John chapter 8

It's hard to know whether to bother writing stuff on this first bit of the chapter. As it says, it isn't in the best manuscripts, and as such it really isn't the most trustworthy part of the Bible.

Just some info on these verses for you:

They aren't found in virtually any greek manuscript before medieval times, or in the early Syriac, Coptic, Latin, Georgian or Armenian manuscripts. All the early church fathers seem to skip the narrative when they are commenting on John, going straight from 7:52 to 8:12. Later manuscripts mark it off as of questionable authenticity. Some manuscripts even put it in after John 7:44, 7:36 or 21:25, or even after Luke 21:38!

But anyway, I will look at it because it's here, it's a well known story, and there are other possible sources from which the story came which could make it an authentic story of Jesus, even if not canonical.

vs 1

Jesus is now at the Mount of Olives.

vs 2

The temple seems to be a fairly regular place for Jesus to speak. It's not surprising - have a look some day at google earth, and check out the Dome of the Rock, and then the Temple Mound that it's on - it's huge.

vs 3

You always have to ask the question "how did they know? How did she get caught?" and the less popular but equally stirring "Where's the man?"

vs 4

The Pharisees are obviously trying to get Jesus to do something - they come publicly, bringing this woman, and say all this in front of the group that he's teaching.

vs 5

Moses did say that. And no doubt the Pharisees would have done it, too. But actually, it turns out that in first century Palestine, it was very rare, especially in built up city areas (like Jerusalem), so instead they sought to gain political capital out of the poor woman. I guess the idea is that Jesus is prissy, and he's going to say "No, don't stone her" and prove he's not really a true teacher of the Bible, or he's going to say "Yes, she must be stoned" and show that the Pharisees are right and that he's a hard-ass. Also, it seems that stoning adulterers was not a very popular passtime among the Jews of the first century, and so it would have made Jesus less popular.

vs 6

As it says here, they wanted to trap him, and as probably weren't going to stone her, their motives are fairly obvious.

What did Jesus write? Nobody knows. There are some fairly excellent suggestions in this commentary I have here, but in the end we don't know for sure.

vs 7

The fact that they kept on questioning him obviously means that whatever he was writing was not seen well by them, or they did not feel it sufficient. So while it delayed them a little, it didn't accomplish much.

So then he stands up and says what he says. Now here's something I've never heard before. According to Carson, Jesus was not expecting the accusers to be sinless paragons of perfection. He was not even saying to them that if they are lustful they are no better (he does say that, in Matthew, just not here). Carson suggests that Jesus was saying "If you are without THIS SIN, then chuck your stones".

Now it is pretty well known that our prudish Western Christian culture demonises adultery as if it were a sin cardinal than any other (perhaps murder and rape). I'm talking about Christians here, not your average thug who sleeps with a different man/woman every night. If a preacher is caught in adultery, in Australia or America, that's it - they're worthless, chucked away. In non-Western cultures, especially some African ones, it's not as big a deal. They tell the guy to get married, or if he is married, they send him away with his wife for a month or two, and then he's expected to clean up his act and get back to preaching. I have a funny feeling that Palestinian culture was and possibly is the same (don't think Muslims would see it differently, by the way - how often do you hear of a man getting stoned for adultery? It's always women, just like here in these verses).

So what is incredible is that 1) They were all guilty of it at one time, but that's probably not as incredible as...

vs 8

(Jesus writes some more, the tension is building!)

vs 9

... 2) Jesus publicly calls them adulterers, and they admit it by leaving. Those who came to shame Jesus are instead shamed publicly by him. Ouch.

They don't even take the woman with them - now that they've been shamed, they just leave her there, she's valueless to them.

vs 10

But she's not valueless to Jesus. When they've all gone, he asks her what's happened. He talks to her, a convicted adulterer, and asks her to explain to him what's going on. Where did everybody go? Is no one condemning you now?

vs 11

The answer, of course, is no one. And because none of the wacky hypocrites condemns her, the pure hearted and perfect Messiah also doesn't condemn her. But his message is more than that. She must repent. What he says to her is the very definition of repent - turn away from what you've been doing, and don't do it anymore.