I have a friend. Let’s call him Steve. He’s a warm, good-hearted fellow. A stalwart member of my local synagogue which he attends daily, he takes his religion seriously and puts much effort into both his prayer and his Torah learning. Being modest, cheerful and helpful, he is popular and enjoys the respect of all around him.
Though Steve
has never hidden anything of mine, I do not think that I would be happy to
share his little prank if he did. When I’m finished with synagogue I’m usually
in a hurry to rush off somewhere else. More seriously, I’ve now reached an age
at which, if I can’t find something in the place where I’ve put it down, my
first thought is that my memory has began to fail me.
My question
is this: what message does Pirkei Avot have for pious pranksters like Steve?
Since Steve’s
little joke involves fiddling around with other people’s property, my first
thought drifted towards Avot 5:13: “There are four types of people: One who
says ‘What is mine is yours, and what is yours is mine’ is an uncouth person…”.
But this didn’t really seem to fit the bill because Steve wasn’t claiming any
proprietary right in other people’s things. I then remembered Rabbi Akiva’s
caution at Avot 3:17 that jesting and levity lead a person to ervah,
immorality. That didn’t seem quite right either, since ervah is a word
that carries strong overtones of sexual impropriety which are quite inapplicable
here.
This leaves
us with the great catch-all mishnah of Rabbi Yose HaKohen at Avot 2:17: “Let all
your actions be for the sake of Heaven”. If Steve could be intercepted at the
point at which he was about to play one of his little pranks he should ask
himself: “Can I honestly say that what I am about to do is for the sake of
Heaven? Will it bring any pleasure to God or cause people to honour or respect Him
more greatly?” Ideally this would inhibit or prevent Steve persisting with his
well-meaning but sometimes annoying little tricks.
Do readers
have any better suggestions?
