Today’s Reading: John 8:1-11 - Decision
The religious leaders of the Jews were constantly looking for a way to trap Jesus and another opportunity arises. That this was a trap was obvious. First of all, where was the man with whom she had committed adultery? They both were to be stoned (see Leviticus 20:10 and Deuteronomy 22:22-24). The woman was caught, so the accusers must have witnessed this adultery and knew who the man was. They didn’t care one wit about the sin, they wanted to trap Jesus.
Jesus does something interesting, he stoops down and starts writing in the dirt. What he wrote is pure conjecture. Some say he started listing all the sins the men around him had committed. Other say that as he was being asked to be the judge. As such, he began writing out the charges against the woman with the name of the man or men which could have included names of men around him. But what he wrote wasn’t important enough for it to be recorded in this story. What Jesus said was, “He who is without sin throw the first stone!”
The trap was sprung but it trapped the accusers. They knew that this was a total set up. The woman was guilty but they were just as guilty because they didn’t really care that the woman had committed adultery, they just wanted to do evil against Jesus. The older wiser men realized immediately they were trapped and moved away quickly. The younger men eventually got the message and left as well.
The woman is standing there, I can imagine looking around in surprise and relief. Jesus asks her, “Has no one condemned her?” “No one!” Jesus knows she is guilty but he too doesn’t condemn her. Rather he commands her to stop sinning. She is given a second chance. She has the chance to be saved. Those who walked away, walked away in their sins.
The question we have before us is the same. Will we walk away in our sins or will we accept the forgiveness God has for us through faith in Jesus?
For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son. -John 3:17-18
You may have noticed that many Bible versions will note that the earliest copies we have of the Gospel do not include this passage. If that is the case, why should we even read it? Is it really a part of God’s Word? Many scholars will note this fact, it bears the mark of veracity even when it may not belong in John’s Gospel.There is a whole tradition in some manuscripts that this passage belongs in the Gospel of Luke. The wording in this passage matches very closely to Luke’s way of writing. It is possible that a page in one of the early manuscripts from Luke was lost which explains why it doesn’t appear in either Gospel but the one tradition which keeps it in Luke is the correct one but somehow that lost page was instead inserted in John in a different line of manuscripts and that is how we now have it.
In either case, most scholars will say that it belongs in the Bible.
