Musar su Pe'ah 1:1

And Chazal have said (Peah 1:1): "These are the things that a person eats… and Torah study over and against all." And we find in Yerushalmi (Peah, Chapter 1) that all of the mitzvoth are not comparable to one word of Torah.

5) It is well known what we say every day (Peah 1:1): "These are the things whose fruits one eats in this world, with the principal remaining for the world to come, etc…. and coming betimes to the synagogue in the morning and in the evening."

And through it [Torah study] one merits the world to come, as Chazal have said (Peah 1:1): “These are the things … and Torah study over and against all.” And Chazal have said (Bava Metzia 85b): “That which is written (Iyyov 3:19): ‘The small and the great are there [in the next world], and the servant free of his master.’ Do we not know that the small and the great are there? — [The intent is] rather, that all who make themselves small for Torah in this world are made great in the world to come, and all who make themselves servants for Torah in this world are made free men in the world to come.” And in Avoth 6:3: “There is no honor but Torah, as it is written (Mishlei 3:35): ‘The wise will inherit honor.’ Do not desire more honor than your learning and do not lust for the table of kings. For your table [in the world to come] is greater than their table in this world, and your crown is greater than their crown, etc.” And in Sanhedrin 100a: “All who blacken their faces in Torah study in this world, the Holy One Blessed be He brightens them in the world to come, as it is written (Song of Songs 5:15): ‘His countenance is as Levanon, choice as the cedars.’” And, similarly, in Midrash Rabbah: “R. Yehudah interpreted the verse as relating to Torah scholars. One verse states (Ibid. 11) ‘black as a raven,’ and another (Nachum 2:5): ‘Their appearance is like flames, they flash like lightning.’ These are the Torah scholars, who look ungainly and black in this world but whose appearance is flamelike in the next world.” R. Tanchum ben Chanilai said: ‘All who starve themselves for words of Torah in this world, the Holy One Blessed be He sates them in the world to come, as it is written (Psalms 36:9): ‘They will be sated with the fatness of Your house.’”

And they gave a parable about this matter of a king that said to his servants to plant every fine tree in his garden. And he said that he would give them payment; but he did inform them of the payment for each [type] of tree, because the king desired that there would be nothing lacking in his orchard. Therefore they planted many species of delightful saplings. But had the servants known the payment for the planting of each [type of] tree of the trees in the orchard, they would then have given all of their effort to the stems of the plantings for which the reward is greater than the other, in order to enhance their payment. The same is [true] with the matter of commandments. For God wanted to give merit to Israel with the fulfillment of all the commandments, to bequeath them eternal life and for all of the commandments together to be a charming wreath for their heads. For when they complete the measure of their work, their payment will be complete from Him. Did you not know that our Rabbis, may their memory be blessed, said (Avodah Zarah 17b), “Anyone who is only involved with Torah is similar to someone who has no God” - even though they said (Peah 1:1), “the [reward for the] study of Torah corresponds to all [the commandments].” And the reward of the light commandment is great and wondrous, such that it cannot be counted or measured. Do you not see with the commandment of sending away the [mother bird] - that has no toil and no large expenditure of money - it is stated about it (Deuteronomy 22:7), “that it may be well with you and that you may prolong your days.” And our Rabbis, may their memory be blessed, said (Kiddushin 39b), “Rabbi Ya’akov says, ‘There is not a single [light] commandment written in the Torah that the [reward of] the resurrection of the dead is not dependent upon. [...] With the sending [of the mother bird from] the nest, it is [stated], ‘That it may be well with you, and that you may prolong your days’ [...] ‘that it may be well with you’ for the world where all is well,’ and ‘that your days may be long’ for the world that is entirely long.” And if that is what the Torah stated with a light commandment that [requires an expenditure of] like an issar (a small coin), all the more so with weighty commandments.

Behold the story of Gedalia ben Achikam where it is clear to our eyes that due to his great Chasidut to not judge Yishmael ben Netanya negatively, nor to accept an evil report, he said to Yochanan ben Kareach "you are speaking falsely of Yishmael" (Yirmiyahu 40:16). What resulted from this? He was murdered, the Jews went into exile, and their last ember was extinguished. Scripture attributes the murder of these people as if Gedalyah himself murdered them, as our sages of blessed memory, said (Nida 61a) on the verse: "all the bodies of the men whom he had killed through Gedaliah" (Yirmiyahu 41:9).

If a man has repented and then returned to his former wrongdoing, even if he has repeated this many times, he can nevertheless still repent. But it is necessary to make repentance more severe the second and third time than it was the first time. We have learned in the Jerusalem Talmud: he who has been wicked all his days and has repented, the Holy One, Blessed be He, receives him. Rabbi Johanan said, "Not only this, but all his transgressions, now that he has overcome them, are considered as merit" (T.P. Peah 1:1). And in the chapter (of the Babylonian Talmud) entitled, "Yom Kippur Atones" we read (Yoma 86b) that if he repented out of love of God, the intentional sins that he committed become merit; if he repented out of fear of God, then his intentional sins become as sins committed unknowingly. And as for all those that have no portion in the world to come and are condemned to Gehenna for generations — they are the ones who died in their wickedness. But if they repented, nothing can stand in the face of repentance. And a man should not think, "Since I sinned and caused others to sin I cannot repent," for he thereby weakens his hand from doing repentance. God forbid that he should do this, for the Sages said in the chapter entitled, "A share in the World to Come" (Sanh. 102a), even Jeroboam who sinnned and caused others to sin — even to him the Holy One, Blessed be He, said, "Now you must repent." And he did not want to (Pirke de-Rabbi Eliezer, chap. 43; Menorat Hamaor, item 254; and see T.P. Sanh. 10:2).

No other commandment is equal in value to the precept of studying the Torah, but the study of the Torah can be weighed against all of the other precepts together, because the study of the Torah leads to the performance of the deeds commanded there (Kiddushin 40b). And the statement that "the study of the Torah outweighs them all" (Peah 1:1) applies to him who studies in order to learn and to teach, to observe, to do, and to fulfill, but who, because of his constant study of the Torah, is not able to fulfill all of the commandments, and when he is not studying he does all that he can, thus showing the state of his mind, that he wants very much to perform the commandments. It is in such a case that "the study of the Torah outweighs them all." For when he studies the precepts and wants to fulfill them, then he already is rewarded as though he had fulfilled them, inasmuch as he has been kept from fulfilling them only because of his diligent study of the Torah. And so he finds that the reward of doing and of studying are both his. But he who frequently is idle, and is able to perform the commandments at the time that he is idle but does not hasten to do them, or when he does fulfill a commandment does not do so with great care, as is befitting, of him it is not said that the study of the Torah outweighs all the other commandments.