The rabbi was asked, “Why did God make us?” He replied, “So God could have many love stories to tell.”

This reflection is told from the perspective of the Good Thief’s wife.

I live with my daughter now, and spend my final days remembering the past. She brings me cool grapes in the afternoon as I sit in the shade of her acacia tree and I tell stories to her children, who are old enough to understand. This is one of the stories I tell.

Before the day that marked my husband forever in history, he was unknown. Called Dismas in Judea, the Roman territory of the Hebrews, his real name was Omari, son of Akmann. We are from this land of the desert storms and the rising river, what you call Egypt. I returned here, on a long slow caravan with my children after my husband’s death.

Omari was an itinerant stonemason plying his trade throughout the Roman empire. The Romans were mad for building with stone so, in the beginning, he had no difficulty finding work. We’d spent many years trying to get by in our homeland, but skilled slaves became plentiful, finally taking our livelihood. It was a day filled with sorrow and tears when we left the land of our ancestors and went northward.

We came to stay on the outskirts of the small city called Sepphoris in Judea, less than five miles north of Nazareth. Perched on a hill, it had once been a fort town and was being rebuilt as Herod Antipas’ showcase. It was common to hear many tongues spoken and to see exotic cloths, spices, trinkets, and perfumes spilling from the stalls of both the upper and lower markets. Children played in the paved streets, and tambourines, flutes, and drums mixed in with the sound of animals and trade.

It was in Sepphoris, filled with craftsmen, tradesmen, and laborers, that I first saw the Nazarene the Jew called Jesus, a carpenter. Every day, as I would take my husband his food and water, I began to notice the Nazarene in the carpenter’s lean-to, near the building site. We knew the Jews to be a scourge because of the plagues they had brought upon us when they escaped from our country. So, at first, I paid him little attention.

But as time went on, I watched the Nazarene at work. We had few wooden objects; wood was a precious commodity in a desert land. He would plane the wood, smoothing out or burnishing it until it shone. There were times I’d wanted to run my hand over a low table or small stool he’d made to feel the silkiness of the wood under my palm.

Once, when he was finishing a lintel, I was surprised to see him step back and, with the utmost reverence and with great care, he let his glance rest on every angle of the piece as if with great love.

I was not surprised to hear a few months later that the Nazarene had become a healer. There was a stillness about him that I’d never seen before. It seemed to come out of a place that was like a well within a pool of deep, calm water.

My Omari worked hard and tried to care for us. But then there was a glut of stonemasons and work became scarce throughout the region. I finally took to washing stone floors in the homes of the Roman women, their husbands soldiers and officials of the Empire. They would sit and complain about foreigners while I worked, drinking their fruit nectars, and plaiting their thick hair with the oil from the Jewish olives. Omari despised my working for them but there was little choice. He and other men who could find no work, hung their heads in shame and, as time went on, in their shame, they turned to things that shamed their families and caused more heartache and grief.

Then came the day that changed so much for me. The old woman who watched my children was ill, so, I had to take my little ones with me to the home of a centurion’s wife. I knew the Roman woman would be angry. We stopped first, to find my husband and give him his bread and drink.

I remember the sun was hot on the dusty, crowded streets and the children were fussing. The baby was heavy as I balanced him on my hip; my daughter was tired and leaning against me, whining and wrapping her face in my skirts. I could see Omari talking to a Roman, haggling for some work, trying not to beg. He showed me, through his eyes, that we should keep our distance. We must wait.

We stood watching for a very long time. I became anxious that I would be late. Rivulets of sweat began moving down my backbone and the baby’s face became damp to my touch.

The heat and worry made me weak and I must have swooned a bit. I backed under the canopy of the carpenter’s lean-to, hoping to get a little relief.

That’s when I heard a bench being dragged up behind us. I turned to look into the darkened interior, with its piles of curled wood shavings and motes of wood dust filtering through the air. When I saw who had moved the bench, I quickly looked around to be sure that no one else had noticed what the Nazarene had done. It was forbidden for him to approach an unclean, non-Jewish woman. It was forbidden for me to accept anything from him.

Then from the shadows I heard him speak my name.

“Halima,” he said, and nodded for us to be seated.

With relief, we sat, but all the while I watched to be sure my husband hadn’t seen. Then the Nazarene was placing a cup of water on the edge of the bench and pushing it toward us. My daughter looked up at me with her large eyes, hesitating until I nodded that she could have it.

A cup of water when we were so parched! It seemed a miracle.

I dipped my finger into the cup first and whetted my son’s sleepy mouth. Then my daughter drained the cup. Within moments, it was filled again and at my side. I watched the carpenter from the corner of my eye, nervous, as I slipped a piece of my garb into the cool water and put it into my son’s sucking mouth. Finally, I held the cup to my own lips and drank deeply.

The Nazarene stood watching at a distance. At first I was terrified

that he would speak again. How had he known my name? He must have sensed my anxiety, for he was silent …almost as a witness. And strangely, briefly, I felt some of my fears beginning to subside. Finally, my daughter turned to him and smiled. He smiled in return, and resumed his work. For a few moments we sat, as a great peace settled upon us. For once, for the first time really, I did not feel so alien in that alien land.

A few months later, the laborers began talking about the Nazarene doing miracles and healing sickness. They did not believe he could do such things and laughed as they told their stories. But when they spoke of his being with women in their suffering --- one caught in adultery, a Samaritan at a well, a woman whose life was draining away through her blood, I knew all these things to be true.

Once, I went to hear him when he preached. I walked alone for miles to another part of Galilee, pulling my veil over my face as I went, hoping I would not be recognized. When I arrived, many people were seated on a hillside and there were men and women passing out fish and little loaves of bread in baskets. I ate the fish greedily, tucking the crusts of bread into my garment for my children.

The Nazarene’s voice rose over the crowd that day: his words strong and clear and filled with no uncertainty. He spoke about his God being among and in us all, and how we were to live from love. Something inside me whispered that that was so. A few times I let my veil fall away and turned my face to catch the breeze. I felt such freedom, such peace…

When I returned home, I lied about my whereabouts. But then, as time went on, and Omari worked less and became more distant, I finally told him about the Nazarene, urging him to go and hear for himself.

But Omari would have none of it. By then his heart had turned to stone from disappointment and despair and spending too much time with Aeneas, who was known to be a thief and liar.

“What can a Jew do for me?” Omari shouted, kicking over and breaking one of our water jars in his rage. “How could words ever lighten my load?”

That was the night he left our home and did not return. Months passed. We lived in grief not knowing what had happened to him.

The next time I saw my husband was at his execution outside of Jerusalem. Omari and Aeneas had been caught taking supplies from the building site of the summer home of the Roman procurator. It was not the first time they’d stolen, but it would be the last time they’d be caught. We traveled down when word reached us that Omari would be put to death. It was the last time we saw him. It would be the last time I would see the Nazarene too.

I will tell you how it was that day, on the hill they called the Skull.

It was a place of shame and suffering outside of the city, not far from the garbage pits, where the lepers lived. Only the families of the condemned made the walk: women and children coming to claim the bodies of their men.

I can speak almost dispassionately about it now, as if from a great distance, but it was a hard and cruel sight: the women keening in their grief, while the children stood like statues or were inconsolable. The crucified men, three that day on the hill, some down on the lower slope, were in agony for hours hanging from ropes, nails, or straps screaming or cursing until, in exhaustion, they became still and saved their few remaining breaths for final words. And then in mercy, their legs were broken so their suffering could end. Some begged for the club early on.

It was a living hell.

We huddled at my husband’s cross, my daughter crying, stroking her father’s feet, my son wild eyed with fear. And then another man was nailed to a crosspiece and it was pulled up its stake so he hung between Omari and Aeneas. His body was badly beaten and he was nearly dead. At first I paid him no heed but then I recognized him … in sorrow, in sadness, I saw that it was the Nazarene.

I looked at my husband in his suffering.

“Omari,” I said, “The holy Nazarene is beside you and suffering too. Please, say a word to him. He has comforted so many.”

From his cross, Aeneas heard what I said and cursed aloud. He knew of the Nazarene too. “If you are who you say you are,” he shouted for all to hear, “save yourself and us. Come down from your cross.”

By then, Omari, was panting and near the end of his time. He managed to open his eyes and look at me and the children. And for me... I know it was for me … and with great effort, he said, “This man is not like us.” And then to the Nazarene, “Remember me … when you enter your reward.”

The Nazarene heard him. He managed somehow to slowly turn his head and replied in words I cannot forget.

“This day,” he said to my husband, “I promise you will be with me in Paradise.”

My Omari looked back at me and for a small moment, for the briefest second, I saw what I had not seen in a very long time: I saw hope cross his face. Then he gave up his struggle.

When I think of it all now, I know it’s only in relation to someone else to Aineas that my husband is known as the Good Thief. Goodness is a way to compare the two, so that Omari and Aeneas have ended up being paired together forever.

I guess I should be grateful that Omari is remembered as the “good” one. I know it was because of what he said at the end. But, if the truth be told, my husband, the “good” one, was no better than Aeneas; both were caught, both were found guilty of their crimes, both were broken and lost.

So, in the end, what I tell my grandchildren, what I tell you now, is that maybe this story about, Omari, … this story about me … and maybe about you, too …is really more about mercy than about goodness … as most stories about love usually are.

BACK