According to the effort ... a word about mitzvot and their rewards

Coming up to Rosh Hashanah, we are encouraged to think about the balance between the mitzvot we have performed over the past year and, in the event that there should be any, the averot that we should not have done -- but did. Ideally we should be in positive territory, with more mitzvot to our credit than averot, but we are not the best judges of our own performance. 

On the subject of mitzvot, here is a thought for those of us who sometimes struggle with them. It is based on Pirkei Avot 5:26, in which Ben He He says "According to the effort is the reward".

In general terms we have not the faintest idea of the nature and quality of rewards enjoyed in the World to Come for good deeds done in our lifetimes. We have however received some guidance from our tradition, and this enables us to make better decisions regarding performance of mitzvot and our commitment to Torah observance. One element of this guidance concerns how we should feel towards mitzvot that are hard or troublesome to perform.  How does this work? The problem below provides an illustration.

Two people perform an identical mitzvah — returning a wallet full of money to its rightful owner.  The first is happy to perform this mitzvah since he is wealthy and the wallet’s contents mean little to him. The second, unemployed and racked by poverty, could make great use of the cash and is sorely tempted to do so, but nonetheless returns the wallet. 

It seems only right that the poor man should receive a greater reward since his is the more meritorious act: he has had to overcome both his financial needs and his yetzer hara in order to perform it.   However the return of the wallet is objectively the same act, regardless of who has performed it — and if the rich man is to receive only a trifling reward for this act because he has not found it difficult, would he not be better served by leaving the wallet in the ground on the assumption that someone else was bound to find and return it, giving another person the chance to get a bigger reward for returning it reluctantly. He could then set off instead to perform some other mitzvah that he found more difficult.

A solution to this problem comes from the Maharal's suggestion that there are two rewards for each mitzvah. The first is on a standard tariff and is earned for ‘ticking the box’ by fulfilling a commandment, regardless of the manner in which it has been fulfilled.  The second relates solely to the effort and hardship incurred in the act of fulfilment.  On this basis, in the problem described above, the poor man and the rich would receive identical rewards for the basic act of returning the wallet, while the poor man would receive a greater, personalised reward related to the need to overcome his personal issues, issues that were not relevant to the performance of the same mitzvah by the rich man.