Gospel Rewrite: Jesus and the Death Penalty
To read an intro to this series, click here. To read the original Gospel story, click here.
John 8: 1-12: The Woman Caught in Adultery
Painting by Eugene Higgins. Taken from Sacred Art Meditations
7 They continued to question him, so he stood up and replied, “All of us here are more righteous than this woman. She must suffer the consequences of her sin. If Moses said penalty should be death, then let the penalty be death.” 8 The legal experts and Pharisees were pleased with this reply and some left to gather stones. 9 Jesus walked closer to the woman, until they stood next to one another.
10 Then he said to her, “Woman, where are they? Where are the men who brought you here?”
11 She said, “They’ve gone to get the stones so they might kill me.”
Jesus said, “Indeed. The wages of sin is death. We can’t have justice if we show mercy to all evildoers. May your death be a lesson to all gathered here to go and sin no more.”
12 When the men returned, they each hurled their stones at the sinful woman until her bones were broken and she was dead. Jesus oversaw her execution, and then he left the temple.
How does this Gospel Rewrite speak to you? Leave your thoughts below.
2 Comments
The death penalty is barbaric. He who is without sin cast the first stone.
I wholly agree! Did you see the introduction to this series? It explains why I’m rewriting the Gospels like this. https://michaelmcray.com/2017/05/22/why-a-gospel-rewrite-series/