Where else do we find a commandment of the Torah to keep such distance from something that is worded as strongly as we find it regarding lying, which Sforno teaches we must stay far away from any matter of sheker completely? What is it about falsehood that makes it so much worse than everything else?
Rav Yosef Elefant shlit”a answered this fundamental question with the words of the Rabbeinu Yonah (Chapter 3, 4th category), which speak about the person who lies for no gain at all; he lies just because he loves lying.
On the one hand, the chisaron of such behavior does not seem as bad, since he really gains nothing by lying. On the other hand, specifically because he does not gain from it is what makes his lie so much worse! For he does is simply out of his love of sheker....
Rav Elefant then went on to explain beautifully: The main strength of the yetzer hara is in his koach of imagination. Torah is truth; Olam Haba is truth. How does the yetzer hora distance a person, R”l, from that which he knows is truth? Because he is going against truth, the only way for him to achieve his goal is by distorting it. The yetzer hora works with two distortions: First, he distorts what is right and what is wrong; and then he distorts the reality of whether the person is actually doing right or wrong. For as we said above, the koach that the Satan uses is all imagination.
We must ask an important question: Why do people want to lie? Explained Rav Elefant; it is because they have taken a path in life of distorting reality — a path of life that is imaginative. This child who played in his imaginative world of Matchbox cars, R”l grows up continuing in that path of “dimyon” and imagination — never entering the world of reality.
Lying out of one’s love for sheker is so much worse than lying for a benefit, as it is only the yetzer hora that wants him to live in a world of falsehood; and loving sheker is how one enters the yetzer hora’s world, Hashem yerachaim.
The Sforno thus writes that the Torah is warning us to stay far, far away from even the slightest sheker, as sheker is a weapon in the yetzer hora’s arsenal to take a person away from the truth of life, R”l. Keep your distance from the slightest hint of falsehood...remain within the world that is only true and real.
Rav Elefant added that Rav Yeruchem Levovitz zt”l was ever so careful that when you told him an incident, he would go every single detail with you to make sure it was true, for R”l even a bit from reality brings a person into a world of imagination.
And perhaps we can add as well: Although it is not for me to give guidance on the very great topic of AI and how it affects and greatly challenges our generation, one thing that must be said is that it is called “artificial intelligence” — for as sophisticated and innovative it is, it is and will always be “artificial.” It can produce incredible images, it can put forward an enormous amount of information in seconds, and it can create songs and poetry...but authentic, genuine, human feelings, and true expressions of the deepest parts of a human heart and soul AI will never bring to the table....
And in a world that is speedily being influenced by AI’s tremendous repercussions, we must tenaciously hold on to truth with all our might.
As Shlomo HaMelech says, “Acquire truth and don’t sell...,” which Rav Miller explains to mean that we must spend our lives acquiring actual truth and not sell ourselves short.... And by keeping our distance from all forms of sheker, we will much more easily grab onto real, unadulterated truth....
B’Siyata DiShmaya.
