Isaiah 43.16-21
‘Behold, I am doing a new thing and I will give drink to my chosen people.’
Philippians 3.8-14
‘For the sake of Christ I have suffered the loss of all things, becoming like
him in his death.’
John 8.1-11
‘Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.’
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.” (John
8.10-11)
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The
Gospel account of a terrified woman being dragged along by a group of men ready
to kill her with rocks and stones for committing adultery is chilling.
It
will not have been the first time, nor the last, that something like this has
happened.
The
condemnation and righteous fury of the scribes and Pharisees is challenged by
Jesus and the scene turns into one of forgiveness, healing and restoration – it
takes us deep into the heart of Jesus’ mission.
Before
we go into the Gospel let’s just go back to paradise, to the Garden of Eden, as
described in Genesis.
There
is method in this! And you might start to make some connections between Eden
and the gospel reading as we go along.
In
the Garden God creates Adam from the dust of the ground (Genesis 2.7).
But
Adam is alone in the garden and, as Adam names the creatures, none can help in
the task given to Adam of tending paradise.
So,
as equally in God’s image as the man, God creates the woman (Genesis 2.22):
from one flesh they’re created so they can find fulfilment in each other and be
complete and fruitful (Genesis 2.23).
They
enjoy the Garden paradise, tasting the fruits of all the trees, but God warns them
not to eat of the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil, for that is knowledge
only God can bear.
But
eat they do.
And
then they hide.
Out
of God’s sight.
God
finds them, and blame is passed around: from the man, to his wife, to the
serpent. (Genesis 2.6,7; 12,13).
God
clothes them in protecting garments and then they are driven out of the Garden
paradise. (Genesis 2.24)
Any
connections?
What’s
the expulsion of Adam and Eve from Paradise got to do with today’s gospel
reading?
Before
addressing that, it’s worth knowing that although humanity left Paradise, there
was always an echo of it in the Temple of Jerusalem.
In Hebrew thought the Temple is
the representation of paradise on earth, a microcosm of how creation should be,
with purity of worship and unity with God, just as the Garden of Eden in the
beginning.
Our
gospel opened with Jesus in the Temple, at the beginning of the day: a new
creation day.
He
is there, teaching people how to live lives worthy of Paradise.
And
in come the scribes and Pharisees with the woman.
You might ask, where’s the man,
the co-respondent in the adultery? (see Leviticus
20:10-12).
The scribes and Pharisees had
singled out this woman, just as Adam blamed Eve for the fruit of the tree being
eaten.
Adultery
is a grave sin which takes two people, a violation of the seventh of the Ten Commandments
((Exodus 20.14) and a breach of fidelity between husband and wife.
Adultery
is used throughout scripture as an image of human infidelity towards God: God
as a spurned bridegroom whose bride turns away. (cf Hosea)
Just
as in Eden the man hides, and both man and woman have breached a relationship of
trust and covenant.
It
was eating the fruit that broke that trust: that was the moment of infidelity:
cheating on God.
Here
it is the scribes and
Pharisees who take it upon themselves to condemn and pass sentence: they put
themselves as arbiters of good and evil; precisely why Adam and Eve were
expelled from Eden.
This is the moment for Jesus to
restore, to bind up and to heal, to recall everyone in the Temple – the echo of
Eden – to a restored relationship with God.
But Jesus’ first action is
puzzling: he bends over and writes in the dust. Why?
Dust is the very stuff from which
Adam was created in the first place before being set in the Garden of Eden,
even from dust God brought life, even from the dust of sin Jesus can bring
forgiveness.
It’s so intriguing. We have no
written words of Jesus, he wrote no books, and the only reference to him
writing is in the dust.
He is the one whose words stand
for ever (Isaiah 40.8b; 1 Peter 1.25), but these written words are blown away
in the dust.
It is only when Jesus stands up
and confronts the baying mob with their own sin, that they see they are in no
position to stone this woman.
She
had violated the Law.
They
violate the Law.
No
one stands innocent before God, as St Paul says, ‘For there is no distinction:
for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God’ (Romans 3.22,23)
Sin
is not just about breaking rules; sin is the words and deeds that estrange us
from God, be that in Eden, in the Temple that morning, or in our daily lives.
The
scriptures reveal patterns we know to be true of ourselves.
Jesus’
project for humanity is bigger than rules kept or broken, it is about the
renewal of Creation, about restoring men and women in the image of God, about
making us holy by being as he is, in perfect relationship with the Father,
unobscured by sin and death.
The
man and the woman were expelled from the earthly paradise, the Garden of Eden:
Jesus’ mission is to restore men and women to their first innocence.
I
wonder if Jesus wrote in the dust the words of Isaiah from our first reading?
Behold, I am
doing a new thing;
now it springs forth, do you
not perceive it?
I will make a way
in the wilderness
and rivers in the
desert. (Isaiah 43.19)
From
his writing,
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.”
Jesus
both refuses to condemn the woman, and he refuses to condone what she has done.
Scribes
and Pharisees wanted condemnation.
Given
attitudes to marriage and fidelity today perhaps some would condone.
But
being humane is not being just or merciful or true; it doesn’t reconcile or
restore.
As
St Augustine says, ‘It is sin [Jesus] condemns, not people’ (Augustine, Homilies on the Gospel of John, 33.6-7)
We
come into Jesus’ presence like Adam and Eve, like the woman caught in adultery –
‘guiltie of dust and sin’, as the priest and poet George Herbert puts it. (George
Herbert, Love [III])
And
as we come into his presence, feeling under condemnation of others or of
ourselves, may we hear Jesus’ words: “I do not condemn you; go, and from now on
sin no more.”
