Customer Reviews

America's Real War

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Rabbi Daniel Lapin says yes, and argues that such attacks should stop: in his view, the U.S. is and should remain a _culturally_ Christian nation.

Christianity, he maintains, provides a proper basis for human liberty, a solid foundation for the free market, and (importantly) a place for Torah-true Judaism in American society. A secular culture can do none of these things.

Rabbi Lapin is under no illusion that there are no important theological differences between Judaism and Christianity; on the contrary, he knows full well that agreement on such matters is not strictly possible for those who remain faithful to their own traditions. However, as he is also at pains to show, Christianity incorporates enough principles of Mosaic law that Torah-observant Jews can feel safe in a Christian culture.

Not so a secular culture, he warns. Secularism is at present cruising on fuel it borrowed from Western religious tradition; once that fuel is exhausted, anything goes.

Many theologically liberal Jews have therefore, in Rabbi Lapin's view, been fighting the wrong enemy. The real foe is not "anti-Semitism"; it is irreligion. Whatever their theological differences, Christianity and Judaism should be brothers in arms in the fight for America's culture.

Agree or disagree, Rabbi Lapin's case is solidly mounted and strikingly put. His book should be read by anyone interested in the preservation of liberty.

Rabbi Daniel Lapin, head of the organization Toward Tradition, addresses several audiences with "(You Are In) America's Real War: An Orthodox Rabbi Insists That Judeo-Christian Values are Vital for Our Nation's Survival." These include Jews who feel out of step with the politics of most Jewish organizations, Christians who wonder why most American Jews demonize the Religious Right, people of all faiths who suspect that separation of Church and State has gone too far, and anyone who worries that America is on the wrong cultural and spiritual track.

The central metaphor in this book is a tug-of-war between Godliness on one side and godlessness on the other. This metaphor rests on two fundamental assumptions: that faith in God is central to the American experiment, and that the political divide between Right and Left hinges on acceptance or rejection of traditional Judeo-Christian values.

Rabbi Lapin establishes these assumptions convincingly. He turns to America's roots, from the original nature of the Colonies to the views of the Founding Fathers, to show that the very idea of the American nation arose from Judeo-Christian faith. Indeed, he shows how many of the central ideas of Colonial and Revolutionary America came directly from the Hebrew bible. He traces the supremacy of God in American political life through the mid-20th century, showing how judges and political figures continued into the 1960s to appeal to the Judeo-Christian God and His values in support of their positions.

Since that time, Rabbi Lapin argues, traditional religion has clearly delineated the sides in the culture war. Rabbi Lapin shows how, despite the presence of many clergymen in the ranks of the American Left, traditional Judeo-Christian belief and practice stand in direct opposition to many positions of the Left.

A central irony of this divide is that the political values of most American Jews are antithetical to the traditional Jewish values expressed in the Torah and Talmud. For example, as Rabbi Lapin points out, mainstream Jewish organizations denounce as "homophobia" any criticism of homosexuality, yet the Western proscription against homosexuality originates in the Hebrew Torah (the first five books of the Old Testament).

The source of this contradiction, Rabbi Lapin maintains, is the tension between the liberalizing tendency in non-Orthodox Judaism and the stubborn desire of Jews to cling to their Jewish identity. Rather than simply renounce Judaism once they have abandoned its tenets, many Jews stridently argue that the religion has changed to match their views - even to the point of no longer requiring a belief in God.

This is why, Rabbi Lapin argues, traditional Judaism has more in common politically with the Christian Coalition than with many Jewish political organizations. Both traditional Jews and Christian conservatives share a belief in a God-fearing society as the ideal plan for mankind.

Indeed, the removal of God from this central role in American society has, in Rabbi Lapin's view, led to the decline in our society's morals, culture, and educational attainment, and will ultimately lead to the downfall of our economic and political systems. Rabbi Lapin reminds us that illegitimacy, abortion, welfare dependency, crime, and other societal evils have all soared in the decades since God lost his place in American public life.

Thus, though he faces criticism from many Jews (who view the Religious Right as the enemy) and distrust from some Christians (who identify Judaism with liberalism), Rabbi Lapin places himself squarely on the side of religious faith and traditional values in the tug-of-war against ungodly liberalism for America's future. He invites all Americans of faith and good will to join him.

This book will enlighten anyone who really wants to know whatis going on in the culture war. Many Christians, and the politicallyuninvolved are blithefully unaware of the driving forces behind the rabid secularism that we see now so often, in the media, politics, and schools. The war is not between Jews and Christians, the war is between secularized Jews and other atheists on the one side, and orthodox Jews, conservative Catholics, and evangelical Christians on the other. Rabbi Lapin explains how there has always been those Jews, ever since Sinai, who have rejected the Ten Commandments, and instead chosen to worship the golden calf of money, and refuse to let anything interfere with their sexual freedom. It is these types that make up many of the political action groups that we see trying to "de-Christianize" America, i.e. the ACLU, People for the American Way, Planned Parenthood, and others. I gained tremendous insights from reading this book. I also read "The Fatal Embrace," by Ben Ginsburg, another Jewish author who explains how the Jewish people have repeatedly, throughout history, sought the protection of the state in order to escape persecution from surrounding peoples, but have made some of the same mistakes they are making now, in Rabbi Lapin's opinion. I never knew before reading these authors how much many Jewish people FEAR the rise of Christianity, and think that secularizing America is protection against another Holocaust. Dr. Lapin argues just the opposite; attacking the Christian heritage has a corrosive effect, and his people should stop acting loud, aggressive and antagonistic. No matter where you are coming from on the political spectrum, this book will give you tremendous food for thought. One thing is sure: political views are always informed by one's religious and metaphysical beliefs. It cannot be otherwise.

There is no doubt that Rabbi Daniel Lapin's America's Real War is one of those rare books destined to inspire and enlighten readers for generations to come. Like Bastiat's classic The Law, Lapin's Real War reveals timeless truths about man, society, and government while devastating the contemporary proponents of ideas that destroy freedom, prosperity, and happiness. Moreover, Lapin scores his intellectual points while simultaneously building a bridge between two groups that have frequently found themselves on opposite ends of the ideological spectrum, American Jews and Christians.

The message of Real War consists of three parts. First, Rabbi Lapin develops the evidence that America was expressly founded as a Christian nation. This will not surprise readers familiar with the writings of the Founding Fathers or those who understand how liberty blossomed as Biblical ideas made their way into European political and economic thought in the centuries from the signing of the Magna Carta to the writings of Blackstone. But Lapin approaches the subject from a fresh perspective, demonstrating how America's Founders appreciated uniquely Jewish customs and ideas at a time when "Hebrew was an accomplishment of gentlemen."

Second, Rabbi Lapin demonstrates how moral ideas that can only be completely found in the Jewish and Christian scriptures work to produce wealth, liberty, and fulfilling lives. Lapin leads the reader to see how ideas like personal accountability and private property create incentives for people to use their God-given talents to get ahead by serving the needs of others. At the same time, Lapin shows that the causes of the political left - like abortion and opposition to capital punishment - are logically inconsistent, and that the sole idea uniting today's jackboot liberals is opposition to God's ideas revealed in the Torah and Bible.

Woven throughout Real War is Rabbi Lapin's third theme, a call to American Jews to return to the principles of Torah. In fact, with a chutzpah only a Rabbi could muster, Lapin unabashedly bases all of his social, economic, and political arguments solely on the Old Testament, as explained in the 2500 year old oral tradition of the Rabbis, the Talmud.

But it is this very approach that will make the book especially endearing to Christian readers. Christians know that Jesus came not to destroy the law or the prophets but to fulfill them. (Mt. 5:17) On page after page as I read, I found myself coming to a fresh and deeper appreciation of the Bible thanks to Talmud's ancient insight.

There can be no doubt that the real challenge facing America today is a war of ideas. In showing that this war is really the timeless battle between good and evil, between ideas born of God and ideas born of rebellion against Him, Rabbi Lapin has crafted a work that will be relevant for years to come.

I had mediocre expectations when I started this book, and at first I found numerous little statements in the book which I didn't agree with. My impression was that many of Rabbi Lapin's conclusions were over-stretched, and I was skeptical about how he reached them. However, the more I read, the more I appreciated the value of his views, and by the time I reached the last few chapters, I couldn't put the book down.

Rabbi Lapin's insights on American Jewry are fascinating, and I loved the rich symbolism of the examples he used from the Torah and the Hebrew language. The main thrust of his thesis is that the modern liberal movement in America is not just an iconoclastic political movement, but that it is ultimately a nihilistic rejection of America's Judeo-Christian God and the religious culture upon which American society was originally built.

This is the common thread which underlies the various groups which are associated with modern liberalism. What do atheism, secular humanism, socialism, feminists, pornographers, the sixties drug culture, the sexual revolution, dogmatic evolution, euthanasia, radical animal rights groups, extreme environmentalists, the coarse decadence of American popular culture, abortionists, gay activists, and other seemingly non-affiliated liberal groups and causes have in common? All of them represent a rejection of, and departure from, the traditional Judeo-Christian culture which underlies America's founding. Earlier I had thought of each of these groups as distinct; now I see the thread that binds them.

In addition to his major thesis, Rabbi Lapin's book is full of excellent insights about human nature and American society. Although I didn't agree with some of what he wrote, this book was a worthwhile read. It also helped me appreciate a sentiment expressed by Alan Keyes during the Republican primaries debates: In order to be true to their heritage, Americans must believe in God. Otherwise, American society will become a secular parasite, living off of the moral capital of our Christian foundations until finally that moral capital runs dry and America crumbles completely.

Rabbi Daniel Lapin's book opens with an ambitious attempt to deconstruct America's cultural decline. He follows up in later chapters with ideas about ideals to reverse this decline.
Rabbi Lapin's analysis is rock-rib conservative, and heavily slanted towards the past and future of Jews here in the U.S.A.. But great storytelling skills serve the reader well as he shares antecdotes from his world travels, amusing parables from colleagues of the rabbinate, and lessons of history.
The Rabbi makes a case that the key to our problems is a loss of God in personal and political spheres all across America.
I'm a liberal Democrat, but I find myself in agreement with many of the Rabbi's thoughts on popular culture. I part ways with him when he says that religion is a socio-economic and political cure-all. To me, his own evidence points to education, within a matrix of some moral framework as being the real answer.
Nonetheless, Rabbi Lapin's work is a fascinating overview from a fresh perspective. Predominance of his religious conservatism steeped in traditions of Western learning couldn't be too bad. In fact it is the best of all conservativism options from America's right.

R.Daniel Lapin takes the time to walk us through an increasingly christian-phobic society.It appears as though 'America's real war' is being played out everyday between politicians,academics and everyday families.The Rabbi clearly states (p.45)that 'We are no longer one nation under God.We are two seperate nations with two distinct and incompatible moral visions.'

The author's witty approach and home truths make for a great read.This informative piece looks likely to take pride of place on my bookshelf for quite some time yet.

It is about time. Finally someone has broken the silence. Jew and Christians are natural allies. Unlike Muslims, our history doesn't just end with Abraham, but spans the entire Old Testament. It is about time Christians embrace our elder brothers and Jews do the same for their younger ones.

This book is refreshing and explains in full detail perspectives all of us have had. However, since the common man has no voice, the great Rabbi has done so for us. There will always be people who disagree about his book, but more often than not it comes from secular and indifferent voices.

I find it funny that some complain in these reviews about freedom of speech, and are afraid of the imposition by the religious right on their lives, even though the secular government has imposed immoral education on our youth. So, as the Rabbi points out, nobody is objective.

I recommend everyone to buy this book. Jews and Christians alike will read something special and something to contemplate. Whether you are an Orthodox Jew, Catholic or Protestant, you need to read the Rabbi's book and come together!

I purchased this book on a whim and I have to admit I did not even read what it was about. Thinking it was a treatise on the war against terror, imagine my surprise when I learned that Rabbi Lapin was addressing the cultural war that America is engaged in. Consequently, it sat in my computer on MP3 format unlistened to for several months.

It is an outstanding and well-reasoned book. Rabbi Lapin makes his points without belittling his opponents. His basic thesis is simple: The liberal left is out to de-Christianize the United States by removing any semblance of religion from the public life. Lapin argues that it is the belief in God and a strong moral sense of right and wrong that made this country great. Imagine my surprise when he argued that America was founded as a Christian nation. No, one does not have to believe in Christ to be a citizen, but that the traditional moral beliefs as stated in both the Old and New Testaments provide the moral foundation of right and wrong.

In this war, conservative Jews, evangelical Christians and conservative Catholics have much more in common that binds them together than differences that separate them. Rather than fearing conservative evangelicals, conservative Jews ought to see them as allies and friends. I have long argued with my Jewish friends that their real enemies are not conservative Christians, but liberal secularist. If there is going to be persecution of American Jews, it will not come from the religious right but liberal left. For instance, it is the conservative Christians who support Israel, whereas secular leftists have more sympathetic toward Moslem extremist in the name of cultural diversity.

His analysis of why Jews are so liberal was both insightful and fascinating. I have always wondered why American Jews have this propensity for liberalism, especially in light of the lefts sympathetic leanings toward Islamic extremists. I will take one issue with Rabbi Lapin. When one speaks of a cultural war, the object of war is to kill and defeat your enemy. When we come to the realm of ideas, I prefer to persuade people to my beliefs than to make war on them.

For those who seek to understand the religious right in America there is no clearer expression of the essence of this movement than Rabbi Daniel Lapin's "America's Real War". The good rabbi analyzes the "culture war" going on in America which he views as a Manichean war of the powers of light versus the powers of darkness. America is suffering from a variety of cultural diseases caused by left wing and liberal ideas. "Ideas have Consequences" the rabbi says and when showing the consequences of liberal thinking the rabbi is at his best. He argues that modern public schools have no problem propagandizing for any secular moral viewpoint even when those moral views are repugnant to the general population. The rabbi cites "Heather Has Two Mommies", the infamous lesbian advocacy textbook placed in public schools, to prove his point. But let someone put God into the moral equation and the school board quickly removes the textbook. His demonstration of the persecution of modern Christian thought is clear and well argued. If schools can teach morality then why not teach the morality accepted by most people?

However, when the rabbi attempts to show the Christian roots of the founding of America he collapses into a level of argument that calls to mind the worst parodies of religious illogic.

America was founded on Christian principles, states the rabbi, but only Old Testament Christian principles. "But" you exclaim "Old Testament Christianity is Judaism!". Exactly! The rabbi cites no uniquely Christian sources at all, not the Catholic church, not Luther or Calvin, not even Christ himself. It seems that America is a Jewish product with Christianity reduced to being the conduit that brought the Old Testament to North America. I, who am an atheist, must take exception to the short shrift given the rich philosophical heritage of the Catholic Church by the author. He implies that it had no effect on the founding of America. Had Thomas Aquinas not resurrected the philosophy of Aristotle and rescued reason from the death grip of faith there would never have been a Renaissance much less an Enlightenment. America was, and could only have been founded during a philosophical period where reason prevailed. The philosophical hallmark of the Enlightenment was the extolling of the power of human reason. But for Rabbi Lapin this is insignificant since he recognizes no influences outside of the Old Testament.

The stretches that the rabbi makes to assert the "Christian" roots of America can best be illustrated by his discussion of the Great Seal of the United States. To show its true significance the rabbi invokes Hebrew numerology. If one assigns numbers to each of the letters of the Hebrew alphabet one can arrive at the value of a word by adding the corresponding numbers. The Hebrew word for "one" adds up to 13, the number of original colonies. On the Great Seal is the inscription "E Pluribus Unum" which, as every school child (except Al Gore) knows, means "Out of many, One" referring to one United States formed from 13 individual states. To the rabbi this is a clear reference to the Hebrew numeralogic value of the word one. He also notes that both "E Pluribus Unum" and "Annuit Coeptis" have 13 letters, the pyramid on the seal has 13 levels, in fact there are 13's everywhere on the seal. All of this, the rabbi maintains, is evidence of the Hebrew roots of the founders' thinking.

However, this interpretation poses problems. If the founders were so enamored of Hebrew why did they choose two Latin phrases to place on the seal? Latin was the language spoken by ancient Romans - the notorious persecutors of Jews. Further, no admirer of the Jews in his right mind would use a pyramid as an emblem for a country based on Old Testament principles since the pyramid is most closely identified with Egypt where the Jews were enslaved. The truth, as is well known, is that the seal is a Masonic symbol. The pyramid with the eye at the apex could not be mistaken for anything else. The rabbi ignores the fact that many of the founders were Masons because it does not fit with the theory that only the Old Testament influenced the founders. One becomes convinced that had the founders inscribed the pyramid with the words "masonic symbol" the rabbi would only have noted that the phrase contains 13 letters.

Were numeralogical fantasies the worst violation of logic committed one could forgive them as a personal eccentricity. However, they are merely a part of what happens when reason becomes the handmaiden of theology. The rabbi proudly asserts on page 67 "I wouldn't renounce Torah Judaism regardless of the evidence ..." If you assume that this is taken out of context consider the following: on page 184 we are told that DNA evidence confirms the Jewish tradition of a priestly bloodline descended from Aaron. It seems that DNA tests showed that most of the people named Cohen, Katz and the like have a single common ancestor. "Science Verifies God's Design" states the rabbi. However, on page 54 the rabbi is both astonished and upset that the Peabody Museum has reclassified certain chimpanzees into the genus Homo which places them with man. The reclassification of chimpanzees is based on DNA research that suggests that a common ancestor of both chimps and men existed more recently than had previously been thought. The very same type of DNA test that the rabbi cites as supporting the Talmud also supports the theory of evolution which the rabbi emphatically denies. It appears that when science supports theology then it is true science, when it doesn't it is false science.

Overall, the book is most illuminating in its revelation of the true soul of religious fundamentalism by one of its more articulate spokesmen. I highly recommend it to the religious right for whom it is intended and for atheists with a very good sense of humor.