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He That Is Without Sin - The Woman Livia Caught in Adultery

We’ve all heard and some of us have read the story of the woman who was brought before Jesus and accused of adultery. She is thrown down before him as a ragamuffin and accusations are brought about that could result in her death by stoning. Let’s read what the evangelist says:

John 8.3, 4 
The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman caught in adultery, and having set her in the center of the court,  they said to Him, "Teacher, this woman has been caught in adultery, in the very act.

One aspect of this short intro that should stick out to the reader is that she was caught in the very act of what her accusers call adultery. We then have to realize that she must have been in the ACT with someone else for it to considered adultery. If so, then where is the other party involved here?

John 8.5
"Now in the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women; what then do You say?"

We now see that the quote or seem to quote a reference to the Law of Moses (the Pentateuch, one of the first five books of the Old Testament) that the woman should be stoned. Once again, shouldn’t we question that statement? Let’s look at what that reference really says!

Leviticus 20:10  ’If there is a man who commits adultery with another man’s wife, one who commits adultery with his friend’s wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death.

Whoa, wait a minute. It says that both of them were to be brought forth and put to death! Deuteronomy also gives us some insight on the Law of Moses regarding this situation.

Deuteronomy 22:22 
"If a man is found lying with a married woman, then both of them shall die, the man who lay with the woman, and the woman; thus you shall purge the evil from Israel.

We can see from both of these references that the religious leaders were bringing deal with both of the offenders being put to death by stoning. This was not a pretty site and if anyone wants to see a quite realistic portrayal of this scenario, then you ought to get on video, The Stoning of Soraya M. I guarantee you’ll either fast forward or turn away from the screen. It was not a pretty site.

Now we have to ask ourselves what was the intent of only bringing the woman forward. We also need to understand that the King of glory knew His Father’s word well enough to no they were mistaken in the accusation by not bringing the other party.  John continues:

John 8. 6
They were saying this, testing Him, so that they might have grounds for accusing Him. But Jesus stooped down and with His finger wrote on the ground.

Being a Rabboni, these “nice guys” were trying to accuse him of the crime of not knowing the Law of Moses, thereby discrediting His works, like healing the sick, raising the dead and making the lame walk. Instead we read the fascinating statement of what Jesus did. He stooped down to the ground and wrote in the ground with His finger. Before we get to that I want to shed a little light on this from some archaic manuscripts about just who this woman was. This scenario comes from a manuscript entitled the Feast of Tabernacles, written by William III of Troyes sometime before 1490.

This scenario was just after Jesus’ rivers of living water declaration in the Temple, on the last day of the Festival of Tabernacles.  The High Priest was supposed to be the one making the declaration, but that is another story for another day. It is because of this usurpation of roles that the religious leaders wanted to kill Him. To do this they know of a woman who has been carrying on an adulterous, illicit affair in plain view.

Some of the manuscripts here use the Greek word anakom for the woman, which was used for a woman of Roman high society. By Jesus making the condemnation of this woman we would be putting himself at odds with the Roman government. Only they had the right to meet out capital punishment. William explains the background of this woman. She was the 22 year old daughter of Plinius Coponicus, who was the Roman Governor of Peraea. It was common knowledge of the day that this Livia, as was her name was having an illicit relationship with Justus the married adopted son of Annas the former High Priest. This would make Justus the adopted brother of the present High Priest, Caiaphas.

According to William, this section of John (7:53 – 8:11) was not included in some of the earliest biblical manuscripts. Bible historians of the 4^th through 10^th centuries believed the story of Livia was added by a disciple of John in the 3^rd or 4^th century or by Jerome in the 4^th century. The Roman historian Practicus was also the court historian for Plinius Coponicus that he was in Jerusalem for the Festival of Tabernacles. He then states that Practicus, mentions a Galilean rabbi, the adopted son of the Roman Senator of Britannica, would was also a Roman citizen. He does not mention him by name, but in all likelihood this was Jesus, who was adopted by Mary’s uncle, Joseph of Arimathea, who in fact was the minister of mines, a Roman Senator in what is now Great Britain, for the Roman Empire. This would also make Jesus a Roman citizen, by adoption.

William states that Practicus tells of Livia being taken from the eastern chambers of the Temple in the midst of sexual fornication and set before this Roman Galilean Rabbi. This Rabbi did not defend Livia, but instead he challenged those that had brought her to take her life only if they had no sin in themselves. When this story began to be included into the John narrative around the 4^th century, the words, “Neither do I condemn thee, go and sin no more,” were not read for fear of presenting Jesus having a lax attitude toward sin.

Of course this is the writings of a medieval scribe who did not have access to all of the knowledge base that we do today in the age of digital information. We should ask the question though of just how many manuscripts that have we never seen has either been lost or stored away in some forgotten hole? Too often we discount the wisdom of the sages of old because they were lacking in technology. What they lacked in technology caused them to excel in study, language and perseverance.  I thought this was an interesting historical corroboration to one of the “now” most well-known records in the Scriptures.

If we go back to the record in John, we see that in the midst of all the accusations and confrontations Jesus stoops down and began to break the ground with his finger. The New American uses the Greek word here which means “to break” while the King James is translated from the word grapho - “to write.” While there was all this commotion, Jesus was breaking the ground up with his finger and writing something. Bullinger says that he was most likely writing down the curses prescribed by the law as set forth in Numbers 5.11-31. There is a problem with that section of scripture though, in that the woman was NOT caught in the act. We know here that Livia was caught in the VERY ACT.

Others have surmised that Jesus was just doodling. I don’t think that is a valid act here for the Son of God. Since He only did what He saw the Father do (John 8), He most likely was seeking His advice in this matter. One of my professors of Theology taught us that He could have been writing the name or names of God as a way of seeking help.

Prov 18:10 The name of YHVH (Yahweh) is a strong tower: the righteous run into it, and is safe.

Either way, just think about what was going on around Him while He stooped down seemingly ignoring them. How many of us when we are instructing our children get upset when they begin to do other things and ignore us as we are speaking. Don’t we tell them to look at us and stop doing what they are doing? These religious leaders were “hell bent” on getting rid of Jesus, and quite possibly Livia, since she was bringing a stain to the High Priest’s household. You can also now see why they dd not bring the man Justus with her. After seeing what the Father wanted done He stands up and makes this declaration, "He who is without sin among you, let him be the first to throw a stone at her." Then He stoops down again and writes some more, until everyone but He and Livia are gone.

His statement to her was not new, as the Rabbi School of Hillel was teaching the concept and the spirit of the statement. Even before that the Stoic philosopher, Lucius Annaeus Seneca was arguably the first to state in his writings that, …if one is to fully understand the law of forgiveness, then one cannot be first to cast a stone, if he too has that deficiency or fault that itself would be worthy of stoning…

So now you know some of the rest of the story…

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Excerpts taken from The Search: A Historian’s Search for the Historical Jesus, by Dr. Ron Charles.