The Jordan B. Peterson Podcast - What Moses Reveals About Your Life

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00:01:23.300 The question I wanted to address tonight is, or that I'm going to address tonight, is

00:01:30.400 what's the story of, what is and should be the story of your life?

00:01:41.820 The first part of addressing that question, I suppose, is why a story?

00:01:48.500 Why the story of your life?

00:01:50.500 well i think it's because i think it's because life is a story

00:01:55.660 and that's a strange idea that life is a story because you could say

00:02:04.080 you tell a story about life that's different than saying life is a story but if you wanted to

00:02:10.940 represent life and you wanted to do that most accurately and you had to do that with a story

00:02:18.480 which is what we do

00:02:20.440 when we try to represent life

00:02:22.400 then

00:02:24.020 why wouldn't you conclude that

00:02:26.540 since the story

00:02:28.540 is the most accurate

00:02:29.720 interesting and memorable

00:02:32.800 way of representing life

00:02:34.400 why would you conclude anything

00:02:35.880 other than

00:02:37.240 life's a story

00:02:39.720 and

00:02:41.600 and it is a story

00:02:46.800 and

00:02:47.300 And that's a very different view than life, let's say, in a dead material world of automatons

00:02:57.180 and creatures that are deterministic in their movement forward.

00:03:02.660 A story is a romance or a story is an adventure.

00:03:06.040 A story is something that has a deep, intrinsic meaning.

00:03:09.640 Or it's not much of a story.

00:03:11.340 And you go to a movie, you go to a story, you go to a movie, you watch a book, and if it's not engaging, it doesn't attract your attention, and bring you along, it's not much of a story.

00:03:38.200 And what that seems to indicate is that it's not a very accurate representation of life.

00:03:42.500 Because why would you be bored or disenchanted or disengaged

00:03:50.200 when you're being told or watching or acting out a poor story

00:03:57.700 if that wasn't a deviation from the ideal that you're actually hoping to experience?

00:04:02.900 right and so life is a story and stories vary in their quality and we have an instinct for

00:04:11.280 assessment of that variation and that instinct is really whether or not we find the story meaningful

00:04:17.100 and engaging and so that also implies that the proper story of your life would be one that's

00:04:23.000 meaningful and engaging now i i realized something a long time ago this is a matter of definition

00:04:29.920 And so in some ways it's a matter of faith. 0.97

00:04:33.140 Like so many things are in life, you're an ignorant creature and there are limits to your knowledge. 0.98

00:04:40.400 It means you have to put a stake in the sand somewhere. 0.97

00:04:43.200 You have to decide what you're going to regard as real and act in relationship with and as if it's real.

00:04:55.520 And we're enjoined by the reductionist materialist types, the enlightenment types particularly, to assume that life in the dead deterministic world of atoms, let's say, is meaningless in its essence with an overlay of meaning on top of it,

00:05:17.560 which is our arbitrary way of dealing with the hopelessness of our fate

00:05:21.780 on this insignificant planet in a third-rate solar system

00:05:27.060 on the edge of one galaxy among trillions.

00:05:30.160 That is a way of looking at the world,

00:05:32.160 but it's not a very interesting or productive way of looking at the world,

00:05:37.420 and it tends to produce a certain kind of bitter hopelessness,

00:05:42.140 and that could well be an indication that there's something a little off-kilter about it.

00:05:46.940 you can start from a different perspective

00:05:49.360 and this is a more

00:05:51.420 religious perspective although there are

00:05:53.320 also philosophical schools that

00:05:55.340 adopt it and you could make the case that

00:05:57.280 no what's really

00:05:59.340 what's real in its

00:06:01.120 most fundamental essence is

00:06:03.220 what motivates you

00:06:05.540 what

00:06:05.880 what interests you

00:06:09.660 what you find

00:06:11.420 deeply meaningful

00:06:12.360 real is a matter of definition in many ways i mean i mean you pay for the definition it's

00:06:21.300 not like there's not consequences for the definition but

00:06:23.800 you make a decision about what you're going to regard as real

00:06:30.120 could investigate that a little bit even the materialist types tend to act as if their pain

00:06:38.280 is real, right? Pain has that intrinsically meaningful quality, which is core. It's the

00:06:48.200 essence of pain to be meaningful. It's not something you can ignore. It's something that

00:06:54.200 brings you to a halt. It brings you to your knees. It can make life itself unbearable.

00:06:59.800 It's not something you can set aside with your disbelief.

00:07:05.660 It's plenty real.

00:07:10.620 And I think that's an undeniable truth.

00:07:15.220 You certainly act as if it is.

00:07:19.100 And you don't...

00:07:20.800 And then, so there's another question that emerges from that observation,

00:07:24.740 which is, well, if pain is real, which is a reasonable proposition,

00:07:32.520 then what helps you cope with pain is equally or more real.

00:07:40.540 That's a good way of thinking about a battle between different realities,

00:07:45.100 is the victor of the battle is the more real phenomena.

00:07:51.680 what helps you deal with pain

00:07:53.860 well love

00:07:56.400 I mean we know this even biochemically

00:08:00.380 if you have a child

00:08:02.760 and the child scrapes his knee

00:08:04.460 let's say on the cement

00:08:06.480 and he runs to you

00:08:08.020 and you kiss it better

00:08:09.520 that works

00:08:10.980 and part of the reason it works

00:08:12.940 we know this biochemically

00:08:14.520 is because the hug

00:08:16.080 and the expression of care

00:08:18.260 produce a release of endogenous opiates in the child's brain along with oxytocin

00:08:25.060 and both of those chemicals are reassuring and analgesic.

00:08:31.980 And so even at the biological level, love has the ability to ameliorate pain.

00:08:38.660 We can withstand a lot of pain in our lives if we're surrounded by love.

00:08:43.420 And so that seems to give love a kind of reality that's irreducible.

00:08:49.820 I don't find that it undermines these sorts of observations to point out the biological parallels with that.

00:09:03.120 It makes perfect sense to me that what's meaningful and what's biological could work together in harmony in some sort of ultimate unity.

00:09:11.600 I can't understand at all why that wouldn't be the case.

00:09:17.020 Meaningful pursuit, that also ameliorates pain.

00:09:21.440 We also know this technically.

00:09:23.740 So it's very common, for example, for athletes who are involved in a very compelling game,

00:09:29.800 let's say a championship game, if they're injured, they can carry on and then continue to play.

00:09:36.360 And the reason for that, there's a technical reason for that.

00:09:38.940 And the technical reason is that, imagine you have a goal that you value,

00:09:46.940 which of course you have in a sporting event, because the goal is a goal.

00:09:53.120 It's pretty straightforward.

00:09:55.120 And the stakes of the goal are high.

00:09:58.840 Perhaps that's the championship.

00:10:00.360 And that's the goal of winning a set or a match made up of many goals.

00:10:07.180 so it's like a meta goal to win a championship is a meta goal and if you're a key player in that

00:10:14.240 and you see yourself contributing in a meaningful manner to the movement towards that goal that

00:10:22.200 produces a release of a neurochemical the neurochemical dopamine which signals movement

00:10:28.100 towards a valuable goal which produces positive emotion and enthusiasm it produces that sense that

00:10:35.540 what you're doing is meaningful, or

00:10:37.540 it's an index of the fact that

00:10:39.540 what you're doing is meaningful. That's a better

00:10:41.560 way of thinking about it. And

00:10:43.480 that's analgesic.

00:10:46.100 And so, meaningful

00:10:47.320 engagement and love are both

00:10:49.340 medications

00:10:51.840 for pain. And

00:10:53.500 pain's pretty real, and so

00:10:55.220 why not

00:10:57.540 assume that what

00:10:59.480 alleviates

00:11:01.880 suffering is real? 0.68

00:11:02.980 you'll pay for what alleviates suffering

00:11:07.640 you'll pursue it

00:11:08.840 what you actually do seems to be a good index

00:11:13.840 of what you regard as real

00:11:15.260 and so if you're willing to

00:11:17.260 pursue

00:11:19.860 if you're willing to pursue something

00:11:27.000 that's just evidence that you have faith in its value

00:11:29.540 and that you believe

00:11:30.960 in its reality.

00:11:36.000 So,

00:11:39.160 now with stories,

00:11:40.300 they indicate what people

00:11:42.580 believe to be real.

00:11:45.760 So when you go to a movie, for example,

00:11:47.920 or when you hear a story,

00:11:51.520 you read a story,

00:11:52.780 what you're watching or listening to,

00:11:57.160 what you're simulating with your imagination,

00:11:59.680 is the theory of reality that the character that you're watching

00:12:07.420 is applying to the world.

00:12:11.620 That's the story they're acting out or the story they're telling themselves.

00:12:15.280 And what you see when you go to see a movie is you see a character

00:12:20.080 pursuing his aim and perhaps transforming that aim as the plot develops.

00:12:28.220 That's the development of character, is the transformation of aim, the sequential transformation of aim.

00:12:34.460 And that's the story of life in many ways, is that each of the episodes in your life is bounded by an aim,

00:12:44.660 what you're trying to accomplish, the destination you're attempting to reach,

00:12:49.280 motivated by the call of something that fills you with enthusiasm.

00:12:54.980 and then the transformation

00:12:59.960 of those aims across time

00:13:02.040 as your wisdom increases

00:13:03.800 or your corruption

00:13:05.440 if you're playing a negative game

00:13:08.180 as your wisdom increases

00:13:09.840 the aim transforms

00:13:11.160 and becomes higher

00:13:13.300 and your character grows and develops

00:13:15.820 and that's what you want to see

00:13:17.500 when you see a movie

00:13:19.700 or when you read a great book

00:13:21.000 you want to see someone pursuing his aim

00:13:23.860 And then you want to see the transformations of those aims that transform his character in some manner that sheds light on the structure of the world.

00:13:33.360 And that can be a hero who's climbing upward and becoming more than he is on a continual basis,

00:13:44.060 transforming as he pursues his aim with the transformation of aim that that entails.

00:13:49.320 Or you can see someone degenerate into hell, essentially, by aiming down, corrupting himself, aiming down more bitterly, corrupting himself more, and pursuing that pathway until he's an avatar of the abyss itself.

00:14:09.460 And both of those patterns of characterization are salutary, they're both informative,

00:14:15.940 because you would like to aim up, assuming that you would like to have your life improve

00:14:23.480 and the life of those around you, assuming that that could happen and that you believe

00:14:27.940 it could happen, that you want it to happen.

00:14:30.160 If you can simulate the life of a transforming hero, then you can practice in your imagination

00:14:38.400 that upward pathway and that's what you're doing when you participate in the world of fiction

00:14:44.900 of literature it's what you do in in some sense as well when you're going to a sports event with

00:14:53.280 the other 20,000 people who are joining you in your worship and it's a worship of aim

00:15:00.680 because every sporting event is a celebration of aim

00:15:07.300 and a communal admission of the value of that skillful aim

00:15:21.400 and a participation in the process of the development of that aim

00:15:27.800 because you want to see skilled athletes on the field getting better at what they do that's the

00:15:32.700 most exciting part of a of any athletic competition it's not only the competition and the possibility

00:15:39.420 of victory but you want to see the athletes push themselves to their limits while they're engaged

00:15:45.760 in that and becoming more than they are while they're doing that and that when you watch that

00:15:51.700 on the field when you watch that say in a gymnastics contest where you see someone really hovering on

00:15:56.320 the edge of disaster and pushing them

00:15:58.360 pushing themselves past

00:16:00.280 where they even thought they could go

00:16:01.920 that's the sort of thing that will bring the whole crowd

00:16:04.120 spontaneously to its feet

00:16:06.380 right because that's a

00:16:08.040 testament to the

00:16:09.360 it's a testament to

00:16:12.300 the logos of human nature

00:16:13.900 this ability to

00:16:15.060 move beyond the zone of comfort

00:16:18.080 and to

00:16:18.660 develop an ever deeper level

00:16:22.340 of skill and commitment

00:16:23.600 while pursuing an aim

00:16:25.340 right and that's what you see in an athletic competition and that's what you participate in

00:16:32.240 as an athlete and that's what you portray as a writer and that's what you act out as an actor

00:16:37.680 and that's what you simulate as a as a as an observer as a as a member of the audience

00:16:45.640 imagine your favorite lecture dial that up on max put that on steroids and then add some

00:16:52.440 cinematic elements to it. That's the best way I could describe a Peterson Academy lecture.

00:16:59.480 I went to college because I had to. I go to Peterson Academy because I want to. I'm still

00:17:03.480 paying off college from 10 years ago and I'm also still questioning the value that I got out of

00:17:08.040 college. In traditional universities a lot of times it's just pretty dry. They don't bring the

00:17:12.840 same energy as the professors at Peterson Academy. It is a completely different experience to learn

00:17:18.120 from somebody who actually wants to teach you if you've been on the fence about this this is the

00:17:23.560 time that thing that's calling to you you won't have an answer for it unless you enroll and see

00:17:27.800 for yourself you have the opportunity to investigate that calling and how do you simulate that that's

00:17:40.360 something remarkable something intensely interesting you simulate this that the same

00:17:46.400 way that you come to understand another person and you don't come to understand a person by

00:17:52.160 taking their arguments apart and understanding them rationally that isn't how we do it uh that's

00:17:59.040 too painstaking and people aren't that coherent anyways um often in their presentation they're

00:18:05.300 full of complexities and contradictions and we don't build ourselves rationally even though we

00:18:10.640 can be rational that isn't what you do what you do is you watch a person and you infer their aim

00:18:17.500 and that's why you watch their eyes right because their eyes point at what they're aiming at

00:18:22.760 and you watch their eyes and our eyes actually evolved so that they're maximally

00:18:27.960 visible black people colored background on a white canvas right they're very evident and

00:18:37.460 That's because all of our ancestors, whose eyes couldn't be read, were either killed or didn't reproduce. 0.77

00:18:44.360 Because everyone wants to know what you're up to.

00:18:47.960 And they infer that by watching your eyes, which is why we gaze into each other's faces when we talk.

00:18:54.040 What's this person up to?

00:18:56.300 What are they looking at?

00:18:58.180 What are they devoting their attention to?

00:19:01.060 They're devoting their attention to what they value.

00:19:04.540 What do they value?

00:19:05.300 The aim at which they're pointing.

00:19:08.540 How do we understand that?

00:19:10.140 We see their aim, we adopt it momentarily, and we replicate the experience on our own body.

00:19:16.340 So to walk a mile in someone else's shoes is to adopt their aim.

00:19:20.680 And that means to see the world through their eyes.

00:19:23.740 Literally, to see the objects of their perception.

00:19:26.840 Because what we perceive are things that move us toward or impede our progress in relationship to an aim.

00:19:37.020 That's what an object is.

00:19:39.160 It's not a dead fact.

00:19:40.980 It's something living in relationship to a journey forward.

00:19:45.380 And this is technically true.

00:19:47.300 We understand this about perception.

00:19:49.580 All facts are not equal.

00:19:51.520 We don't perceive everything in the world.

00:19:53.380 We perceive relevant things in the world.

00:19:56.220 And those are the facts at hand, the relevant facts.

00:20:00.720 And relevant facts are relevant because they pertain to a goal.

00:20:05.860 Even in a simple situation, if I want to walk across this stage to move from point A here to point B there,

00:20:15.760 I am making the assumption that point B, the place I'm headed, is better than the place I'm at,

00:20:22.480 Because otherwise, why go?

00:20:25.220 And that's why the chicken crossed the road, by the way.

00:20:29.580 And then when I look on that pathway that opens itself up because of my aim,

00:20:36.040 I can see the pathway forward.

00:20:38.700 I can see these chairs, let's say, as obstacles in my path.

00:20:43.020 The fact that I perceive them as obstacles in relationship to the aim

00:20:47.600 means that I perceive them with negative emotion.

00:20:52.480 Things that get in your way elicit negative emotion.

00:20:56.460 That's a marker of an obstacle.

00:20:58.380 And things that move you forward elicit positive emotion.

00:21:02.320 Enemies get in your way.

00:21:04.340 And allies and friends facilitate your movement forward.

00:21:07.860 And enemies raise your ire and make you anxious.

00:21:11.520 And friends fill you with enthusiasm.

00:21:14.160 And the desire to cooperate towards that shared aim.

00:21:18.820 And that's the landscape of the world.

00:21:20.580 That's the story that you inhabit.

00:21:22.480 This journey from point A to point B, right?

00:21:27.360 A story is the representation of an aim.

00:21:29.740 It's the representation of a journey.

00:21:32.560 And it's more than that because it can be a sequence of transforming aims.

00:21:36.060 That's a complex characterization.

00:21:38.340 And then it's more than that too because it can be a story of how the aim transforms

00:21:43.540 because there's a pattern.

00:21:44.980 When you go from point A to point B, you can just go there and that's not much of a story.

00:21:52.480 Or you can start to go there and you can encounter the allies and tools that move you forward

00:22:02.980 or the obstacles and pitfalls that interfere with your progress and transform you.

00:22:09.700 And that's a deeper story.

00:22:11.920 The deeper story is I was moving from A to B and something emerged that I didn't expect.

00:22:19.060 And in consequence of that unexpected occurrence, I changed dramatically and my aim shifted.

00:22:27.820 And I started to move upward in a different direction as a transformed person.

00:22:33.460 And a sequence of stories like that is a tale of character development.

00:22:38.540 And that's exactly what happens in the biblical narratives.

00:22:42.840 That's exactly what they portray.

00:22:45.060 this story that we inhabit of upward transformation and I'll give you a

00:22:53.300 concrete example of that tonight so that you understand more deeply what this

00:22:57.780 means I'm going to tell you some of the story of of Exodus of the story of Moses

00:23:05.460 and you'll see how it fits this archetypal pattern it's a portrayal of

00:23:11.160 the story itself. Okay, so what's the basic story of Exodus? Well, the Israelites

00:23:16.740 are going somewhere. They have a point B, right? They have a plan, they have an aim, 0.98

00:23:22.620 they have a destination, they have a purpose, and that purpose is the journey

00:23:26.820 to the promised land. And what does that mean for you? Well, everything you do has

00:23:31.740 that structure, because if you're doing it,

00:23:36.120 What would you say?

00:23:39.380 If you're doing it right, everything you do has that structure.

00:23:44.620 Well, why?

00:23:45.480 Well, if you're not moving somewhere better, why move?

00:23:50.900 Right?

00:23:51.300 So, and I'm really, I'm dead serious about this,

00:23:54.100 is that the motivation to move is allied with the faith that the place you're going is better.

00:24:00.800 So what that means is whether you know it or not,

00:24:03.080 This is assuming you're not bitter, twisted, nihilistic, and downward aiming, right?

00:24:09.120 I'm assuming that you're on the upward path.

00:24:12.380 We can lay out the other alternatives as well.

00:24:14.920 But for the sake of this presentation,

00:24:18.720 we'll assume that what you're acting out is a comedy with a happy ending

00:24:22.660 rather than a tragedy that culminates in catastrophe.

00:24:26.920 Because you can act that out too.

00:24:28.540 And if you don't know the story of your life,

00:24:30.820 it might be that that's the one you're acting out and you should probably figure that out

00:24:35.680 so you're going to act out one story or another or it's going to use you as its agent those are

00:24:42.920 the options upward aiming moves you from what from the undesirable state that you're in to the more

00:24:51.380 desirable state that you're hoping to achieve how is that portrayed in the exodus story

00:24:58.340 what's the undesirable state

00:25:02.060 tyranny

00:25:04.800 or more precisely

00:25:07.640 the dynamic between tyranny and slavery

00:25:10.660 right because those two things dance 0.73

00:25:13.500 you can't have one without the other 0.94

00:25:15.620 the Israelites are under the thumb 0.99

00:25:18.560 of the Pharaoh and the Egyptian state 0.98

00:25:20.680 they've been transformed in slaves 1.00

00:25:23.020 the ancient Hebrews because they had the temerity 0.61

00:25:25.640 to be successful right so that's a story that's many thousands of years old and it's the same 0.89

00:25:34.400 story that's playing out on university campuses right now right the temerity of the jews to be 0.99

00:25:43.080 the successful minority that's what dooms them to slavery in egypt they arrive there as beneficial 0.66

00:25:50.540 visitors under the authority of Joseph and the new Pharaoh forgets their

00:25:57.440 contributions and the resentful Egyptians who are angry with the Hebrews for their

00:26:02.900 success turn them into slaves and so that's been going on for a very long

00:26:08.300 period of time and so the Israelites are burdened by the yoke of the tear the

00:26:19.880 tyrant and a leader arises to speak for them. That's Moses. Okay, so who's Moses in relationship

00:26:30.120 to you? Well, you might say no one because I'm not a leader or no one because I'm not

00:26:37.640 a member of the tribe of slaves. And I would say, well, you should rethink that.

00:26:49.880 Because there's a fundamental significance to this story,

00:26:55.340 and the story is trying to situate each person in the actual landscape of human existence.

00:27:02.760 And that landscape is characterized by tyranny and slavery, always.

00:27:07.040 Okay, so how can you understand that?

00:27:09.080 Well, tyranny exists at multiple levels, right?

00:27:13.140 Multiple levels of social reality.

00:27:15.580 So let's walk through, and I mean this, I don't just mean this metaphysically.

00:27:19.020 I mean this in the case of actual tyranny as well.

00:27:22.480 Don't be thinking that tyranny is just something political.

00:27:25.360 That's a big mistake.

00:27:27.460 It's something that exists at the level of...

00:27:30.020 It exists in relationship.

00:27:32.820 It exists in your relationship with yourself.

00:27:37.340 You can be a tyrant to yourself.

00:27:39.000 No problem.

00:27:40.100 That's extremely common. 1.00

00:27:41.520 You have stubborn, foolish ideas that have possessed you. 1.00

00:27:49.020 Whose origin you're unconscious of that dominate you in ways that you, that your slavish habits allow. 1.00

00:28:00.460 And that's always the case. 0.91

00:28:04.020 And that's just you as an individual.

00:28:06.000 So the part of you that has a redemptive quality, the part of you that could be a leader,

00:28:11.740 could stand up against your tyranny to yourself

00:28:16.940 and your proclivity to be a slave to that tyranny.

00:28:20.500 And that's something you will wrestle with in your life. 0.62

00:28:24.240 You as tyrant.

00:28:25.940 Maybe you're a harsh taskmaster.

00:28:28.060 You're hard on yourself and you're using the stick instead of the carrot constantly.

00:28:33.300 You force yourself to do things.

00:28:35.120 You exist in a relationship of power with regard to your present and your past and your future.

00:28:41.740 You crush your desires, you force yourself to step forward in your traces.

00:28:47.740 And you're a tyrant and a slave simultaneously.

00:28:50.740 And in principle, you could rise above that and be an agent of transformation and escape from that dynamic.

00:28:58.740 That dynamic doesn't only exist psychologically, let's say.

00:29:02.740 Maybe that characterizes your marriage, right? 0.97

00:29:05.740 And that you're a tyrant and your wife is a slave, or she's a tyrant and you're a slave. 0.98

00:29:10.740 slave or you take turns being tyrant and slave but the relationship the 0.99

00:29:16.780 degenerate relationship has degenerated in the direction of the expression of

00:29:22.500 power and that's the definition of a degenerate relationship and so you could

00:29:27.300 be the tyrant in your marriage or you could be the slave in your marriage or

00:29:32.160 you could be whatever the alternative is to tyranny and slavery and you could

00:29:39.180 fight that battle out in your marriage which you will you will it's like the definition of marriage

00:29:46.540 that and then it's the same with your family like are you a tyrant to your kids or are you a slave

00:29:53.080 to your two-year-old that's more common now than the tyrannical situation and so all that means is

00:29:58.740 the two-year-old's the tyrant which is very very common it's very very common it's very bad for a

00:30:05.920 two-year-old to be the boss because he knows he doesn't know anything and he's already on top it's

00:30:11.960 like what the hell is he going to do for the rest of his life so that means the two-year-old who's

00:30:19.020 a tyrant is immediately lost in the desert right it's very very bad so you can be a slave to your

00:30:26.100 children you can be a tyrant and then it's the same in relationship to your parents and

00:30:30.600 And it's the same in relationship to your friends.

00:30:33.880 Maybe you don't have friends.

00:30:35.480 Maybe you're the sycophant to the local bully. 0.59

00:30:38.480 Or maybe you're the bully and you have sycophants. 0.97

00:30:42.120 Or maybe you're such a slave to your appalling habits that you don't have any friends at all. 0.97

00:30:49.940 So that just means your fantasies are tyrannical.

00:30:53.320 Your fantasies of revenge and isolation.

00:30:55.600 and then maybe as a business person

00:30:58.260 you tyrannize

00:31:00.260 over your employees and maybe you try that

00:31:02.020 with your customers which is not a

00:31:04.020 good strategy by the way

00:31:06.100 right you it's not

00:31:08.020 a good strategy with your employees either

00:31:10.040 that power dynamic

00:31:12.160 but

00:31:13.000 power corrupts as

00:31:18.060 they say and if you're in a position

00:31:20.220 where you can wield the

00:31:22.260 rod

00:31:23.300 the temptation to do so is something against which you will struggle

00:31:29.200 and that's part of the eternal dynamic of slavery and tyranny

00:31:33.480 and then it becomes more obvious when you start thinking about the community

00:31:38.100 or the state or the nation

00:31:39.600 well that's usually where we think of tyranny residing

00:31:42.640 you can see that proclivity for tyranny now in the west

00:31:46.480 really start to invade the more local forms of community organization

00:31:51.460 the school boards and the municipalities that are taking or the universities that are taking a

00:31:57.600 vicious turn towards authoritarianism and we know that that can possess a whole state that happens

00:32:03.120 repeatedly and certainly a nation and then you might say well what's a nation like when

00:32:08.760 it's a tyranny and you might think Hitler and Stalin and Mao and the freedom-loving people 0.97

00:32:14.780 on whose neck the heel of authority rests and that's complete bloody rubbish that is not 0.77

00:32:21.360 how a tyranny works in a true tyranny everyone is a tyrant to themselves every self-tyrannizing 0.98

00:32:30.380 thug is a tyrant to his wife every couple is a tyrant to their children every family is a tyrant

00:32:37.420 to the neighbors that the tyranny and the slavery is everywhere at once and that's a totalitarian 0.95

00:32:44.180 state that's why it's totalitarian and along with that comes the grip of the lie every single person

00:32:50.960 in that awful dynamic slave to the totality tyrant in the moment every single one of those

00:33:00.620 participants is lying about absolutely everything to themselves and to everyone they love 100% of

00:33:08.860 the time and that's the story of hell that's for sure and so this landscape that's portrayed in

00:33:18.660 exodus this is this is the human realm this is the human realm and the battle against tyranny and

00:33:26.860 slavery in favor of the proper alternative that's life really now moses becomes a leader

00:33:35.040 how well that's interesting moses is transformed into a leader

00:33:42.620 When he encounters the burning bush

00:33:45.960 So let me tell you that story

00:33:47.740 Because this will tell you how to be a leader

00:33:50.120 That's a good thing to know

00:33:51.760 Well, unless you want to be a tyrant or a slave

00:33:53.980 And you can want both of those

00:33:57.940 Maybe simultaneously

00:33:59.280 The tyrant has power

00:34:00.980 And can gratify his whims

00:34:02.660 And the slave has no responsibility

00:34:04.560 So what a deal that is for the slave

00:34:07.220 And every tyrant needs a slave

00:34:09.220 And if you're not a leader 0.96

00:34:10.680 then you're a slave 0.97

00:34:13.340 or a tyrant 0.97

00:34:15.020 Moses is out

00:34:17.080 Moses is an adult when he becomes a leader

00:34:21.560 that's a good story

00:34:25.200 it's like how about you're an adult

00:34:27.020 before you're a leader

00:34:28.080 something university students should be taught

00:34:31.180 on campus

00:34:31.920 it's like you're 18

00:34:33.900 7 years ago you were 11

00:34:36.020 you don't know anything

00:34:37.800 you're not a leader

00:34:39.740 Why?

00:34:41.080 Your parents subsidize you, or the state.

00:34:50.840 You haven't had a job.

00:34:52.580 You've never supported yourself.

00:34:54.500 You don't have any children.

00:34:55.860 You have no responsibility.

00:34:57.980 It's like, you're not a leader.

00:35:00.480 You're not going to fix the world.

00:35:01.860 You can't even keep your dorm room clean.

00:35:06.640 Moses is an adult.

00:35:08.020 when the call comes for him to become a leader.

00:35:13.880 He is married.

00:35:15.960 He's established a good relationship with his father-in-law, Jethro,

00:35:19.180 who plays a very important role in the Exodus story.

00:35:23.240 He's the kind of husband who chases away the thugs,

00:35:28.780 which is how he meets his wife-to-be initially.

00:35:32.640 She's trying to draw water from a well,

00:35:34.880 and Moses is a master of water, by the way, like Christ.

00:35:38.020 she's trying to draw water from a well and there's thugs around the

00:35:41.720 around the well site and he chases them away and so

00:35:45.800 his future wife is pretty happy about this

00:35:49.460 as she should be because Moses shows himself as the man who has

00:35:53.560 enough spine to keep the thugs at bay

00:35:56.940 and that's the responsibility of

00:36:01.220 any man who's masculine in the fundamental sense

00:36:05.200 is to keep the true predators at bay.

00:36:09.460 And that theme is amplified by his choice of profession.

00:36:17.860 Moses is a shepherd as an adult, and that's not a high-status occupation.

00:36:22.120 It's a working-class job, but it's a noble working-class job,

00:36:26.840 and that's emphasized in the Scriptures repeatedly,

00:36:29.880 because the shepherd is very frequently the Savior.

00:36:34.460 David is a shepherd, for example.

00:36:36.300 And Christ is a shepherd, in the metaphorical sense.

00:36:41.160 And so why a shepherd?

00:36:42.800 Well, it was a hard job being a shepherd in the ancient world.

00:36:48.000 You had to fend for yourself.

00:36:49.960 You were isolated for long periods of time.

00:36:52.320 You had to guard and defend the most vulnerable.

00:36:57.000 Sheep, lambs even more particularly,

00:37:00.500 who were quite tender and delicious.

00:37:01.880 and there were lions and wolves

00:37:05.400 and you had like a spear

00:37:06.960 and a shield and a slingshot

00:37:08.380 and that's not a lot of armament

00:37:10.320 to take on a lion let's say

00:37:12.160 and so if you're a shepherd

00:37:14.060 you're an adult

00:37:16.740 and you could take care of things

00:37:18.980 that were vulnerable

00:37:19.640 and you could keep the beasts

00:37:21.000 of prey at bay

00:37:22.580 and that's what Moses was

00:37:24.420 and he was having a pretty good time

00:37:25.920 of it being a shepherd

00:37:26.880 it was an incredible job

00:37:28.360 he had a couple of wives

00:37:30.020 got along with his father-in-law

00:37:31.600 he was away from the tyrants because he'd left

00:37:33.580 Egypt. He's an adult.

00:37:36.040 So now one day he's out with his sheep

00:37:37.840 wandering about

00:37:39.580 in the wilderness and

00:37:41.700 he's near Mount Sinai

00:37:43.720 or Horeb and Mount Sinai

00:37:45.760 is a pyramid

00:37:46.660 with its pinnacle in the clouds.

00:37:50.340 It's the place where

00:37:51.720 earth and heaven meet. Now why

00:37:53.560 is a mountaintop that place? Well

00:37:55.340 partly because up is good

00:37:57.460 so up is heavenward.

00:37:59.840 Partly because as you climb

00:38:01.580 a mountain, you rise above things, partly because when you climb a mountain, you can

00:38:06.660 see everything much more broadly, and that expansion of vision is associated with enlightenment

00:38:13.360 and illumination, with the ability to see widely and far, and so the mountain pyramid

00:38:21.040 is a classic place where earth and heaven, which is the ultimate up, meet, and many magical

00:38:30.180 transformations happen at Mount Sinai, and Moses' transformation into a leader is one of them.

00:38:39.660 And so he's going from point A to B as a shepherd, guiding his flock, and something attracts his

00:38:48.920 attention. Now that's worth knowing. People in the modern world have no idea where to find God,

00:38:58.900 so to speak. They believe they have to have the faith in God, which is something like

00:39:04.600 the proclamation of a set of descriptive beliefs. I believe in God. That's not what

00:39:13.080 happens to Moses. What happens to Moses is that God reveals himself to Moses. That's

00:39:19.740 a whole different kettle of fish, you might say. And how does that happen? Well, you need

00:39:24.940 to know this because it happens to you and you don't notice it. And that's a mistake. So God is

00:39:32.180 characterized frequently in the biblical texts as the spirit of calling. Now that's not his only

00:39:40.400 characterization. He's characterized as well in many ways as conscience, for example, the voice

00:39:46.200 of conscience. But the spirit of calling is a prime characterization. The spirit of calling is

00:39:51.720 that which fills you with

00:39:54.140 enthusiasm, right? The desire

00:39:56.100 to move forward. This

00:39:57.700 analgesic pleasure in

00:40:00.240 the journey upward.

00:40:02.680 That's calling.

00:40:04.300 And enthusiasm means,

00:40:06.020 to be enthusiastic means to be filled

00:40:07.920 with the Spirit of God. Because the

00:40:09.980 root word, entheos,

00:40:12.520 theos is deos.

00:40:14.440 It's deity. It's God.

00:40:15.960 To be enthusiastic is to be filled

00:40:17.720 with the Spirit of the Divine.

00:40:20.080 So that's something to know too.

00:40:21.720 what makes you enthusiastic?

00:40:26.060 What calls you forward?

00:40:28.240 Well, you have to notice and you have to understand

00:40:32.940 that it will take you off the beaten path.

00:40:36.260 Even if the path you're on is an adult, mature, and useful path,

00:40:41.320 the call of what will transform you

00:40:44.240 will come from the side, so to speak,

00:40:47.280 and it will take you off the path.

00:40:49.960 Okay, so now how do you understand that in your life?

00:40:52.940 Well, are you interested in things?

00:40:55.700 And then you might think, well, is that a good way of saying it?

00:40:59.360 I'm interested in something.

00:41:01.020 It's like, not exactly, eh?

00:41:02.620 Because you don't get to pick what you're interested in.

00:41:06.460 It's more like what you're interested in picks you, right?

00:41:10.680 You find yourself interested in something.

00:41:13.340 Something beckons, a dream, a desire, a fantasy.

00:41:19.440 Something that says to you that you could be more than you are and your life could be more than it is.

00:41:26.340 Now, that can be pathological.

00:41:27.980 You can nurse a false calling and become delusional, but that has nothing to do with the core phenomena.

00:41:39.060 Your children develop and mature like you do because they're called by the world to move out into it.

00:41:47.740 right the spirit of adventure beckons to them and it does that like it does for you by gripping

00:41:54.820 their interest and that's what a calling is and so this is what happens to Moses he catches out

00:42:03.840 of the corner of his eye a glimpse of something glimmering and glittering and beckoning like the

00:42:09.600 snitch that Harry Potter chases in the Quidditch game and in the Harry Potter series right that

00:42:16.420 metagame that the seeker is playing that if successful also constitutes the victory over

00:42:24.540 in the actual game right it's seek and you will find knock and the door will open that's what

00:42:31.720 happens to Moses something beckons to him this is something to understand you will see in your life

00:42:38.220 that things call to you and that there's something behind what calls to you well what is it that's

00:42:45.180 behind what calls to you as your aim transforms as you move upward well classically that's the

00:42:51.540 spirit of the ancestral God of Abraham and Isaac it's a definition right so God makes himself

00:42:59.700 manifest in what calls you upward and that's so useful to know because no matter where you start

00:43:06.860 murderous shepherd that's where Moses starts he flew from Egypt he fleed from Egypt because he

00:43:14.440 murdered someone, he starts in a pretty rough place. It's like, well, you can start in a rough

00:43:19.520 place. Well, how? Well, aim up. Well, I don't know where up is. It's the opposite of down, okay? I'm

00:43:28.240 dead serious about that. I don't care how confused you are. There's some stupid things you're doing

00:43:33.520 that you know are stupid. You know they're hurting you by your own definition. You know it with 1.00

00:43:40.320 certainty. Stop doing those. That's a start. That's an upward aim. And why? Because you're

00:43:48.660 going to stop doing stupid things, so your life gets better. It's a proclamation of 1.00

00:43:52.880 a decision made in faith. Things could be better. I could take action. If you even dimly

00:44:00.300 apprehend the next stage up, you're on the path. And if you make it closer to that proximal

00:44:06.880 up, your vision will clear

00:44:08.620 and the next destination will make

00:44:10.840 itself known. And that's Jacob's

00:44:12.760 ladder, by the way, that

00:44:14.260 spirals upward forever with

00:44:16.320 the God of 1.00

00:44:17.940 the ancient Jews beckoning 0.97

00:44:20.580 at the apex. That's a 1.00

00:44:22.480 definition. God is

00:44:24.600 the spirit that stands behind

00:44:26.260 everything that calls to you.

00:44:28.680 Right? Behind love.

00:44:30.800 Behind curiosity.

00:44:32.540 Behind hope.

00:44:34.420 Behind that

00:44:35.480 That compulsion of interest that pulls you down the pathway of your destiny.

00:44:42.080 And I've interviewed many people who've been very successful.

00:44:46.060 And I often ask them how their calling made itself manifest in their life.

00:44:52.740 And it's often very early.

00:44:53.880 These people, Jocko Willink, for example, who's this brute of a soldier.

00:44:58.980 He's about three feet thick this way. 0.99

00:45:01.500 And like quite the bloody monster. 0.99

00:45:03.500 and a very good man but with all the capacity to be a very bad man 0.95

00:45:08.560 and he knew he was going to be a soldier when he was like three.

00:45:12.840 I'm sure his parents knew it too

00:45:14.240 because I imagine he was one of those kids that was running around the house

00:45:17.500 shooting a cat with a toothpaste tube, you know.

00:45:20.380 So people have their pattern of interest very, very young, often.

00:45:28.600 Not always but often it makes itself manifest and pulls them along

00:45:32.120 And that's in you.

00:45:34.840 And maybe you repress it.

00:45:36.080 Maybe you're afraid of it because you think you'll betray yourself.

00:45:38.740 You don't think you have it in you or you don't want the responsibility.

00:45:42.180 But man, you reject the call at your great peril, right?

00:45:46.840 Literally the peril of your soul.

00:45:48.420 And you imperil everything by doing so.

00:45:51.140 Because if you don't follow what calls to you, you don't become who you could be.

00:45:56.240 And then the world's a lesser and more evil place because of that lack.

00:46:00.780 and that's on you.

00:46:02.380 Like seriously, that's on you

00:46:04.960 and you feel that in the pointlessness

00:46:06.840 and bitterness and misery

00:46:08.840 of your misbegotten life.

00:46:10.800 That's the voice of conscience

00:46:12.160 telling you that the path of irresponsibility

00:46:16.040 that you chose in preference to the call

00:46:18.660 is the pathway to hell itself

00:46:20.820 and not just for you.

00:46:22.860 And that's, man, that's the brutal truth.

00:46:26.700 And so Moses has enough faith

00:46:29.180 to wander off the path, to investigate.

00:46:32.200 And what he sees is a flaming tree.

00:46:34.900 Well, why a tree?

00:46:36.480 What's the tree of life?

00:46:38.720 Well, why a tree?

00:46:40.640 Well, a tree's alive and it branches upward

00:46:43.700 and it grows from nothing, from a little seed

00:46:46.000 into this magnificent thing that stretches its leaves

00:46:49.760 up towards the sun.

00:46:51.860 And the tree is life itself.

00:46:54.600 And it's on fire because living things are on fire.

00:46:58.160 and so it's like the essence of life magnified that's what a burning bush is and that's what

00:47:04.040 you see when you see i took my daughter when she was about 16 months old up to this cabin in

00:47:12.380 northern saskatchewan which is a province a rural province that's mostly inhabited by old people

00:47:18.180 and we took my daughter to this cabin with my parents and they had a lot of their friends

00:47:25.620 they're all retirees and my daughter was very happy child and she wandered around in this little

00:47:31.120 cabin living room playing away and chirping away happily and you know on fire like little kids are

00:47:38.500 and all those grandparents they just sat there and watched her like they were watching fire itself

00:47:43.580 and that's because they were and there's a glow in that you know that attractiveness of children

00:47:49.880 that is the revelation of infinite possibility

00:47:53.880 and the blessedness of the untrammeled spirit of childhood,

00:48:00.520 that expansive attempt to reveal the light and move upward.

00:48:05.620 And they were entranced by that, as wise old people are.

00:48:10.320 And Moses encounters that, as you do,

00:48:14.380 when anything grips you or when anything makes you love it

00:48:17.260 or anything calls you forward.

00:48:18.560 It's, what is that? Well, it's the spirit of life itself calling to you, and you could say, well, that's the instinct for development.

00:48:29.820 And I'd say, fine, I don't care if you want to think about it from a biological perspective.

00:48:34.160 It doesn't make any difference. You have an instinct or impulse to continually mature and develop into more than you are.

00:48:42.520 Fine. It doesn't matter how you construe that in some fundamental sense.

00:48:46.680 The instinct and the religious will line up in any case.

00:48:50.660 And Moses investigates.

00:48:52.040 And as he investigates, he first removes his shoes.

00:48:57.120 And that's a sign of respect.

00:48:58.640 He wants to touch the ground again.

00:49:00.740 To shed anything that separates him from what's most real.

00:49:06.480 And in taking off his shoes, he also abandons his current identity.

00:49:10.820 Shoes signify identity.

00:49:13.760 Shoes are part of the uniform of work, let's say.

00:49:16.080 There's soldiers' boots.

00:49:17.380 There's Dorothy's red shoes in the Wizard of Oz.

00:49:19.780 There's the glass slippers of the princess.

00:49:27.180 Shoes signify your current pathway.

00:49:30.360 And Moses sheds them because he's ready to change.

00:49:33.040 Which you have to be if you follow the calling that pulls you off the path

00:49:40.140 towards the destiny that's characterized by the revelation of who you could be.

00:49:45.820 And Moses continues to confer with this phenomena that attracts him.

00:49:53.980 And it pulls him in more and more deeply.

00:49:56.480 And that's what happens in your life.

00:49:58.240 And you know this because maybe you committed in some minor way to some personal deviation,

00:50:06.060 to some hobbies, to some obsessive interest that pulled you away from your mundane identity

00:50:12.680 towards the domain of your interest and you concentrated on it deeply and learned a lot

00:50:20.040 because of your pursuit and in that learning you got deeper and deeper into things you started to

00:50:27.020 understand i had a friend a professor who took up stamp collecting when he was like 55 you think

00:50:33.120 stamp collecting you know it's pretty mundane occupation but he traveled all over the uk

00:50:40.480 to find these stamps and he talked to all these people who collected and he collected old stamps

00:50:47.080 and that brought him much more into contact with the history of his country and he become

00:50:52.460 became a very avid amateur historian and like everything that you take seriously leads to

00:50:59.360 everything else right everything that's true and real that you interact with partakes in the

00:51:04.900 structure of reality itself and if you take it seriously enough then that reality will make

00:51:10.060 itself known to you. And what's

00:51:12.060 the consequence of that? Well, what happens

00:51:14.020 to Moses is that God himself speaks

00:51:16.280 from the depths of the

00:51:17.780 burning tree of life.

00:51:20.360 And that's what happens when

00:51:22.180 you take something

00:51:24.140 seriously enough to go deep.

00:51:26.500 That's what happens to you. And so

00:51:28.180 what happens to Moses? Well, God says,

00:51:30.040 I am who I am. I'm the spirit

00:51:32.240 of being itself. I'm what always

00:51:34.360 has been and what is now

00:51:36.320 and what always will be.

00:51:38.420 And that's what's calling to you.

00:51:40.820 And it's telling you to shed who you are and become who you could be.

00:51:46.040 And Moses says, well, who's that?

00:51:48.680 And God says, the leader who eternally leads people away from the tyrant and the thrall of slavery.

00:51:56.660 And Moses says, well, who's going to listen to me?

00:51:59.200 And God says, if you tell them I sent you, they'll listen.

00:52:03.480 And you think, well, what does that mean?

00:52:05.180 And it's like, well, if you listen to someone who's deeply engaged,

00:52:09.300 telling you about what they know, you listen.

00:52:13.320 Well, why? Because their speech has the charisma of truth.

00:52:17.120 And you can tell that.

00:52:18.740 I mean, you can be gamed. 0.81

00:52:20.440 A charlotte and a psychopath can fake that, but not for long.

00:52:23.280 That's what the court magicians do in the pharaoh's court,

00:52:27.120 is they ape magic. 0.58

00:52:29.900 But there's real magic, too, and that's the magic of someone who's gone deep.

00:52:33.660 And Moses says, well, I'm slow of tongue. I'm not much of a speaker.

00:52:37.680 And God says, that's your problem, buddy. Sort it out.

00:52:42.900 And what does that mean? It's like, while you have your problems and your insufficiencies,

00:52:48.260 your areas of no talent, let's say,

00:52:51.460 and no doubt you console yourself with the proposition that in your flawed state,

00:52:58.120 it's okay that you take a back seat because what could you do anyways?

00:53:02.020 and that's just wrong.

00:53:03.820 It's like you're called upon to do what you can

00:53:06.640 regardless of your flaws

00:53:08.380 because if that wasn't the case

00:53:10.240 then no one would ever be called upon to do anything

00:53:12.500 because there's no one without their requisite flaws

00:53:15.720 and their abilities, their talents

00:53:18.420 that they're both unique

00:53:19.920 and it's your fate to contend with them

00:53:22.820 and God says,

00:53:24.120 well the fact that you can't talk is no problem for me

00:53:26.660 because I'm God and I made everything

00:53:28.200 so you don't really have to worry about that being an impediment.

00:53:31.580 And then he says, more practically, don't you have a brother, Aaron?

00:53:35.440 Can't he talk?

00:53:36.860 Moses says, yeah.

00:53:38.280 And God says, well, why don't you just take him along for the ride?

00:53:41.500 And what's the wisdom in that?

00:53:43.780 It's, well, if you pursue your calling and you're called upon to be more than you are,

00:53:48.480 and you have impediments in your way, you don't have to do it alone.

00:53:53.380 You could find some other people to take on the adventure with you,

00:53:56.960 and there's enough bloody adventure for them, too.

00:53:59.060 It's not like they have to take a back seat.

00:54:01.600 It's not a zero-sum game, adventure.

00:54:05.300 There's more than enough for everyone.

00:54:07.120 There's enough difficulty in life so everyone could strive to their utmost

00:54:11.900 and not exhaust the possibility.

00:54:15.040 Right? All that would do is make more possibility.

00:54:18.500 Right? Life is not a zero-sum game.

00:54:20.560 And it's a corrupt proposition to hypothesize.

00:54:25.260 Otherwise, there's not enough for everyone.

00:54:27.520 What does that mean?

00:54:28.480 well there better be enough for me

00:54:30.240 right because that's the first thing that leaps

00:54:32.780 to mind it's like no there's plenty

00:54:34.480 of trouble for everyone

00:54:36.760 so

00:54:38.160 you don't have to worry if you're not up for the

00:54:40.680 job if you can ally yourself with

00:54:42.660 others and you have the humility

00:54:44.080 to understand who they might be

00:54:46.240 well the more the merrier 0.84

00:54:48.260 so Moses

00:54:51.640 goes back to Egypt

00:54:54.540 and he's told by God to face

00:54:56.760 down the tyrant

00:54:57.640 And that's a hell of a thing

00:55:00.400 But that's

00:55:01.500 If you don't want to be a slave

00:55:04.760 And you don't want to be

00:55:06.640 Boxed in by your presumption

00:55:10.500 Of your own ordinariness 0.98

00:55:12.280 If you don't want to be sterile 0.94

00:55:14.000 And frozen

00:55:15.800 And turned to

00:55:17.240 Lifeless stone

00:55:19.080 If you don't want to be a dead branch

00:55:20.960 Then you better learn how to talk to the tyrant

00:55:24.220 And how do you do that?

00:55:26.260 Well you tell them the truth

00:55:27.340 right and that's what overthrows the tyranny and

00:55:30.360 God tells Moses something very specific which is very much worth knowing

00:55:34.420 very much relevant to the story that we're telling

00:55:37.620 God tells Moses go to the Pharaoh and you tell him this very specifically

00:55:43.100 you say God has commanded me to tell you to let my people go

00:55:49.280 right that's a very famous line all you Americans know that from the civil rights

00:55:54.040 movement let my people go that was the clarion call partly for the american revolution certainly

00:55:59.700 the clarion call for the civil rights movement in the 1960s which used the exodus theme repeatedly

00:56:07.000 as a motivating and uniting motif but that isn't what god tells moses he says tell the pharaoh to

00:56:14.080 let my people go so they may worship me in the wilderness right and he doesn't just say that once

00:56:21.200 He says that once per plague, exactly those words.

00:56:25.640 And that's very relevant because what God sets up as the alternative to tyranny

00:56:32.800 is not anarchic, hedonistic freedom.

00:56:37.700 That's not the dynamic.

00:56:39.840 The dynamic is the properly structured state as the antithesis of tyranny and slavery.

00:56:47.200 Of course, that begs the question, what's the properly structured state?

00:56:51.200 Right? And you can think about that state multiple ways. You can think about it as the state of your mind.

00:56:56.200 You can think about it as the state of your house. You can think about it as the state of the nation.

00:57:01.200 It doesn't matter. It's the same pattern at all the different levels of potential analysis.

00:57:08.200 What's the proper state that characterizes the alternative to tyranny and slavery?

00:57:14.200 You can think tyranny and slavery as opposites, although they dance perversely together.

00:57:18.200 together but there's a alternative that stands in opposition to both and that's

00:57:23.660 the mystery that's the right story what's the alternative that stands in

00:57:27.320 opposition to tyranny and slavery well Moses confronts the Pharaoh and

00:57:36.200 performs his magic which the magicians of the court are able to duplicate for

00:57:41.240 the first four or five

00:57:43.140 tricks and then as 0.50

00:57:45.140 the charlatans of 0.89

00:57:47.100 tyrants are wont to do 0.92

00:57:48.720 their tricks fail

00:57:50.060 Moses warns the Pharaoh

00:57:53.160 let my people go 0.99

00:57:55.080 so they may worship me in the wilderness

00:57:56.840 or or what

00:57:58.780 or hell is going to break loose

00:58:00.700 what does that mean in relationship to tyranny

00:58:03.100 well how often have you 1.00

00:58:05.000 stuck to something stupidly 1.00

00:58:07.400 to torture 1.00

00:58:08.860 yourself and not

00:58:11.060 even learned from that. Well, that's in the nature of the tyrant. What does the tyrant do? A tyrant

00:58:17.220 is the person who refuses to learn from their own mistakes. And what happens if you refuse to learn

00:58:24.220 from your own mistakes? Well, that's easy. Each mistake gets worse. And that's what happens to

00:58:33.280 the Pharaoh and the Egyptians. First of all, the world falls apart. Plagues come up from 0.99

00:58:39.420 underneath so to speak the natural world rebels and then the heavens fall apart and darkness

00:58:46.380 falls and then the future itself is destroyed and that's the death of the firstborn and

00:58:53.580 the moral of that story is if you're tyrannical enough and you refuse to learn in the face of

00:59:00.720 mounting evidence not only will you destroy the present you will destroy the future and that's 0.86

00:59:08.580 what happens to the Egyptians, and that's what happens to everyone who insists upon remaining 0.82

00:59:15.000 the tyrant who's absolutely right in the face of all disconfirming evidence. And the opposite of 0.90

00:59:22.460 that is humility. It's like, maybe you're wrong. That's why you're miserable. And so you pray,

00:59:31.900 God, reveal to me the manifold ways in which the tyranny of my presumptions makes me wrong.

00:59:40.780 That's a prayer that will be answered to the great relief of everyone who knows you.

00:59:47.260 The Pharaoh refuses that and brings devastation on his state.

00:59:51.600 And of course, that's what tyrants do.

00:59:54.040 So there's nothing about that that isn't true. 0.91

00:59:57.160 The Egyptians leave. 1.00

00:59:58.360 They despoil. 1.00

00:59:59.700 The Israelites leave. 1.00

01:00:00.680 They despoil the Egyptians. 0.98

01:00:03.260 The Egyptians leave their treasure on the table for the Israelites to take. 0.99

01:00:08.500 Well, what does that mean?

01:00:09.880 It took me a long time to figure that out.

01:00:12.140 It's like, well, what happens in a tyranny?

01:00:14.780 This is what's happened in the universities.

01:00:16.840 People in a tyranny forget what's valuable.

01:00:20.140 They just forget it.

01:00:21.100 It's like they're so warped that they think that the true value lies somewhere else.

01:00:26.040 So the universities have left truth, beauty, justice, the scientific method, and the entire religious tradition on the table.

01:00:34.400 For what? For anyone to take and use.

01:00:38.160 It's like, well, if you're going to leave that behind, someone's going to pick it up because that's where the treasure is. 0.57

01:00:44.740 And that's what happens to the Israelites when they leave Egypt.

01:00:48.160 They take the treasure with them because the tyrant forgets what it is.

01:00:52.880 And so now they're in the desert.

01:00:55.980 They cross the Red Sea.

01:00:57.520 Why?

01:00:58.160 Well, look, man, when you first escape from the tyranny of your own presumptions,

01:01:02.540 there's going to be some cataclysm associated with that.

01:01:05.120 You know what it's like to learn something painfully, right?

01:01:09.160 It just about kills you.

01:01:10.340 You were so wrong that you almost die to learn.

01:01:15.660 And so that's the Red Sea.

01:01:17.140 That's the sea of blood that wipes out the tyrant.

01:01:20.000 And Moses can weave his way across that chaos,

01:01:23.320 maybe in one fell swoop or maybe

01:01:25.360 there's traditions differ in this, maybe by

01:01:27.480 feeling his way across carefully

01:01:29.340 like someone who's thoughtful does 0.84

01:01:31.420 and the Israelites cross 0.83

01:01:33.800 the Red Sea of 0.98

01:01:35.420 catastrophic, cataclysmic

01:01:37.720 destruction of the

01:01:39.580 tyranny and they end up

01:01:41.460 not in the promised land

01:01:43.680 and this is something to know

01:01:45.620 and this is part of the story

01:01:47.200 why do people stubbornly

01:01:49.580 adhere to their 0.88

01:01:51.460 to the beliefs that make even them miserable tyrants. 0.71

01:01:57.040 And the answer is, better the tyranny than the desert. 0.67

01:02:01.140 Right?

01:02:01.560 Better a certainty that's false than a confusion that's real.

01:02:06.160 Or that's what people are afraid of.

01:02:08.040 It's like, I can't let go of that.

01:02:10.280 Where would I be?

01:02:11.300 And the answer is, lost in the desert for three generations.

01:02:15.920 Right? 1.00

01:02:16.160 The poor Israelites, it's like a short trip geographically.

01:02:20.480 I heard the other day that your state spent $11 billion building 1,600 feet of high-speed rail. 1.00

01:02:30.920 $80 million a foot.

01:02:34.060 Okay, how do you account for that?

01:02:35.720 If you're confused enough, it takes you forever and costs everything to do nothing.

01:02:43.100 Right.

01:02:44.200 Well, that's the condition.

01:02:50.920 There's no limit to the amount of time and money you can waste if you're confused enough.

01:02:56.700 Right?

01:02:56.980 And so that's...

01:02:57.840 And the Israelites are confused. 0.83

01:03:00.040 They have the habits of slaves. 0.99

01:03:02.580 Right?

01:03:03.480 So they don't know anything.

01:03:05.180 They're not used to taking care of themselves.

01:03:06.980 They don't take responsibility.

01:03:09.380 And the tyrant's gone.

01:03:11.800 And so they're wandering lost.

01:03:15.880 Moses and God guide them.

01:03:17.580 But it's a rough journey.

01:03:19.340 and it takes them a long time

01:03:21.860 to shed the habits of slaves.

01:03:24.100 Well, they're in the desert. 1.00

01:03:25.960 They bitch and whine and moan 1.00

01:03:28.360 and complain and lose faith constantly. 1.00

01:03:31.680 They lose faith in Moses.

01:03:33.400 They curse God.

01:03:34.920 They doubt the existence of the promised land

01:03:37.940 and worse, they pine for the bloody tyranny.

01:03:41.300 Well, didn't we have it good 1.00

01:03:42.360 under the thumb of the Egyptians? 1.00

01:03:43.760 At least we weren't wandering around in the desert. 0.81

01:03:46.660 Right, and that's that false nostalgia

01:03:49.200 for the pathological past that characterizes a kind of sentimental,

01:03:54.640 the worst of a blinkered sentimental conservatism. 0.87

01:03:59.340 You saw this emerge in the Soviet Union.

01:04:01.820 You know, in the midst of the 90s, everyone over 50 was pining for Stalin.

01:04:07.580 You know, at least everyone knew where they were then.

01:04:11.140 You know, that false nostalgia for the previous tyranny,

01:04:15.960 another impediment to growth.

01:04:17.460 You won't let go of your own iron grip on your soul

01:04:22.180 because you'll be in the desert and you'll be so lost there 1.00

01:04:26.600 that you'll wish that you were back in the grip of the idiot ideology 1.00

01:04:30.420 that had you under its thumb. 1.00

01:04:33.020 And that's what happens to the Israelites. 0.99

01:04:34.560 They're the whiniest lot, constantly fighting with each other. 1.00

01:04:39.420 Why? Well, they have the habits of slaves.

01:04:42.240 They don't know how to negotiate.

01:04:43.960 They don't know how to organize themselves into a community.

01:04:46.040 They don't know how to take responsibility.

01:04:48.560 They're used to being ordered around,

01:04:51.260 which, of course, makes you a slave,

01:04:53.100 and I suppose there's some misery in that,

01:04:54.580 but you don't have to bloody well think, do you?

01:04:56.860 You don't have to take any responsibility,

01:04:58.920 and that's what the tyrannical state always offers, 1.00

01:05:01.520 idiot slaves, is you won't have to think. 1.00

01:05:04.240 You won't have to take any responsibility. 1.00

01:05:06.620 Everything will be done for you.

01:05:08.140 It's like, well, everything?

01:05:10.520 Why should I even be around then?

01:05:12.800 Well, that turns out to be a major problem

01:05:15.020 for people in a tyranny.

01:05:16.680 Like the utter meaninglessness of a life

01:05:18.920 that's run according to, you know,

01:05:21.160 a top-down patterned order.

01:05:23.700 There's no adventure in that.

01:05:25.540 All the adventure is in the responsibility.

01:05:28.480 And that's what's vacuumed up by the tyrants

01:05:30.660 when the people themselves 1.00

01:05:32.040 become irresponsible and slavish. 1.00

01:05:35.520 Right? 1.00

01:05:35.740 And so all of you who are sitting there,

01:05:37.100 one of the questions I was going to ask you tonight is,

01:05:39.460 how many of you take an active role

01:05:41.440 in your political,

01:05:43.200 in the political realm?

01:05:45.020 And, you can ask yourself that, and here's something to think about.

01:05:50.020 It's like, for all you decent citizens who abdicate political responsibility,

01:05:56.020 you need to understand that that void will be filled by tyrants.

01:06:00.020 Right? So it's either you or the tyrants.

01:06:03.020 That's the option. So if it's not you, and you're wondering why there's a lot of tyrants,

01:06:08.020 it's because it's not you.

01:06:10.020 And so, and we'll get to that, I'll explain why that's the case. 0.76

01:06:14.020 case so now the israelites are out in the desert bitching and moaning and whining and fighting with 0.69

01:06:18.940 each other because they don't have enough sense to settle their own their own disputes and they

01:06:24.340 start to pine for the pharaoh who was always there when they needed him and they set up moses as a

01:06:30.120 judge and so he sits from morning till night judging the israelites listening to all their

01:06:37.220 petty complaints and adjudicating right and you can imagine that's that's a very difficult job

01:06:44.500 to take all that responsibility onto yourself and at that point moses father-in-law jethro shows back

01:06:51.560 up and he's a good guy jethro a benevolent foreigner pattern of character in the biblical

01:06:58.660 corpus the foreigner who has the wisdom that the tyrannical state has abandoned right so the

01:07:04.340 foreigner as agent of transformation. That's Jethro. He comes and he sees Moses out there in 0.97

01:07:09.660 the desert visiting his, he's come for a visit to his son-in-law, and he sees Moses sitting from

01:07:15.180 dawn till midnight judging the Israelites, and he says, you've got to stop doing that. And Moses

01:07:21.180 says, well, why? You know, the people need me. And Jethro says, well, there's two reasons

01:07:26.980 fundamentally. First of all, you're going to, no one can do this. You can't take the weight of 150,000

01:07:33.140 people onto yourself that's too much you're just you can't handle it it's too much for you it's too

01:07:40.260 much for one man and then he says but there's something worse this is not good for the israelites 0.96

01:07:45.580 it's like they're trying to make you into another pharaoh they're abandoning the necessity to make 0.77

01:07:50.940 responsible judgments for themselves they're pushing it up the political hierarchy they want

01:07:55.940 to turn themselves into slaves and you into the king and eventually the israelites demand a king

01:08:02.340 This is much later in the biblical stories.

01:08:04.240 They demand a king because everyone else has one.

01:08:06.220 And God keeps saying, you don't want a king.

01:08:09.280 You could do things yourself.

01:08:11.460 And the Israelites think, we'd rather have a king.

01:08:14.060 And God says, well, you know, those kings, they tend to turn into tyrants.

01:08:18.140 And the Israelites say, well, as long as we get to be irresponsible,

01:08:22.280 we don't care if we have a tyrant.

01:08:24.420 And so they end up with the kings.

01:08:26.280 And that's not a good deal.

01:08:28.020 And that's something your country realized a long time ago.

01:08:31.640 Right when it was founded

01:08:33.220 That responsible citizens

01:08:35.500 Don't need a king

01:08:36.560 Why?

01:08:37.440 Because they do the bloody work themselves

01:08:39.540 And what's the utility in that?

01:08:41.880 Well then you get to have a life

01:08:43.300 So that's what Jethro tells Moses 0.56

01:08:49.180 It's one of the most brilliant

01:08:51.220 It's a very short part of the biblical story

01:08:53.160 He says look

01:08:55.020 This is what you have to do

01:08:56.200 You've got to take all these people

01:08:57.680 And you've got to make a hierarchy out of them

01:09:00.520 And here's how you do it. Find familial groups, kin groups of ten people, and get them to nominate a leader.

01:09:09.020 And then when anyone in those ten has something to bitch about, they can bring their problems to the leader, and he can sort it out.

01:09:16.020 And then, maybe now and then, there'll be a problem that the leader of ten can't adjudicate.

01:09:22.020 And so, put the leaders into groups, and then have them elect another leader.

01:09:28.020 And then if a dispute can't be settled locally, it can move up one rung to the next level of self-government and do that all the way up to groups of 10,000.

01:09:38.980 And then you can put yourself at the top and any dispute that isn't settled as it moves up the hierarchy of responsibility can land on you and you can have a chat with God about it.

01:09:48.580 and that'll alleviate the excess burden of responsibility

01:09:53.460 that you've pridefully taken on yourself

01:09:56.020 in your unconscious desire to become the new pharaoh

01:09:59.680 because the pull of power is a temptation for Moses 1.00

01:10:02.840 and it'll be real good for the damn Israelites 1.00

01:10:04.960 because they'll have to stop being immature slaves 1.00

01:10:08.040 and figure out how to solve their own problems. 0.96

01:10:10.900 Then they won't need a bloody tyrant

01:10:12.220 and that's the establishment of what's called the principle of subsidiarity

01:10:16.300 which is a core doctrine in catholic social theory and the doctrine is the alternative

01:10:21.940 to tyranny and slavery is a hierarchy of distributed responsibility starting with the individual

01:10:27.940 you have something to do moving to the family to the marriage the couple is a unit of responsibility

01:10:34.960 moving from that to the family another unit of responsibility from that to the local community

01:10:40.240 and then to the state and then to the nation with responsibility distributed down that hierarchy

01:10:46.000 as far down as it can possibly be distributed.

01:10:49.300 Then you don't need a king.

01:10:50.700 Then you're not under the thumb of a tyranny.

01:10:54.020 And you're not a slave.

01:10:55.860 And what does it require?

01:10:57.240 It requires the voluntary adoption of maximal responsibility.

01:11:01.340 And that's, what's the payoff?

01:11:03.800 You get to be a man or a woman who's mature and integrated

01:11:08.540 and contributing to the community in a meaningful way.

01:11:11.400 And bear the weight of

01:11:13.440 Bringing the order that is good

01:11:15.740 Into the world on your own shoulders

01:11:17.300 And what's the payoff for that?

01:11:19.160 Well, you get to do it

01:11:20.180 And it happens

01:11:21.240 And you don't need a king

01:11:22.120 And you're not a slave

01:11:22.980 But there's more to it than that

01:11:24.640 It's the same as having an adventure

01:11:27.080 Right?

01:11:28.420 To take on that responsibility

01:11:29.920 That's what gives you value

01:11:33.360 Even in your own eyes

01:11:34.560 You know, that ability to

01:11:35.900 Take some of the burden of the world

01:11:38.240 On your own shoulders

01:11:39.120 Or maybe a plenty of it

01:11:40.320 Not only for you

01:11:41.340 but also for your wife or your husband and for your children and for your town and your community, right?

01:11:46.640 And you can see then that you are a locus of stability and positive transformation operating in the world

01:11:55.000 and there isn't anything that's more deeply meaningful than that.

01:11:57.920 And there's no difference between that and establishing the proper covenant with the God

01:12:02.680 who sits at the top of Jacob's eternal ladder.

01:12:05.700 That's all the same thing.

01:12:07.020 And what that means is a properly God-fearing, responsible citizenry

01:12:11.740 is no longer under the heel of tyrant

01:12:14.620 and no longer prone to the hedonistic blandishments of the irresponsible slave.

01:12:21.080 And that's a great deal.

01:12:22.400 And one of the things that is very useful for you Americans in particular to understand is

01:12:27.600 that's the story of your country.

01:12:30.580 Like, seriously.

01:12:32.280 And your country is very highly functional.

01:12:34.140 And most of you admire success, and this is a remarkably non-envious society.

01:12:39.840 And it's unbelievably productive, and hospitable, and trusting, and generous.

01:12:44.540 Remarkably so. Uniquely so in the world.

01:12:47.840 And uniquely so in the history of the world.

01:12:51.640 And why? Because you adopted a subsidiary structure of self-governance.

01:12:56.740 And you adopted the roles of voluntary,

01:13:00.940 of the citizens who took the burden of governance onto themselves.

01:13:05.220 And look what's happened.

01:13:07.240 Don't lose that.

01:13:09.140 Don't lose that.

01:13:10.180 The world depends on that.

01:13:14.800 And so what's the story?

01:13:17.440 What's the story?

01:13:18.560 Well, you're going from point A to B, right?

01:13:21.260 And it's punctuated.

01:13:23.280 A, is it tyranny that you're trying to escape from?

01:13:26.780 Or a state of slavery?

01:13:28.220 There's something wrong with where you are.

01:13:29.920 Where are you headed?

01:13:30.940 Somewhere better, or you wouldn't want to go there.

01:13:34.480 That's the eternal movement upward towards the promised land.

01:13:37.900 Upward, up the holy mountain, towards the kingdom of heaven.

01:13:41.540 Up towards the heavenly city of Jerusalem, to the place where the lights are on the hill.

01:13:48.060 Right?

01:13:48.400 Everyone understands that imagery.

01:13:50.240 That's where you're headed.

01:13:51.440 That's what motivates you in life.

01:13:53.020 That's what holds you together.

01:13:54.040 That's what unites the community.

01:13:56.080 Along the way, you leave the tyranny, and it's not a linear journey.

01:14:00.940 to up. It's a punctuated

01:14:03.120 journey because you end up in the desert

01:14:05.140 that's a consequence of 1.00

01:14:06.820 your previous idiocy and refusal 1.00

01:14:08.880 to learn and you have to 1.00

01:14:10.580 strive chaotically in that

01:14:12.980 desert to put yourself back together and

01:14:14.840 you do that by

01:14:16.200 organizing yourself

01:14:19.240 properly, psychologically

01:14:20.740 and in the community and adopting the

01:14:22.960 responsibility for your own

01:14:24.840 destiny and then you can

01:14:26.700 sojourn in God's company

01:14:29.000 to the promised land.

01:14:30.940 Right, and that's the story of life.

01:14:33.840 And it's true.

01:14:37.320 And that's the end of that.

01:14:50.300 Thank you, thank you.

01:14:52.780 Thank you.

01:14:53.860 That's quite a trip from Egypt through the desert

01:14:56.560 to the threshold of the promised land.

01:14:59.680 It's a hell of a story.

01:15:00.940 that's for sure and it's one well worth knowing and well worth understanding because it is a story

01:15:06.280 about you like right to the core you know it's a story about what everyone could be if they

01:15:12.780 hearken to the voice of calling an adventure and and it's a story about how a harmonious psyche

01:15:20.900 and a harmonious productive state can be set up by people who are willing to bear the responsibility

01:15:27.000 of their own life there's no difference between that and hoisting the cross those are the same

01:15:31.700 idea right and we've we've founded our communities in the west on the image of the cross for exactly

01:15:40.660 that reason because at a deeply unconscious level a deeply implicit level we understand that

01:15:47.620 responsible self-sacrifice is the soul of the community and that's true

01:15:54.760 obviously obviously if you're if you're going to organize yourself communally

01:16:00.180 you're going to give up your impulsive individuality there's no

01:16:05.120 difference between that sacrifice there's no difference between that

01:16:07.980 maturation obviously that's the pathway to psychological integration and social

01:16:13.280 harmony, right? The human pattern of existence is voluntary self-sacrifice, right? And that's

01:16:19.900 the message that's at the core of the biblical library and at the center of the Christian

01:16:25.060 ethos, right? You see it reflected in the story of Abraham, right? He's called upon

01:16:30.640 even to sacrifice his son. Everything is to be offered upward in the process of sacrifice

01:16:36.740 that stabilizes the community and transforms the individual, right? And that's the story

01:16:42.280 that the West is founded on.

01:16:44.720 It's the story that insofar as you're sane,

01:16:47.180 you see the world through, right?

01:16:49.300 And we're in danger of forgetting that.

01:16:51.700 And that's a very, very, very bad idea.

01:16:57.160 If you forget the truth, you live in falsehood.

01:16:59.860 And there's no difference between that being in hell.

01:17:02.820 And so, God help us avoid that.

01:17:06.020 That's for sure.

01:17:07.840 So.

01:17:08.020 all right i'm going to i'm going to ask my daughter to come on stage again and she's going to

01:17:16.340 she's going to to select some questions from the audience that you were kind enough and

01:17:23.820 interested enough to offer and we'll do that for 23 minutes apparently and that'll be evening

01:17:38.020 that was great thank you dear i opened you one already oh thank you

01:17:48.020 nailed it yeah yeah well that's such a fun story such a remarkable story you know every

01:17:55.840 one of the every detail in those stories is is stunningly worth evaluating you find these little

01:18:02.360 treasures hidden in the stories that you just i'll give you an example this is so funny there's a

01:18:07.860 there's a scene of rebellion in the exodus story near the end like the israelites have just about

01:18:14.100 made it to the promised land and this guy named koresh gets bitchy like the israelites always do

01:18:20.280 and he goes to moses and this is literally what he says he says i've got together with some of

01:18:26.460 my guys we're feeling we're feeling kind of victimized and oppressed and we think that

01:18:32.320 you've done everything you've done just to gain power for yourself right it's exactly what

01:18:39.840 the radical critics of western civilization are screeching about now everyone who's successful is

01:18:46.860 a victimizer yeah well there isn't a more pathological story than that i tell you when

01:18:54.020 your culture starts to identify success with criminality you're in serious trouble you

01:19:00.080 criminalized success yeah yeah yeah and that process that process by the way historically

01:19:08.260 often starts with demonization of the jews because the jews have the temerity to be a successful

01:19:14.300 minority and the successful in any dimension are always a minority and so the jews are the canary 0.96

01:19:24.760 in the coal mine, when the thugs and the resentful monsters of Luciferian rebellion come crawling 0.97

01:19:35.280 out from underneath their rocks, they point to the Jews first and portray them as victimizers 0.74

01:19:41.440 because of their success, and people abandon them, not understanding that the target isn't

01:19:49.580 the jews the target is those who have the temerity to be successful and the jews fall first but

01:19:55.840 they're not the last to fall and if you can't see that unfolding in what's in front of you right now 0.83

01:20:00.840 you are not paying attention and that's a bad idea so so koresh has this rebellion against moses 0.83

01:20:11.460 and it's a victim victimizer narrative and the consequence of that is the earth swallows up 0.63

01:20:17.100 koresh and all his followers right yeah well so you know play victim victimizer and just watch

01:20:27.240 what happens so and hopefully we'll have enough wisdom to not let that go too far but 0.98

01:20:34.920 we'll see won't we we'll see we'll hope

01:20:40.740 are you ready

01:20:43.780 i'm starting with a light one

01:20:48.820 how do you see the archetype of satan in today's society

01:20:55.140 well probably the most interesting manifestation is related to the tower of babel

01:21:05.220 So, the Tower of Babel is a pyramid of Babylon, right?

01:21:12.300 Babel is Babylon.

01:21:14.540 And at the time the story was created, there were multiple city-state kingdoms in the Middle East.

01:21:22.880 And all of the tyrants, all the petty would-be tyrants in those states,

01:21:28.460 who tried to make themselves into gods

01:21:32.220 built pyramids, towers

01:21:35.600 in competition to see

01:21:37.680 who could build the highest tower.

01:21:39.360 And that was a testament

01:21:40.180 to their own god-like status, let's say.

01:21:45.020 And so, you know, that still happens today

01:21:47.240 as cities compete to see

01:21:48.760 who can build the tallest building.

01:21:50.060 And there's something in that

01:21:51.020 that is, you know, emblematic

01:21:53.120 of genuine technical striving.

01:21:56.760 And the cathedrals, of course, of Europe had that proclivity to be the tallest structure in the community.

01:22:03.340 Of course, they were consecrated to God, so not to the local bloody thug.

01:22:11.740 The Tower of Babel is a monument to human presumption.

01:22:17.260 And the builders of the Tower of Babel were the engineers. 0.81

01:22:21.160 and that's what's happening in today's society

01:22:25.140 is that the engineers build Towers of Babel

01:22:27.580 to their own intellectual presumption

01:22:29.420 and that's happening everywhere

01:22:31.220 and why the engineers?

01:22:36.800 because the engineers are

01:22:37.920 I like engineers by the way

01:22:39.740 don't get me wrong

01:22:40.560 we're talking about something very specific here

01:22:42.980 engineers have a proclivity to worship technology

01:22:46.700 and that's a bad idea

01:22:48.820 Because technology can help us solve our problems if we're upward oriented.

01:22:53.960 But orientation towards technology is not an upward orientation.

01:22:57.760 It has to be put in its proper place.

01:22:59.900 And if you put technology at the pinnacle, which is what the builders of the Tower of Babel do, 0.72

01:23:04.000 you build false, you build false monuments to the wrong God. 0.67

01:23:10.580 Well, what God?

01:23:12.100 Well, imagine the worship of technology is associated with the, what would you say,

01:23:17.360 elevation of intellect to the highest place it's something like that look how smart we are

01:23:22.240 well the spirit of intellectual presumption that's lucifer right because lucifer is the

01:23:29.900 intellect that worships itself and believes that it should take the place of god and that produces

01:23:34.980 this luciferian technological presumption that produces towers of babel what happens when you

01:23:40.700 produce a tower of babel everyone speaks a different language why because no one's united

01:23:48.180 psychologically or communally towards the proper highest aim and so no one can understand each

01:23:55.020 other anymore everyone speaks a different language commentators on this story say well that was a

01:24:01.640 primitive way of explaining why there's so many languages it's like hey guys you seriously missed

01:24:07.040 the point. Like, seriously. Right? It's a story of technological presumption. Why do people

01:24:13.080 start speaking different languages? Because unity of apprehension makes words comprehensible.

01:24:19.860 What do I mean by that? What is a woman? That's what I mean by that. Right. Okay, so, so, 0.86

01:24:31.260 So we don't know.

01:24:33.800 And so what does that mean?

01:24:34.800 It means the most fundamental words are now, have now gone askew in their meaning.

01:24:41.860 Well why?

01:24:43.960 Because we're, we inhabit the wrong towers.

01:24:46.920 Like seriously, I tell you, I truly believe this as a psychologist who's looked deeply

01:24:53.140 into such things.

01:24:56.140 There is no confusion deeper than inability or refusal to distinguish the sexes.

01:25:03.160 Creatures without nervous systems can tell the difference between male and female.

01:25:08.160 Right? I'm serious about that.

01:25:11.220 Right?

01:25:12.500 From an evolutionary perspective, we have been able to make that discrimination for 650 million years.

01:25:20.620 That's a long time.

01:25:21.960 It's more fundamental than up and down or black and white or night and day.

01:25:26.140 It's the most fundamental, verbally signified reality.

01:25:33.380 If you're confused about that, then everyone speaks a different language.

01:25:38.800 And that's in no small consequence the result of our, what would you say,

01:25:46.840 mind-addling Luciferian technological presumption.

01:25:50.640 I know those things are tangled together oddly, but the world's an odd place.

01:25:55.880 And you can see the fractionation in our ability to communicate occurring as we produce Facebook, as we produce Twitter, as we produce these new landscapes of presumption that destroy, threaten our ability to communicate.

01:26:22.560 Presumption that's doing that.

01:26:24.460 it's luciferian presumption you know there's nothing wrong with the intellect but it's a

01:26:29.420 terrible master it's a great servant but it is a terrible master and one of the temptations of

01:26:36.540 those with the intelligence to manipulate technology is to place the worship of their

01:26:44.460 own intellect at the highest pinnacle and then it's luciferian instantly and that is a bad thing

01:26:52.140 it's always been a terrible thing it's no better now worse probably because we're so technologically

01:26:58.740 powerful you know if we if we worship technology which is a real threat god only knows what's

01:27:07.600 going to happen you know i look today i saw this new ai system it's the uh avatar of chat gpt4

01:27:15.660 it's been given a voice at a very attractive female voice very charismatic very caring

01:27:22.240 very responsive it's like we're literally building soulless agents soulless agents

01:27:29.460 of seduction jesus that's probably not going to go well

01:27:33.740 yeah and it's who's doing it the presumption in the presumptuous engineers who can't

01:27:45.640 get a date yeah ha ha right it'd be it'd be funny if it wasn't terrible you know pornography drove

01:27:57.220 the development of the net and 30 of the traffic is still pornographic it's like don't be

01:28:03.460 underestimating the terrible power of frustrated sexual desire and what it's capable of what kind

01:28:12.620 of havoc it's capable of wreaking so yeah so be awake that's for sure well so that's an example

01:28:24.340 of of lucifer tromping around the earth and when you use that uh what did you say 0.73

01:28:31.980 you're dumber than an organism without a nervous system yeah that's a good one i'm gonna keep that 0.90

01:28:39.600 okay ready yep 1.00

01:28:42.620 This is a new one. We haven't talked about this before.

01:28:46.100 How can someone who intends to live by logic also hold true to the supernatural elements and beliefs in the Bible without feeling as though you're betraying logic?

01:29:12.620 that's a very complicated question um you know i would say i i hesitate to attempt an answer

01:29:23.040 because it's not it's an to answer that question properly you have to elucidate

01:29:28.520 a non-materialistic philosophy like really from first principles and you just can't do that in

01:29:34.740 five minutes i mean i've been trying to do that for i've been literally trying to do that for 40

01:29:38.980 years you know and so um let's see if i can just make a make a crack at it

01:29:52.420 i feel like let me i give you an example that's all i can do so and i this just pushes me to the

01:30:01.460 limits of my knowledge right and so don't be thinking that this is some kind of final answer

01:30:06.500 So Christ in the Gospels is presented as the source of the banquet and the banquet that never ends.

01:30:15.680 He's the well that never runs dry, the fish that multiply beyond necessity, and the bread that feeds the multitude.

01:30:27.760 That's Christ.

01:30:29.040 Okay, so what does that mean?

01:30:31.300 Well, here's at least what it means.

01:30:33.880 i'm not saying this is everything it means but this is at least what it means

01:30:38.140 okay you know in this culture we have the idea of natural resource hey 0.98

01:30:42.800 that's a stupid idea it's a materialistic idea and it's fundamentally 0.98

01:30:47.780 a envious and marxist idea because it's predicated on the idea that 1.00

01:30:52.840 valuable things are just sort of lying around

01:30:55.220 and you know thieves take them and monopolize them and that's capitalism

01:31:00.460 it's something like that and if the natural resources were just distributed fairly everyone

01:31:06.460 would be rich it's like there are no natural resources like air maybe you can breathe but

01:31:13.280 even then you have to put some effort into it no one's going to push the air into your lungs

01:31:17.860 right so there's even some human effort in breathing there's no natural resource okay

01:31:24.980 well what about fresh water it's like really are you really that clueless like seriously do you

01:31:30.700 know how hard it's been to produce a civilization that has a reliable that has the kind of reliable

01:31:36.720 access to fresh water that you have in la it's a desert here like how did you manage that

01:31:43.300 like it's impossible most of the world still has no fresh water it's hard to have fresh water

01:31:52.860 okay so what are the preconditions for fresh water a insanely sophisticated technological

01:32:01.000 infrastructure okay what are the preconditions for an insanely tech insanely sophisticated

01:32:07.400 technological infrastructure people who go to work every day right like working class people

01:32:16.960 who are fundamentally honest and hard-working,

01:32:20.020 who are upward-aiming,

01:32:21.420 who go and fix the pipes

01:32:22.940 that would otherwise be breaking non-stop,

01:32:25.700 that keep the whole bloody clattering apparatus

01:32:28.520 working miraculously,

01:32:30.540 that keep the lights on,

01:32:31.820 which is impossible.

01:32:33.100 Do you know how many countries in the world

01:32:34.280 have, like, no electricity?

01:32:35.840 Or if they do, it's rolling blackout city.

01:32:39.040 It's like, why are these on?

01:32:41.860 Why are these on? 0.99

01:32:42.860 Because you're a Judeo-Christian nation.

01:32:45.300 That's why. And why would I say that? Well, it's because there's an ethos of sacrifice that constitutes the valid, meritorious work that produces the American dream. And by and large, everyone adheres to it. Like, it's a miracle. You've got to see this. It's an absolute miracle. 0.96

01:33:08.340 people damaged people you know hurt people they struggle out of bed at 6 in

01:33:13.560 the morning and they go out into storms and they fix the power lines and why do 0.99

01:33:18.180 they do that well obviously to get paid but it doesn't happen in third world

01:33:22.560 countries they do it because they they act out an ethos it's an it's the ethos 1.00

01:33:30.660 on which complex civilization depends it's the self-sacrificing ethos that's

01:33:36.540 characterized by let's say the offering of Christ and the reason he's the well

01:33:42.600 that never runs dry and the bread that never ends is because the pattern of

01:33:46.800 self-sacrifice and upward aiming that's embodied by Christ is the source of the

01:33:53.040 resource that never exhausts itself right and so is that a miracle well yes

01:34:01.560 S, is it the kind of miracle that people usually think about when they read the Gospels?

01:34:07.820 No.

01:34:09.240 Now, can I bridge the gap between the historical reality and that, let's say, more symbolic interpretation?

01:34:19.840 No.

01:34:20.340 You know, no one can bridge the gap between the historical reality of Christ and the, what would you say, the transcendent narrative power that suffuses the text.

01:34:36.780 That's beyond anyone's ability.

01:34:39.980 And it's beyond my ability.

01:34:42.240 But I can tell you that that's at least what it means.

01:34:45.740 And that's not nothing, right?

01:34:47.960 That's something, to understand that the pattern that calls you to adventure,

01:34:53.020 the conscience that encourages you to tell the truth,

01:34:58.540 that's the same spirit that makes the desert bloom, right?

01:35:02.220 That's the same spirit that provides the food that never ends to the starving.

01:35:06.100 That's true.

01:35:07.760 And so, is that a miracle?

01:35:09.680 Yes.

01:35:10.180 Is it a miracle that the rational can appreciate?

01:35:13.280 It depends on how rational they are.

01:35:14.780 like i there's nothing about the account i just gave that doesn't make sense

01:35:18.900 so that's a reconciliation of the rational and the miraculous and if you don't think that

01:35:26.160 the fact that electricity comes out of the plug with the wall when you put the plug in

01:35:30.600 if you don't think that's an ethical miracle you're you just don't you just don't know the

01:35:37.500 first thing about what would you say what makes life more abundant it's an ethos

01:35:43.800 it's the ethos in which technology itself should be nested right and that's that's the tower of

01:35:50.560 babel problem it's like technology is not what makes us rich is ethical conduct makes us rich

01:35:58.180 technology can serve that if it's put in its proper place just like the intellect just like

01:36:03.100 sex just like adventure everything subdued and named properly then it can serve what's highest

01:36:11.000 out of place anything out of place especially elevated to the highest place is immediately

01:36:16.260 some variant of of satan could be sex it could be power could be anger it could be intellect

01:36:25.160 you got to get what's properly at the pinnacle in the right place and and then everything

01:36:33.220 then you're in the garden and everything is at your fingertips and that's the truth

01:36:41.380 It's really, that's really how the world is structured.

01:36:53.200 That was impressive.

01:36:56.060 Thank you, my dear.

01:37:01.720 Okay, going in a different direction.

01:37:03.820 how do we understand and respond to the differences between men and women

01:37:12.960 in a society that has blurred the obvious truths

01:37:16.160 well that's sort of a problem you hash out in the confines of your marriage isn't that you know i

01:37:25.660 mean that's where the rubber hits the road so to speak and so how do you do that well i'll tell you

01:37:32.420 a story about that so i had this friend came from this little town called bear canyon and when i say

01:37:39.320 little town you have to understand that the town i came from had 3 000 people in it was way the

01:37:44.960 hell out in the middle of nowhere and bear canyon was a little town that compared to fairview was

01:37:50.160 way out in the middle of nowhere so i don't know how many people were in bear canyon it was like

01:37:56.940 at the edge of the northernmost prairie it was literally it was literally the last part of the

01:38:02.860 prairie settled by europeans in north america and that was only in the like the 1950s or thereabouts

01:38:08.760 so it was a backwoods place anyways i had a friend who came from there and he was of swedish

01:38:13.980 extraction and uh he ended up falling in love with and then marrying the cousin of my wife tammy

01:38:21.380 and uh they she was also swedish of a swedish origin and they decided that they would go to

01:38:28.200 sweden to get married and during their marriage ceremony there was a custom that they both

01:38:35.060 participated in and the custom was that when they were standing beside each other at the altar they

01:38:41.280 lifted a candle above their heads right and that signified the marriage but it signified more than

01:38:46.800 marriage see it signified what a candle signifies on a christmas tree which is enlightenment and

01:38:52.160 illumination and the return of the light in the darkness and the return of the sun in the depths

01:38:57.120 of winter and the heavenly sovereignty of the sun compared to the stars and that's all tied up in

01:39:03.600 that candle but it also signifies christ and that's because marriage is a sacrament and the

01:39:09.440 The theory is that the union of man and woman

01:39:12.080 recreates the original Adam prior to his division into man and woman

01:39:17.680 and the re-establishment of the identity

01:39:21.900 that characterized life in the Garden of Eden.

01:39:26.060 That's all packed into that symbol, that idea.

01:39:30.260 So what does that mean practically?

01:39:33.240 Who's the boss in your marriage? 0.75

01:39:35.100 well you know the the traditionalists the demented power mad traditionalists they'll

01:39:41.600 insist that it's the man um try that in your marriage and see how that works for you 1.00

01:39:47.800 it's like one of the really troublesome things about women is they make terrible slaves 1.00

01:39:54.480 they're really they're like unruly and you know they're full of tricks and if you oppress them 1.00

01:40:01.040 they got like they got six tricks to your one like club it's just it's just not going anywhere

01:40:07.540 and so so you know the man is he in charge well the odd deluded man thinks so and that's just

01:40:18.020 an indication of how absolutely he's been what defeated by his wife yeah so so then it's the

01:40:26.840 wife that's in charge it's like no that's a that's a dismal set of circumstances for everyone

01:40:33.160 so women have the misfortune of liking men who are of higher status than they are right that's

01:40:39.600 cross-culturally true and there's a reason for that and the reason fundamentally is well why 0.93

01:40:45.220 would a woman want a man who's more useless than her she's going to have a baby to fill that role

01:40:51.600 she might as well have someone who's helpful and so she looks for someone who's going to be helpful 0.91

01:40:56.120 compared to her and so and that's very much key to sexual attraction between men and women

01:41:02.460 and that's well documented like cross-culturally it's one of the most well-founded observations 1.00

01:41:08.760 and all of uh what would you say in all of psychological investigation and so a woman

01:41:15.600 who dominates her husband will have virtually no sexual attraction to him so that's real fun

01:41:20.060 for both of them and so then you might say well who the hell's in charge then

01:41:23.820 and the answer is what's in charge is what's signified by the candle

01:41:30.000 right and so the notion it's so sophisticated this idea this is like the superstition of the

01:41:38.140 religious it's like you have no idea man how deep these ideas are it they're insanely deep so here's

01:41:45.060 the idea so one of the christ's proclamations is that whenever there's two or more together in his

01:41:51.540 name that he's present the logos itself or the holy dove that descends from heaven is present

01:41:56.140 so what does that mean well it means that there's a logos that's christ that's the force that

01:42:02.000 extracts order out of chaos at the beginning of time that's present whenever there's honest

01:42:07.340 dialogue dialogue dialogos the logos that two or more people engage in whenever there's truthful

01:42:14.120 communication present the spirit of the logos makes itself manifest well that's what a marriage

01:42:19.780 is it's the opening up of the possibility of intimate truthful communication that's transformative

01:42:25.720 okay that's a spirit now that's the spirit that's supposed to be elevated that's what you both serve

01:42:30.960 in a marriage right so that's the right answer to how the relationship between men and women

01:42:36.960 should be constituted it's it should be constituted in the spirit of love and truth

01:42:41.220 and the willingness to take maximal responsibility.

01:42:45.200 And if you do that, then the Logos flows between you

01:42:48.820 and that's what solves the problems

01:42:51.380 and ennobles you and keeps you in love

01:42:54.720 and provides a stable platform for your children.

01:42:57.760 And that's a good deal.

01:43:00.920 And so, what do you serve?

01:43:03.160 You serve what's highest in your marriage, both of you.

01:43:05.940 And then neither of you is a tyrant or a slave.

01:43:08.680 and you take the responsibility that's commensurate with your role

01:43:13.420 and you negotiate that

01:43:15.300 and then you're the foundation of the community

01:43:18.500 and you have someone to love. 0.98

01:43:21.220 You know how it's the most sex?

01:43:22.640 This is funny. 1.00

01:43:24.420 Religious married people. 1.00

01:43:27.200 So isn't that funny? 1.00

01:43:28.280 It's like 60 years after the sexual revolution, 1.00

01:43:31.200 the Dada-Urian. 1.00

01:43:32.980 Is it the alphabet hedonists who are on top 0.89

01:43:36.700 or the conservative Christians. 0.81

01:43:39.800 It's like, on the sexual front, 1.00

01:43:42.180 the conservative Christians are kicking ass. 1.00

01:43:50.620 That's so funny. 1.00

01:43:52.180 It's so ridiculous. 0.98

01:43:53.440 It's so unpredictable. 0.99

01:43:55.640 You just know that's true

01:43:57.320 because it's so absurd.

01:43:58.880 so the clock counted down to 23 a number of minutes ago i see so we should stop we should

01:44:10.840 probably stop we should stop yes do you have one more do you have one more quick let's see if i

01:44:15.840 can do one quick okay okay okay speed question okay speed quest okay this might be helpful for

01:44:21.080 people um what would you advise people who wish to find meaning in their lives by embracing their

01:44:26.840 responsibilities but find themselves unmotivated oh you're probably you're probably forcing yourself

01:44:35.180 too much that'd be my guess you're using the heavy hand of power right you're you want to invite

01:44:41.660 yourself to play so how do you do that well figure out a game you want to play you know and then make

01:44:49.620 a plan it's like how do you do that well this is what christ tells his followers in the gospels he

01:44:55.240 says, knock and the door will open. Ask and you will receive. Seek and you'll

01:45:03.340 find. Okay, so you have a problem. You want to be motivated. So you have to

01:45:08.380 meditate. You have to pray. You have to think, okay, if I could have what I needed

01:45:15.580 to be enthusiastic about working towards it, what would that be? And that's a

01:45:23.320 question everyone should ask themselves it's like what the hell do you want what would satisfy you

01:45:29.240 well you first of all you have to ask the question right and people don't they're afraid to

01:45:35.640 for all sorts of reasons and then you have to accept the answer and you might think well that's

01:45:41.160 impossible it's no no i'll tell you what's impossible stumbling forward depressed anxious

01:45:47.320 hopeless and unmotivated that's impossible striving to attain a difficult goal that's

01:45:54.840 that's a compelling challenge if you set it up properly and if the end is something you want

01:46:00.560 it's like you could do this in your marriage it's like okay well i tell people to do this

01:46:04.620 in local ways here's an example um it's a good example imagine coming home at night after work

01:46:12.880 you do that every day let's say take a stereotypical example that takes you about

01:46:18.100 half an hour to make that transition and so that's about five percent of your life

01:46:23.840 is the half an hour every day that you come home after work five percent of your life so

01:46:30.560 you get 20 things like that right you got your life right so you might think well how would i

01:46:35.780 like things to happen when i came home like what would motivate me to come home what would motivate

01:46:42.320 me to keep working how would i like to be greeted how would i like my kids to react when i walk in

01:46:47.860 the door what would response would i like from my wife so that i feel that the work i did during

01:46:52.740 the day was justified how could i make her happy to see me so that we were pleased when we re

01:46:58.880 encountered each other after a day's separation well you can sit there and think that through

01:47:04.260 if you could admit it to yourself you know probably what you want isn't that unreasonable

01:47:11.120 you might be able to negotiate that with her,

01:47:13.020 and then you'd have it, and then you'd be motivated.

01:47:14.920 It's like, dare to dream.

01:47:17.860 You know, ask yourself, what do I want?

01:47:20.680 With the presumption that, you know,

01:47:22.140 if you're not completely blind and deluded and greedy,

01:47:26.860 that you could probably have it,

01:47:28.560 and the world wouldn't fall apart

01:47:29.860 just because you got something that you needed.

01:47:32.040 You could give yourself that break.

01:47:35.000 And you have to find out,

01:47:38.020 just like you would from when you're making friends with someone it's like what the hell do

01:47:42.120 you want if i could offer you what you wanted what would it be well i don't know it's like well

01:47:47.560 then the first thing you want is to know what you want there's some place to start you know and you

01:47:53.060 can figure it out and if you aim small enough you can figure it out and then so if you're not

01:47:59.360 motivated you're probably living someone else's dream you're laboring under some false illusion

01:48:04.660 you're tyrannizing yourself you're taking on too much responsibility you're using power when

01:48:09.680 invitation would suffice and you don't have a vision well it doesn't have to be that way you

01:48:16.480 could figure out a game you want to play and invite yourself along and that's you can do that

01:48:24.740 that's how life is constituted so don't think it's impossible it's not impossible i told you

01:48:31.460 was impossible stumbling miserably forward that's impossible that's for sure all right that's good

01:48:40.500 thank you everyone thank you mick nice to see you all thank you everybody for coming

01:48:55.460 pleasure to see you

01:49:01.460 All right, everyone.

01:49:06.240 Good night.

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The Jordan B. Peterson Podcast - September 13, 2026

What Moses Reveals About Your Life

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