Easter Eggs Part III

I missed writing about Luke last week, so this post is from John.

My favorite find in all the Gospels was another one presented by Rick James and it comes from the story of the adulterous woman in John 8. There has been debate whether that story was actually written by the apostle John; some early manuscripts do not include it. And before I was always indifferent to whether it was the genuine article, but knowing this about the story makes me really hope it was written by him.

While the Pharisees come and present the woman caught in adultery before Jesus, it says twice in the account that Jesus writes with his finger in the dirt. And many people speculate about what he might have written. But if the writing were important, John would have given it to us. What is actually important in that phrase is the mention of Jesus' finger, because it is a reference to the book of Exodus: "When God had finished speaking with Moses upon Mount Sinai, He gave him the two tablets of the testimony, tablets of stone, written by the finger of God" (Ex. 31:18).

The Pharisees bring the woman to Jesus to put Him in a predicament: excuse the woman and He is breaking the Law of Moses that says adultery is punishable by death. Condemn the woman and they can find a reason to get Him in trouble. And there is some suspense in the story about what Jesus will decide. How will He get out of this one? But in the middle of the suspense comes John's reference to Exodus, which brings out the delightful irony of the situation: the Pharisees are trying to catch Jesus in a loophole of the Law, when He Himself is its author.

Knowing this reference makes the ending of the story even more poignant. While Moses' Law condemns the woman to death because of her adultery, Jesus, the originator of that Law, says to her, and to us, "Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more."