Guide me, O Endless Light! To the space elevator! It will glint from Heaven like lightning!
No, I have no idea which commandment is the smallest. I suspect if ten Rabbis gathered to discuss this, there would be at least ten opinions, probably more. However, there is a reason for my strange subject today.
On the commuter bus, I am still reading the Torah for Dummies, by Arthur Kurzweil. He is very supportive of his students, assuring them that taking an interest in the Torah will not be in vain, even if it is on the “for dummies” level. But when asking several Jewish educators where they recommended a newcomer to Jewish life begin, they all answered: Find one mitzvah (one divine commandment from the Torah), and do it forever. Become an expert on that one mitzvah.
This reminded me brightly of a song of encouragement that the Christian Church at Brunstad used to sing when I was young. It is in Norwegian, but the two lines that struck me translate as follows: “Begin now with the smallest commandment, it will glint from Heaven like lightning.”
When people wanted to discuss the teachings of Jesus Christ, he told them: “If anyone wants to do my Father’s will, he will learn whether the teaching is of God or whether I speak from myself.” Somewhat disturbingly, Ryuho Okawa says something similar. Start giving love without expecting reward from people and see if you don’t get happy! Of course, you do so at your own risk. When you actually begin to do something, you get drawn into whatever greater system of teaching you engage with, be it for good or ill.
It is not like people who take no interest in religion do nothing, either. Even they engage with a system of thought that is prevalent in this world at their time. But the the worldly system of thought is rather different from the religious. This is what I call the lower gravity. When you begin with the smallest commandment, you hook up to a divine “space elevator” which is capable of eventually lifting you up to a height where you can start to feel Earth’s gravity growing weaker, and a new more subtle pull from above. Or so it would seem.