I read Harley Lippman’s “Jewish philanthropy can’t miss the AI revolution” (April 20) with a sense of déjà vu born of more than a dozen years of writing the same piece every time the Jewish world meets a new shiny thing. From blended learning to MOOCs to the metaverse and NFTs, every “transformative” platform promised to scale Jewish life quietly evaporated. 

That pattern matters. If we rush into AI as if it were a magic wand, we will repeat the same mistakes of pouring money into platforms while starving the people who actually sustain Jewish life.

Lippman suggests that this time might be different if our response involves funding chairs in AI ethics, convening technologists and rabbis, and bringing Jewish voices to emerging policy debates. These are serious proposals, but they are also familiar ones. They prioritize visibility, prestige, and influence at the highest levels while remaining largely disconnected from the institutions where Jewish life is actually taught, practiced, and sustained. Without a far deeper investment in those institutions and the people who lead them, such efforts risk becoming another layer of well-intentioned infrastructure with little capacity to translate into lived experience.

AI is just another tool, and tools amplify what already exists. If we feed AI the same underfunded, undertrained and under?valued ecosystem that produced mediocre digital experiments of the past, we will get more of that amplified mediocrity. To be sure, AI will help us produce that mediocrity faster, more cheaply and delivered in that “convincing” AI patter sprinkled with em dashes that will undoubtedly grant us an opportunity to cultivate experiences to help us delve into the tapestry to leverage and foster the intricate details that are the hallmarks that underscore Jewish life.

But is that really what we want?

Jewish funders must decide whether they want to be a booster for durable Jewish life or venture capitalists shilling for the next shiny thing. 

Ten years ago in this publication, I documented the history of over 100 years of technological advancements and new futures that promised to transform Jewish life, solve the affordability crisis, the crisis of engagement or to finally make sure kids would learn. None of them did. I suggested that part of the solution going forward was to embrace a series of really wise recommendations offered now 40 years ago in a report by the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture.

And yet, a decade later, we’re still no closer to conquering the big issues, and we are still constantly distracted by the shiny things. The solutions to our problems are not new, our unwillingness to implement them remains the core blocker.

To put it more explicitly, we have spent millions of dollars on technologies and ideas that mostly ignore the expertise of those in our communities doing the actual work and then millions more trying to train these teachers, rabbis and local organizers to retrofit their programs around products that were never built for them, that they never asked for and that they probably never needed.

If you really care about AI in Jewish contexts, fund the people first. And if you don’t give a lick about the tech, then all the more so fund the people first. Underwrite the slow, messy work of curriculum design and community adaptation. Invest in proven research-based solutions and not the newest shiny things. Work with folks who collaborate with others to maximize the limited communal resources. And figure out ways to engage folks at the margins who are missing from our communal voices. 

Platforms without people are expensive toys. People without platforms are resilient institutions.

If Jewish philanthropists really want to lead, not just in shaping AI policy but in shaping Jewish life, they need to start thinking more like civic stewards than speculators. That means investing in people placing educators, rabbis and other communal leaders at the heart of the effort, not as an afterthought. It means demanding rigorous evaluation and funding projects based on  evidence, not enthusiasm, with clear goals and a willingness to walk away from what doesn’t work. It means saying no to the seductive promise that the new shiny thing will solve our problems. It means stop chasing the revolution and start investing in the people who will live with its consequences.

Equally fluent in Yiddish and JavaScript, Russel Neiss is a Jewish educator, technologist and activist. Neiss is a 2020 recipient of the Covenant Foundation Award for Excellence in Jewish Education, and his work has been featured in The New York Times, Washington Post, NPR, The Atlantic, CNN, Wall Street Journal, the Jewish Telegraph Agencyand other media outlets.