Modern technology is learning to prepare for emergencies before they happen. The Torah teaches us that there is also a time in our lives when we are meant to prepare ourselves spiritually, and that time is Elul.
I want to tell you about an organization that some of you may know, but not everyone knows about the special way it operates. United Hatzalah is an organization of thousands of volunteer doctors, paramedics, and emergency medical responders spread throughout Israel. When someone calls and reports a medical emergency, the closest volunteer can receive the call and immediately head to the scene. The idea is simple: instead of waiting for an ambulance to arrive from a hospital or station, there are medical professionals already located within the neighborhoods and cities.
And here is the amazing part. Until now, the model was to respond: an incident happens, a call comes in, and then they go out to save a life. But not long ago, they began using artificial intelligence in a way that could change the entire model. They took approximately twenty years of data, roughly 2,000 emergency calls every day, and built a system that tries to predict not only whether there will be an emergency call, but also where and when there is a high likelihood that one will occur. The system divides the map into areas and shows volunteers areas where there is a higher probability of a call occurring in the next few minutes. It can even provide a forecast for the next 10 minutes.
Then they do something that sounds almost opposite to our instinct: they send the emergency responder before the call comes in. This saves extremely valuable time and prevents accidents which often when emergency responders rush to save lives. Thanks to this software, the lives of both the rescuers and the people they are trying to save can be protected.
One of the organization’s leaders, Rabbi Dov Maisel, said that he wanted to personally test how it works, so he decided to join a shift on an ambulance.
After contacting the dispatch center, which was already using the new AI technology to predict where emergency incidents might occur, Maisel and his team were instructed to position their ambulance in Rishon LeZion, on a street near the Azrieli Rishonim shopping center, in case an emergency call came in from the area.
After less than five minutes of driving, when they arrived at the shopping center, the team received a notification that an emergency was occurring right in their vicinity.
“I hadn’t even gotten the ambulance into the parking lot yet, and the app alerted us. Four hundred meters away from me, a person was suffering from chest pain. Within a minute, we arrived at the scene, and the family was still on the phone with the dispatch center.”
Within seconds, the team was able to determine that the person was suffering a heart attack, and they began providing advanced medical treatment, including medication and advanced support for vital systems.
“This is simply amazing. We are not only able to shorten the response time, but also to use our resources more intelligently,” Maisel says.
According to Maisel, within just a few months of the technology being introduced into the United Hatzalah system, they were already seeing a very high success rate.
“We are at around 90% to 93% accuracy in predicting where the next call will occur,” he says. “We receive endless reports from the volunteers themselves.”
Maisel emphasizes that the regular model, in which volunteers respond to emergency calls, is not changing. The new technology simply makes it possible for a volunteer who has free time, to go ahead to an assigned area instead of waiting for a call.
Do We Ever Invite Trouble?
There is an idea in Judaism called “Al Tiftach Peh LaSatan.” In the language of the Talmud, “Le’olam al yiftach adam piv laSatan” (Berachot 19a). In simple terms: do not speak about a disaster as though you are inviting it or giving it a place. Even when a person has no bad intention, there is significance to what a person brings out of his mouth. Therefore, when it comes to negative things such as illness, death, or disaster, G-d forbid, our Sages instructed us not to speak about them explicitly as though they are about to happen.
This raises a question. Is the very act of predicting in advance the location where a disaster is likely to occur not problematic from the perspective of “Al Tiftach Peh LaSatan”? After all, if the system says, “There are elderly people in this area, and therefore there is a higher likelihood of a heart attack, so within five minutes we need to send an emergency responder there,” isn’t the very act of speaking about and focusing on a particular place where something is expected to happen somewhat similar to inviting that event?
When people heard about this system, they became frightened and asked: Could AI reach a level where it would be able to predict not only which area an incident will occur in, but also which address, which house, and even which person it will happen to? To some degree, the very thought of such a thing is frightening.
Perhaps the answer can be found in this week’s Torah portion, Shoftim. The Torah returns for the third time to emphasize the mitzvah of Cities of Refuge.
The Torah mentions the mitzvah of Cities of Refuge in three places. In the Book of Numbers, Parshat Massei (Numbers 35:9 to 14), the Torah first speaks about how Moses must designate six Cities of Refuge, three cities on the eastern side of the Jordan and three cities on the western side of the Jordan.
The second time is in the Book of Deuteronomy, in Parshat Va’etchanan (Deuteronomy 4:41 to 42). The Torah returns to the subject of Cities of Refuge and tells us that Moses had already carried out the designation of three Cities of Refuge on the eastern side of the Jordan.
And in our Torah portion, Shoftim (Deuteronomy 19:1 to 2), the Torah speaks about the Cities of Refuge again. When the Torah repeats a mitzvah three times, it demonstrates the importance of the mitzvah.
What are Cities of Refuge? They are cities that the Torah designated as places to which a person who accidentally killed another person could flee, in order to protect him from the blood avenger until his case could be clarified.
At first glance, we can ask the same question here: When Moses prepares the Cities of Refuge, isn’t this also “Al Tiftach Peh LaSatan”?
But the answer is simple. When speaking about predicting bad things through speech, certainly this is forbidden, “Al Tiftach Peh LaSatan.” There is no need to speak about negative things. But when it comes to saving a person from the blood avenger, so that he will not kill him, there is no place for “Al Tiftach Peh LaSatan.” On the contrary, we are obligated to prepare and do everything possible to save a human life.
The AI is not actually predicting the disasters. It is not saying that the disaster will happen. It is only causing us to be more prepared, so that if, G-d forbid, something does happen, we can respond more quickly and save lives.
Elul, A Safe space
We can sit here and ask ourselves: What do Cities of Refuge have to do with me? After all, Cities of Refuge belonged to the biblical period, when the Jewish people lived in their own land. Today we live in other countries, and we do not have this mitzvah in its literal form, and we are not obligated in it.
But as with everything, Chassidic teaching comes and shows us that Cities of Refuge belong to us today as well, in a spiritual sense.
We are standing at the threshold of the month of Elul. There are five different acronyms for the word Elul, and one of them is “Ina LeYado VeSamti Lach” (Exodus 21:13), a verse that is said in connection with the Cities of Refuge.
The Rebbe spoke about this many times in his talks, that the month of Elul is comparable to the Cities of Refuge. Just as a person flees from the blood avenger in order to save himself and enters a City of Refuge, so too every Jew, spiritually, has a “time” during the month of Elul to which he can flee in order to save himself from the “blood avenger,” which is the evil inclination.
As the Rebbe says in a talk:
“It is stated in the writings of the Arizal that Elul is an acronym for ‘Ana LeYado VeSamti Lach,’ and this means that the service of Elul is comparable to the concept of the Cities of Refuge, whose purpose was that ‘there the murderer should flee’… Similarly, this is the concept of refuge in the month of Elul. The concept of repentance during this month must be publicized, and many Jews must be awakened to it, by going to them, telling them about it, showing them the path, and making it easier for them to come to repentance and be saved in ‘Elul’… Even someone who is asleep and deeply asleep, we must also go to him, awaken him from his sleep and slumber, and tell him about the month of Elul, that even someone who has sinned, G-d has provided a place for him to flee there and return to G-d.” (Torat Menachem, Vol. 69, p. 213)
Just as in physical life there is a need for a place of refuge that protects us from harmful events, so too in spiritual life there is a need for a “refuge,” where one can escape and feel protected. From time to time we stumble and fall and stain our souls. The month of Elul is a time of “refuge,” to which we can flee in order to escape the judgement. In the month of Elul, G-d extends a hand to help us conduct a genuine accounting of the soul and cleanse ourselves.
Just as the City of Refuge provides a safe space, the month of Elul provides a ‘safe time.’ May we all be blessed with a good and sweet year.