What did Jesus really write in the sand?

[DaveBj]

Bottom line – we absolutely do not know.

Personal take on the issue – I am so not going to start guessing.

D

 

[woolycaterpillar]

His memoirs.

 

[Rasoleil]

“Your butts are mine!”

 

[Mike_from_NJ]

We’re making memes!

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[Wampa]

We recently had a fruitful conversation on this topic at:

Jesus bent down and began to write on the ground with his finger Apologetics

It struck me at Mass during John 8:1-11 regarding “Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground.” The act that is generally portrayed as mysterious and what did he write…. It comes after being challenged about Law Of Moses basically written by the finger of God on stone tablets (at least 10 Commandments). Jesus being God, the author of the tablets, in a sort of mocking gesture “re-writes” the “law” in sand. “You want something written…here ya go” . Since the people did not even seem …

I’ll repost the theory I presented there…

During the Mass I went to [on April 7], the priest in his homily said that this is one of the theories (“favored by St Jerome and by lots of commentators since”):

At that time, people would bring other people to the temple to accuse them of sins. The priests would write two things in the ground at the temple: the sin and the name of the accused person. Because this was the custom, some speculate that Jesus did the same thing, but turned it on the scribes and Pharisees. Rather than writing about the woman, he wrote about the scribes and Pharisees: the first time he bent he wrote their sin, and the second time he wrote their names.

 

[englands123]

There is a lot of speculation about what Jesus was writing, including the idea that He was writing a list of the sins committed by each of the Jewish leaders present. Another theory is that, since the woman was “caught in the act” of adultery, perhaps she was naked, and Jesus was writing in the dirt to avert His eyes from seeing the naked woman. Both of these ideas are possible, but there is no way to know for certain.