The Word’s First Disruptor

In today’s fast-changing world, the most successful organizations aren’t those with the biggest budgets or the best technology. They’re the ones that ask better questions.

What if our assumptions are wrong? What aren’t we seeing? What if the greatest risk is doing what’s always worked?

“We run the company by questions, not by answers.” — Eric Schmidt, former CEO and Executive Chairman of Google

For most of history, stability meant survival. A farmer in 1500 lived much like one in 1000. The feudal system endured for centuries. Governance, technology, and even belief systems remained largely static. To question authority or tradition was dangerous. Galileo learned that the hard way.

Today, the opposite is true. In many industries, if you’re not reinventing yourself, you’re irrelevant. Harvard’s Clayton Christensen called this “disruptive innovation.” When challengers don’t just compete, they redefine the game. Netflix, Uber, and Airbnb began as outliers. Then they became the rule-makers.

But the courage to question didn’t start in Silicon Valley. It started with Abraham.

The Original Disruptor

Surrounded by idol worship and inherited beliefs, Abraham dared to ask: what if there is something greater, unseen, and just? His questioning shattered the assumptions of his world.

According to Midrash, Abraham found God through questioning. Even after God appears to him, he kept asking. When told that Sodom would be destroyed, he challenged the divine plan: “Shall the Judge of all the earth not do justice?” He didn’t question to rebel. He questioned to search for truth.

The Torah calls him an Ivri, the one who stood on the other side. It wasn’t just geography; it was mindset. Abraham thought differently. He was the first contrarian with conviction.

As George Orwell wrote in the dystopian novel 1984, “Being in a minority, even in a minority of one, did not make you mad. There was truth and there was untruth, and if you clung to the truth even against the whole world, you were not mad.”

Abraham’s legacy isn’t just monotheism – it’s the courage to think independently.

A Tradition of Tension

Judaism built a culture around questions. The Talmud is an eternal debate. The Passover Seder centers on asking. Even the “wicked” son’s challenge is recorded and engaged.

My late father once said that Torah is liberal in spirit. Not politically, but intellectually. It values dissent. It preserves Beit Shammai’s opinions even when the law follows Beit Hillel. In Judaism, disagreement isn’t a flaw. It’s the foundation.

The Modern Lesson

As a CEO, I often told my teams: my job is to ask the questions. You are the experts who find the answers.

Schmidt’s insight still holds: “We run the company by questions, not by answers.” Organizations that stop asking stop growing. They lose the curiosity that keeps them alive.

Judaism grasped this long ago. Its wisdom is not frozen in doctrine but alive in dialogue. Its heroes are not just believers, but thinkers.

Think Different — and Think Deeper

Apple’s campaign celebrated “the ones who see things differently.” Rebels. Misfits. The round pegs in square holes. But the first of them was Abraham. He was the original round peg.

Innovation isn’t only about invention. It’s about disciplined doubt, the willingness to challenge, refine, and rebuild.

In an age that prizes disruption, his story reminds us: every true transformation begins not with an answer, but with a question.

Abraham’s journey continues in us. And so do his questions.