The LORD… gave to Moses, when he had finished speaking with him on Mount Sinai, the two tablets of the testimony, tablets of stone, written with the finger of God. (Exodus 31:18)

The Jews were jealous of the Law of Moses, and when Jesus began to teach, many questioned his credentials.  This was one of the reasons that by the final year of his ministry (that would conclude at Passover 33AD) many were seeking to be rid of him. This came to a head the previous year at the feast of Tabernacles:

About the middle of the feast Jesus went up into the temple and began teaching. The Jews therefore marvelled, saying, “How is it that this man has learning, when he has never studied?” 

So, Jesus answered them, “My teaching is not mine, but his who sent me…” 

(John 7:14-16)

While some openly question whether Jesus could be the Messiah, Jesus goes on to make a different assertion, albeit indirectly; importantly, one concerning his Godly authority.

“If anyone’s will is to do God’s will, he will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own authority. The one who speaks on his own authority seeks his own glory; but the one who seeks the glory of him who sent him is true, and in him there is no falsehood.  Has not Moses given you the law? Yet none of you keeps the law. Why do you seek to kill me?” (ibid 7:17-19)

The previous year Jesus had challenged prevailing understanding of the Sabbath by healing the paralytic at the Pool of Bethesda upon the Day of Rest; and Jesus reminds them of this after many are shocked by his allegation that people are seeking to kill him.

The crowd answered, “You have a demon! Who is seeking to kill you?” 

Jesus answered them, “I did one work, and you all marvel at it. Moses gave you circumcision (not that it is from Moses, but from the fathers), and you circumcise a man on the Sabbath. If on the Sabbath a man receives circumcision, so that the law of Moses may not be broken, are you angry with me because on the Sabbath I made a man’s whole body well? Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgement.”  (ibid 7:20-24)

Circumcision was first given to Abraham, in other words, it preceded the law given Moses, but his appeal is for people to exercise ‘right’ judgment, in fact to employ their conscience. Of course, God’s work could be done on the Sabbath.

The Jewish Authorities had not forgiven what they perceived as a challenge to that authority and also their judgment, so a year later, they set up a test over the application of the Law of Moses.

Early in the morning he came again to the temple. All the people came to him, and he sat down and taught them. The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and placing her in the midstthey said to him, “Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. Now in the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. So, what do you say?”  (ibid 8:2-5)

This episode was not recorded in the first versions of the gospel of John for a good reason, while this incident in fact continues the debate over Law and Authority, it interrupts the flow of narrative concerning Jesus and his candidacy as Messiah.  The Messiah was a man, but only God wrote Law.  Would Jesus restate his claim which effectively proposed he was God?  If so, he would probably be stoned for blasphemy by the righteous anger it would inflame (as the first martyr to Jesus’ divinity would come to suffer, see Acts 7.)

There is no reason to question that this woman had committed adultery, nor that the Scribes (formal custodians of the Law of Moses) were not discharging their rightful duty in arraigning her, but this is not the reason they bring her Jesus, as John’s narrative comments, this was a test.

This they said to test him, that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. And as they continued to ask him, he stood up and said to them, “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.” 

And once more he bent down and wrote on the ground.  (Ibid 8:6-8)

To understand the nature of the test, it is critical to know the legal and civic context, which John assumes all do. Adultery was indeed forbidden, it was the seventh of the ten commandments (Exodus 20:14) and under Mosaic Law it was punishable by death (Deuteronomy 22:22); however, the Romans allowed the Jewish Authorities to exercise their law up to capital punishment, this power they sequestered unto themselves.  Should Jesus advocate for the full exertion of the Law of Moses and he would be arrested as insurrectionist; disavow the Law of Moses and he would be exposed as a false prophet; either way, Jesus would probably die. This was more than a test, the Scribes had set a snare.  Crucifixion or the assassin’s blade, it mattered not, the Pharisees would be rid of this troublesome and presumptuous Nazarene.

But Jesus refuses to play by their rules.  He remains seated and begins writing, tracing his finger on the flagstone flooring.  Now much has been made guessing at what Jesus wrote; however, Scripture is always sufficient and what John records is to be noted, it is not what he wrote, but that he wrote which is significant.

In this way, Jesus takes the issue to heart of the matter.  It was the finger of God who wrote upon the stone tablets, not Moses’.  The law that was given to Moses is God’s not his – nor any man (or woman’s) since.  Seated and writing, in this, Jesus remains in the attitude of a teacher, and his visual teaching points towards his own authority, not as Messiah, but as God himself but this is not the time for that revelation.

Of course, he knew that they themselves had broken another commandment of the decalogue, that of bearing false witness, as the woman alone is brought, and no witnesses are identified to testify against her.

If a man is found lying with the wife of another man, both of them shall die, the man who lay with the woman, and the woman. (Deuteronomy 22:22)

But his teaching is designed to awaken ‘right judgment’, and the implication as to their sinfulness does prompt them to reconsider:

Then those who heard it, being convicted by their conscience, went out one by one, beginning with the oldest even to the last. (John 8:9 NKJV)

Their conscious is pricked, but over what?  The common exegesis is that this incident serves to demonstrates Jesus’ compassion, especially for downtrodden women and the unjustly accused, by exposing hypocrisy.  But is that the case? Of course, Jesus is compassionate and his unjust death as the sinless for sinful humanity exposes everyone a hypocrite, but his next utterance should counter this common misteaching. 

Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him.  Jesus stood up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” 

She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.” (Ibid 8:9b-11)

As God, Jesus is intolerant of sin and though he does not condemn the women, he also convicts her of sin along with the men.  After all, it is his law that forbids adultery, and not only does he uphold this, he even extends this to include acts committed in the mind in his inaugural teaching, the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:27-28).  And this uncompromising hatred of sin extends to the church, Jesus commands the unrepentant sinner to expelled from the congregation (Matthew 18:17).

Thus, he does not repudiate or seek to undermine the Jewish Authorities in the administration of his holy law.  There was nothing wrong in bringing a charge against this or any woman and man caught in the act of adultery.  The Scribes along with party of the Pharisees exercised custodianship and regarding them Jesus declares to the crowds in the Temple:

“The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat, so practise and observe whatever they tell you—but not what they do. For they preach, but do not practise…” (Matthew 23:2-3)

In this statement and what follows in a lengthy critique their hypocrisy is exposed, but note Jesus does not disavow their duty to declare and uphold the Law of Moses (recalling that the Apostle Paul reiterated obedience to God-given governance, see Romans 13:1-7).

It is another transgression then that pricks the conscience of the men testing Jesus, not hypocrisy; it concerns trespassing others of the ten commandments.  Jesus turns their test of him regarding adultery into one where he convicts them of taking upon themselves Godly authority to make law; in this they had broken the tenth commandment, ‘do not covet’.  In being a law unto themselves and not recognising Jesus for who he is, they covet God.  Placing oneself before God is also transgressing the first commandment, the first transgression of humanity.  For in believing his wife over God, Adam exercised the ‘wrong judgment’ and disavowed God.

The terrible irony of misusing and twisting the Law of Moses against the very one who graciously bestowed it on the Jews was yet to strike them and perhaps never would; perhaps it was limited to the ninth commandment, against bearing making false witness (Exodus 20:16).  Perhaps the older men among them brought to mind another incident from twenty or so years ago, at the Feast of Passover when as a twelve years old boy, that yet of majority (which is thirteen) he taught.  Joseph and Mary look for him:

After three days they found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers. (Luke 2:46-47)

The rabbinical tradition, the teaching model, conducted within the courts of Temple, examined the Law of Moses, and from the outset Jesus demonstrated his authority.  

In bring the test of the woman caught in adultery, the hope was not that she would be put to death but Jesus.  Six months on, Jesus submitted himself to death, this to fulfil the very Law they coveted and misused.  Many false witnessed will defame Jesus, and he will be murdered as a result, breaking another of the Ten Commandments the Scribes treasured.  But by this the mutinous Scribes and Pharisees achieve their goal, and through their evil, God the Father’s will was done at the time and in the way, He wanted.  Spring of 33AD was that time and Passover was the feast to be fulfilled.  Jesus was then the Paschal Lamb, the perfect sacrifice for the sin of humanity.  The redemption of all, including the woman caught in adultery, and her false accusers, was won by Jesus’ willingness to go to the cross of shame.  Yet he was also the writer of the Law, God Incarnate and for this claim many Jews desired to kill him.  As maker of law, Jesus will exercise ‘right judgment’, in fact, he is perfectly just.  

As to the Scribes and Pharisees who falsely accused him will stand before him, and he, once again seated, will declare the judgment he withheld.   Maybe like one of their number Nicodemus, many came to acknowledge Jesus’ lordship, if so the punishment for disobeying so many of the Ten Commandments is not laid on them, only the accountability.