When the Donkey Talks Back: AI, Torah, and the Power (and Peril) of Speech
Tech Tribe Dispatch #308
💡 Think:
You never want to go MechaHitler… A failed tweak to xAI’s Grok caused the model to run amok. Thanks to a new prompt to reply with claims that were “politically incorrect, as they were well substantiated,” the beastly mouth unleashed a slew of horrific (and wholly unsubstantiated) claims.
But this isn’t the first time the mouth of the beast has been opened.
In this week’s Torah portion, after seeing the Emorite kings Sichon and Og destroyed by the children of Israel, Balak, king of Moab, hatches a new plan to undermine the Jewish People.
If the Jews draw strength through their mouths —through prayer— he reasons1 “we too will come against them with a man whose strength is in his mouth.”
Enter Balaam, the non-Jewish prophet-for-hire, recruited by Balak to curse the Jews. Speech —the very medium by which we connect to G-d, explore the mysteries of Torah, and the backbone and sustaining force of creation itself— would now be weaponized.
Yet despite Balaam’s zeal to curse, G-d made His displeasure clear. When Balaam’s donkey tried to stop him from going down his wicked path, Balaam struck it. Then, the mouth of the donkey was opened, and the beast spoke2:
“The L-rd opened the mouth of the she-donkey, and she said to Balaam, "What have I done to you that you have struck me these three times?…Am I not your she-donkey on which you have ridden since you first started until now? Have I been accustomed to do this to you?"”
What have I done to you, the beast called out, that I should be harnessed as an agent for human corruption. Am I not a faithful tool, just following your prompts?
Rabbi Ovadia Sforno, the Renaissance Biblical commentator, notes3 the reason G-d so chose to break the matrix of nature at that moment:
“All this was so that Balaam might be awakened to repent, remembering that the L-rd can punish even the unwilling, much less remove it from the willing at His will…”
Speech is what makes us uniquely human. If Balaam would abuse his gift for evil, he was reminded that G-d alone is the ultimate arbiter of its use.
Language Models share all the hallmarks of speech but the stochastic parrot is no more than an animal — a tool to be harnessed. True speech, the kind the donkey was given for a moment, and that Balaam (and all of us) possess, is of a different, transcendent order.
As Rabbi Sholom Dovber Schneersohn, the Rashab of Lubavitch, notes in his magnum opus Ayin Beis4:
”Speech is more than just the expressions of the mouth…for even an animal can make noises, yet does not have true speech…
The main form of human speech, which is why a person is called a medaber [a speaker, as opposed to a animal, vegetable or mineral], is because the soul’s capacity for speech - to reveal the ideas bound with its essence.
This is the real meaning of speech, that even when a person isn’t speaking – even when a person is all alone – he has the ability to articulate ideas [in his mind]. (This is true speech, since if speech were merely the ability to produce sounds, even non-humans can speak. Take for example the parrot, which can be taught to mimic the sounds, but is not a medaber, since true speech is to reveal the ideas found within the soul.)”
As we explore the power of AI, we have to ask: At what point will the donkey cry out to remind us how to harness our uniquely human gift?
🏃 DO:
✨ TONIGHT: Join us for our Mid Summer Shabbat this Friday, July 11th at 9:00 PM — a special evening under the stars with a delicious Shabbat meal and meaningful community spirit.
🥂 Be part of our upcoming event: Thursday, July 17th at 3 PM — "Social Media and Free Speech." Enjoy a lunch and learn with the Jewglers. Contact Jewglers NY leads to join in!
🍷 We invite you to attend this month’s Third Thursday Schmooze on Thursday, July 17th at 7 PM — an evening dedicated to meaningful conversation and community connection.
🎧 Listen:
Evert Week Dovid Taub cooks up a song on the Torah portion. Check out: More to Say
🎬 Watch:
🎉 Mazel:
🌹 A special mazel tov to the indominatable Sasha Troufanov and Sapir Cohen on their engagement!
👶 Mazel tov to Bianci Livi and Danny Avizov on the birth of a baby girl!
🎨 Create:
Balaam and his donkey
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📚 Read:
✊The Woman Who Stood Up To The Soviet Beast
🤖 Grok’s antisemitic spree makes it clear: AI poses a real threat to Jews Thoughts on AI & Antisemitism by Tech Tribe friend David Zvi Kalman
😍 Fave:
Berel Lightstone got 30 kids to sign up to get a letter in the Unity Torah scroll this week.
Do you have yours?
(Did you know you can email Berel? Go to the Email Talmid section and select Mesivta here)
🔥 Lit:
This week, light Shabbat candles in NYC at 8:09 PM
For Shabbat candle-lighting time in your area click here.
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Numbers 22:28, commentary of Sforno ad loc. See Mordechai Rubin’s collection of many of the classic commentaries on this episode.
Admur Harashab, Discourse from 5672 p. 905