Project Inspire Convention 2026 - Rabbi Ken Spiro - "Driven"

This is a really project inspire is all about like kiru. This is a great class that I came up with years ago. Um it has to do with the Jewish personality. So first of all it's really important to understand in kiru. It's a very big as we say kap to get this to understand who Jews are all Jews religious secular this is a kind of universal idea. So, it's it's it's very it's this is very useful and I think it gives us a lot of help in understanding how we want to approach whether you're a professional or an amateur and I always say like amateurs built the ark and professionals built the Titanic. Whether you're an amateur or professional, you're dealing with a a Jewish person, whether it's you're doing a class for them or you're just trying to share something in Yiddish kite with them, it's so important to understand what I'm going to talk about now. And this class came out of my own personal experience. Um, I am, as I said earlier, I'm FFA. I'm from from Aish. I was raised reform. You know, people, my kids are all born in Israel, raised religious, speak Hebrew as their first language. It really cool. First kids in first people in my family in 20,000 years who speak Hebrew as their first language. My oldest, my oldest son asked me years ago, he said, he says, "Aba, what does it mean you weren't religious? What' you used to do Jewish?" And I said, "On pess, we used to have ham and cheese on matzah. You can't make this stuff up." I kept and he said he said he said ava why'd you bother with with the matzah I said it was peso we couldn't have bread so anyway so I ended up the whole story is very interesting I went as a graduate student university of Moscow in the Soviet Union I studied Russian for seven years and I I met Jews they were risking their lives to uh to be Jewish with no books no kosher food nothing I was so blown away I was going to go to kibbutz before going to grad school I checked into I canceled the kibbutz. I went to yeshiva was supposed to be three months. So my three months has turned into a little longer to say the least. I was I've been in a so long when I first got there Yeshua bin nun was teaching the introductory program. So they have but and and but this comes out of my own personal experience. The first question I asked noberg zala blessed memory the the roshiva in many ways the founder of the baluva movement. I said, Rabbi, I said, "Rabbi Weinberg, Rashiva, are Jews different than non-Jews?" So, I ask this audiences all the time and I ask it to audiences with Jews and non-Jews in it. So, I ask you guys, Jews different than non-Jews. Raise your hand. What do you think? So, it's funny with from audience. Everyone's going to raise their hand. >> What do you mean different? >> Ah, that's it. David asked the golden question. Different. Leave that for a second. Mo when I ask audiences and by the way Jews are religious Jews are more like yeah secular Jews like especially more liberal they're very uncomfortable with this like different it's like racism you know I say better or worse different but about 75% of the people in any class I ask will raise their hands but then the question I ask which is the much more interesting question anyone studies psychology if you're coming in now grab a there's some sheets back here source sheets grab one there's a big debate in psychology that we are we are because of it's called the nature or nurture debate. You know it's your internalness or it's your environment. So there it's a little more by the way even if we decide that Jews are somehow internally wired differently. We'll have to discuss that. There's no question environment plays a role. How do you know that? I travel I've been a speaker for literally decades. I've been all over the world. There's not a Jewish community I think I haven't been to some point of time to speak. And you see that Jews in different parts of the world, they're all Jewish, but they're different. You know, American Jews are different than British Jews. Uh, Canadian Jews are definitely different than American Jews. East Coast Jews in New York are very different from California Jews. So, there's definitely a difference here. Grab a source sheet if you're coming in. I'll put some more over here in case you want. So, there we go. I heard a very funny joke because all cultures have certain strengths and weaknesses. I heard a funny joke that illustrates this that says, "In the best of all possible worlds, the soldiers are British, the cooks are French, the lovers are Italians, and the engineers are German." And in hell, the soldiers are French, the cooks are British, the engineers are Italian, and the lovers are German. Like, no one ever went to England for food. Now, it's good because they have all these foreigners living there. And I know this being recorded. I got to be careful. But you know Fiat, the car company, you know what it stands for? Fix it again, Tony. You want a good car, you get a Porsche, you know, you got anyway, but so there's no question. But but let me ask you a second question. Who thinks if Jews assuming Jews are different, who thinks the essential difference is nature? Meaning they're internally wired differently? Who thinks it's basically a nurture thing? Your mother making you guilty because you're not a doctor, lawyer, accountant. Who doesn't want to vote? Most people. So Rabbi Weinberg, Rabbi Weineberg, who was a genius at saying very complicated things in a very simple, seemingly simple way, which he then figured out was actually quite deep. He said, he said, "Yeah, Jews are different." He said, "Every Jew inherits from great grandpa Abraham and great grandma Sarah a drive." He said, "Non-Jews could be driven, but Jews are disproportionately driven." Said, if that Jew is connected to the national historic mission of being Jewish, which is what? To connect the world to God, Keshm, he or she will try and use that drive to do that. But if not, the driver is a raw force pushing the Jew to rise to the top to be the biggest doctor, the biggest lawyer, the biggest accountant, the biggest businessman. And then he says something funny. He says when he stops driving himself, he starts driving his kids. I would actually say she drives her kids because after God, there's no question as a historian, the greatest force in Jewish history is Jewish mothers. I don't know about you, but until I get my PhD, my mother's never going to leave me alone. She said, I want Rabbi Doctor. I'm leaving money in the will. I'm going to come back and haunt you. Thank god my older brother was a surgeon. So at least one of the family is a doctor. She ended up with two sons who were rabbis and a son-in-law is a rabbi. You know what I mean? Anyway, anyway, so what Rabbi Wyberg was saying is actually something very profound. He was not the first person to ask this question. As I mentioned in my earlier class, when you quote things about Jews, never quote Jews talking about Jews because no one believes when a Jew talks about a Jew. But when the Gentile says it, oh my god, this is Kashu. So look at Mark Twain, famous American author whose real name is 10 bonus points. >> Samuel Clemens. >> 10 bonus point, David. And okay, Samuel, what's his middle name? Longhorn Clemens, who not only wrote Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer, but has seven patents for the elastic and suspenders. And if that's ever on a game show and you win like a million dollars, I want half. Okay. Anyway, what does Mark Twain say in quote number one? If statistics are right, the Jews constitute but 1% of the human race. It suggests a nebulous dimple of smoke lost in the blaze of the Milky Way. Properly, the Jew ought hardly to be heard of, but he is heard of and always been heard of. He's as prominent on the planet as any other people, and his commercial importance is extravagantly out of proportion to the smallest of his bulk. His contributions to the world's list of great names in literature, science, art, music, finance, medicine, obstruuse learning are also way out of proportion to the weakness of his numbers. He has made a marvelous fight in this world in all ages and has done it with his hands tied behind him. He's over here like I'm moving I'm moving around the room. I apologize. Here we go. He says, "All things are mortal but the Jew all their forces pass, but he remains." What is the secret of his immortality? Whoa, look who's here. My best student. My best students are here, guys. I cut it back to these smiling lovely people in the back. How you doing, guys? Interesting, right? Very interesting. He's saying, what is it? He's asking two questions. How do we outlast everyone? And what is it about the Jews that enables us so small to be so disproportionately impactful? Look at Erns Vandenhag. He's an American Dutch with the name of Vandenhag. You're either going to be an ice cream or Dutch. By the way, Hagenas was invented by a bunch of Jews who wanted to have an ice cream that didn't sound like it was from Brooklyn. Boo sales. But Van Denhog wrote a great book called The Jewish Mystique, which came out in 1969 just when Jews were really mainstreaming it into American culture. It's a really interesting book. And he asks, he says, "Asked to make a list of the men who have most dominated the thinking of the modern world, many educated people would name Freud, Einstein, Marks, and Darwin. Of these four, only Darwin was not Jewish. In a world where Jews are only a tiny percentage of the population, what is the secret of disproportionate importance the Jews have had in the history of Western culture? And there's a funny line. He said, "My just got untied." Rabbi Machi Burgerer, Rabbi friend of mine, he once asked a question. He said, he said, "Of the four most impactful people, three were Jewish and one was wrong." First of all, first of all, I don't agree with that. I I love Marvati Burgerer, but it's funny line. First of all, I'm not a big fan of Marks. Freud, I'm not so sure about Einstein's held up well. And Darwin, >> I guess in other debate, Darwin is the most religious of all of them. If you ever read the origins of species, which I seem to be the only person who actually read the book, he he's talking about God throughout the book. Why did God do it this way? Why did God do it that way? Anyway, not not a topic. But of the four people, this is already a little dated. Now, you could have like, you know, Elon Musk, and there's a lot of Jews up in that list, too. But of the four most impactful people in the last hundred years or so, that three of them are Jewish is crazy. But what Rabbi Weinberg was saying when asked to deal with the when he when I asked him the question are Jews different than non-Jews for those who came in late I just filled you in he basically said yes and the difference is internal and if you look at the great 18th century rabbi the Ramos Lutato author of great works of Jewish thought like Derk Hashem and Multilia Shahim he writes in number three the descent he talks about the 70 original nations you know it's like there's that all the nations come out of these original nations. He said the descendants of each of these were thus divided to permanent groupings, each with their own characteristics and limitations. They were destined to father future generations who would inherit these characteristics just as members of any particular species inherit the characteristics of their forebears. Okay, very interesting point he's making here. The idea was that the original nations of the world were large extended families. Interesting point by the way you think about it. Today we travel all over the world. You can in a day fly across the literally around the planet. But in the ancient world and up until relatively modern times, very recently, most people for generations were born, lived, and died in the same more or less area that their great great great great-grandparents lived in. And therefore, you had much clearer genetic connections. You don't see this in the Western world anymore because they're being overrun by first of all, America's just a giant melting pot. But if you go to Japan, you know, Japan is 99.9% ethnically pure. You cannot as a white person ever get citizenship in Japan. You can never become Japanese. You can marry a Japanese person and you get sushi all the time. It's great. You get and your kids can get Japanese citizenship because they have a Japanese parent. But in the Western world, America is the giant melting pot. But it would be if you can beam yourself back in time to the ancient world, you would meet people on the street and talk to them and you go, "Oh my god, that guy is such a Moabitete." Or like, "Stop being such an ammonite. Like what a Philistine thing to do." Which explains why in the Torah certain groups of people like Moabites, you know, why are they tainted? So what's this? Some genetic disorder, you know? No, no. It's because they're so impure in their origins and it's internal. It's passed down. But we know you guys all studied biology at some point. Everyone studied biology, you know that you do the fruitfly experiment. We did these experiments when I was in school a thousand years ago. You know, you can we you can see how traits are passed on. You can see it with it works very well in the from world by the way. I love looking you know in the western world today no one has even two kids. Do you know that mo the average number of children Israel has the highest birth rate in the developed world developing nations. There's three kids per family among secular Israelis in the average age in Israel is about 29 now. The average age in South Korea is 48. The average age in Italy is an interesting side point. Italy, Portugal, Spain, it's all 45 years old. No one has any kids. So you can't do the experiment. But you go to firm families like you go to like in Muny and you go to like the the inner part with the families where they have like 10 12 kids. I love looking daddy model, mommy model, hybrid model. That's biology, which is clearly demonstrable, your DNA. All your kids are a combination of your your your physical traits. But the Torah is saying it's the same thing, not for Jews, for everyone. That your kids will also have some manifestation of you or your spouse's personality. And that nations were one giant extended tree. So the progenitors, the people at the beginning of these people who founded these n these families that became nations, they not only have a genetic connection, which today you can still, if you do ancestry.com testing, that's what they're building these models on are common genetic signatures for different parts of the world. By the way, all Jews, you should know, have a Middle Eastern genetic hloype. Even if you're like me and you lost your melan from living in Poland for 500 years, it's interesting. And we have more I have more in common with Yakov Misrai from Dam from Damascus genetically than I have with, you know, Christian Gentile III who actually looks more like me in his skin, hair, and eye color. It's a very interesting side point, but what what what Rabbi Weinberg was saying and what the Ramal saying, what the Torah was saying is that Jews have a different internal wiring. They have traits that are unique to the Jewish, not unique to the Jewish people, but that the Jews have them, as we say, in spades, a lot more than other people. And what are the traits? So trait number one is radically transformative thinking. What? Look at Abraham. The whole world is worshiping idols. And he's basically saying, "No, you're all wrong. That's pretty radical. Jews are incredibly radically transformative." Non-Jews could be radical. Jews are disproportionately radical. What does it take to push radically transformative ideas on the world? Why was Abraham able to do? Abraham something that you know Noah couldn't do and no one else did. He had an incredible drive to stand up to the world to be willing to die for your beliefs to transform the world in such profound ways that very few people in humanity appreciate how much of the background soft operating system of humanity is is Jewish of Jewish origin. You got to be incredibly driven. So non-Jews are driven but Jews are can be dri can be driven but Jews are disproportionately driven. What's the third trait? That's the real Jewish personality. Caring. Jews are obsessed with fixing the world. Remember Aram, he had the tent with the four doors. What was that for? Like like like cross ventilation and good like light? No, he wanted to be able to invite guests in from all sides. So he got the three traits. The problem with these this stuff is however that unlike biology that you can look at through a microscope and you can see the DNA, you can't see the spiritual genetics. But statistically, it's clearly provable. Again, if you're coming in late, just grab a source sheet over there. We're focusing on our Jews different than non-Jews. For anyone coming in late, and you clearly can see this in so many ways. A couple of examples. Let's go out of order. Let's start with Jewish drive for just a minute. What percentage of America is Jewish? I'm not talking about Burough Park or sorry less than 2% of the United States is Jewish. Yet Jews make up about 10% of the professionals in the United States. About 10% of the student body and faculty of pretty much every college in the university. And before October 7th in the Ivy League schools going out of their mind, they were making up to 30% of some of the Ivy League schools. Harvard Law School's tenure professors from Dersowitz on down was 40% Jewish at one point. Now Harvard's down to 5% by the way en Roman of Jews because it's a crazy place to go. You pay $100,000 to be hated by people. But the uh now you might think that that's so this tremendous over like tremendous over representation in professions and you name it. Now if this is something that is objectively a reality because someone might say an anthropologist, oh it's just a unique uh mixture of Jews a specific period of time and a specific culture but it should work everywhere like gravity. What if I go to if I go to Australia and I drop this piece of paper, it goes up? No. If gravity works as a as a scientific rule, it'll work everywhere consistently a thousand years ago and today, any part of the world. So, let's put Jews in where my family's from, Germany. My family's from Spire in Germany. So, go to Germany. Go a thousand years ago to the city of Shpire. Bishop Rutiger of Spire. He writes, "Wishing to invite, wishing to make Spire into a city, I invited in Jews." You think the bishop of Shpire a thousand years ago liked Jews? No. He hated Jews. But he knew that Jews were such a dynamic force for change. If I could just get a couple hundred to move in, I'll turn this town into a city and build a cathedral, which is what happened. Of course, then he then the Jews got expelled and invited back in. Expelled and invited back in. They can't live with us. They can't live without us. But that's a separate discussion. Go to Germany pre-Holocaust. Okay. Jews are like like let's say 2% of America. What percentage of Germany's Jewish preholocaust? 610 of 1%. But they're the same 10% of doctors, lawyers, accountants, just like in Germany. Same 10% of everything. And they own 70% of the retail stores in Germany. You know that joke, why did God create Gentiles? Someone had to buy retail. So we see what's the prize given by the guy who invented TNT from Sweden who didn't want to be known for just dynamite. Nobel. >> Alfred Nobel. What percentage of the world is Jewish? By the way, it's an interesting thing. I used to I've been I used to fly, you know, a lot more than I do today, but I would fly 70 80 times a year on flights. Sometimes 14 times in 10, 12 days I'd be on flights. And I'm super extrovert. So I always talk to people sitting next to me. I love asking them how many Jews you think there are in the world. It's not the first question I ask when they sit down. Otherwise, they ask to have their seat changed. But the numbers they give are hysterical. Like I've had at least three dozen people tell me there's many Jews as Chinese and twothirds of them are Asians by the way. But it goes exactly to this point. Exact this point. What percentage of the world is Jewish? It's not three, you know, 1.5 billion people. 2% of the world's population. Nobel prizes. What percentage of Nobel prizes should Jews have being 2% of the world's population? 2%. Look at quote number four. At least 221 Jews and people of half and 3/4 Jewish ancestry have been awarded the Nobel Prize, accounting for 22% of all individual recipients worldwide between 1901 and 2025. That is 11,500% more than we should have. That is crazy. Jews have 24% of the fields medal in mathematics. They're like 25% of the Forbes list of the wealthiest people on the planet. You know, like out of the top 10 wealthy people, like five of them are Jewish. I'm not saying this to brag. Jews can also do bad stuff. We'll talk about the point is, my friends, we cannot see Jewish drive under a microscope like we can see Jewish DNA. But you can clearly see wherever you look at any period of time, Jews are incredibly driven people. Like I told you, I love quotes about non-Jews talking about Jews. I have a book called What Did They Think of the Jew? It's this giant book. Some of these people are super famous. Some of these people you never heard of. It's amazing how they all kind of see the same thing. So this is this look at look at what Gerta the famous German writer writes at quote number five. It's such a good quote. He says energy is the basis of everything. Every Jew no matter how insignificant is engaged in some immediate and some decisive and immediate pursuit of a goal. It is the most perpetual people of the earth. We should get like a t-shirt with that on it. You know, Jewish people always in motion. Jews never sitting still. It's unbelievable. I travel all over the world and I go to places like South Africa and Mexico. I'm always in awe. You can go to countries where literally there are endless numbers of people pretty much sitting and doing nothing. I mean, thankfully they're not they're happy with very little, but like sitting under a piece of cardboard on the side of a street all day long. You know, it's like wild. I said Jews don't ever no Jew be doing that. He'd be building like a whole cardboard city. He'd put in like a pool. He'd be like renting them out. He would be like, my favorite quote is number six. This is Erns von. This is this is Erns Jones who is uh a British psychoanalyst from the mid- 20th centuries. I love this quote. He says, "Whatever other qualities Jews may possess, likable reverse, no one who knows them well can deny that they are personally interesting. By that I mean especially alive alert, quick at comprehending people and events and making pungent and witty comments on them. One might at time find their rather hot house family atmosphere with its intensities and frictions somewhat trying. But one could be sure of never being bored. That my friends is the single best description of Israel I have ever read because I mean I've lived in Israel literally for for 44 years. I I was raised in America but I've lived in Israel most of my life. And uh what are Israelis? Israelis are unfiltered Jews. Remember I talked about the beginning like if you if you if you any Canadians here like in in Toronto the number the number one word out of all Canadians mouth especially in Toronto is sorry because you live in Toronto you pick up the can Canadians are British people just without the accent you know I always say South Africans are British people with good food and good weather you know any any British people here I'm in trouble now okay sorry no seriously so the um but Israelis are unfiltered they're not living among amongst a larger culture and absorbing the culture of the area in which they live. When I'm teaching this class in Israel to like new guys who are coming and off the street or coming to study for a like we get all these new guys who don't know anything about Judaism, they come to this program called foundations. I say, "Guys, I'm going to give you like a an empirical homework assignment here. You got to do it quickly because after a while you get used to it. It's like when you live, you come to Israel the first night and you're in Jerusalem and 3:00 in the morning, you know, Allah and you're like, you like think there's a jihad going outside your bedroom and two weeks later you don't even notice it anymore because you get used to it like living next to the L in New York. You don't notice the trains going by. So I said, before you get you you get used to this, notice in Israel that the horn and the gas pedal seem to be connected. And I'm driving. I'm I'm back in this is the longest I've been in America since 1982 and I'm driving in Monte. I'm like don't honk. Don't honk. Don't honk. It's like my mantra. Don't honk. Don't honk. I use my horn more in one day in Israel than I've used in like six months driving here. It's incredible. Notice that the colors on a traffic light seem to be red honk green. Notice that please excuse me and thank you do exist in the Hebrew language but are actually rarely used. You know, we married my my my my middle daughter. My first kid married my middle daughter. At 19, she gets married. And she married a nice Yemenite boy. It's great. We mixed up the gene pool. I now have like Latino looking granddaughters who are great. They tan. I just burn. But we had 720 people at the wedding cuz he had 300 and something cousins. And and we had we're like angels. We have to we have to do thank you notes. You know, we could not find a thank you note in Israel. We went into the biggest station Kravitz in Jerusalem and we said we want thank and the guy says no. We printed our own. We printed our own. No, but the pushing the shoving, you know, LL's, you know what LL's motto is? It's not it's not an airline. It's Israel. It is. Which is why before you come to Israel, you should only take LL because it it prepares you for getting to Israel. You know, it's like 400 Jews crushed into a small space with a flight attendants giving you advice. But I once flew from like Israel to to Kendi airport, changed planes, and flew to Indianapolis, Indiana, the Midwest, which is really nice. Everyone in the Midwest is chilled, you know. And I'm standing in the parking lot waiting to be picked up. And I'm like, Gentiles, it's like a relaxation mantra. I'm not saying anything negative about non. My blood pressure goes down 30 points when I leave Israel because it's all these crazy unfiltered juice. So we see the drive. It's there. The energy is crazy. What's what's the most off-re repeated negative trait? Because this none of this stuff is necessarily it can be good. It can be very bad. The seats up here if you want by the way you want come. What's the most off-re repeated criticism that God says about us in the Bible? Yeah. >> Where what >> 10 points for what's your name? something tie with David over here. Okay, that's so look at the midrashmot rabba quote number seven. What is meant by saying Jews are a stiff necked people? Ravyakim said there are three who are inherently that word is so Jewish most non-Jews can't even say it. You ever noticed that you work with non-Jews they can't say they can't say for sure they can't say and they definitely can't say but they have it's unbelievable they just can't get the sound out but what does mean? What does it mean to be? Audacity, nerve, spunk, gumption. It says there are three who are inherently the dog amongst the animals, the rooster amongst the birds, the Jew amongst the nations. Then it go what it says now very insightful. You might think this is something negative, but it's really praise. It means that the Jew would rather be hanged than give up his Judaism. Rav Abin said, he's saying this like 2,000 years ago, you know, to this very day in diaspora, Jews are called stiff necked. Like I said earlier, to outlast the greatest empires, to transform the world, to stand up against all of world opinion, like everyone against us and transform the world, you got to be really stiff necked. But what's the negative side? It's a double-edged sword. It's enabled us to accomplish our mission. It's what Aram needed to create the the outreach team called the Jewish people before Project Inspire. What's the negative side of being self-sift neck? It makes for an incredibly fractious people who is impossible to unify. I'm a history guy. I love all of world history. And I'll tell you that the toughest job in the world is leading the Jewish people. Jewish leaders in the Tanakh who would have been the greatest leaders had they let anywhere led anywhere else. We we chew them up and spit them out. And Jewish Schumer really reflects this. So there's some stories like one this one maybe apocrypha fall. I'm not sure. But it's a conversation supposedly took place between Harry Truman and David Bengurian when when Truman was the president after Roosevelt died. who was the one who backed the founding of the state. And Truman says to Benguran, "You have no idea what it's like to be the president of a country of 180 million people." And Benuran says, "You're right, but you have no idea what it's like to be the prime minister of a country of 1.8 million prime ministers." Because, you know, in the first Israel election, there was 16 political parties. There was like eight Jews in the country. Last election, like 40 part, every Jew should have his own party just in negotiating, you know, it's like ridiculous. It's unbelievable the fractiousness. And the Jewish Jew, remember the joke about the Jew gets stranded on the desert island and they come to rescue him and he's built two synagogues. He's giving him a tour. This is the one I do in I never go on that one. But real life is stranger than fiction. When the US Army went into Kabell, Afghanistan after 9/11, and this is still on CNN's website. You can see it. Afghanistan used to have like 25,000 Jews there. Now there's two Jews left in Kabell in 20ou in 2001 of it. And they find the last two Jews the first night of Hanukkah, the non-Jewish CNN reporter on either side of the synagogue writing monoras and not speaking to each other. One is named Simmonto, the other one is named Levy. And and the reporter who's a non-Jew, he re this is crazy. Last two Jews in the country. He goes to he goes to uh he goes to Ley. Simov is still around. Ley passed away. He goes to Ley and he asks him he goes, "You're the last two Jews in the country. Can't you light them and Nora together?" And Ley says, "I'm 70 years old. I've lived through everything. I've lived with the Muslims. I've lived through the Soviet invasion. I've lived through the Taliban. I've lived through the US invasion. But that guy Simmonto, he's evil. They fought so much. The Taliban arrested them and threw them in prison. They fought so much in prison. The Taliban couldn't stand it and threw them out of prison. You can't make this stuff up. But this is the Jewish personality. So it's it's it's the one but this is so important for us to recognize again as professional cur people or just the amateurs doing it unifying the Jewish we are so fractious which is great it also makes us challenge ideas you know like learning that's what that's the whole yeshiva system of learning gamorra kusa you argue back and forth it's funny years ago I took a Korean you know in Korea they learn gamora they have this like watered down Korean like gamora thing and I took a Korean TV crew to Asa tora and I showed them around and I said to them I said, "You know, guys, I I like you guys. Koreans are really like nice. You make good smartphones." Um, but I said, "You got to understand something. You think you're going to get like become like Jews and be all successful if you like have learn Gamora." I said, "No, the Gomorrah is the byproduct of of the Yiddish aup. It's the Jewish mind." I said, "You guys, Asians are really great, but you guys are really conformist. They're not into arguing. They're into like listening and obeying." I said, "You got to first start thinking like Jews. Then you could write your own like version of it, your own." But this is the Jewish personality. So that's the there's the drive, there's the fractiousness, but let's look at the radical stuff. So go back to Vandenhog, the American Dutch sociologist. Look at quote number eight. It's another really insightful quote. He says, "Of all groups, Jews are most prone to expectation of radical change. Although very few Jews are radicals, very many radicals are Jews. Out of 100 Jews, five may be radicals, but of 10 radicals, five are likely to be Jewish. What attracts them so disproportionately to radical causes? The late great Jonathan Saxs, Lord, Rabbi, Doctor. His mother was like so happy. All the titles, it was actually Rabbi, Lord Doctor, I think. Um, he wrote a great book. It was a wedding present for his oldest son when he got married called Radical Then, Radical Now. This is the This is Amrainu. Think outside the box. I don't care if the whole world, you know, there's a great line. Who read 1984? What a what a George Orwell. What a great book. And he was a socialist and he saw the danger of totalitarianism. I'm paraphrasing him, but there's this one guy who's the one freethinking guy left in a brainwashed totalitarian state. And he has a line which is so like Abraham. It's not in the it's not in the Bible, but it should be. He says there are truths and there are untruths. And just because you're in a minority of one doesn't make you wrong. That's the Jewish people. So we're always radical. We're always pushing the envelope looking for which is why you put a Jew in any situation always find some something to do some way to whether it's in in business you name it but especially when it comes to things like politics like communism and socialism which are almost are secular religions for Jews when I was growing up you hit 18 thou shalt vote Democrat was one of like the 10th 11th commandment you got to become a registered Democrat no why are Jews so inclined uniquely so by the way that they stay loyal to the party. I have a whole class just on Jewish political. It's a very dangerous class to teach today. But it's interesting that sociologists point out Jews are the only people who don't vote with their pocketbook. They came in at the bottom as immigrants a 100red years ago like in the sweat shops. So they went for the Democrats because they were the labor parties and the workers and but then they became within two generations the highest income earning bracket in America. Yet they still say more loyal to the Democratic party than almost any group of people in the United States. A so an anthropologist wrote he goes Jews he says they earn like Episcopalians but they vote like Puerto Ricans. So it's but this is because we're very idealistic. Jews are the only people in the world who think it's it's selfish to think about yourself in any way without putting someone else before you. But Jews because Abraham what was Aram all about? He was the ultimate top- down person. What was Abraham's ultimate top down solution for humanity? What's the ultimate top down solution? bring Hashem into the world and the values that come from Hashem and the rules and the whole worldview. But when Jews left and Jonathan Sax has a great quote on this. He says when Jews leave left God behind which a lot of them doing unfortunately they went and created a form of government that put government in the place of God. What's socialism all about? Top down cradle to grave. We'll take care of everything. Jews love this idea. You got to take care of the world. They're obsessed with this. But it but it's really really interesting. Look at what Edmund Wilson who's an American uh social thinker literary critic from the mid- 20th century writes in quote number nine. He says the Jew lends himself easily to communism because it is enables him to devote himself to a high cause involving all of humanity characteristics which are natural to him as a Jew. You see this is the non-Jew saying it. It is natural in the Jewish personality. has nothing to do with going to yeshiva and learning about the mitzvah. It's in the spiritual DNA of the Jewish people that anything that involves holistically dealing with the world to try and make it a better place, Jews are going to obsess on it. Which brings me to the third part which is really interesting which is the third attribute that Avar has the spiritual genetics which is that Jews care. Take any cause to make the world a better place. Any political ideology you could think of in the last 150 years. Communism, socialism, feminism, black civil rights, anti-aparttheide, doctors without borders, amnest international, human rights watch, you name it. If it isn't founded by a Jew, and it almost always is, it's going to be run by Jews. Because nothing gets a Yid, even one with no Jewish education of any kind, more excited than fixing the wall. Which is why in 2012 when they did a Pew Research study, you know, they it's an associative study. I say a word to you and you have the first thing come out of your mouth. Like 10 years old, they said the word Jew to Jews and the first word out of their mouth was holocaust, which is really sad. Like that's what you think of when you hear the word Jew. So by fast forward like a decade later, 52% of Jews answered what talking about Jews. No commitment to social justice. Tikkun, the most misunderstood word that everyone loves to use. Tikun. Tikum. Tikun. I love it. Now, so come to my presentation tomorrow. They That's the best one of all of them. That was my mother making me say that. No, but seriously, Tikinum is very much a part of the Jewish worldview. But of course, we know it comes from the ta, you know, gods in the but Jews are so dedicated to constantly trying to fix the world. The best way I heard it said is Jews for every ism but Judaism. And by the way, it goes for sadly for Saddak, you know, there there's this there's this canard out there. It's not true that Jews are cheap. Jews are not Jews are the most generous people. I'm not just talking about hessid within Jewish communer. Go to any building in New York. Everything is like the I you go to the Metropolitan Museum of Art or anything. It's the Schwarz Pavilion, the Goldberg building, the this, the that. It's unbelievable. I saw a statistic years ago that Jews gave who were 2% of the United States. They gave 25% of all mega gifts of $10 million and above the United States to the tune of $3.6 $6 billion dollars of charity in 10 years, of which 94% of it went to non-Jewish causes. You know, it's a joke, but it's not a joke. What's the number one form of birth control in the Orthodox Jewish world? Day school tuition. No, seriously. You got to make a $100,000 after taxes to pay for four kids in school. I think it's New York. It's much more than that now, probably. I don't know what it is. I didn't Thank God I edit my ed educated my kids in Isra. It was free. But but there's enough money floating around the Jewish world to give every Jew an excellent free education. But because these are Jews who just care about the world and want to fix it, but don't realize the importance of having the Torah worldview and and and putting it into educating Jews for Judaism that are the best role models for humanity when they get it right. So it goes for everything else. So you can see this no matter but it explains so much when we're dealing with our fellow Jews. We're talking about Kiru here, bringing Jews close to you. You have to recognize that any Jew, even people like Bernie Sanders, the guy is so he's like one of the most anti-Israel people in in Washington, but he's so Jewish. He really is. But he just has the all the wrong software. It's unbelievable. Look what Winston Churchill, Winston Churchill actually, but before I get to Winston Churchill, you should know that this stuff can be also negative. Besides creating things like communism which is the worst political economic system ever thought up in human history which has led to the estimate led to estimated 100 million people being killed in the 20th century. When Jews if Jews are radical driven they can use that drive in the wrong way in very bad ways. Jews can do great good and big bad. And you see this all over the place in so many different things. Unfortunately, you look at you look at um organized crime. Like who organized organized crime? This this building has a speak easy in it, an illegal bar. That's the Volstat ad. Jews Jews got into organized crime. Myer Lansky. Crime didn't get organized by Italians. Only when Myer Lansky teamed up with Lucky Luciano, the the Sicilian did crime crime get organized. And then Jews invent a crime syndicate called Murder Incorporated to write the bullets off as a tax deduction. But Sam Bankman Freed, Bernie Maidoff, the most appropriate name criminal in the world. He made off with 65 billion dollars in a Ponzi scam. Jeffrey Epstein, you know that we need like a Smith committee. We get hated for so much stuff that we didn't do. We need these guys with these really obvious Jewish names doing horrendously bad things so they have more reasons to come after us. But it's not necessarily always something that's going to be good. Look what Winston Churchill says in quote number 10. And he liked Jews. and he was a big supporter of Zionism. He said some people like Jews and some people don't but no thoughtful man can deny the fact that they are beyond any question the most formidable and the most remarkable race which has appeared in this world. Now I said now some of you who was at my class earlier today I did why the Jews okay so one two a quote from here sometimes the people that hate us the most get us the best and Adolf Hitler is probably the best example of this people say how could you quote Hitler about what he says about Jews generally we don't quote anti-semmites talking about us because they're just they're just mouththing nonsense but I guess you should have come to the class earlier you can watch it on my website if you want listen to the podcast but uh look what Hitler says and he really nails it quote 11. If only one country for whatever reason tolerates a Jewish family in it, that family will become the germ center. The bells and heart is the German word for basilicus. I said Jews are super spreaders for fresh sedition. Look what he says now. If one little Jewish boy survives without any Jewish education with no synagogue and no Hebrew school, it's in his soul. Even if there had never been a synagogue or a Jewish school or the Old Testament, the Jewish spirit would still exist and exert its influence. It has been there from the very beginning. And there is no Jew, not a single one, who does not personify it. That is wild. But he is he's exactly right. Every yid has this unique Jewish soul. And they they have these traits. Remember, non-Jews can have it. Like I said before, they can be driven. They can be radical. They can care. But Jews disproportionately. I'm telling you, my friends, put this running as a background program in your brain. When you deal with Jews, you will see this is so true of the Jewish personality. And it gives us a great insight into how we have to deal with Jews, especially when we're talking about Kirub and the great challenge of unifying the Jewish world. I'm not just talking about religious and secular. I love when people say orthodox Jews as if that's like one giant group of people who get along and agree on everything. The most fractious part of the Jewish world is or there's so many different like there's different versions of secular Jews. Like what kind of pork they eat? What I No, seriously. It's the Orthodox world can be very fractious. Also, it's a it's a Jewish trait that transcends everything. We see it everywhere. But to go back to the story, I began with my own personal journey coming from not being from growing up in the north end of Nurishelle, which was so Jewish we called it Je Rochelle. My elementary school was the first bus school in the United States where they brought black kids from the south end of Nurishelle to the north end. We had like four or five black kids in the school. And the school, the school was literally like 95% Jewish. And then my parents who I told said weren't religious. Uh but they were very culturally Jewish. They weren't the slightest religious. And and so all our friends, my whole social circ was always Jews. We had the Jewish mitzvah of secular Judaism. New York Times with bagels, locks, and cream cheese on Sunday morning. Things like that. Thou shalt have Chinese food on on cracksmith day and thing. All these things you have to do these mitzvah. But when I got to junior high school, my best friend was a Japanese American kid named David Nakagawa, whose parents were very upset with me because I learned Japanese and he didn't. And then when I got to college, my best friend in college was a son of a Lutheran minister from upstate New York, Colden, New York, who had three sisters named Faith, Hope, and Charity, who had never met a Jew in his life and ends up rooming with three of them in Vasser. And he still likes Jews. Unbelievable. It was pretty intense taking this guy from upstate New York and sticking him with David Bernstein, me and Cliff Wtel. But that's before I went off to Yeshiva. So I go off to Yeshiva for what I thought would be three months. I come back for a quick visit to America now basically committed to being a Sha Mashabus. I come home. This is a very dangerous period of time. I'm 22 years old. I'm a flaming balcha. I call this the Shiite phase of being a balcha. It's very dangerous phase where you're shuckling constantly because you see that's what they do. You are doing a lot of thumb moves. You're saying things in a singong way and you're a little fanatic when it comes to halaka like you want to napom your mother's refrigerator. But I was pretty good. I actually was reasonably good. But I'm also super social like I said before. So I had a little get together. This is I'd spend a half a year in the Soviet Union and then I'd spent like four months in Israel. and and uh I get together about a dozen of my friends, half Jews, half non-Jews, some from high school, most from college, just to get together and everyone and it's amazing. You could cut the room like a knife. First of all, everyone else but but myself are talking about because they're all 22 or 23. Everyone's talking about their their graduate school, their job, their boyfriend, their girlfriend, their stuff. I'm like, I'm on fire. Remember, he's lit me up. I'm like, you know, Messiah, redemption, fix the world, bring the world back to God. I'm like, you could slice the room like a knife. And this is where you have to pay attention because this is where it becomes very relevant to why we're all here on this weekend. How do you think my my Jewish friends are responding to me ranting about the Jewish responsibility in the world? >> Yeah. Now, when I'm not to make when I'm speaking, I'm looking at everyone. I can see and you guys are all paying attention. It's good. I like it. But they have But I can see people getting fidgety, the body language, the defensive, you know, crossing start playing with their paper. I can always tell people getting ready to leave that they start they give cues off like a minute or two before all my Jewish friends were arms crossed 45 bless you 45 degree angle away looking like they're about to bolt and you think John Frenzel my Lutheran friend was behaving he was leaning in I am not exaggerating I had to talk him out of getting on a plane he wanted to come to Israel and convert and be Jewish had more blondes than the Jewish people like an Aryan you know total German but why Why? That's why why do you think why how what was going on in the background program of the Jew of every Yid >> relevant fight or flight relevant every Jewish soul knows this is relevant on some level the non-Jew you know there's a famous expression God less the one who's who is commanded to do something gets a bigger scar I always say the best example were teenagers like you can ask your teenage take out the garbage and they act like not any teenagers in this room I'm sure you're all very nice and good kid But you know they act like you're like trying to remove their spleen with a chainsaw. Like how? But then once it'll happen something ru I say rush your kid will volunteer to take the garbage out and you'll be so shocked. You don't even know to reply like what do you mean you're volunteering? But when you don't ask them they want to do it. When you ask them that's the human nature when you're told to do something. Every Jew knows this but why is this relevant to us? This is so important when we're doing kiru whether it's in a formal or informal situation. The reason why all my Jewish friends wanted to flee was I was leaning into them. I wasn't going after them. Yeah, you got to go to yeshiva, but they all knew it because I was preaching to them, you know, and they were like, "This is and this guy's from Mars." They never heard any of this stuff before. My non-Jewish friends, they knew it wasn't relevant, so they could just take it and it was cool and you're doing your cultural ethnic thing, Ken. That's great. When we're when we're dealing with our fellow Jews, we have to recognize every Jewish soul wants to be fed. They really want this stuff. But you know the laws of physics, for every action there is an >> equal and opposite reaction. If you push on a Jew, they will push back. Which is why I say if you want to get a Kiru movement going, let's get the Congress to outlaw Torah. You're not allowed to learn. Suddenly every yeshiva like BMG will have like a 100,000 students within a week. Like everyone will be down in Lakewood. We got to join. Nothing nothing gets a Jew going than telling you can't do something. But we have to remember when we're dealing with our fellow Jews, we have to do it with love and idea that I'm doing this because I care about you. Like you heard people saying this in this weekend. You have to show a person that you care. People are very quick also with kids if they're having issues. Kids are really quick to pick up on you just want me to do that because you want me to be from people have to really appreciate that you care about them. That's so important. But if you do it in the right way, you do it gently, you do it with love, you do it non-judgmentally, you can change a person's life. I just want to share one anecdote I heard from a Sparty guy who lived in Bkharin quarter in is in uh in Jerusalem. He said into this neighborhood, we'll end in a minute. Into this neighborhood, moved in this organized crime guy, sparty crime guy into the Bkharan quarter, like a dangerous guy. There's a couple of these families everyone knows about. Most of them Moroccans, but they uh and and they weren't religious. And it's a very religious neighborhood. So he said, "My father told me," he said, "don't you dare," because sometimes the kids are nasty. They start teasing this guy's kids or something. "Don't you dare say a word to this people. He's dangerous." But every Arab Shabas, he would sneak over to the guy's house and put a bottle of wine and two halas at his door. And he did this for weeks and weeks and weeks. He didn't want to see the guy. The guy was like a really dangerous guy. And one day the guy catches him doing it because he never saw him doing it. He's always sneaking in and doing it and he's freaking out. And the guy says he says, "Thank you. Would would you take me to shul and he's farting ally by the way non-observant even though they're not religious. They're all totally you know they have the the muna that the Ashkanazi world they really have it." And he went it's he told the story like very way of telling stories very took 20 minutes to tell the story. was beautiful and the guys from today's raising a family and it was all done with no coercion just I care about you it's shabas have a bottle of wine and two kalot we have coming up soon subtle hint but it's so important we got to recognize that every one of our fellow we are responsible for them that is so important and every Jew wants this and project inspire by the way has a lot of great ways like schlakmanas of doing in a gentle way to reach out to try and take that little teeny flame that teeny little teeny any flame and turn it into a big flame. And believe me, trust me, I've been in Kiru now for decades. It is unbelievable how you can transform human beings. The world today, the biggest problem in the world today is lack of clarity. The world is nuts and lack of role models. Who the world looks to for role models? Athletes, actresses, musicians. These are the worst role models for the planet Earth. I don't want to hear what an actor has to say about morality, you know, like give me a break. But they're all like shooting their mouths off on social media. We are supposed to be humanity's, you know, role models. We're the ones who have the unique connection to this boro. We're the ones who have the system that you can't improve on that we're supposed to be teaching the world. Not by converting the world, not by conquering the world. You make it very hard to convert. And the only Jewish empire in history has been Hollywood and possibly the atomic bomb. But it's a creation of Jews and not a source of Jewish values, Hollywood. But by doing what we're supposed to do as Jews and focusing on hyper awareness of living in a way that is akish to Hashem and being so aware of how our fellow Jews look at us and the world in general, it's a tremendous opportunity to do little things and make a big difference. Like that old saying, trifles make perfection, but perfection is no trifle. So we have to up our game and be hyperfocused on our benad mitzvot and balance all of our we're taking on benad with those and how they're going to affect people. We have to be twice as careful. What comes out of our mouth is what we put in our mouth. But we have to go on the offense today in a world today that does not have role models. It is our job to be to demonstrate the world how you do it well. You all heard the expression imitation is the highest form of flattery. That's the shortest class you ever got on Christianity and liberal democracy. If it wasn't for the Jewish people doing it, often in the worst situations better than anyone else, and that's my presentation tomorrow, World Perfect. The world would not be here today. But we got a lot of work to do. And we have to recognize that the world needs role models and Jews for Judaism, a balanced yid with Torah software. We're the hardware. We got the drive. We got the radical thinking. We want to make the world a better place, but we're like a rocket ship. And a rocket ship is a very neutral. It's the largest m man-made machine probably. And it can do great good. It can launch a communication satellite or NASA's preparing to send some people to the moon again. They'll find a B kabadat up there when they get there. Or it could launch a nuclear weapon like our good friends in Iran. That was sarcasm. Okay. A rocket ship needs a payload. A rocket ship needs a guidance system. A rocket ship needs fuel. And happens to be there's one commodity in cla that serves as both. All three. What is that? It's the Torah. It's the Torah and the mitzvah. First of all, it's it's the it's the rocket fuel. Because when Jews leave Judaism behind, undebatable fact, they're no longer Jewish. Within a few generations, you're not speaking Shabbat. A couple generations got Khalil. They married out. Okay. It's also the It's also the guidance system. Where are they going to use that drive? Are they going to start open up a soup kitchen for stray pigeons in Central Park or do something truly meaningful to change the world? Not there's anything wrong with animal rights, but it's got to have limits and you got to have your priorities straight. And it's also the payload. It's what we're supposed to deliver. And what we're supposed to deliver is the system from the aister, the big guy upstairs. You can't improve on that. And it's only by living and acting away. Not by converting, not by forcing. Doing that. Jews for Judaism make the best role models on the planet earth. The Talmud and Bates says, "If Jews didn't have Torah, they destroy the world." And unfortunately, you see that when Jews, like I said, go bad. They go big bad. But look what Rashi says when commenting on the Tommed and Ba. It's quote 12, page 25B. He says, "The Torah is given to Jews because they're overly aggressive. And the Torah serves to moderate their energy and to subdue their heart." It's kind of like spiritual Prozac for the Jewish people. It calms us down, enables us to think and direct our energy in the right direction. And that's what we need to be doing now in a world that is rocking out of control. Jews for Judies, the best role models in the world. I want to just end with a great quote which is from the Tikuni Zohar. It's quote 13. You should put this on your refrigerator. It's the best. Such a beautiful quote. It says, "Torah is like oil in a lamp and Israel is its wick, causing the light of God to shine forth on all creation. And we should dive in that we have a Jewish people that it puts stops focusing on what separates us but what unites us as a people because God knows the non-Jews when they come after us they don't care what kind of yid you are you know Ashkanazi farty reformed conservative orthodox they all look at us the same way that's what we see after October 7th we should we should have some Jewish unity and this is what project inspire is all about we need the productivity every one of us needs doing little things we can make a big difference and if we make that big difference we can push it over the edge you know like it says inahu it says I will hasten in its time we need to hasten the redemption the world needs us let's hope that starting with us here that we have that proactivity and the clarity and we bring Msiah soon and then the world will stop fighting us they will line up behind us and they'll ask us please show us how to do it because we know you guys have the system we should be z to see that soon in our days and thank you very much and everyone should have a good by the way I have but even the old website has a lot of content if anyone would like a card, my business card for the website address or anything, you're welcome to get it from me. And I'm going to have some of my crash course in Jewish history books later tonight if anyone wants. I know everyone got a copy of one of my books. Thanks too. Can I mention? Okay.