The Hebrew Scriptures do not mince their words when it comes to the punishment suitable for adultery. The Book of Leviticus, reflecting the traditions of the southern Jews in Judea, clearly provides a severe penalty: “If a man commits adultery with another man’s wife, even with the wife of his neighbor, both the adulterer and adulteress must be put to death....(20:19).” Again, in the Book of Deuteronomy, which largely relies on the practices of the northern Jews in Galilee, a like condemnation is found, “If a man is discovered lying with a woman who is married to another, they both shall die, the man who was lying with the woman as well as the woman. Thus shall you purge the evil from Israel (22:22-24).”
Now this radical consequence for marital infidelity blatantly indicates the reverence that the historic Jewish community had for marriage and family. The high rate of infant mortality in the ancient world and the equally high rate of maternal deaths at child birth caused these early ancestors in the faith greatly to value a healthy and fruitful family unit. Adultery was a great affront to the stability and continuity of a happy and productive relationship between spouses and a continuing and fruitful rapport with children. Family, the basis of society, was sacrosanct. As Scripture states about adultery, Jewish society must, “…purge the evil from Israel.”
By the time of Jesus Christ and his generation of Jewish society, the practice of stoning or in some circumstances strangulation for adultery and other crimes had long fallen into neglect. Perhaps the Jews themselves began to see death as too severe a penalty for some diverse crimes. Or more likely, it was the omnipresence of the Roman troops throughout the Middle East that prevented local peoples from exercising any traditional punishment. During Christ’s lifetime, the severest penalty that the Jewish authorities could inflict on any offender was “…forty lashes less one (2Cor11:24).” St. Paul was the unhappy but patient victim of this reprimand more than once.
Certainly the Scribes and Pharisees who drag a woman caught in adultery before Jesus Christ in this coming Sunday’s Gospel passage knew that execution of any kind had long passed out of Jewish hands. Their sole motive for seeking Jesus’ opinion was not Biblical justice but rather public humiliation. Jesus was known as a faithful Jew who taught the Scriptures and kept the Mosaic Law. To hear Jesus contradict the sacred written words of Leviticus and Deuteronomy and let the adulteress go free would greatly lessen his reputation as a teacher and greatly justify the Jewish authorities’ hostility towards him. Yet were Jesus, however unlikely, to consent to the execution of the woman he would be in violation with the Roman authority who only allowed a good whipping. Jesus gives no oral response to the rabbis but then, rather famously, “bent down and began to write on the ground with his finger (8:6).”
Jesus does not respond to the religious authorities because he is not at all interested in either stoning or lashing. No, Jesus is not interested in chastisement but in conversion. “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” She replied, “No one, sir.” Then Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you. Go, and from now on do not sin anymore (8:10).” Jesus treats this woman no more harshly than he treated the cripple at the Pool of Bethsaida: “After this Jesus found him in the temple area and said to him, “Look, you are well; do not sin anymore (5:14).” And shortly after the incident with the hapless woman, Jesus would clearly advise the Pharisees: “You judge by appearances, but I do not judge anyone (8:15).”
Jesus does not point fingers rather he points the way toward a transformation, a transformation that comes from opening one’s heart and soul to God and accepting his divine grace. As St. Paul writes to the Philippians in this Sunday’s second reading, “…that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having any righteousness of my own based on the law but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God, depending on faith to know him and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings…(3:10-11).” The adulterous woman and the cripple at the pool have to lay aside any sinful or piteous ways and concentrate fully on Christ through faith. To endure sufferings like Christ and to hope in a resurrection like Christ’s must replace any attraction for sin that the woman might have known or any self-pity that the cripple might have nurtured. Not sinning anymore is the start but focusing fully and maturely and gratefully on Christ is the proven way to begin healing and find full conversion.
