Dennis Prager: The Battle Over Good and Evil

For 50 years, Dennis Prager, one of the most important and influential conservative thinkers of the 21st century, has made a single core argument: Without God, there is no good and evil—only opinion. He advanced it on the radio, in five volumes of biblical commentary, in more than a dozen books on religion, morality, and the foundations of Western civilization, and to millions of viewers through PragerU. Generations of prominent conservatives, including Ben Shapiro and the late Charlie Kirk, have named him as a primary inspiration for their worldview, and he is perhaps the greatest defender of Judeo-Christian values in the last half-century.

In November 2024, stepping out of the shower, Prager suffered a catastrophic fall that left him paralyzed from the shoulders down. Doctors have said it’s a miracle that he can speak. In his first appearance after his accident, Prager expressed not dismay or despair but gratitude. He said, “I’m thrilled to be alive.”

Prager dictated his new book, "If There Is No God: The Battle Over Who Defines Good and Evil," from his hospital bed. The title is taken from a paraphrase of a passage in Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov: “If there is no God, everything is permitted.” That is the central argument of Prager’s wonderful new book: that in the absence of God, we have no morality. All we have left to guide us are feelings.

Today, Free Press columnist and senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute Abigail Shrier sits down with Prager to talk about why the collapse of religious life is destroying America’s moral foundations, the rise of antisemitism on the right, and why, despite everything, he still wakes up grateful.