Bible Buzz #10 Did Jesus Violate the Torah with the Woman Caught in Adul...

Not in the slightest! The story of the woman caught in adultery in John 8 is much beloved by the church. Many sermons are built from it and it is frequently quoted to reveal the character of Jesus and His mercy.

The story begins with Jesus teaching a crowd in the temple. At some point during His teaching the Pharisees interrupted, probably dramatically, by bringing a woman they had caught in adultery into the midst of everyone to ask Jesus if they should stone her according to Mosaic Law. This was clearly a cunning trap as the Romans who occupied Israel forbade the Jews to execute prisoners (this is why Jesus would later be brought to Pilate). If Jesus counseled the Jews against Mosaic Law He would be discredited as a teacher and could possibly suffer stoning Himself. If He agreed to stone the woman He would be punished by the Romans for the execution. A catch 22. Jesus kneels down and scribbles with His finger in the sand before saying "Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her." The Pharisees left little by little until Jesus was left alone with the woman standing in front of Him. Jesus then asks her "Woman where are they? Has no one condemned you? She says "No one Lord". Jesus replied with the famous line "Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more."

There are many popular interpretations of this text, some are very good and some are very bad. One very popular interpretation shows Jesus as the only man present who was qualified to stone the woman but in His mercy He freed her. This, while having the makings of a great and sure to be popular sermon brings about serious implications regarding Jesus and the Law. John Piper preached it on YouTube in his sermon titled "Neither Do I Condemn You". Piper says it this way; "Jesus exalts Himself over the Law of Moses, changes an appointed punishment in the Law, and re establishes righteousness on the foundation of grace." While I like John Piper and I own several of his books I emphatically disagree with his interpretation of John 8. Did Jesus bend or break the Law of Moses at any point in this story? Absolutely not!!

The law states that "If a man is found lying with the wife of another man, both of them shall die, the man who lay with the woman, and the woman. So you shall purge the evil from Israel.(Duet. 22:22) This was the statute that the Pharisees meant to invoke. Interestingly it calls for both the man and the woman to be executed but the Pharisees only brought the woman.

Jesus statement of "let him without sin throw the first stone" is very profound in that it shifts focus from the legal letter onto the moral bankruptcy of the accusers while still satisfying the letter of the law. The Mosaic Law required that the first stone be thrown by a witness to the crime (Deut.17:7) and now the witnesses found themselves standing in the very trap they set for Jesus. They had no moral reason for executing the woman. They weren't interested in purging Israel of sin or they would've started with purging themselves of sin. Now they must choose to carry out the judgement to fulfill a law they only followed outwardly. In doing so they will receive Roman wrath all with the full understanding of their own hypocrisy weighing on them. The men simply won't do it and they walk away with plenty of egg on their face.

Now Jesus can't stone the woman for three legal reasons. Duet. 19:15 that a single witness shall not suffice against a person for any crime, and only by the testimony of two or three witnesses may a charge be established. Jesus is standing alone with no accusers and He Himself didn't witness the crime. If there were no witnesses then Deut. can't be fulfilled because a witness must throw the first stone. You can clearly see that Jesus didn't break or bend the law. He would have broken the law had He stoned her!!!

I'd like to point out that Jesus is God and the Author of the Law. He was present and glorified by all the Jews who had righteousness in their hearts when they carried out His punishments commanded by His Law. (I'm so grateful He has made us righteous by His blood.) We have a tendency to play good cop bad cop with Jesus and the Father and we need to make every effort to keep ourselves from doing that as we study this story.

The main point of this story is to show us that the Pharisees attempted to trap Jesus but His Spirit of Wisdom overcame the obstacle while maintaining perfect righteousness. Many preachers of sloppy grace doctrine attempt to use this story as ammunition against those who are intolerant of sin. Jesus Himself gave us directions for confronting sin in Matthew 18 that begins with the most gentle approach. Confronting sin becomes a problem when we do it without wisdom or compassion, when we are guilty of the sin ourselves, and most terribly, when we esteem ourselves over the person we are confronting.

You can clearly see that Jesus had not broken the Law and he never once did. He was accused of breaking the Sabbath but he only broke rabbinical tradition, not the Laws laid out by God. The entire point of Christianity is that Jesus obeyed the Law perfectly and was sacrificed as the spotless Lamb because we couldn't uphold it! If Christ ever broke the Laws then He would be ineligible as the propitiation for our sins!

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