Free Republic

Many factors led to ancient Rome’s fall, say politically-correct experts. True. At the same time, there were many reasons to explain her rise too. Also forgotten: some stand out more than others. Thus, to ignore history’s greatest forces is to ignore her most important lessons. Standing on the work of the late historian Will Durant, Rabbi Daniel Lapin turns to big-picture ethics. “Excessive regulation, excessive government size and intrusion, and excessive and abusive taxation policies were only the tip of the iceberg. The essential causes of Rome’s decline lay in her people, her morals, her bureaucratic despotism, her stifling taxes,...

Just when I thought that I’ve heard every possible insult in the political realm this year Rabbi Daniel Lapin added his two cents. On the Glenn Beck program he said he views the atheists as parasites who without putting any energy into it benefit from America created by the faithful people. The Rabbi is entitled of his opinion and is free to call me parasite. However, I urge his friends to help him, because he may need advice from psychiatrist. Just two days ago a fellow who was calling people parasites strapped himself with bombs to make a point on...

Interview with Rabbi Daniel Lapin on How Today's World Compares to the Days of Noah By John-Henry Westen WASHINGTON, DC, June 25, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The recent death of Mrs. Ruth Graham, the beloved wife of preacher Billy Graham, has caused renewed reflection on her oft quoted comment:  "If God does not judge America soon, he'll have to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah."  Indeed, with the culture war raging on abortion and same-sex 'marriage', many a Christian has wondered about a coming purgation - a cleansing as in the time of Noah and the flood. It may come as a surprise to...

Like Noah, Jerry Falwell walked with God and found grace in His eyes. He was a friend to all Americans, he was a friend to the Biblical values that he believed America needed, and he was a wonderful friend to me. My children have wonderfully warm memories of Dr. Falwell from the Toward Tradition banquet in Washington DC at which our organization honored him. His speech to a largely Jewish audience that day, September 11, 2000, was almost prescient and he left an indelible imprint on everyone’s memories. Of his gigantic accomplishments in making a place at the political table...

I am certainly not a Churchill. I am not even a Revel. I am having enough trouble just trying to be a Lapin. But I am issuing a very serious warning about deep consequences, just as they did. It is a warning about the earliest stages of what could become a cataract of disasters if not resisted now. During the 1930s, Winston Churchill desperately tried to persuade the English people and their government to see that Hitler meant to end their way of life. The British ignored Churchill, which gave Hitler nearly 10 years to build up his military forces....

© 2006 WorldNetDaily.com A rabbi has launched a defense of D. James Kennedy, whose new television special this weekend will raise an alarm about the bloodshed credited to the influence of Darwin's theories of evolution, and has been attacked because of its message. Did Hitler practice Darwinism? The program is "Darwin's Deadly Legacy", a Coral Ridge Ministries production featuring more than a dozen experts in various fields talking about the connections between Darwin's theories, eugenics, Hitler and abortion. Its premise is that Darwin's thinking changed the world's perception of people, so instead of considering them made in God's image, they...

Examining which issues raise its organizational blood pressure, it is easy to see that the Anti-Defamation League chiefly represents two categories of Jews. One, Jews for whom the doctrines of secular fundamentalism and of the Democratic Party have replaced the authentic principles of Judaism. Two, Jews who consider Christian conservatives to be a far greater peril than Islamic extremism. It now turns out that the ADL represents yet a third category of Jews: those passionately dedicated to defending Darwin. Once again, like a friendly and frolicsome puppy with a large, bushy tail that constantly knocks down expensive vases, the ADL,...

After years of defining itself as the party of secularism, the Democratic Party is at a crossroads—they’ve suddenly discovered that Americans are becoming more religious. So what can they do? Learn how to sound spiritual. Well into America’s third great religious awakening (about which I started writing ten years ago), magazines like Business Week, Fortune, and Forbes have all carried articles speculating on the growing buying power of America’s evangelicals. Yes, Henry, they really do spend over seven billion dollars a year just on religious articles. Time recently ran a cover story about the country’s 25 most powerful evangelicals. Some...

To: Assignment Desk, Daybook Editor Contact: Bryan Rudnick, 561-499-3201 News Advisory: WHAT: Jews for "It's OK to Say Merry Christmas" press conference WHEN: Thursday, Dec. 1, 1:30 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. at The National Press Club (529 14th St. N.W., Washington, D.C.) in the Murrow Room. WHY: To speak out against the War on Christmas -- ongoing efforts to purge Christmas from our schools, public events, retail establishments and the culture, and why this should concern Americans of all faiths. WHO: Don Feder -- president, Jews Against Anti-Christian Defamation Michael Horowitz -- senior fellow, Hudson Institute Rabbi Daniel Lapin --...

What do you do if you are devoted to the Democratic Party which has spent years defining itself as the party of secularism, and you suddenly discover that Americans are becoming more religious? Answer: you learn how to sound spiritual. America’s third great religious awakening, about which I started writing ten years ago, is well under way. Magazines like Business Week, Fortune, and Forbes have all carried articles speculating on the growing buying power of America’s Evangelicals. Yes, Henry, they really do spend over seven billion dollars a year just on religious articles. Time recently ran a cover story about...

Heading an organization whose entire purpose is to promote friendship and mutual respect between Jews and Christians, egregious assaults on this friendship really bother me. As I reported last week, it gives me little pleasure to admit that most of these assaults come from my side of the fence. Well, here we go again. In Bellevue, Washington, just a few miles from my home, a Jewish Reform temple has been upsetting its neighbors by insisting on hosting an encampment of homeless people on its property. Fearful neighbors in this upper middle class enclave of young families point to countless offenses,...

NEW YORK - Institutionalized Christianity in the U.S. has grown so extremist that it poses a tangible danger to the principle of separation of church and state and threatens to undermine the religious tolerance that characterizes the country, the national director of the Anti-Defamation League, Abraham Foxman, warned in his address to the League's national commission, meeting in New York City over the weekend. (Haaretz Newspaper, Israel.) We Jews aren’t chic any longer. Not too many people care for Jews these days. Europe, including England, makes little secret of how it feels towards Jews. If possible, they care even less...

God Causes the Problems—And all along you thought it was President Bush Rabbi Daniel Lapin September 28, 2005 Once upon a time in St Louis, there lived a husband who yearned to vacation in Los Angeles while his wife craved a few days in New York. Averaging their desires and finding the midpoint, the couple went to Kansas City. Averaging doesn’t always work. Averaging doesn’t work when you are dealing with two very different things like Los Angeles and New York or like traditional Americans and those of the secular fundamentalist persuasion. Now, in one of the best examples of...

The Only Thing We’re Short of Is Time by Rabbi Daniel Lapin President, Toward Tradition With five single daughters, each more beautiful, brilliant, and gracious than the next, I am naturally interested in the topic of “meeting & mating.” Perusing various match-making websites the other day, I was baffled by how many women, who, as part of their “sell” proclaimed their political affiliation. Frankly, who cares? And didn’t their mothers ever tell them not to talk about religion, sex, or politics? What is more, almost to a woman, they all declared themselves to be “left wing liberal.” Now, why on...

<p>Every few weeks or so Rabbi Daniel Lapin finds a reason to fly east from his home in Mercer Island, Wash., near Seattle, and spend a few days in Washington, D.C. He might be leading a Bible study on the Hill, having dinner with his ''close friend'' House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, breakfast with Karl Rove. Last year he came for a private Shabbat dinner with President Bush. ''The president recognizes my enthusiasm for his faith,'' says the rabbi.</p>

Toward Tradition and Rabbi Daniel Lapin urge the husband of neurology patient Terri Schindler-Schiavo, and Judge George Greer, who issued her death warrant, to recognize that starving an invalid is murder, not mercy. Florida Circuit Court Judge Greer Thursday last week re-interpreted the law, calling food and water "medical treatment," thus allowing Michael Schiavo to withdraw Mrs. Schindler-Schiavo's feeding tube. This also ignores the rights of Terri's primary caretakers and loyal defenders, her mother and father. The court has ordered all food and water withheld beginning this Friday, March 18th; it is expected to take her between 1- 2 weeks...

Choose the statement that comes closest to your belief: A: People occupy this planet on account of a lengthy process of unaided materialistic evolution that transformed primitive protoplasm into Bach, Brahms, and Beethoven. B: People occupy this planet because a benevolent God created us in His image and placed us here. If you chose “A,” John Kerry is your man. If you chose “B,” the only way to retain your integrity is to commit your vote to George W. Bush. You see, by choosing “A,” you are unavoidably affirming that other than for some superficial biological differences, such as brain...

If you chose “A,” John Kerry is your man. If you chose “B,” the only way to retain your integrity is to commit your vote to George W. Bush. You see, by choosing “A,” you are unavoidably affirming that other than for some superficial biological differences, such as brain size and opposable thumbs, you think that people and animals are similar. From here it follows logically that as animals, smart and sophisticated animals perhaps but animals nonetheless, we are products of our natures just like denizens of the zoo or occupants of the farmyard. It should also be said that...

At least five million fervent Jews and Christians, most of whom are conservative politically, sat out the election of 2000. There are very disturbing indications that these same citizens of faith have no plans to vote this coming November. Politics is nothing more than the practical application of our most deeply held religious convictions. Any passionately held belief must surely translate into some specifi c practical policy that would further that belief. Why would so many otherwise patriotic and law-abiding citizens avoid the ballot box? It turns out that large numbers of fervent Christian and traditional Jewish conservatives plan not...

MERCER ISLAND, Wash -- Two prominent, long-time Democrats have said they will vote in November for President Bush: One is United States Sen. Zell Miller of Georgia; the other is former New York Mayor Ed Koch. My experience as a lecturer and talk radio host assures me, however, that they will not be alone. Enormous numbers of Jewish voters, all long-time Democrats and more, I believe, than current polling indicates, will also be voting for President Bush. Let me tell you why. No country has been a more stalwart friend of Israel than the United States. No other society has...

On Wednesday afternoon the United States Senate voted against moving forward on a proposed amendment which would have added to the constitution these words, “Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman.” Some Americans are celebrating this as a triumph of tolerance while others are mourning it as the defeat of decency. However, I suspect that many Americans, whose basic credo is live-and-let-live, are ignoring it entirely. It is to these readers, who regard the Senate vote as largely irrelevant in their lives, that I address myself. The majority of us...

With perhaps one in five Americans already having seen it, The Passion continues to rack up attendance records. Would you like to hear an amazing statistic? In spite of dire warnings by some Jewish groups, no American Jews wending their way homewards from the synagogue have been set upon by crucifix-wielding Christians intent on wreaking revenge for the death of Jesus. I am not being sarcastic. This truly is an amazing statistic. According to Boston police reports, the Oliver Stone-Quentin Tarantino 1994 Natural Born Killers inspired several imitation murders including a firefighter killed by a man who claimed to be...

by Jonathan S. Tobin The first time I heard Rabbi Daniel Lapin speak, he told a story that struck me as odd. ...[snip] Rising to address a gala luncheon, Lapin sounded the message that all people of faith had more in common with each other than with their nominal co-religionists. To reinforce this point, Lapin confided that he and his wife had chosen for their children to be born in a Catholic hospital that had a cross on the wall of every room rather than at Cedars-Sinai, a Jewish hospital in Los Angeles where he then lived. Why? Because abortions...

Why Mel Owes One To The Jews February 12, 2004 By Rabbi Daniel Lapin President, Toward Tradition Two weeks before Mel Gibson's Passion flashes onto two thousand screens, online ticket merchants are reporting that up to half their total sales are for advance purchases for Passion. One Dallas multiplex has reserved all twenty of its screens for The Passion. I am neither a prophet nor a movie critic. I am merely an Orthodox rabbi using ancient Jewish wisdom to make three predictions about The Passion. One, Mel Gibson and Icon Productions will make a great deal of money. Those distributors...

America’s Real War: An Interview with Rabbi Daniel LapinTHE PASSION OF THE CHRIST CBN.com – Rabbi Daniel Lapin is a well-known speaker and radio talk show host, president of Toward Tradition, an organization dedicated to building bridges between American Jews and Christians, and the author of a book called "America's Real War," which touts the importance of our shared Christian-Judeo values. Pat Robertson talked with Rabbi Lapin about the intense reaction to Mel Gibson’s newest film "The Passion of The Christ," anti-Semitism in America and Europe, and much more. PAT ROBERTSON: "The Passion of The Christ" opens in theaters across...

The Biblically-based moral framework that once unified all of western civilization has already been exiled from Europe. Not only have right and wrong lost their meaning but art is now indistinguishable from degenerate propaganda designed to degrade. Rome let in the barbarians and they toppled the empire from within. For us in America, this is both the pernicious promise and the sinister legacy of secular fundamentalism. Martin Luther King Day can perhaps be best observed by contemplating how the God of the Bible, worshipped by both Bach and Reverend Martin Luther King, is the same God whose values are now...

How should Jewish and Christian Americans of faith view Sunday's historic capture of Saddam Hussein? ============================ One unintended side effect of the secular fundamentalism sweeping America is how it erodes the rules that hold together the invisible net of social stability. By encouraging unfettered personal license, secular fundamentalism helps collapse civilized norms. Then, when people dress with deliberately provocative vulgarity and they express themselves loudly and obscenely in public, hardworking, family-minded citizens are left with a growing feeling of unease. When young people no longer see their maturation leading naturally toward marriage and when marriage itself becomes threatened by cultural...