The first of Rabbi Tarfon’s teachings does not mention the pursuit of Torah study, but most commentators assume that this is the meat of the metaphor and that the task of learning Torah is an unceasing commitment. The mishnah (Avot 2:20) reads:
“The day is short, the work is in abundance, the workers are lazy, the reward is great, and the Master is pressing”.
That these words apply to Torah study is easy to argue. But how do we know whether they also apply to the fulfilment of other obligations towards God?
In considering this proposition, let us take as our starting point another mishnah, this time from the end of the fifth perek (Avot 5:26):
Ben Bag Bag used to say: “Turn it over, turn it over, since everything is in it; see with it; grow old and grey in it; do not budge from it, for there is nothing better”.
Taking these words literally, let us turn Rabbi Tarfon’s words on their head and give them quite the opposite meaning. This leaves us with something like:
“The day is long, the work is light, the workers are industrious, the reward is not so great, and the Master is easy-going”.
Does this inversion of Rabbi Tarfon's words have anything to tell us? Arguably it does, in that it can be said to be capable of applying to many if not most of the positive mitzvot in the Torah—but not to the learning of Torah itself.
We know from our own experience that, if we are not continuously occupied, the day is long and time weighs heavily on our hands. In retrospect, time often seems to have passed swiftly, but our real-time experience tells us otherwise. Ask any confirmed cigarette smoker about those last ten minutes before Shabbat goes out. God has given us an amplitude of time, more than we require for our essential needs, which is why we run the constant risk of bitul zeman, killing time that could have been put to productive use if we only valued it properly.
As for the work being in abundance, relatively little time need be spent performing many of the Torah’s biggest mitzvot. Prayer, the recitation of Shema, recalling the redemption from Egypt, taking and shaking the lulav, eating matzah at the Passover seder—these are examples of commands that we can quickly and easily discharge, tick the box and then move on to some other activity.
We workers are industrious too, creating innovative and imaginative ways to fill our time when we are neither working for a living nor doing our Jewish thing. Even rest and leisure have an active dimension to them, so that we can focus on wearing ourselves out by living our lifestyles to the full and going to bed exhausted in mind and body at the end of each day.
As for the reward, we are encouraged to make every effort not even think about it, and certainly not to work in order to receive it (Avot 1:3), so whether the reward is big or small shouldn’t be allowed to enter the equation.
Finally, is the Master so demanding? It can he argued that He is not. Who but an easy-going God would create the notion of the mitzvah kiyumit, the commandment that one can go through one’s entire life without fulfilling? Tzitzit, mezuzah, challah—these are all examples of precepts that depend entirely upon the circumstance of a person possessing a four-cornered garment, a doorway or a large enough piece of dough. Nor do we have to build a house with a flat roof so that we can oblige ourselves to fence that roof safely.
Arguably, every one of the mitzvot in the Torah, with the exception of the study of Torah, can be said to comply with at least one of the five points described in the “upside down” version of the mishnah we have just discussed. In contrast, talmud Torah complies with none of them—and only Torah study matches all five points listed by Rabbi Tarfon in the real mishnah text.
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