woman caught in adultery

[White_Peony]

when the Pharisees asked Jesus about her Jesus knelt down and started writing on the ground.Why did He do?Why write on the ground?

The gospels don’t tell us. But some say He was writing the sins of the Pharisees down. But just a guess.

 

[EricFilmer]

I heard someone once speculate that writing in the sand was simply an excuse for Jesus to bend down. We can assume that the woman being accused was both fearful for her life and ashamed at having been caught in the act, and was therefore looking downward. Jesus may have simply desired to place himself in her view, so that her eyes would be on him, her loving Savior, in the midst of an otherwise hostile crowd.

Of course, this could be true and, at the same time, Jesus could also have been writing the the sins of the Pharisees. One theory does not necessarily rule out another.

 

[Petergee]

We cannot tell from the text was was written; until we come to be able to ask Jesus himself, I suspect we will never know.

However, the text does give us other details to consider:

If the woman was truly taken “in the very act” of adultery, why was only the woman brought? What happened to her partner, since this sin is one that, by definition, cannot be committed alone?

If they allowed one sinner to escape, and dragged another off publicly for punishment and shame, is that not being unjust?

If they want to change their story, are they not guilty of lying–or, in this context, perjury, since they are asking Jesus to act as judge?

The Jewish Law required two adult male Jewish witnesses to testify before guilt of a serious offence could be proven.
Posssibly the couple were seen by one other man, and the two men testified against the woman, but the man would not be able to be convicted, because only one man besides himself saw him commit the offence.

So either it was a set-up, and the man seduced her to settle some grudge against the woman and/or to try to trick Christ into teaching contrary to the Law,

or maybe having been caught in the act, the man decided to “turn Queen’s evidence” as we would put it today, to save his own skin.

Or maybe it was just a simple case of sexism.
People who rant about trivial or non-existent instances of sexism in Christian countries today, don’t realise just how overwhelmingly and oppressively sexist pre-Christian societies were.