“This is a story about believing in something and the two very different men who taught me how.”

As he opens the narrative, Mitch Albom identifies the book’s unifying theme and structure. Though the events he describes concern multiple characters and storylines, some of which never interact directly, these disparate elements unified in their exploration of faith, a term that Albom uses in the broadest sense. The narrative thus presents the intertwined faith journeys of three men, including the author.

“He had to form his own vision of God. He pictured a giant, dark cloud with eyes that weren’t human. And a crown on its head. At night, Henry begged the cloud to keep the rats away.”

Here, Albom captures Henry Covington’s understanding of God at a young age. At this point, he views God as a mysterious force that can provide wish fulfillment upon request. Naive as this view seems, Henry’s conception of God as a sort of lender of last resort, to be appealed to when all else fails, would remain basically intact for the first few decades of his life. Later, he would come to feel a stronger obligation to give back to God, rather than continuing to seek his own benefit.

“Already, at that age, I sense the world as ‘us’ and ‘them.’ If you’re Jewish, you’re not supposed to talk about Jesus or maybe even look at Jesus.”

Albom reflects on seminal experiences from his youth that demonstrate the fundamentally divisive view of religion he initially held, until his conversations with the Reb pushed him to reevaluate them. Tensions between Judaism and Christianity were particularly prominent, both due to the partially shared yet diverging history of the two religions, as well as the fact that Christianity was the dominant religion in the area where Albom grew up.