Thanks for the thank-you

 Earlier this week my wife and I received a "thank-you" card from a newly-wed couple to whom we had sent a present. This set me thinking.

The card, which was printed, bore a hand-written inscription that was several lines long. It made reference both to the gift itself and to the couple's appreciation of it, and it was penned relatively soon after the wedding.

I was greatly surprised to receive this card. For one thing, it seems that in recent times many couples do not acknowledge gifts at all, so the arrival of this epistle was quite unexpected. For another, both newly-weds are very busily engaged in their work, their studies and their communal activities. It would have been quite understandable if they had printed out a standard one-size-fits-all thank-you card and posted it without further ado. We do not know the couple particularly well, though one of them is the child of a cousin.

Our gift was not a particularly generous or exotic one and I rather felt that the letter with its attendant message was somehow more valuable than our gift. It gave me great pleasure to receive and read it; I felt that the world was not quite as full of thoughtless and ungrateful souls as sometimes seems to be the case.

What does this have to do with Pirkei Avot? A great deal, I believe. We learn that we should treat even small mitzvot (commandments) with as much alacrity and conscientious application as we would direct towards the fulfilment of big ones (see Avot 2:1, 4:2). This is because we are not in a position to know which, if any, are more important to God than any others. We may think something is a trivial ritual requirement that can be easily passed over or done in a desultory fashion, but we have no idea how our performance of mitzvot is received at the other end.

I'm sure that the young couple who sent us their thank-you message do many things each day that they may regard (maybe rightly so) as being more important. However, they have sent out a message that, from their outset of their marriage, they are prepared to devote as much attention to getting the little things right as to addressing the big ones -- an attitude endorsed by Pirkei Avot.

From my standpoint, their little gesture of gratitude made a great impact. Apart from giving me huge pleasure, it has forced me to ask myself whether I am sufficiently conscientious in adequately acknowledging the kindness of others that I so enjoy (and sometimes expect) to receive.