From Dennis Prager’s eleventh lecture on Deuteronomy (2003):
Dennis: “When people say ‘Jews’, nobody yawns.”
Deut: 6:20: “If your child asks you tomorrow, saying, ‘What are the testimonies and the decrees and the ordinances that HaShem, our God, commanded you?”
Asking questions is a Jewish mentality. “At yeshiva we were taught to ask questions. Often the rabbis didn’t have answers. I have friends who grew up in other faiths and they were not encouraged to ask questions.”
“Moses is instructing every Jewish generation that will ever live how to answer your child – how come we keep kosher? How come we keep Shabbos? Because God took us out of Egypt.”
Reading aloud different translations of the Torah, Dennis says: “The Jewish commentators don’t like the word ‘fear’. The Orthodox can live with it. The non-Orthodox don’t like it. The Christians are OK with it. But the Hebrew word is ‘fear.’ It doesn’t mean scared. If God created the world and judges everything, He is worth fearing.”
“It’s OK for children to ask questions. The Torah assumes your child will ask you questions. Notice it doesn’t say, keep quiet and do them. This sets a tone. Parents, you owe your children explanations. So many parents think you just tell your kids to do it. It says to give a reason.”
“Judaism forgot to give rational answers over thousands of years. When people do something over and over, it becomes tradition. The Hebrew word for tradition, ‘minhag’ spelled backwards is ‘Gahnim’ (hell).”
