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NEW YORK: A New York Senior Rabbi Josh Franklin read a sermon written entirely by Artificial Intelligence (AI) to his congregation. The sermon written entirely by The rabbi used the website ChatGPT, an application that is free and accessible to anyone with an internet connection.
After reading the AI-written piece, Rabbi Franklin asked his congregation to guess who had written the sermon. In response, the congregation guessed Lord Rabbi Sacks had written the piece.
According to a report, Rabbi Franklin expressed fear over the advancement of AI. He expressed fear of knowing where content comes from, fear of AI replacing jobs and fear for future developments.
While Rabbi Franklin expressed the belief that AI would not be taking his job anytime soon, AI has the potential to take hundreds of millions of jobs, according to Zippia. The career expert website has stated that half of all companies currently use some form of AI, and 375 million jobs are expected to become obsolete over the next decade.
The Rabbi was confident that, despite the excellently written piece, AI would not be taking over his job because technology lacks “Nefesh,” meaning soul. While technology might be able to mimic emotions and write in-depth about human relationships, it cannot feel and it has no soul.
The Rabbi’s statement on AIs’ lack of ‘Nefesh’ is one of Talmudic debate. Rabbi Gershon Winkler has argued that if golems, clay humanoid creatures created by Jews to protect Jews, can be considered Jewish then a robot might one day be able to be called Jewish. If a robot is considered Jewish, it is because the robot would have a Jewish soul.
The report says that only time will tell what AI will become. Perhaps, one day, AI will participate in prayers as an accepted Jew. Maybe AI will replace rabbis.
