#116: Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks: A Final Conversation That Still Speaks to This Moment [Re-release]

This week we're doing something a little different to what we did before, but something very close to our hearts. For the first time, we are re-releasing one of our favorite episodes and one of the most impactful ones that we've had here on the podcast from our conversation with Rabbi Jonathan Sachs, O. Vashalam, who we interviewed five years ago, which I can't believe it's already been five years. I cannot believe we have been doing this podcast for five years, a little over five years. This is one of our first episodes. And at the time, we couldn't have known that this would be his final interview before his passing. Looking back, it feels like such a gift, one of the most treasured conversations we've ever had. So if you want to watch the video version of the episode, you can do that on YouTube, but the reason we are re-releasing the audio is because when we recorded the interview, we were not planning on putting the video out, because at the time we were an audio-based podcast. And so we did a lot of editing on the audio one, and we added some reflections throughout the episode. And that's why we want to put this one out again, but you're welcome to check out the video, which is still available on YouTube, but that is the expanded version. The audio is the edited version, which we did edit at the time shortly after we did the interview. Yeah, we have many new listeners, so we thought for our new listeners who have not heard this episode, it's a must listen. And for those who have heard it, it is totally worthwhile to listen to again, because there was so many beautiful, inspiring halls of wisdom that Rabbi Lord Jonathan Saks shares with us. And there were a few moments from this conversation that have stayed with both Idenai that we often bring up, discuss between each other and on our episodes. And one of them was that Rabbi Saks shared that the LeBavitsh Rebbe believed in him more than he believed in himself. And that is how he became the great orata and Rabbi that he was in today's generation. And that showed us the power of believing in somebody else. And how we can do that in our lives and what a gift that is. And where that can lead to, just even expressing one word or one sentence and what an impact that can have on someone's life. Also, he showed us that he experienced his own self-doubt and not knowing his capabilities. And he discussed self-doubt within the episode. And the positive things that self-doubt can lead to. For example, how it allows other people in your life where you're not just consumed with yourself, but you take guidance and the wisdom from others. And that often makes me think about how Jonathan Saks reached out to other people before he would put a lecture out or put something out on social media and how I do the same now. I will reach out to other people and ask them their opinion. And many other reasons why self-doubt is not a bad thing. For example, humility and allowing God in the picture. Right. And then talk about believing in yourself. Rufka, you and I prepared a lot for that episode. We prepared for every episode. We spend many, many hours in the preparation phase. And you know, it's interesting because it's not very obvious because the conversation is very spontaneous. But there's so many hours of preparation that go into each episode. But sometimes things just pop up that were not scripted. And sometimes those are the most insightful and valuable parts of our conversations. And I think Rufka, in that one, you asked him a question. At the end, it was almost like an afterthought because we knew we were limited with time. We only had, think about an hour. And we were already, I think, at an hour and 15 minutes. We went over. And you just, you got in that question at the last minute and that clip went viral. The question about why bad things happened to good people. And if you've heard the episode, you've heard that, of course. But if you have not listened yet, listen in because that has stuck with both of us for a very long time till today. That and many other things that he said. Yeah, so many people have reached out to me and said that, that answer that he gave to why bad things happened to good people. Well, life changing for them. And they watched the answer over and over. So it's a must listen in the episode. But at the time, I was so nervous if I should ask the question because his English and he sent him all the questions before. He'd prepared the answer. We were going over time. But I just felt like I had to get it in. And I'm so grateful that Hashem allowed me to, out of the words, but these are the things that end up being amazing those spontaneous moments. It takes a lot of courage to ask something like that. And I feel like you have to trust yourself. And you have to just go a little bit out of your comfort zone. I feel like that's something I definitely struggle with. It's worried about saying the right thing and the right, you know, what if it comes out the wrong way? What if it doesn't make sense? And I think what you did, and you taught me to do, was to be okay trusting your intuition sometimes. And even if it means that, yes, you might say something that ends up being the wrong thing. And you might say something or do something that in hindsight, maybe you would have done differently. But the fact that you did it says a lot about your character. And also the way that you grow as a person. That's how you grow as a vice, stepping out of your comfort zone sometimes. I don't know how out of your comfort zone, you were at the time because I feel like you are generally comfortable asking questions. And staring out of my comfort zone, it was one of our first episodes, it was Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks. I was nervous. I knew we were thrown into the deep end with our podcast because we had him early on. We didn't really have much fear. And that's just a lesson to trust the timing because sometimes he thinks you're not ready, but that's when Hashem wanted us to interview him. And it was the last episode that he did and we're very grateful for it. Imagine we had said at the time, we're not experienced enough, we're not ready. Let's wait till next year when we really have more podcast experience and the ability to really do a better job. Had we done that, we would not have this happened. Yeah, yeah, so another lesson there. It was a big quote. Yeah. And we're really honored to bring it to you. This was Shashana. And as you listen, we invite you not only to enjoy the conversation, but also to notice your own highlights. The lines and ideas that touch you most and think about how you can apply them in your own life. And we have no doubt his words will stay with you as they have stayed with us. Yes, and one quote, since we're so big on quotes, it just stands out to me with his story, is it's when I saw recently and I posted, it's doubting yourself as normal, but letting it stop you is a choice. And I like to live by that. We all have self doubt, sometimes, about different things. And it's important to just reflect on the fact that it's completely normal part of being a human. And just the important thing is that we don't let it stop us. And I want to just say one quick reflection for me from the past couple of years. That I just recently discovered is a very powerful tool that I hope that maybe you can use. And that is specifically in the month of LL. This is a Jewish New Year. It's different from the secular New Year, January 1st, where we have resolutions, like we add things to our agenda. We're going to start working out every day. We're going to start doing this, start doing that. I feel like for me, LL is very much about not adding. It's about clearing out and removing and going back to our essential self. And instead of piling on more commitments and more resolutions, for me, it's just about clearing the space and removing distractions and letting go of things so that I could go back to my essential self. That, for me, has been sort of like a guiding principle in the month of LL. That's actually such a real and authentic way to think. It's also calming. Like, I'm not adding. I'm just really going back to myself. But you end up adding because you're working on yourself by getting back to your job. So that's the ripple effect. And that's what people don't realize. Sometimes the smartest way to get things done is to not do them yourself. To no one, to not do them yourself. And to hand them off to others. All the productivity tools that I built over the years, I realized so much of them, other people were willing to help me with. I wasn't taking advantage of that opportunity. And the more I did, the more I realized. Everyone's better off. Because everyone is better off doing what they do best. And so if you're in a position to let go of something, it might be worth exploring that. Yeah. This month about. And on a spiritual level, it's also about letting go and surrendering to know that Hashem is right there. And we're surrendering him being a vessel to know that and to know that we need to do our part. But know that he is right there. We need to do our part to surrender to him. Yes. So, may this month of Ella and these upcoming months be a time of reflection of renewal of going back to your essential self. Amen. Hi, I'm Riska. And I'm Eda. Welcome to From the Inside Out. We're mom-tripper nurse and friends, and we come to you with a shared mission. To inspire you through meaningful conversations with each other. And interviews with some of our everyday heroes. And some of the most inspiring thinkers and leaders of our time. Pia, you'll find tips, tools, and inspiration that we hope will ignite positive change from the inside out. So without further ado, we introduce you to Rabbi Lord Johnathan Sachs. Enjoy. Hello. Hello. Hello, Rabbi Sachs. Hello there. Whoa. Rabbi Lord Johnathan. This is a fan, isn't it? Oh my goodness me. What's the weather like in Balhaba, Florida? It's humid as usual, but very nice. We're enjoying it. Wonderful to be with you both. How's the weather in London? Believe it or not, it's quite nice. For a change. Yeah, I mean, the weather in Britain is a major, major element in British political history. Because it's usually so miserable that nobody can have the energy to revolt. So it's kept us a very peaceful country. It's damp and cold and wet, but today is actually looking quite nice. It's so reliant. Good. Hopefully the weather today will still keep things peaceful. And how with you? Thank God, doing well. And we are very honored that you have taken the time to speak with us. And we are grateful that you are here on our podcast and are very excited to bring the conversation to our listeners around the globe. And many of them live in the UK. I don't know. We're with you. Great to be with you. Yes, it really is an honor and a pleasure. I don't know if you know, I just wanted to tell you that my parents had the pleasure of hosting you. Of course. Okay. Yes, Lentara. Of course. We did some stuff together. We laid the foundations for something or other. and we did all those stuff together. - Well, yeah, I was living in New York that I heard all about it and you made such an impact at the groundbreaking of 770 in Australia and at my grandfather, Rebecca and good next-yard site when you spoke there and it really had a great impact on my family and the whole community. - Well, please give your parents my very, very best. - I will. - Both remarkable in quite different ways. - Yes, thank you. They'll be listening. - Well, speaking of remarkable, your story is a remarkable one. Can you take this back to your early days and tell us a little bit about how a young Cambridge university student who has no plans of becoming a rabbi or leader becomes an internationally recognized icon chief rabbi of the UK world leader. - That's a good question. Give me the answer. I've got a clue. I know now. (laughing) - I'll tell you what happened. - I'll tell you what happened. 1967, my first year as a university student, Six Day War had an enormous impact on all of us. It changed the Jewish world, changed Nautan Shoransky, it changed Russian, we were all changed. But I couldn't do very much with it at the time and so I had to wait for a year and that next summer, when I'd finished my second year at university, I decided I am going to explore what it is to be Jewish. And my first stop was believe it or not, the United States because I knew that there were many, many brilliant rabbis in the United States. And a long list of them, for $100, I was able to buy a Greyhound bus ticket, unlimited travel across the States. And so for that summer, that's what I did. I travel around the States meeting rabbis and every single, almost every rabbi I met said to me and not only Orthodox rabbis said to me, there is one rabbi you must meet, rabbi, Manachem Mendelschneer's, and the Luboviti rabbi. So after about 10 people had said this to me, I thought, okay, where is he? And they said, well, he's 77 Eastern Parkway. So I took the subway to Eastern Parkway. I walked in to 770 and being full of Hutzpah. I said, I am a student from Cambridge University who has come 3,000 miles to meet the Luboviti rabbi. Please could I have an appointment? And they all fell about laughing. They said, do you realize how many thousands of people are waiting to see the rabbi? Come back next year, 10 years, come back later. So I said, well, look, I can't tell you where I'm gonna be because I'm going to take a bus around America. I don't know where I'll be. But I do know that I have an aunt in Los Angeles and if the rabbi is able to see me, please ring this number. And so I traveled around America, reached Los Angeles and once Sunday night the phone went and it was somebody in 770 saying, the rabbi will see you on Thursday night. Now I had absolutely no money. (laughs) And the only way of getting from Los Angeles to New York is to take a nonstop Greyhound bus, which took 72 hours in those days. Probably takes a bit longer these days. I do not necessarily recommend a nonstop 72 hours on a Greyhound bus. (laughs) But I arrived at 770 Thursday evening and eventually I got to see the rabbi. We had a Echidis lasting 20, 25 minutes and that was a life-changing experience. Not the only life-changing one, but a very significant one where the rabbi really challenged me to become a leader in Jewish life in Cambridge University. The interesting thing, if you ever seen a film of a forebring in, I guess, you know what I'm gonna look like. - Absolutely, yeah. - Of course, yes. - He would speak for four or five hours, usually in sections of about 20 minutes. And then they would all think a niggun. And the guys told me since I was going back the next day, I was going back the next Sunday. That when you leave, you have to go up to the rabbi with a bottle of vodka and point him a little bit of vodka and he says, "Lakhine." And then you take that bottle with you and that's the rabbi's vodka. So this is what happened on my last day or what was supposed to be my last day in New York. I went up to the rabbi while I was singing in Niggun and he looked at me, "What's this?" I said, "I'm going." He said, "Why?" I said, "Because I've got to get back to Cambridge University." And he looked at me and he said in these words, "But the Cambridge University term does not begin until the second week in October." - Wow. - I think you should stay. Well, everyone was watching this because the rabbi did not normally engage in conversations in the middle of a bragnant. So by the time I got back to my place, everyone wanted to know, "What did the rabbi say? What did the rabbi say?" And I'm afraid I didn't realize what I was doing 'cause I was new to the combat. And I'm afraid I told them. I said, "The rabbi says I should stay, but I can't, I've got to get." And I should have realized when the Hasidim had, the rabbi said, "You should stay." You stay. So one way or another, when it came to the next day, they managed to make sure I couldn't get out of 770. - I'm sure. Back to it. - Back to the airport. I said, "No, no, seriously. I've got to go. I can't get back. This is not a regular ticket." It's a charter flight. They said, "Then why are we phone already and we've told them you're ill?" I said, "But I'm not ill." They said to me, "You are." And tomorrow morning we're going to the rabbi's doctor to find out what illness you have. Which they did. They did. They took me to the rabbi's doctor. I mean, went through a list of about 100 illnesses, none of which I'd had. Until five. - I'm fine. - I went to John Dis and I said, "Yeah, I had John Dis, 10 years ago." He wrote down, "Recurrents of John Dis." - Oh my. - So that is how in 1968, I met the rabbi and I was with the rabbi on Rosh Hashanah and I had the rabbi blowshofah. Now these are life-changing experiences and that is how it all happened. That is how it all began. It took many years to work, it was way through, but that's how it began. - Rabbi Saks visited the LeBavitsa Rebbe with the intention of asking him all his prepared intellectual philosophical questions. The rabbi gave him intellectual philosophical answers and then the rabbi did what no one else had done. He did a role reversal. He started asking Rabbi Saks questions about what he is doing for Jewish life on campus. Rabbi Saks responded with these words, in the situation which I find myself in. - At this point, the rabbi did something which was quite unusual. He actually stopped the young student, mid-sentence, and he said, nobody finds themselves in a situation. You put yourself in a situation. And if you put yourself in that situation, you could put yourself in another situation. - That moment changed his life. In his words, here I was, and nobody from nowhere, and he was one of the greatest leaders in the Jewish world, challenging me not to accept the situation, but to change it. And that was when I realized that I have said many times since that the world was wrong. When they thought that the most important fact about the rabbi was that here was a man with thousands of followers, they missed the most important fact that a good leader creates followers, but a great leader creates leaders. As Habbad women, we were inspired by a beautiful statement you made about the rabbi. You said, this was not a man who was interested in creating followers. This was a man who was passionate about creating leaders. How can we apply these principles of leadership today in the age of technology and social media? - You ask a difficult question, because if you want to change someone's life, don't do it by social media. This is a real eye-thou face-to-face experience. And yes, you'll keep your two meters distance or whatever. There are certain things you really can't do other than face-to-face. You can't fulfill the mitzvah of listening to Shofa by listening on Zoom. It can't be done. You've got to be there in that famous phrase from Hamilton in the room where it happens. - In the room where it happens, yes. - So it's really, really difficult, but there's a big plus to social media. I mean, many pluses, number one, you can reach people across the world, which is really and truly incredible. And Habbat were the first people who used modern communications technology, cable television, satellite television, they kind of think they used it way, way before anyone else. And the other thing, which I'm not an expert on, but here it is, I have two brothers living in Jerusalem. So when I was in Jerusalem, I would always go with my brother too. the local shul, it's called the stebler, it's a little cluster of shul in Catamon. And for 22 years I was chief Rabbi of Britain and the Commonwealth. And yet when I was in shul, almost nobody came up and said Shabbat Shulam. Wow. I was in the shul on Chalamade Sukkot last year and almost everyone came up and said, "Thanks amer." And I was trying to work out how come for 22 years they didn't and suddenly they did. And I realized the answer, WhatsApp. WhatsApp. You know, I'd been doing a daily WhatsApp from the beginning of Ella all the way through. And for some reason people found WhatsApp very direct and very intimate. They tell me they felt as if I was speaking to them. So it's clear that each of these technologies has a particular strength. And I was amazed that WhatsApp turned out to be more powerful than being chief Rabbi. Interesting. Yeah, it's amazing how you channeled social media and technology and I think that we all have the opportunity to channel it in a positive way and use it for the benefit of all of us. Yes, you have said that social media is one of the wonders of our age. You also remind us of the importance of human connection and that social media shouldn't become a replacement for face-to-face relationships. So thank you for that reminder in today's world which we tend to forget. I was just wondering, do you have a message or a theme you keep in mind in order to spread your light and influence others in both settings, in both human interaction and modern technology? This is what I discovered in my life. I had the great privilege of coming to know, no well and work with people who believed in me more than I believed in myself. And that's what you have to do. You have to really and truly believe in people more than they believe in themselves. A lot of people have internal doubts even when they achieve considerable success. They suffer from something called the imposter syndrome. People think I'm really good but actually I'm really bad. That kind of thing. And I think it's the strength of your belief in them. I have long said that religion is less about our faith in God than about God's faith in us. I continue to be moved almost beyond words. By the way, I sham does believe in us, does empower us. Put his image on each of us, made each of us his emissary. And that's really the thing to get hold of, believe in people more than they believe in themselves. That's beautiful. Yeah. You were destined to be a leader and it's not something that you had initially planned. Were there any times or any moments where you felt a reluctance or doubt or difficulties, challenges? And so how did you get through them? Elaine. I love that. Full stuff. Full stuff. The beginning, middle and end. Elaine believed in me all the way through. She has such a radiant disposition that she never got depressed even when things were very, very depressing. And I couldn't have done it without her full stop. I mean, ridiculous to even think of it. And I'm very touched by that because when Elaine and I met when we got engaged, when we got married, there wasn't the slightest hint that I might become a rabbi. I mean, it just wasn't on the agenda. And so this was completely unexpected for Elaine. And in the end, it was the, it was the chain. It was the resilience and the grace of her personality that took me through it. You're lucky. You're a lucky man. I should say, you know, didn't take me long as soon as I noticed Elaine. And of course, I met Elaine pretty much as soon as I came back from the rabbi. This was all happening at the same time. And so it was one of those years, 1968. My friend, my friend, was Elaine in 1968 when he was studying philosophy at Cambridge University and experiencing what he referred to as deep existential angst. When he saw Elaine across the line, the first thought was, this is the person most unlike me I've ever encountered. She radiated joy. It took him all of three weeks to propose. And he says he profoundly regrets that it even took him that long. He never once had the slightest doubt that she was the one for him. They married when he was 22 and she was 21. And as you will soon discover, it's the people most different from us who have so much to teach us. Well, they say, "A man's success has much to do with the woman in his life." And I guess this holds very true for you. And you recently celebrated a wedding anniversary, I hear, a big one, a 50 years. Yeah, yeah. Golden Missile. We would have, we would have got married much earlier, much earlier, but I just wanted to go to Yushivar to Kfar Khabad before we got married. So we put it off by a year or two. We met in November 68 and we got married in July 70. But we really would have got married much, much sooner otherwise. The role Elaine helped me with was really secondary. The role that was primary was the strength she gave our children. When you are a public figure, that is very challenging because your children become kind of public figures. And that can be very difficult for them. And it was Elaine who kept them stable and positive and who helped them become strong people in their own right. And that was really important. That was the most important. The side, not behind the side of every great man, is a greater woman or great woman. Yeah, oh, absolutely. Nobody, nobody can doubt that that's how we do things. I'm very honored to have your PDF, yearly release book, Morality. And it is brilliant. It's. I say that. Yes, I'm very honored. The real thing is better. Morality restoring the common good and divided times. It's the best seller in the UK and it is very relevant during this trying times. One thing that stood out to us throughout your book is how we have become an eye generation as opposed to a wee generation. Can you expand on this and share how we can practically shift from eye to wee? Yeah. You know, when I when I tried to understand what the Lubovicir Abba was doing, it was something extraordinary because nobody had ever done this before. Nobody in the whole history of Judaism had ever done an outreach campaign before with a possible exception of Rabbi Moses of Kousy in France in the 14th century in relation to Mizzazzan Fille. That was the only precedent we could find. And I was thinking of myself, you know, Jews for 20, 30 centuries held back from this. And why do the rubber not? And I suddenly realized at a certain point that there was a kind of arithmetic here. Imagine you have a certain amount of wealth or power. You have, let's say, a thousand dollars and you decide to share that with nine other people. How much do you have left? Answer a tenth of what you began with. You have total power. You decide to share that with nine other people. How much do you have left one tenth of the power with which you began? But if you are dealing with something else like love or friendship or trust or even knowledge and you share that with nine other people, how much do you have? You don't have less. You may have more. You may even have ten times as much. And I suddenly realized that is the difference between material goods and spiritual goods, material goods, the more you share the less you have. But spiritual goods, the more you share, the more you have. And that is why material goods, wealth and power lead to competition. I don't want to have less. I want to have more. And therefore you have these two arenas in society for competition. One is the market economy, the competition for wealth. The other is the political system, the competition for power. And when it's competition, it's all about I, I, I. It's all about self-interest. That's fine. I don't have a problem with that. But society needs something else as well. It needs an arena of cooperation. It needs an arena in which we are concerned with other people's interests, not just ours, where we really think as a we. And the truth is all the spiritual goods are like that. Friendship, love, influence, knowledge, etc., etc. And that is what I call morality. Morality is whenever I say somebody else's interest counts as much as mine. That's called altruism. And what happened is we always had such a thing. It's just in the last half century we've lost it. We've really lost it. So that all that really matters today is economic, some politics and forget the rest. We're in a competition with a wealth and power and don't bother me with other people who need something because let them go to the government for it. And that is a total and absolute disaster. So I suddenly realized the rebel understood this as far as Judaism was concerned. Kabaddi is all about we. I embrace you. Even though you're not like me, you may keep less of them and you may know less of them. It doesn't matter. You're part of this collective us. I'm going to share my Judaism and the more I share, the more I have. And likewise, in general with society, I am going to share my concern with the common good and the end result will be the more I share, the more we will have. And you won't get something like Black Lives Matter where a whole group of people feel we are left out and detail Hispanics and did who knows what you will get a situation in people in which people were a lot of realized we are part of something that's bigger than us, but which cares for us? Yeah, I think the rebel also went even further in that he took, he helped us take the physical elements and elevate them into spiritual realms. Oh, 100% and giving Sudaka and the tangible if we give them, we elevate them in the spiritual realm and that brings more blessings. Lot of medical research on this, that giving is a fundamental way of getting healthier. It strengthens the immune system. It combats depression. An enormous amount of medical research in the last 10 years, that when you give, you gain more than you give. Yes, and that was one of the really beautiful and powerful messages in your book that giving is a way for our generation to shift to it the way and that each action we take, even if it's a small gesture in giving, helps us shift to the way rather than the eye. And you had also shared that by us sharing our stories, like sharing the story of our exodus from Egypt and sharing a broadway show like Hamilton is a practically good way to shift towards the week. Can you expand on that for us? I tell you, Zerby, this is one of the more unusual things I ever did. It took place in 1974 or 1975. I can't remember where, when, but either one of those years. The smear in class of Jewish college, rabbinical seminary of Britain and the top class of Montre Yuschiva. I don't think it exists anymore, but it did then. Engaged in Switzerland halfway up a mountain with a group of African bishops to fight anti-Semilia and feminism in Africa. And so a half way up a mountain and we have these three days of interfaith dialogue. It was very rare for me to take part in them, but this one, my own teacher thought I ought to do it. And it was very cognitive. You know, the word cognitive, it's the English word for boring. And so I thought to myself, you know, this is great. We're all giving each other lectures, but nothing's really changing. So I, on the last night, I arranged with the bishops and the Bukharem that we were going to have a fibrang. And the African bishops didn't know what a fibrang is. And I explained, we brought in vodka, some whiskeys, some cake. And I said, we are going to tell you our stories. And then you are going to tell us your stories and you are going to teach us your songs. And we are going to teach you our songs. We sat there from 10 in the evening till 3 in the morning and then we danced around the room. And I suddenly realized this incredible power of sharing stories and sharing songs that allowed us to bridge what was in every sense a major cultural abyss. And these people, we couldn't have been less alike. But because we had songs, we shared and stories we share, we really reached this beautiful, beautiful, serene moment that was probably life-changing for most of the people that. Yeah, you mentioned people not like us are just like us. And that's very much related to the story of recognizing that we're more alike than we are different and bridging the divide that we're experiencing today by sharing our common ground and talking to each other even if we feel like we don't have anything to come. And it's likely that we have a lot more common than we think. Absolutely. Yes. Rabbi Shastab had shared a quote. We are all different in that we are all the same and we are all the same in that we are all different. Your chapter in your new book on self-help. In it, you write in that chapter, you write, I have felt the fear and done it anyway. I have refrained from sweating the small stuff. I have experienced the life-changing magic of tidying. I know the power of now and so forth. You continue stating that you do have some experience in the self-help world, reading self-help books. But what you've found time and time again is that hope comes not from the self but from others. I'm wondering if you can expand on this concept. The notion that self-help in many ways is no help at all. I was very struck by the statement in the Gammara. In Havush Matirat that small me beta as a dream, a prisoner cannot release himself from prison. You know, somebody else has to turn the key. And that seemed to me very much the case on something like depression, for example. Depression, unless you're just treating it chemically and as you're just taking anti-depressants. You cannot get yourself out of that state. You need somebody else to help you do so. And this was always very clear to me, but the example I gave, of course, I'm not going to tell the story in detail, came from a honeymoon when I very nearly dropped. I mean, it's too, I still find that a bit too scary to tell that story terribly often. But I said, "Well, I went under for the fifth time." And there was no one near. And this was in Italy. And I said, "I remember my last two thoughts." In a number one, what a way to begin a honeymoon. And number two was the Italian for help. But clearly, somebody saw me and saved me and so on. Thank God. But self-help was absolutely no use at the time. None whatsoever I was drowning. And he did somebody to hold my hand and pull me out. And I think a lot of our personal problems do tend to be like that. Now, obviously self-help is real and important and it's what Hillel meant when he said, "In aine, unele, me, lea, if I am not for myself, who will be." So clearly, we have to work on things ourselves. Nobody else can solve our problems for us. But it does really need somebody else to, as it were metaphorically, hold our hand when we manage to get to dry land. I don't think these things are stressed often enough in the self-help literature. It's wonderful literature. No criticism of it. But it does leave out the fact that we need somebody else to take us out of that locked of room. This reminds me of the paradox. You have to do it by yourself and you can't do it alone. Yeah. Yeah. It's other people who help shape your life. Now while all this was going on, for instance, in 1968, I was very struck because everything from that period in my life is very heightened. There was an English pop group called The Beatles, and these four singers managed to be the finest pop musicians in the history of popular music. But in '68, they started breaking down 1970. They split apart. And these four brilliant people never really managed a single brilliant piece of music afterwards for the rest of their lives. And for me, there's even a simple thing like creativity. You have to have somebody who's willing to be there with you. Did you ever read the story of those two Israeli economists, Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky who came across them? Sure. Yeah. The judgment under uncertainty, fascinating. They were the creators of behavioral economics. And Michael Lewis has a book about them called The Undoing Project. These two people just sparked brilliant ideas of one another. And they would spend hours every single day just talking. And that's why they were able to do what they did. This kind of myth of the Lonely Creator is exactly what it is by and large it's a myth and we need that collaborative creativity. The Gameranke to book tells us that Raviyohanan had it with Rashlokish and so on. These were more partnerships that were immensely creative but sitting on your own doesn't help. Yeah, partnership and mentorship as well and speaking of mentorship do you have a mentor? I used to have two people who were very much senior to me, my own teacher who died this summer very sadly. Rabbi Nochun Rabinovic, Zerhitzade Gliburachah and an American Roshishiva firm I had a very high regard. I'm not going to name him and these were people that I would turn to as I would turn to the late Rabbi Ahar and Lichtenstein, Zetzal. And they were the kind of people I would turn to. But be aware that we have just lost some major figures from our world. Most obviously in addition to Rabbi Nochun Rabinovic, Rabbi Eidin Steinzels, and we were just coming up to the Shlokishim I think and the American Rabbi Dr. Norman Lam, Zetzal who is head of University. So we have lost in the space of three months some of the great teachers of our time. I always take advice on things but I don't have mentors as such at this point. You are the mentor. Yes, you're the mentor. What's special about the reber is that we can learn through his teachings. He's still a mentor to us because we have his sikhasis, we have his teachings that we follow. So I guess we can still have mentors even though they have passed on. The first book I ever wrote is a book that you may have seen called Terrorist Studies. It was translations into English or adaptations into English of the Rebus Heroes. So I meant that in 1973 when I wrote it, I was working very much on the inside. If you know what I mean, working out the Rebus thought patterns. And I found that extremely helpful. So it's a very early on as it were. I didn't just read the reber from from the outside. I tried to read him from the inside as well. That's very meaningful, special. So as a leader, you are a mentor for thousands of people around the world. Does that come with any sense of self doubt or second thoughts about taking on such a significant role that carries such heavy responsibility? I should say I have feelings of self-doubt every single day, possibly every single hour. You kind of recognize them by now. That is very comforting to hear that Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks self-doubt every hour would never have thought. It's important for people to know that. We're untapped resources, many of whom are afraid to tap into the strengths and the talents that we have and use them. And I think hearing from someone who has achieved so much that it is possible and that self-doubt is a part of the process. I think it's very important. It's very important. Self-doubt is actually terribly important because it helps you as far as possible. Just to stay sane, then don't think too much of yourself. Second thing it does is that it encourages you to reach out to people. People who represent very different vantage points from you. And we kind of do that with almost everything we do. We take somebody there, somebody there, somebody there, somebody there, somebody on the right, somebody on the left, somebody on the et cetera, et cetera. We use that technique because I realize and virtually everything I write, even a script for a radio broadcast, will be seen by other people. And virtually everything that I do, somebody will raise a question, is that right? Are you sure that's right? Is that the best way of expressing it? And rather get it right first, then get it wrong and then have to apologize. And then I've just got a wonderful, amazing team, a tiny team, three people that consists of people that I really, really respect and admire. Always work with people with the very highest moral standards. And then you can feel pretty sure that you won't go wrong. When the respect of people you respect. There's somewhat of a dichotomy there where there's that uncertainty looking to others for guidance, but at the same time being so strong in your Judaism and your faith, no matter where you go. And so how do you do that? How does one stay strong in their face today? It's very simple, but you'll have to have a leap of faith here because it's not the way things are in American, it's not the way things are anywhere nowadays. But way, way, way back in Anglo-Jury, nobody wore a Yomelker in the street. It just wasn't done. And I mean nobody, but nobody. And I remember, and Jews kept to low profile. And I remember in our summer holidays, we were just walking back to our apartment from the shoe. There was a shoe in the in the seaside resort. And I was walking back and I was wearing my Yomelker. And a member of the congregation saw me and came to the conclusion, obviously, that I had not realized I'd just forgotten to remove it. And he came up to my father, Oliver Schaum, and said to him, "Mrs. Sax, your son is wearing a Yomelker." My father looked at the man and said, "No, son of mine will ever be ashamed to be a Jew in public." You hear that when your five, six years old changes you will. I just knew from him, never be ashamed at who you are. Never be ashamed of what you believe. So that's how it happened. Very easy. Yeah, very important for our younger generation, especially. Yes. And a reminder for us as parents, like your father gave you, to give our children this some strong feeling of Jewish pride, no matter what the surroundings are. Russia Shana is always a time to reevaluate and reassess, "Does it have particular meaning this year during the pandemic and the challenges we face in the world today?" Well, I think it does really. You know, we tend to take things for granted. I once did a little experiment called the Black Dot. I used to put a black dot on a piece of white paper and ask an audience, "What do they see?" And everyone in the audience said, "A black dot." I said, "Now look at this piece of paper. That black dot represents less than 1% of the paper. The 99% is the white paper." You've noticed it. So that is how we are conditioned. We are conditioned to notice the discrepant and take the rest for granted. So we notice all the bad things that happen in the world, but we ignore all the good things that happen in the world. And I think halakhah, the Sidur, is a place for doing the opposite. I call it foregrounding the background. So when we do Bir Kotashakhah, we thank Hashem for making the car grow, for putting a ground under our feet, for giving us clothes to wear, for being having eyes to see, etc. All the things we normally take for granted come Bir Kotashakhah and they foreground those things instead of leaving them in the background. So I think the most important spiritual thing is to look at the beauty and the miracle of all the stuff we normally take for granted. Now what has happened for the last six months? Every single one of us has been in a situation of Sakhanat, in the first shot. We've been in mortal danger. Every individual on the face of the earth moralize. We have had a situation in which almost a million people have died, a terrifying but terrifying situation, in which we never know where is it going to come from next and so on and so forth. This pandemic should make us stop taking life for granted. And that's what Rosh Hashanah is about. Zakhre Nulakhai, mehla khofits bakhai, because we do bzei bakhai, Mankhaila keemakhai, remember us for life, God who delights in life and rises in the book of life. Judaism is about not taking life for granted. You know, when we get a new suit, what brokha do we make? Thank you God for making a new suit. No, we make a brokha of Shachih Yana, we give Yana, we give Yana, thank you for keeping me alive. The whole of Judaism is don't take life for granted. Life is in miracle. And that's what we should be feeling right now from the pandemic. Nature has been telling us, look at at the miracle of life and the vulnerability of life. Number one, the miracle of life. These are the prize I won it four years ago called the Templeton Prize. This year's winner is a scientist. This is the man who ran the program to map the human genome when he began, he's not Jewish. When he began mapping the human genome, he was an atheist. By the time he finished, he was a religious believer. Yeah. Wow. He wrote about this, he called his book, The Language of God. Francis Collins. Francis Collins, through pure science, was turned from an atheist to a believer. And that's the physical basis of life. The spiritual basis of life, as you know, the Rumbum says, God gives us one thing, but it's everything. God gives us life. And to my mind, the key text this year from Philo Lemoshe, Psalm 90, Limitio Menucane Hodevan Ovilovov-Hochma teaches to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom. That is realize how precious every single day of life is. And how we must give thanks for it. I would say, do that one thing and you will be spiritually really uplifted, really uplifted. We will most definitely do our best. Thank you for this inspirational perspective. On this topic of gratitude and seeing the good, just comes to mind, I remember my father said to us that the last time he saw you, you remembered my mother had asked your question, why do bad things happen to good people? And you said to my father, tell your wife, I still don't have an answer for her. I was wondering if you had any more insight. Yes, I do, actually. God does not want us to understand why bad things happen to good people. Because if we ever understood, we would be forced to accept that bad things happen to good people. And God does not want us to accept those bad things. He wants us not to understand so that we will fight against the bad and the injustices of this world. And that is why there is no one's that are that question because God has arranged that we shall never have an answer to it. I wanted to ask, if you have a favorite book that you can recommend, I know you've probably read thousands of books, but is there one that stood out to you that you enjoyed? Well, you know, the one that certainly changed my life, but it also changed about 15 million other lives as well, was the book written by the late Victor Frankel. Yes. Which he published actually just a year after leaving Auschwitz, surviving Auschwitz. And it's called Man's Search for Meaning. It's our favorite book. Yeah, it's almost everyone's favorite book and it's a life-changing book. And basically it contains one message above all others, which is there is one freedom that they can never take away from you. And that is the freedom to choose how to respond. The freedom to choose one's own way. Yeah. And I find that, of course, that's a profoundly Jewish message, profoundly, profoundly Jewish message. Even the phrase man's search for meaning is profoundly Jewish. Judaism is the search for meaning. It's not the search for salvation. It's not the search for submission. It's not the search for domination. It's the search for meaning. So I think Victor Frankel is the giant. And his book is my most important book. We were going to ask you if you can share a favor, quote. You did just share a beautiful quote. Well, you can continue to be a light on to the nations and continue shining your light. We want to thank you for everything you've done and continue to do today on behalf of humanity. We are so inspired by everything you've done. Huge blessings for a happy and sweet and peaceful new year with only good tidings and blessings and health to your family and everybody around you. Yes, May I shen give you both a year of health and blessing and safety. And may you likewise to everyone who's tuning into this conversation. And may he give us some light after a quite dark period in time. And we emerge from the darkness full of joy. Your book has come out in a very dark time and that's why particularly this book on morality, I think is so relevant. It has brought a lot of light to me. I know it's gonna be a lot of like to thousands and thousands of people. Yes, it's called morality restoring the common good in divided times, by Rabbi Jonathan Sacks. Great. Thank you.