“For it is not an empty thing for you.” Devarim 32:47
–“It is not worthless for you to tired yourself out from learning Torah, for much reward comes from it, for it is your very life.”-Rashi

How much is one mitzvah really worth?

Very few people since the planet Earth was created 5,770 years ago have received the merit of ruling the entire world during their lifetime. One of them was King Nevuchadnetzer, who was extremely wicked and destroyed the first Temple. The reason he merited this great fame was because of three steps he once took. The Gemara Sanhedrin (96a) explains that in his younger years, Nevuchadnetzer was a servant to the king in Babylon. King Chizkiyahu, the Jewish king during this time, became very sick and was miraculously healed. When the king of Babylon heard about this, he decided to send King Chizkiyahu a letter, since he must be a great person to be able to be healed this way. He began the letter by stating “Peace upon King Chizkiyahu. Peace upon the city of Jerusalem. And peace upon the great G-d of Jerusalem.” He then sent a messenger to deliver the letter. Nevuchadnetzer heard about the letter after the messenger had already started on his journey but he told the king that the letter was written wrongly. He said if the G-d of Jerusalem is so great, then He should be first. His name should not appear after an earthly king’s or a city’s. The king of Babylon told Nevuchadnetzer to stop the mail carrier and to get it corrected. Nevuchadnetzer took three steps to stop the messenger. Our Sages tell us because of these three steps Nevuchadnetzer took in honor of G-d, he merited a great reward. Since Nevuchadnetzer was an evil person, G-d did not want to reward him in the next world, so he rewarded him that he should rule over this entire world. These three steps in honor of G-d got him such a great reward!

Look closely at the story, though. Nevuchadnetzer did not really mean to honor G-d. He stated that the statement did not make sense because if the king of Babylon was saying G-d was so great, then he should not put His name behind King Chizkiyahu’s and Jerusalem’s. He honestly did not care about G-d’s honor but was bothered with the way it sounded. Still, G-d rewarded Nevuchadnetzer because indirectly he sanctified G-d.

Think of how many mitzvos you do every day and how much energy you use to perform them. If Nevuchadnetzer received such a great reward for only taking three steps, imagine how large the reward is that is waiting for us in the World to Come! And when we perform mitzvos, we do them to praise G-d, so our reward is many times greater than Nevuchadnetzer’s because that was not his intention. And just think how much greater of a reward we can get by doing more mitzvos. We literally cannot fathom how great of a reward is waiting for us.

In a few days, we will be celebrating Yom Kippur by fasting for 25 hours and standing in shul for most of the day. We might start wondering if it is really worth doing this. If you get these thoughts, just remember we are praying for life so we can merit to do more mitzvos and get more reward.

Good Shabbos!
-yes
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