The Transformative Power of Mercy: Jesus and the Adulterous Woman

04-06-2025Weekly ReflectionFr. Albert

The Gospel is one of the great Jesus stories and perhaps one of the most controversial. The central piece in which the woman, who is a sinner, is accepted by Jesus and forgiven. She is shamed, paraded, humiliated under the sentence of death. Jesus pronounces a sentence of life and ongoing conversion. The focus of Christian reconciliation is the sinner, not the sin. Jesus risks the wrath of the Law, the leaders, and the hearers to free the unnamed woman, and He does so within the temple itself.

The woman is not the only sinner nor perhaps the most sinful of the sinners present. The scribes and Pharisees have much to atone for. Their interest is not the Law, justice, or the woman. Their intention is to trap Jesus. They craft a devious plan. They test Jesus' fidelity to the Law under three trying circumstances for the Galilean teacher. They make the test around obedience to the divine Law. They set the test within the grounds of the Temple, the sacred place of the holy commandments. They take His audience of hearers as hostages; these hearers have come to hear a new teaching but will be forced to witness that with Jesus there is nothing too new or extraordinary.

Jesus opts for the poor, shamed, sinful woman, and He loses everything. He takes the risk of Love. The religious officials will soon have His death. The temple and the Law will stand as witnesses against Him. His hearers also desert Him—they do not seem to want to take in any more of His teachings. The woman is freed. Scribes, Pharisees, and hearers had an opportunity to embrace the freedom and reconciliation God offers in Jesus, but only the adulteress takes up the offer.

The scribes and Pharisees are eager to see the response of Jesus in the face of the sin of adultery, considered punishable by death by stoning under the prevailing Law. Seeking a chance to trap Jesus in His response to the situation, the Lord refuses to pass any judgment. Instead, He simply stoops down and starts writing with His finger on the ground. The gesture was a way of saying without words that Jesus was unwilling to discuss the matter with the accusers. The silence of Jesus in this instance becomes an outright condemnation of the hypocrisy of the faultfinders. Jesus speaks well-known words: "Let the man among you who has no sin be the first to cast a stone at her." In response, the hypocritical audience drifts away one by one, until no one is left except the woman and Jesus. Saint Augustine says of the scene: "There remained only two; the one in great misery and the one with great mercy."

Jesus not only saved the life of the woman but also made her realize her true condition and the need for conversion. We are all in need of such an encounter with the Lord, who can help us to become aware of our true condition as He gently draws us to Himself.