John 8 Did Jesus forgive the adulterous woman?

[atassina]

Did Jesus simply not condemn the adulterous woman or did he forgive her? Did Jesus not condemn her as in “I do not condemn you to death by stoning but you are still full of sin and unrepentant so go and sin no more and repent for you sins”? In other passages Jesus directly say your sins are forgiven be healed, pick up your mat your sins are forgiven etc.

I feel that her sins were forgiven but I do not think this. The word forgiven is not in the passage.

 

[Benadam]

I think there is a tradition that this woman is the same one that annointed the feet of Jesus in the home of the Pharisee. The woman who’s tears fell on Jesus feet and wiped off with her hair. Jesus said of her : “She loves much because her many sins have been forgiven her for those who have been forgiven much love much.”

Also, it is common for Jesus to say " sin no more" after saying ’ Your sins are forgiven" I believe the sense of the passage is that she walked away from this event cleansed of sin otherwise the meaning of being told to sin no more by Jesus falls flat.

 

[atassina]

Thanks for your reply. I’m already into my third commentary and getting nowhere fast. When Jesus says “Go and sin no more”, doesn’t he first say “Your sins are forgiven”? Also, I looking for an answer that doesn’t rely on feelings but on thought.

 

[Benadam]

Thanks for your reply. I’m already into my third commentary and getting nowhere fast. When Jesus says “Go and sin no more”, doesn’t he first say “Your sins are forgiven”? Also, I looking for an answer that doesn’t rely on feelings but on thought.

Condemnation is a state of guilt for being the cause of offense. It’s a state that only occurs after a judgement has been pronounced.

Forgiveness happens when punishment due for an offense is waved. Also after judgement.

Not condemned for sin committed

Forgiven for sin committed.

what is the difference? I think she was not culpable for sins committed.

 

[rcjones]

What amazes me is that Jesus often forgave people before they asked and even when they didn’t ask. Sometimes we have a tendency to reserve forgiveness until we have the self-satisfaction of being asked.

An example: He was busy forgiving those who were driving the nails.

 

[thistle]

Thanks for your reply. I’m already into my third commentary and getting nowhere fast. When Jesus says “Go and sin no more”, doesn’t he first say “Your sins are forgiven”? Also, I looking for an answer that doesn’t rely on feelings but on thought.

Under your thought process it would mean that the criminal on the cross was not forgiven when Jesus told him “today you will be with me in paradise” because he didn’t use the words “I forgive you”. How could he be with Jesus in paradise if he was not forgiven??

 

[atassina]

I appreciate all of your replies. I’m still grinding through this exegesis. In John 8, Jesus did not apply the temporal punishment of stoning to death. He obeyed the Law. There were not enough men to condemn her. That is why He said he did not condemn her. Why does this forgive her sins?

The thief on the cross had no sin since Jesus stated he would be in heaven. He was holy enough to enter heaven. The meaning is implicit in the text. Where is the implicit forgiveness in John 8.

I continue to think there is more to this story than another example of Jesus forgiving the sins of the woman. I’m digging deeper.

 

[Ceil-1]

Thanks for your reply. I’m already into my third commentary and getting nowhere fast. When Jesus says “Go and sin no more”, doesn’t he first say “Your sins are forgiven”? Also, I looking for an answer that doesn’t rely on feelings but on thought.

Gee, could you be a little more rude and sarcastic, next time? Sheesh.

 

[Benadam]

I appreciate all of your replies. I’m still grinding through this exegesis. In John 8, Jesus did not apply the temporal punishment of stoning to death. He obeyed the Law. There were not enough men to condemn her. That is why He said he did not condemn her. Why does this forgive her sins?

The thief on the cross had no sin since Jesus stated he would be in heaven. He was holy enough to enter heaven. The meaning is implicit in the text. Where is the implicit forgiveness in John 8.

I continue to think there is more to this story than another example of Jesus forgiving the sins of the woman. I’m digging deeper.

Consider the tradition. There are interesting implications if she wasn’t forgiven at that time and not condemned because of the requirements of the Law, yet is the same woman that loved much because she had been forgiven much.

This event can be seen as a picture of the Church and the persecutions she is destined to suffer.

 

[atassina]

I’m still thinking. What are the implications you mean?

 

[Benadam]

I’m still thinking. What are the implications you mean?

How sins can change from venial to mortal as we come to know them in the light of faith. It makes Jesus words ‘sin no more’ make sense.

 

[atassina]

Benadam: I am arguing for the simple withholding of temporal judgement from the adulterous woman. How did Jesus forgive her if he forgave her?

 

[Benadam]

2 And early in the morning he came again into the temple,

This is important to the story. This happens in the Temple.
**

6

• And this they said tempting him, that they might accuse him. But Jesus bowing himself down, wrote with his finger on the ground. *Here the finger of God is writing on the floor in the Temple. Was He writing a new law or just prompting a buried law to rise? Did He rise up and speak the law because they weren’t listening to the internal voice of His Spirit?

7 When therefore they continued asking him, he lifted up himself, and said to them: He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.

This event is a lesson about sin that we have no knowledge of therefore is not sin that condemns. These 12 men were sinning but didn’t know it. Once they knew they didn’t continue. Jesus was in the Temple teaching when they came in, He listened for a moment and then sat down and began writing with His finger on the floor. According to the author He only stopped because they ‘insisted’. Because of their insistence to be vocal He stopped ‘stood back up’ and spoke the words that stopped them in their tracks and made them walk away in a precise order. The young are closest to their hearts.They made visible the behaviour Jesus asks of the woman. He could have said to them as well, go and sin no more’ but they were at that moment doing just that. Jesus didn’t accuse or judge He wrote a law then He spoke it. They obeyed.

8 And again stooping down, he wrote on the ground. 9 But they hearing this, went out one by one, beginning at the eldest. And Jesus alone remained, and the woman standing in the midst. 10 Then Jesus lifting up himself, said to her: Woman, where are they that accused thee? Hath no man condemned thee? 11 Who said: No man, Lord. And Jesus said: Neither will I condemn thee. Go, and now sin no more.

The womans conscience was dead for it is doubtfull that she had not been exposed to the law she was breaking. The finger of God had long ago written the law the woman broke. Her sins though did not condemn her so it was no fault of her own that caused it to not accuse her. But this encounter with the judge who’s finger writes on the floor of the Temple changed that. From now on it will. Jesus words ‘sin no more’ will probably be the voice that warns her every time she is tempted and if she sins again it will be the voice inside her that will be a witness against her.
It’s my opinion that Jesus didn’t forgive anyone when this happened.

 

[ALLGIRLS]

Well, I think (and this is just my opinion, as this is the first time I’ve given it much thought), that Jesus forgiving the woman isn’t the point of the passage. The point John is trying to make is “he who is without sin cast the first stone”, along the same lines as removing the plank from your own eye b/f commenting on the speck in your brother’s. Not passing judgement on others. Other passages are about Jesus’ forgiveness (indeed, His ability to forgive, as only God can forgive sins). I’m sure she must have been forgiven at some point (if she is the same woman who washed His feet w/ her tears), but John probably didn’t feel need to mention that point (as everything Jesus said and did isn’t in scripture).

Like I said, just my opinion, and I’m no scripture scholar!

In Christ,

Ellen

 

[atassina]

Benadam and Allgirl-- thank you for your thoughtful replies. Both of you seem to have agreed with my initial assertion that Jesus did not forgive this woman. Rather, he simply did not condemn her. How can we arrive at clear and certain knowledge of what is happening in this passage?

Could you take an inventory of some of your friends? Let’s continue to discuss this point. I have been ruminating about this for several days now and still remain facing a brick wall.

 

[Ceil-1]

I believe the culpability of this sin mainly falls on the shoulders of the man. Especially then, when women were in such subjugation to men, in general. The men attacked the woman, but, I am sure they were all guilty of this sin in one form, or another.

Is that what was written? Perhaps they realized that, they too, had committed adultery in one way or another and deserved the same fate.

I believe Jesus was saying, in not so many words, that what she was about to undergo was unjust, not deserved according to her part in this sin. IOW, she was not the one guilty of the mortal grievance of this sin.

I often reflect on this passage when I am praying outside the abortion clinic. In this culture, these girls are seduced by the guys, then made to deal with the consequences while they go scot-free? I’m willing to bet God has a different perspective on it.

I have taught my boys that a girl’s innocence is something belonging to God, and that, if they rob her of it, they have robbed directly from God, and that they will answer to Him for it. That they must have the blessing of the Church, which is basically permission from God to have her, under its parameters. I hope they find girls who agree with them.

 

[rcjones]

I have taught my boys that a girl’s innocence is something belonging to God, and that, if they rob her of it, they have robbed directly from God, and that they will answer to Him for it. That they must have the blessing of the Church, which is basically permission from God to have her, under its parameters. I hope they find girls who agree with them.

When speaking wisdom to the young man, Solomon admonished him not to be captivated by the promiscuous woman, saying:

Pr 6: 27 Can a man take fire in his bosom, and his clothes not be burned?

The Hebrew word pronounced ‘ish-shaw’ means ‘woman’. When pronounced ‘esh-shaw’ means fire.
The word for ‘bosom’ also means ‘treachery or deceit.
Garments are a symbol of works.

For the sensus plenior, re-read the proverb as a pun/riddle:

Pr 6:27 Can a man take a woman in his treachery, and his works not be burned?

In old movies the dad would ask the young man who was giving his daughter attention, “What are your intentions”. “Taking a woman in his deceit” would be pretending to be a suitor, but simply trifling.

Why didn’t we change the last ‘burned’ to ‘woman’? Because it is a different word in Hebrew. The word for fire is the one related to the woman. The second one simply means burnt up completely.

We see that Solomon also suggests that if one pursues the lusts of the flesh, and deceives another to do so, then all the good works which we were created for and have performed are burned up.

One would think that many of the emotional games played in dating also fall into the category of treachery.

 

[Ceil-1]

Very interesting.

 

[Boxie]

Did Jesus simply not condemn the adulterous woman or did he forgive her? Did Jesus not condemn her as in “I do not condemn you to death by stoning but you are still full of sin and unrepentant so go and sin no more and repent for you sins”? In other passages Jesus directly say your sins are forgiven be healed, pick up your mat your sins are forgiven etc.

I feel that her sins were forgiven but I do not think this. The word forgiven is not in the passage.

I say he forgave her because he did not stone nor allow it to happen and he also knew none of those men were without sin to so they were just as bad as her but only her sin was talked about, not the fact that they went with her also, and sinned. Point? Are you trying to say just because you did not hear it directly that she was a sinner and was not forgiven? What about the fact the men were also sinners? Sin is Sin, no?

 

[Boxie]

I believe the culpability of this sin mainly falls on the shoulders of the man. Especially then, when women were in such subjugation to men, in general. The men attacked the woman, but, I am sure they were all guilty of this sin in one form, or another.

Is that what was written? Perhaps they realized that, they too, had committed adultery in one way or another and deserved the same fate.

I believe Jesus was saying, in not so many words, that what she was about to undergo was unjust, not deserved according to her part in this sin. IOW, she was not the one guilty of the mortal grievance of this sin.

I often reflect on this passage when I am praying outside the abortion clinic. In this culture, these girls are seduced by the guys, then made to deal with the consequences while they go scot-free? I’m willing to bet God has a different perspective on it.

I have taught my boys that a girl’s innocence is something belonging to God, and that, if they rob her of it, they have robbed directly from God, and that they will answer to Him for it. That they must have the blessing of the Church, which is basically permission from God to have her, under its parameters. I hope they find girls who agree with them.

You are not without insight thank you because that is the right answer. You have the heart of Jesus i wish men would have this same heart but they can be selfish and abusive.