The woman caught in adultery in the Bible was adulteress and a prostitute. She was caught in the act of committing adultery by a mob, who then brought her to Jesus, who was passing by at the time. The mob wanted Jesus to condemn her to death for her sin, but instead of doing so, Jesus told them that he would not condemn her but that whoever does not judge others will be judged by God. Then the scribes and Pharisees brought to Him a woman caught in adultery. And when they had set her in the midst, they said to Him, “Teacher, this woman was caught in adultery, in the very act. Now Moses, in the law, commanded us that such should be stoned. John 8:3-11 New King James Version (NKJV)
The Woman Caught in Adultery
In the book of John, we find the story of the woman caught in adultery. This story is a powerful reminder of God’s grace and forgiveness towards sinners. The woman was brought before Jesus by the Pharisees, who were trying to trap Him. They wanted to see if Jesus would uphold the law of Moses, which required that adulterers be stoned to death.
An anonymous woman who was caught in the act of adultery is brought to Jesus by a group of slanderous scribes and Pharisees in the Gospel of John. Putting Jesus to the test is what they want to do. Considering that He is a merciful guy, would He choose to go against the Mosaic Law? Jeremiah scribbled the sins of the Israelites, and the finger of the Lord engraved the stone tablet with His Ten Commandments. Jesus, however, remained mute and scribbled in the dirt. This is reminiscent of Jeremiah’s actions.
Then Jesus challenges them: “Let him who is without sin cast the first stone.” (John 8:7) The men disperse in shame, including in all likelihood her cruel partner in crime. After their departure, Jesus asks, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?”
Curiously, Saint John does not report any penitential resolve on the part of the woman. Although Jesus also does not condemn her, neither does He absolve her of the sin. His parting words are, “Go, and sin no more.” (John 8:11)
These are enigmatic omissions and leave the story open-ended. The account seems incomplete. So we might piece together a credible narrative for the woman throughout the Gospels.
Quotes from the Bible:
| Verse | Explanation |
|---|---|
| John 8:3-4 | “The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group and said to Jesus, ‘Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery.’” |
| John 8:7 | “When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, ‘Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.’” |
| John 8:10-11 | “Jesus straightened up and asked her, ‘Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?’ ‘No one, sir,’ she said. ‘Then neither do I condemn you,’ Jesus declared. ‘Go now and leave your life of sin.’” |
This passage showcases the compassion and mercy of Jesus. Instead of condemning the woman, He offers her forgiveness and a chance to start anew. It also serves as a reminder to us all that we are all sinners in need of God’s grace.
More Quotes from the Bible:
These verses highlight the universal need for repentance and forgiveness. We are all guilty of sin, but through Christ, we can find redemption and restoration.
In conclusion, the story of the woman caught in adultery serves as a powerful reminder of God’s grace and forgiveness. It challenges us to examine our own hearts and attitudes towards sinners, and to remember that we are all in need of God’s mercy. Jesus’ response to the woman teaches us about compassion, forgiveness, and the transformative power of grace. Let us strive to extend the same love and forgiveness to others as we have received from our Savior.
Jesus silenced his critics and offered new life to a woman caught in sin
The story of the woman caught in adultery is a beautiful illustration of Jesus silencing his critics while graciously addressing a sinner in need of mercy. The poignant scene delivers a healing balm to anyone with a heart weighed down with guilt and shame. When Jesus forgave the woman, he did not excuse her sin or treat it lightly. Rather, he expected a change of heart–confession and repentance. In turn, he presented the woman with an opportunity to begin a new life.
Key Takeaways
- By bringing the woman to Jesus, the Pharisees’ motive was political entrapment.
- Jesus silenced his critics and demonstrated grace, mercy, and forgiveness.
- Sin is never to be treated lightly. God calls us to turn away from sin, but in turn, offers forgiveness.
- This story exposes the sin of self-righteousness, a tendency in all of us.
- God offers all people a chance to repent and begin a new, transformed life.
Scripture Reference
The account of the woman caught in adultery takes place in the Gospel of John, verses 7:53 – 8:11.
Woman Caught in Adultery Bible Story Summary
One day while Jesus was teaching in the temple courts, Pharisees and teachers of the law brought in a woman who had been caught in the act of adultery. Forcing her to stand before all the people, they asked Jesus: “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. In the Law, Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now, what do you say?”
If Jesus consented to stone the woman, he would have been breaking the Roman law and causing the people to distrust him. However, refusing to stone her could be construed as treating the Law of Moses too lightly.
Knowing they were trying to catch him in a trap, Jesus bent down and began writing on the ground with his finger. They persisted in questioning him until Jesus stood up and said: “Let any of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.”
Then he resumed his bent position to write again on the ground. One by one, from oldest to youngest, the people slipped away quietly until Jesus and the woman were left alone.
Straightening up again, Jesus asked, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?”
She replied, “No one, sir.”
“Then neither do I condemn you,” stated Jesus. “Go now and leave your life of sin.”
Historical Context
The story of the woman caught in adultery has caught the attention of Bible scholars for a number of reasons. First off, it is a biblical addition that appears to be a displaced story, not fitting into the context of the surrounding verses. Some believe it is closer in style to Luke’s Gospel than John’s.
A few manuscripts include these verses, in whole or in part, elsewhere in the Gospel of John and Luke (after John 7:36, John 21:25, Luke 21:38 or Luke 24:53).
Most scholars agree that the story was absent from the oldest, most reliable manuscripts of John, yet none suggest that it is historically inaccurate. The occasion likely happened during Jesus’ ministry and was part of oral tradition until it was added to later Greek manuscripts by well-intentioned scribes who did not want the church to lose this important story.
Protestants are divided on whether this passage should be regarded as part of the biblical canon, yet most agree that it is doctrinally sound.
Points of Interest
If Jesus told them to stone her according to the law of Moses, it would be reported to the Roman government, which didn’t permit Jews to execute their own criminals. If he let her go free, he could be charged with violating the law.
But where was the man in the story? Why wasn’t he dragged before Jesus? Was he one of her accusers? These important questions help unravel the flimsy trap of these self-righteous, legalistic hypocrites. Actual Mosaic Law prescribed stoning only when the woman was a betrothed virgin, and the man was to be stoned as well. The law also required that witnesses to the adultery be produced and that a witness begin the execution.
Major Themes and Life Lessons
With one woman’s life hanging in the balance, Jesus exposed the sin in us all. His answer leveled the playing field. The accusers became acutely aware of their own sin. Lowering their heads, they walked away, knowing they too deserved to be stoned. The people who had come to trap and shame Jesus are now left in shame. This episode dramatically captured the gracious, merciful, and forgiving spirit of Jesus, along with his firm call to a transformed life.
Like the Pharisees, we don’t always act like forgiven people. But when we stop and consider our own shortcomings, we realize that none of us has the right to throw stones.
What Did Jesus Write on the Ground?
The question of what Jesus wrote on the ground has long fascinated Bible readers. The simple answer is, we do not know. Some like to speculate that he was listing the sins of the Pharisees, writing the names of their mistresses, citing the Ten Commandments, or simply ignoring the accusers.
Questions for Reflection
Jesus did not condemn the woman, but he did not overlook her sin. He told her to go and leave her life of sin. He called her to a new and transformed life. Is Jesus calling you to repent of sin? Are you ready to accept his forgiveness and begin a new life?
God and Our Sin
Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote a fictional novel in 1850 entitled: ‘The Scarlet Letter.’ It is set in 17th-century Puritan Massachusetts during the years 1642–1649. The novel is about Hester Prynne, who conceives a daughter through an affair and then struggles to create a new life of dignity and repentance for herself.
Through scorn and judgment from the public and Roger Chillingworth (Hester’s husband), she remains married. However, Hester is subject to the condemnation of the public for the remainder of her life.
At the beginning of the novel, after giving birth to a baby of unknown parentage, a crowd gathers to witness Hester’s punishment. We find that her sentence is to stand on a scaffold for three hours, exposed to public humiliation, and then to wear a scarlet ‘A’ on her dress for ‘Adultress’ the rest of her life. As she enters the scaffold, many of the other women are angered by her beauty and dignity, and the crowd demands that she reveal the father of her child. Hester refuses.
As Hester stands on the scaffold, she sees a small, misshapen man whom she identifies as her husband. He had been presumed lost at sea but showed up for the sentencing. After finding out what has happened, he angrily demands that the man who was the co-conspirator in the adultery, the baby’s father, be found out and brought to trial as well. And he vows to destroy this man who ruined his life. He also chooses a new name, Roger Chilingworth, to hide his identity as Hester’s husband and aid him in his plan.
Hester never reveals her lover, whom we find out to be Arthur Dimmesdale, the minister of her church. Dimmesdale, tortured by a guilty conscience, confesses his sin years later, on the same scaffold that Hester was made to stand upon, as he dies in her arms. Later, most people thought that they saw a stigma in the form of a scarlet ‘A” upon his chest as he confessed, although some denied it.
Chillingworth, having given up all thought of revenge, dies shortly after, leaving Hester and her daughter Pearl a substantial inheritance. Hester later goes back to her cottage, continuing to wear the scarlet letter on her dress, and later dies and is buried next to Arthur Dimmesdale.
‘The Scarlet Letter’ is a brilliant tale that reveals a lot about sin, public condemnation, stigmatization, and guilt. And although we don’t treat the sin of adultery in such a public way today, we nonetheless have our pet sins that we treat as unforgivable, while we minimize our own sins and think ourselves superior because ours are “not as bad” as another person’s sins.
But how does God look at sin? Or, perhaps just as important, how does God see the sinner? And are some sins more angering to God than others? How does he see the sin of adultery for instance, as compared to the sin of lying on your income taxes? There is an incident in the New Testament that involves a woman caught in the act of adultery that may give us some clues.
Woman Caught In Adultery
I. The Setting
The account of the woman before Jesus is found in John 8:1–11. In the early morning, Jesus is at the Temple, teaching. when a group of Jewish leaders brings a woman found guilty of adultery before him in order to trap Jesus and get him in trouble. Adultery is a capital crime according to Jewish law and they wanted to see if our Lord would condemn her or let her go.
The truth is that the Scribes and the Pharisees hated Jesus because they saw him as a threat to their position in society as the traditional authorities and he also disregards the ritual laws about eating by sitting down with known law-breakers. They had worked hard to get where they are and aren’t about to give it up to some Galilean rabble-rouser.
And of course, one of their jobs, as they saw it, was to maintain the peace, which was hard to do in that society where a lot of mayhem was constantly happening. And if Rome had to do it, they would strike down any rebellion and ask questions later.
The challenge is that if he told them to follow the Law of Moses, he would be going against Roman law. And the Roman government had stripped the Jewish leaders of the ability to execute anyone for a capital crime. The Romans had authorized their appointee, the governor, as the only person who could impose the death penalty on anyone.
And of course, if he freed her, he would be going against the Law of Moses and would himself be in trouble of disobeying God’s Law. So they were using this poor woman to get Jesus in order to cause Him to make a bad move, allowing them to have a chance to condemn the Savior.
II. The Encounter
Jesus was likely teaching in the court of the women in the temple when a group of Scribes and Pharisees came, bringing a woman and they threw her at the feet of Jesus.
Of course, they feign to have respect for the Lord, calling him ‘didaskale’, which in English means ‘teacher’. They say to him:
“Teacher, this woman was taken in adultery, in the very act. Now Moses, in the Law commanded that such should be stoned. But what say you?” (8:4-5).
However, Jesus wasn’t playing their game. He knew that they were trying to trick him, so he stooped down on the ground as if he hadn’t heard them and began to write. It isn’t told what Christ wrote. Maybe it was the ten commandments. Perhaps he began to list the sins of the men who were accusing the woman of adultery. Whatever it was, it didn’t stop the men from continuing to ask Jesus what he would say about the situation (6-7).
It was then that Jesus got up from the ground and said to them:
“He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.”.(7).
And again he stooped down on the ground and continued to write (8). You can imagine how convicted each of these men must have felt. They were remembering the times when they had done things that, if they’d become known, would have had them beside this fearful and sobbing young woman and people would have been throwing stones at them.
I can imagine hearing thuds as rocks started hitting the ground with each man slowly turning and walking away. The Scripture tells us:
“And they which heard it, being convicted by their own conscience, went out one by one, beginning at the eldest, even to the last: And Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst.” (9).
Jesus then rose from where he was kneeling and saw that there weren’t any accusers left. He then asked the woman:
“Where are your accusers? Has no man condemned you?”
And the woman said:
“No man, Lord.”
Then came some of the most beautiful words a sinner could ever hear from our Savior: He tells her:
“Neither do I condemn you. Go, and sin no more.”
Many people, when they think of God, think of someone in Heaven waiting to zap you when you sin. The truth is, God does hate sin. And he doesn’t take it lightly. But he loves the sinner and wants them to repent and turn to Him for salvation.
John 3:17 says:
“For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world but that the world through Him might be saved.”
And, before Christ came, we were already condemned and separated from a Holy God. However, Jesus came to die to make it possible that we could be saved from eternal condemnation.
Jesus, the only one who could rightly stone this poor woman, dealt patiently and kindly with her and had compassion on her. He didn’t condone her sin. But He didn’t condemn her. He set the sinner free and told her not to sin again.https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/w5GXnM_TxSQ?start=0
III. The Missing Piece
A careful reader would realize that there is one missing piece to this story that no one among the religious leaders was telling Jesus about. The obvious point and the one that makes it quite apparent that the whole situation was a set up was the fact that only one person was brought before the Savior. Anyone knows that it takes two people to commit adultery. So, where was the man? It is apparent that these leaders didn’t care about justice at all. If they did, they would have taken the man and sought his punishment as well.
These religious leaders cared solely about trapping the Savior and getting rid of Him once and for all. They were simply using the woman as a pawn in the religious game that they were playing. They didn’t think about her at all. Nor did they care about her as a person.
Jesus, on the other hand, loved her and cared about her soul. He, came to seek and save her because she was lost (Luke 19:10).
The sad thing is that many Christians, in encountering sinners, are more like the Pharisees and not like the Savior. They don’t see a soul that is lost and in need of a Savior. They simply look at the sin and automatically condemn them for it.
Since all of us are sinners (Romans 3:23). then without Christ, we would all be condemned just as this lady was. If we saw everyone the way Jesus does, we’d have less condemnation and more compassion on those who are steeped in sin.
The sad and honest fact is that we are all that woman, caught in the very act of sin. None of us who know the Lord Jesus Christ can rightly throw stones at anyone. We can all say: “There but for the grace of God, go I.”
IV. The Condemnation for Sin
The only reason that Christ could have compassion for the woman caught in adultery was the reality that He was going to take her sin upon Himself in a few short days from that encounter with her. God hates and is angered by all sin. His standard is perfection. And we are told in the book of James:
” For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of all of it.” (2:10).
Further, the Bible tells us that we have all sinned and fallen short of God’s glory (Romans 3:23). Sadly, those who don’t know the Son as Savior will one day know Him as their judge. The wages of sin will be satisfied. Either it will happen through Christ on the Cross of Calvary or through an eternity spent separated from God in Hell.
The Scriptures say of Christ that:
“He, (God the Father), made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” (II Corinthians 5:21).
Though none of us deserves the compassion of Jesus Christ, by God’s love and grace, we can all receive it through faith in our Lord and what He did on Calvary. It was through this one act that both God’s wrath for sin and His love of the sinner could be shown at the same time. This leaves God free to have compassion on all who call upon Jesus’ name.