or my son
Speaker 2: in law. In the case of the man who married
Speaker 2: my daughter, he is my son in law. His family
Speaker 2: is now part of my family. They are not merely
Speaker 2: my daughter's boyfriend's family. These are huge differences. Huge Now
Speaker 2: the stakes are greater and the chance for pain is
Speaker 2: also greater. That's right. So you have a choice in life.
Speaker 2: Do you wish to avoid pain or you want to
Speaker 2: live life fully? Those are your choices. If you want
Speaker 2: to live life fully, then you take risks for pain.
Speaker 2: That is the way it works. That's the way in
Speaker 2: which the world has been made one, Aid Praguer seven
Speaker 2: seven six. You are listening to the Dennis Prager Show,
Speaker 2: the Ultimate Issues Hour, and let's go to Susie in
Speaker 2: Los Angeles, Susie, Dennis Prager, thank you for calling. Hello, Susie, Hi, Hi?
Speaker 2: How old are you?
Speaker 3: Susie thirty?
Speaker 2: Thank you for calling. Go ahead.
Speaker 3: Well, here in LA marriage is under attack because when
Speaker 3: you get married and you're happy, then after a year
Speaker 3: or two, the husband is noticing about Hugh Hefner and
Speaker 3: then his friends tell him, oh, everybody wants to be
Speaker 3: like Hugh Hefner and have a lot of women, and
Speaker 3: oh he's so happy, But is he really happy? And
Speaker 3: then you get cable and you get the package, and
Speaker 3: then you discover Playboy channel is on that and your
Speaker 3: husband is glued to watching those nude women in sex
Speaker 3: acts with women and in disgusting scenes. So marriage is
Speaker 3: really under attack.
Speaker 2: Well, there are two separate issues here, the envy of
Speaker 2: the Hugh Hefner and the guy glued to the Playboy channel.
Speaker 2: Are you speaking about from your own experience?
Speaker 3: Lots of women here in LA have that problem of
Speaker 3: my girlfriends.
Speaker 2: Of their husband in effect wanting to live a Hefner
Speaker 2: like existence. Yeah, well, this is why I, oh, thank
Speaker 2: you for calling. I need to comment on that. This
Speaker 2: is why I have said to you. As important as
Speaker 2: I consider so much of what I've done on tape,
Speaker 2: I have hundreds of hundreds and hundreds of lectures on tape.
Speaker 2: My four tapes on male sexual nature maybe the most
Speaker 2: important thing I ever did to help men understand themselves
Speaker 2: and women to understand their men, because there's so much
Speaker 2: denial about male sexual nature on the part of both sexes,
Speaker 2: and it has to be maturely acknowledged. And then we
Speaker 2: have to bring in what works and what and value systems.
Speaker 2: And I beg you, I do this about nothing else
Speaker 2: I've ever done. I beg you to get them. Go
Speaker 2: to Dennis Prager dot com and or call eight hundred
Speaker 2: two two five eighty five eighty four eight hundred two
Speaker 2: two five eight five eighty four my four tapes on
Speaker 2: our CDs or downloads. However, it's gone. I feel bad
Speaker 2: because it sounds like an ad Okay, I got that
Speaker 2: out the This, Yes, Hugh Hefner, is what male nature
Speaker 2: would would live like if it had no nothing to
Speaker 2: stop it, not society, not values, et cetera. That is correct.
Speaker 2: Hugh Hefner is profoundly empty empty. Is he happy in
Speaker 2: some ways? Undoubtedly. I'll continue with that in a moment
Speaker 2: on the Dennis Prager Show.
Speaker 1: This episode of Timeless Wisdom, we'll continue right after this.
Speaker 1: Now back to more of Dennis Prager's Timeless Wisdom.
Speaker 2: You're listening to the Dennis Prager Show, the Ultimate Issues hour.
Speaker 2: This one is the case for a marriage and it's June,
Speaker 2: and I figured it's a perfect time to do so.
Speaker 2: A lot of marriage is taking place, and a lot
Speaker 2: of marriage is not taking place if we follow the data,
Speaker 2: especially in the Western world. And the last woman, a
Speaker 2: thirty year old woman from Los Angeles, called in and
Speaker 2: then about how she says so many of her male acquaintances.
Speaker 2: I want to live a Hugh Hefner life, especially she
Speaker 2: feels in Los Angeles. And indeed, that is it is
Speaker 2: absolutely worth dealing with. I don't have the time now
Speaker 2: because of the larger subject of marriage, but I but
Speaker 2: that has to that issue has to be dealt with.
Speaker 2: I said that at the very beginning. Women have their
Speaker 2: own reasons, now given to them by feminism and and
Speaker 2: now internalized about oh well, it's not that important. I
Speaker 2: need to need to be professionally successful, you know, if
Speaker 2: I find a guy that's nice, but it's not critical,
Speaker 2: and so on and then and men have their own
Speaker 2: nature to fight, because male nature is variety oriented. So men,
Speaker 2: you have a real choice. You want to be let
Speaker 2: around by your by your testes or by your mind.
Speaker 2: That is, That is very simple. Guys, that's your choice.
Speaker 2: If you if you wish to live a life and
Speaker 2: at the end of your life be able to say
Speaker 2: that you slept with uh, with eight hundred women and
Speaker 2: this will be meaningful to you, then do it. That's all.
Speaker 2: But please understand you will not look back at your
Speaker 2: life and say, wow, this was terrific, uh, compared to
Speaker 2: a man who can look back at his life and
Speaker 2: have and have made a home and a life with
Speaker 2: with a with a woman, uh, and with with hopefully
Speaker 2: with children, and with a community of people, and with
Speaker 2: and with friends as well. Yes, there's plenty of divorce.
Speaker 2: I know that obviously I'm one of them, and and
Speaker 2: that and and and it's tragic and it's absolutely tragic
Speaker 2: when it happens. So so so therefore, what what is
Speaker 2: the choice to live? To live that that that hefnarian life?
Speaker 2: It is utterly, utterly shallow, a viagra based life. Ah.
Speaker 2: Now now I am happy. Look, it's it's possible to
Speaker 2: be to be happy on some level if you were
Speaker 2: if if if happiness is available with such shallowness that
Speaker 2: you have never in effect left high school or college,
Speaker 2: then fine, And you should be avoided by women. And
Speaker 2: if women wish to give themselves to you, then fine.
Speaker 2: And they they they deserve the uh, the life that
Speaker 2: they have chosen. But I believe in any any definition
Speaker 2: of happiness that is beyond having an orgasm, uh, you
Speaker 2: have a far a far deeper happiness available to you
Speaker 2: through through commitment to somebody, to building something. I've always
Speaker 2: thought ever since I'm a kid. But I but I
Speaker 2: acknowledge I was born mature. I mean, you know, there
Speaker 2: are kids like that, So I take no credit for it.
Speaker 2: I was I was just was born thinking about these things.
Speaker 2: And I remember as a kid thinking what will I
Speaker 2: want to say about my life? Before as I'm ready
Speaker 2: to die, what will I want to say about it?
Speaker 2: And I certainly had my time of what they say
Speaker 2: sewing wild oats, and I realized, after a certain number
Speaker 2: of years, this is this, this could go on forever,
Speaker 2: and and what do I have to show for it?
Speaker 1: What?
Speaker 2: Exactly? One A Praguer seven seven six is the number
Speaker 2: one eight p R A G E R seven seven
Speaker 2: six and Houston, Texas, Ryan Hillo, Ryan Dennis Prager. Hey, okay,
Speaker 2: thank you.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I just wanted to.
Speaker 2: And how old are you? In this case ages are
Speaker 2: significant to me. How old are you?
Speaker 4: I'm twenty five years old, Okay, go ahead. And I've
Speaker 4: been married for two years. I got married a year
Speaker 4: and a half after I graduated from college. And I
Speaker 4: actually it was an interesting interesting experience for me because
Speaker 4: I I did a few research fellowships in college, so
Speaker 4: I had a pretty close relationship with a handful of
Speaker 4: professors and went back and met with them because I
Speaker 4: wanted to talk to them about what, you know, what
Speaker 4: was going on in my life and everything. And I
Speaker 4: was telling them I was going to get married, and
Speaker 4: these professors were just adamant, adamant that I was making
Speaker 4: a huge mistake.
Speaker 2: Now wait wait, now, wait at a huge mistake because
Speaker 2: of your age or because of getting.
Speaker 4: Married, because of getting married. The specific one professor in
Speaker 4: particular was just in general was I could you know,
Speaker 4: thought the marriage was all of those things that you've
Speaker 4: already said at patriarchal institution, et cetera, et cetera, a
Speaker 4: very academic there.
Speaker 2: Now were these male and female male and female professors.
Speaker 4: Both female professors.
Speaker 2: Actually, yeah, well that's look the university, which is which
Speaker 2: is the most confused place in America as an institution,
Speaker 2: that's where you would have it's the only place where
Speaker 2: you would have women systematically arguing against marriage. And I'm
Speaker 2: sure they're they're just unbelievably happy women, those two women,
Speaker 2: I'm certain of. It will be back in a moment.
Speaker 2: You're listening to the Dennis Prager Show, The Ultimate Issues Hour, Hi, everybody,
Speaker 2: Ultimate Issues Hour, the third hour of my Tuesday show.
Speaker 2: And it's June, and I figured the Ultimate Issue is
Speaker 2: the case for marriage. You want to grow, there is nothing,
Speaker 2: there is no profession that will enable you to grow
Speaker 2: the way marriage does. And then again parenthood by the way.
Speaker 2: And really, folks, you have a choice to make. And
Speaker 2: I'm speaking especially to those of you on the younger
Speaker 2: side are who debate this whole issue and who have
Speaker 2: put an effect all of your future eggs in the
Speaker 2: profession basket. Do you want to live life safe or
Speaker 2: do you want to live life deeply? That is one
Speaker 2: of the questions you will have to answer. I know
Speaker 2: that I have always wanted to have all of life,
Speaker 2: with its pain, with its joy. This has always been
Speaker 2: important to me. But if you want safety, if you
Speaker 2: want if you want to guarantee less hurt, then I
Speaker 2: guess don't get married. That's a guarantee. And then you
Speaker 2: can die saying well I experience less pain than others. Wow,
Speaker 2: that's really something now. But if you want to grow,
Speaker 2: if you want the intensity of life's experience, if you
Speaker 2: want to march through life with somebody at your side,
Speaker 2: doesn't mean it's guaranteed, of course not obviously, given the
Speaker 2: divorce rates, and there are a lot of people who
Speaker 2: are not divorced who are certainly unhappy in their marriages.
Speaker 2: That's a given that that's true. So so what therefore what?
Speaker 2: And to you guys who want to live the efnarian existence?
Speaker 2: You speak to the guys. You speak to the guys
Speaker 2: who do and tell me that they have a deep, rich,
Speaker 2: wonderful life. They have fun, Yeah, they have fun. I
Speaker 2: don't know how much fun. Frankly, to be perfectly honest
Speaker 2: with you, I don't know how much fun you know
Speaker 2: when you do well? What you guys? When you get
Speaker 2: involved with a woman, and especially if you sleep with her,
Speaker 2: for most women, at least those those over college age,
Speaker 2: there is there is usually a desire. Unless the woman
Speaker 2: has really squelched her nature, there is usually a desire
Speaker 2: for something more with that man. And unless you are
Speaker 2: prepared to absolutely ignore their their calls and ignore them afterwards,
Speaker 2: then there is there is. It's not exactly the most
Speaker 2: pleasant way to lead a life. Alright, Let's go to
Speaker 2: more of your calls one Aid Prager seven seven six,
Speaker 2: and we go to a Dallas and mar kello Mark
Speaker 2: Dennis Prager, Hello, good, thanks.
Speaker 5: My question is you know, from a Jewish perspective, poligamility, polygamy,
Speaker 5: was allowed in to the medieval period in the Fardika communities.
Speaker 5: It wasn't outlawed or prohibited. It was just a question
Speaker 5: of maria's contracts being modified so that the husband wouldn't
Speaker 5: taken more than one wife. Why do we today look
Speaker 5: at it as morally wrong in terms of having more
Speaker 5: than one wives?
Speaker 2: Well, I wouldn't even use the word morally wrong. But
Speaker 2: I'll tell you why it's wrong. Uh. The since you've
Speaker 2: cited the Bible itself or was and specifically the the
Speaker 2: the Hebrew Bible or the Old Testament or the Torah
Speaker 2: and the and the rest of the Tanach, the answer is,
Speaker 2: every single time there is polygamy described, Uh, it shows
Speaker 2: how terrible it is for one of the women. One
Speaker 2: is loved and one is hated. That is a common
Speaker 2: a description of the two women. And and there and
Speaker 2: that's it. It doesn't work. It doesn't work. Does is
Speaker 2: it economically beneficial? In some cases? Probably? Does it satisfy
Speaker 2: some women who otherwise would not marry and at least
Speaker 2: they they then have a chance for a child. Yes,
Speaker 2: But in terms of the way in which ultimately, if
Speaker 2: you still want to talk Bible, which is what you did,
Speaker 2: God created one woman for Adam after saying it is
Speaker 2: not good for him to be alone, by the way,
Speaker 2: not two women, by the way. That is in itself instructive.
Speaker 2: Notice it's not Adam who said it's not good for
Speaker 2: man to be alone. Men don't realize it. They often
Speaker 2: have to be told it. It's God who makes the
Speaker 2: pronouncement it's not good for man to be alone. It's
Speaker 2: not like Adam woke uple one day. You know, I
Speaker 2: need a partner. God made the announcement, and they need
Speaker 2: to be talking about Bible. Seem to keep remembering personal
Speaker 2: things to mention to you. I resume tonight for those
Speaker 2: of you in the southern California area, I resume my
Speaker 2: Bible teaching at the University of Judaism. So contact contact
Speaker 2: of the university and a joint it's the It's four
Speaker 2: four nights, four Tuesday nights. I believe it works out
Speaker 2: it and tonight is the one again. It doesn't matter
Speaker 2: if you have ever studied with me or not. Doesn't matter
Speaker 2: if you're you're religious or not religious, or what your
Speaker 2: religion is. If you are religious. So that's at the
Speaker 2: University of Judaism. Tonight begins the four wee the four
Speaker 2: Tuesday nights of this season, and let's go to what
Speaker 2: Tory a man in Mankato, Minnesota. Hello Tory, Dennis Prager.
Speaker 3: Hi Dennis.
Speaker 4: Both my wife and I Hello.
Speaker 2: Wow you know I, Oh my god, I think all shure?
Speaker 2: Are you there? Yeah? Notice every line got killed, including Torri.
Speaker 2: Every something happened to our telephone line. Every single line there.
Speaker 2: Everyone was full and everyone just got knocked off. Too bad,
Speaker 2: because I really wanted to take that. I wanted to
Speaker 2: take every one of your calls. They're coming back now,
Speaker 2: but it's I don't know how does that happen. I
Speaker 2: guess it's inevitable sometimes because it's a bank taking so
Speaker 2: many calls. Well, they're all religned to bed. I think
Speaker 2: there was about an impending divorce, and I would have
Speaker 2: loved to have been able to answer you. I'm making
Speaker 2: the case for marriage on this Ultimate Issues Hour. It
Speaker 2: is so obvious to me that with all its issues,
Speaker 2: you really have to answer. These are questions, These are
Speaker 2: ultimate questions that you folks have to answer. You folks
Speaker 2: have to answer the question of what is it you
Speaker 2: want in the final analysis out of life? Do you
Speaker 2: want a deeper life? Do you want to grow or
Speaker 2: do you want to avoid pain? Do you want as
Speaker 2: easy a life as possible? Or as rich a life
Speaker 2: as possible? These are intellectual, value based questions you must
Speaker 2: ask yourself, and depending upon those answers, that is how
Speaker 2: you will ultimately lead your life. But I'm telling you,
Speaker 2: the one thing that has always guided me is how
Speaker 2: do I want to look back at my life? Do
Speaker 2: I want to say I played it safe and as
Speaker 2: a man? Do I want to say, oh, I was
Speaker 2: with ex number of women? Wow? What an achievement. Back
Speaker 2: in a moment on The Dennis Prager Show.
Speaker 1: This episode of timeless Wisdom.
Speaker 2: We'll continue right after this.
Speaker 1: Now back to more of Dennis Prager's timeless wisdom.
Speaker 2: Don't listening to the Dennis Prager Show. The case for
Speaker 2: marriage is what I'm making on this Ultimate Issues Hour.
Speaker 2: Every week at this time I devote an hour to
Speaker 2: some ultimate issue case for marriage, and I will certainly
Speaker 2: return to it another time. But but I thought June
Speaker 2: was a perfect time to do this. How in Philadelphia,
Speaker 2: Dennis Prager, thank you for calling. Hello, How are you okay?
Speaker 2: Thank you?
Speaker 6: I The reason I called you had turned on the
Speaker 6: radio and you were talking about somebody sewing their wild
Speaker 6: oats as before they became monogamous, and I guess maybe
Speaker 6: even mentioned yourself. And it's a debate. I've had with
Speaker 6: friends in the past who have had that experience and
Speaker 6: claimed that they wouldn't have had it any other way,
Speaker 6: that in fact, they're better off for having had that
Speaker 6: experience before they settled down, and I disagree with them,
Speaker 6: But I was wondering what you thought about that.
Speaker 2: I think that it depends very much on the individual,
Speaker 2: on the type of society in which they live. There
Speaker 2: are people in closed religious societies for whom this would
Speaker 2: not be a good idea. I also believe that the
Speaker 2: act of intercourse itself should be reserved for the person
Speaker 2: that you will marry. But if I may generalize, I
Speaker 2: think that for men, I could speak for men better
Speaker 2: than for women to be able to say, when married,
Speaker 2: you know what, I really do know what variety would
Speaker 2: be like, and and I don't sit here yearning for
Speaker 2: something that I've already experienced, could be, could be, isn't
Speaker 2: necessarily but could be helpful.
Speaker 6: Do you think that someone who has had that variety
Speaker 6: And I'll acknowledge I have not married with seven children
Speaker 6: only one person. Do you think that somebody who has
Speaker 6: had that variety can honestly say that they don't continue
Speaker 6: to yearn for it.
Speaker 2: No. I think that men have a yearning for it
Speaker 2: in their nature, no matter what. But I believe that
Speaker 2: the fantasy world has diminished tremendously. To take a non
Speaker 2: sexual arena. If one has had certain foods, one doesn't
Speaker 2: wonder what does that food taste like? There still may
Speaker 2: be a yearning for that food because it's yummy, but
Speaker 2: you don't have the additional uh a fantasy of g
Speaker 2: what would it be like? And and in that regard,
Speaker 2: it could And I'm not the issue is not advocating.
Speaker 2: I'm trying to be as honest as I can in
Speaker 2: answering your question. And it could, it could help for
Speaker 2: those men. But as I said, I think the act
Speaker 2: itself and I distinguished between the act of intercourse and
Speaker 2: and and other contact between men and women. I think
Speaker 2: that should be reserved for the person that you will marry.
Speaker 2: I think there's some some some one thing and that
Speaker 2: specifically should be sacrisanct. If if to the extent that
Speaker 2: people can do that, you want to lead a deeper life,
Speaker 2: get married you want to lead a painless life, don't
Speaker 2: the Ultimate Issues hour on the Dennis Prager Show.
Speaker 1: This has been Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager. Visit Dennisprager
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