234. Why Christ died between two thieves
234. WHY CHRIST DIED BETWEEN TWO THIEVES
What is the significance of the two thieves who were crucified with Christ?
Pope Leo observes: Two thieves were crucified, one on His right hand and one on His left, to set forth by the very appearance of the gibbet that separation of all men which shall be made in His hour of judgment. And Augustine on John 7:36 says: The very cross, if thou mark it well, was a judgment-seat; for the judge being set in the midst, the one (thief) who believed was delivered, the other who mocked Him was condemned (III,46,11).
Another example of divine providence. Non-miraculous as well as miraculous events are “signs” to be read. The literal and the symbolic are not mutually exclusive categories. In God’s world everything has significance, i.e., is a sign as well as a thing. St. Thomas, unlike ourselves, has not lost the art of sign—reading. (Cf. ST I,1,10 on the fact that things are signs being the basis for symbolic interpretations of Scripture.)
The most obvious significance of the two thieves is the two ways of life (Psalm 1), leading to salvation and damnation, Heaven and Hell; the free will we all have to choose between them; and the wonderful and terrifying responsibility this gives us. Even the atheist Samuel Beckett saw this. In Waiting for Godot he has one of his hopeless characters see hope there: “One of the thieves was saved.”
Going deeper into this sign, we find Christ at the center. He is the great divider (“I have not come to bring peace but a sword”—Mt 10:34) both of men and of ages. He divides history into B.C. and A.D., splitting time in two as an axe splits a coconut.
As Augustine saw, there is irony here too, for the One Who is dying because He was judged by men to be guilty is really the Judge of all men. Christ pointed out this irony to Pilate in John 19:10-11. His position as Judge of all men is shown even physically, by his being in the center between the two thieves, like the king at the Last Judgment who has the sheep on His right and the goats on His left (Mt 25:32). Jesus is not to the right or to the left of either thief; one is to His right and the other is to His left. (Perhaps that can apply even to politics!)
Does this mean that the most decisive question in the world is what we think of Christ? Almost but not quite. The most decisive question in the world is what He thinks of us.
It is that same reversal of perspective that is the key to the “solution” to the so-called “problem of evil” at the end of the Book of Job. (See Job 38:1-4.)