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Lent 2007
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Year C: Fifth Sunday of Lent The Gospel: John 8: 1-11 Today’s Gospel has posed problems for some Scripture scholars. Early manuscripts did not have it at all. It was put in various places in John’s Gospel and even found its way into Luke’s Gospel. Some ancient authorities mark this story as “doubtful”. Whatever the arguments around it, the story of the woman taken in adultery and Jesus’ response would not go away - and it is here for us today. Old Testament Law did, in fact, decree the stoning to death of a married woman who committed adultery - but by Jesus’ time, this rarely happened, not least because the Roman authorities had claimed the right to put people to death. The fact that people were so anxious to see what Jesus would say had more to do with putting Him to the test than really wanting to work out what the right thing to do was. Their thinking was - if Jesus said that it was right to stone her - then He was lacking in the “mercy” that even they would have shown (though imagine what her life would have been like) If Jesus said to let her go, then He would be failing to honour the Law of Moses. We don’t know what Jesus was thinking as He wrote in the sand. Some people think He might have been writing down some of the sins of those so eager to condemn - or He may have chosen to do this as a way of calming the situation and for giving the accusers time to think and the opportunity to creep away. Jesus seems not to have taken much personal interest in the accusers but His interest in the woman is marked by tenderness. She must have heard of His reputation as a man of God and must have been bewildered to see Him writing in the sand at her feet. It must have been even stranger to hear Him ask her whether anyone had stayed to condemn her - it was obvious that they had all gone. Perhaps, Jesus was making her tell herself that no one was left to condemn her - so that she could believe it. What does it mean for me?
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