The Woman Taken in Adultery

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The Woman Taken in Adultery
Christ and the Fallen Woman (detail) - Oil on
copper transferred from wood The Hermitage, St.
Petersburg CRANACH, Lucas the YoungerGerman
painter (b. 1515, Wittenberg, d.1586, Weimar).
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A Time-Line for Jesus Ministry
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The Law on Adultery

• Deut 2222 (NIV) If a man is found sleeping with
  another mans wife, both the man who slept with
  her and the woman must die.
• Lev 2010 (NIV) If a man commits adultery with
  another mans wife with the wife of his
  neighbour both the adulterer and the adulteress
  must be put to death.

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The Dilemma

• If Jesus had contradicted Moses he would have
  been discredited with the people.
• If he had advocated the womans death then the
  Pharisees would have had grounds to lay a
  complaint against him before the Romans
• John 1831 (NIV) we have no right to execute
  anyone, the Jews objected (when Pilate at first
  refused to judge the Lord).

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This was a Set-up

• The record says so
• John 86 (NIV) They were using this question as
  a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing
  him.
• In the very act. Where was the man?
• Both were guilty the law said both should die.
• Stoning only the woman would be unjust.
• The episode shows careful planning. Was the man
  one of the conspirators?
• They had no interest in the actual question!

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Escape From the Trap

• There are questions to which the best answer may
  be silence.
• Jesus seems to have considered the womans sin to
  be less of a pressing issue than the Pharisees
  perversity.
• A wise man not only knows when to be silent, he
  also knows how to be silent.
• So he withdrew writing on the ground leading
  them to think they had triumphed.

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What Did Jesus Write?

• Cannot be known its possibly a waste of time to
  guess. However
• May have just doodled.
• Some texts are apt. A few suggestions

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What Did Jesus Write?

• The priest shall bring her and have her stand
  before the LORD.Then he shall take some holy
  water in a clay jar and put some dust from the
  tabernacle floor into the water.After the priest
  has had the woman stand before the LORD, he shall
  loosen her hair and place in her hands the
  reminder offering Numbers 516-18 (NIV)

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What Did Jesus Write?

• O LORD, the hope of Israel, all who forsake you
  will be put to shame. Those who turn away from
  you will be written in the dust because they have
  forsaken the LORD, the spring of living
  water.(Jeremiah 1713, NIV)

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What Did Jesus Write?

• For I desired mercy, and not sacrifice and the
  knowledge of God more than burnt offerings. But
  they like men have transgressed the covenant
  there have they dealt treacherously against
  me.(Hosea 66, 7, AV)

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What Did Jesus Write?

• The LORD said to me Son of man, will you judge
  Oholah and Oholibah? Then confront them with
  their detestable practices, for they have
  committed adultery and blood is on their hands.
  They committed adultery with their idols they
  even sacrificed their children, whom they bore to
  me On the very day they sacrificed their
  children to their idols, they entered my
  sanctuary and desecrated it. That is what they
  did in my house. (Ezekiel 2336-39)

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What Did Jesus Write?

• Oh, that my head were a spring of water and my
  eyes a fountain of tears! I would weep day and
  night for the slain of my people. Oh, that I had
  in the desert a lodging place for travellers, so
  that I might leave my people and go away from
  them for they are all adulterers, a crowd of
  unfaithful people. They make ready their tongue
  like a bow, to shoot lies it is not by truth
  that they triumph in the land. They go from one
  sin to another they do not acknowledge me,
  declares the LORD.(Jeremiah 91-3, NIV)

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He that is Without Sin (vs 7)

• Jesus summation may have been based on the law
  of witness in Deuteronomy 177
• The hands of the witnesses must be the first in
  putting him to death, and then the hands of all
  the people. You must purge the evil from among
  you. (NIV)
• Only those who are themselves purged from evil
  are qualified to purge the evil in others
  Executioners must be guiltless!

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With What Judgement Ye Judge...Matthew 72-5

• They came as a group to Jesus, secure in the
  rightness of their cause.
• He challenged them to measure themselves (even)
  against the standard of Moses law.
• Then he gave them time and space to feel the
  weight of their individual share of that
  challenge (vs 8).
• They left as individuals (vs 9), unable to endure
  the righteousness of the Lord Jesus.

• When we judge others we must first, as
  individuals, feel the weight of that judgement.

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What of the Pharisees?

• Do we relish their discomfort and humiliation?
• If so weve just moved them into the place
  formerly occupied by the woman and have taken
  their place ourselves!
• A kind of paradox Criticising the unspirituality
  of another may merely declare our own.

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Who Can Stand Before the Lord?

• In this case only the woman whose sin was
  openly acknowledged! (vs 9)
• For the word of God is living and active. Sharper
  than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even
  to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow
  it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the
  heart. Nothing in all creation is hidden from
  God's sight. Everything is uncovered and laid
  bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give
  account.(Heb 412, 13, NIV).

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What of the Sin?

• It was condemned without condemning the sinner.
• Here is the whole basis of atonement
• The principle acknowledged, the sin passed
  over.
• What God has done for us we must find a way to do
  for each other!

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The Woman Taken in Adultery
Christ and the Fallen Woman (detail) - Oil on
copper transferred from wood The Hermitage, St.
Petersburg CRANACH, Lucas the YoungerGerman
painter (b. 1515, Wittenberg, d.1586, Weimar).