It has long been the fashion of the historical-critical scholars of the text of the Bible to discount or reduce the status of the famous passage, "The Woman Taken In Adultery" found in John 8:1-11 since the earliest manuscript of John doesn't contain that story. The line, taken up by many an atheist hater of Christianity for the polemical purposes, say that it was a later addition to the Gospel and Jesus never said that most wonderful sentence.
I don't know, as does no one else, today, if the story was true in total or in part but if it was added by later Christians it's worth asking why they would have done that and why it was considered to be consistent with the character of Jesus as understood by early Christians. They never wonder if the scribe who made that early manuscript might have left it out for some reason, maybe he hated women or didn't like the idea that the literal meaning of a part of The Mosaic Law being overturned in it. The fact is, we don't know if that happened, either.
I don't know what early commentary there is on the story, which would be interesting to know, but it's clear that the earliest centuries of Christianity included that radical break with the interpretation of The Law which commanded that a woman taken in adultery be stoned to death. It also demands that the man committing adultery be stoned too (Leviticus 20:10), I always wonder why they didn't haul him in front of Jesus but I would guess that's pretty much a self explanatory question.
For anyone who might not be familiar with the story, here it is from the Good News Translation.
Then everyone went home, but Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. Early the next morning he went back to the Temple. All the people gathered around him, and he sat down and began to teach them. The teachers of the Law and the Pharisees brought in a woman who had been caught committing adultery, and they made her stand before them all. “Teacher,” they said to Jesus, “this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery. In our Law Moses commanded that such a woman must be stoned to death. Now, what do you say?” They said this to trap Jesus, so that they could accuse him. But he bent over and wrote on the ground with his finger. As they stood there asking him questions, he straightened up and said to them, “Whichever one of you has committed no sin may throw the first stone at her.” Then he bent over again and wrote on the ground. When they heard this, they all left, one by one, the older ones first. Jesus was left alone, with the woman still standing there. He straightened up and said to her, “Where are they? Is there no one left to condemn you?”
“No one, sir,” she answered.
“Well, then,” Jesus said, “I do not condemn you either. Go, but do not sin again.
It's clear that that story was either a fairly accurate report of an incident in the public life of Jesus or it is a moral fable that was consistent with the very early understanding of the character of Jesus and his teaching. I would guess the people who heard that would often have been familiar with the statement of Paul that Jesus was like all of us except in sin, which would lead them to the same conclusion I remember reaching when I was a kid that Jesus was the only one who was qualified to throw the first stone at her and he refused to condemn her. Which should be about as profound a statement about the forgiving of sins, leaving her with the most mildly given commandment to not sin again but which also disqualified the rest of humanity from imposing the death sentence commanded in The Law which Jesus said he came to uphold. That is the reason I said what I did about that last week. I don't think there is a clearer prohibition on any human being - all of us sinners - imposing the ultimate legal prescription for a crime. That in such large numbers Americans who favor the death penalty claim to believe every word of the Bible is literally true - or some similar claim - would present them with a real quandary as to their favoring capital punishment. That is a quandary which it is notable that had so little effect throughout "Christendom" which is certainly not the kingdom of Jesus - though I think it is arguable that in some ways Christianity was an improvement on the earlier kingdoms, empires, territories governed by various pre-Christian governance (human sacrifices were banned as were some other terrible practices, with variable effectiveness) it can hardly be considered to have approached the teachings of Jesus.
No, I say we adopt the story as authentic and advocate that it is an absolute ban on any person who has sinned imposing the death penalty. If The Law, contained in Scripture is made impossible to carry out under that amendment to it in this commandment of Jesus, it is even more clear that human law that provides for capital punishment is not only illegitimate, it is against the Law of God as taught by Jesus.
I wonder why "leftists" who so widely take a stand against capital punishment wouldn't be entirely in favor of this story as about their strongest argument with those who claim to be Christians. But I don't wonder very hard.
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William F. Buckley once and insincerely said that he would rather be governed by the Gospel than any constitution ever devised - given his stands on just about everything, I doubt that, completely. I can say that if any nominally Christian country or state or town had ever governed itself even imperfectly approaching full compliance with the teachings of Jesus, it would be considered a paradise on Earth and would almost certainly be attacked by other polities who would find the radical equality and economic leveling of it intolerable. Jefferson couldn't tolerate Haiti's early aspirations to be a republic and began the long campaign to make sure nothing like good government ever happened there.
But the question is why should anyone want to discredit the teachings of Jesus if they claim to be an American style liberal? Even the American play-lefties advocate, in theory, a morality closer to that of Jesus than of Nietzsche or Darwin or Marx. You wonder why they so consistently try to discredit what would have to be the strongest possible humanly understandable reason to make equality, justice, kindness real in human life, THE FIRMLY HELD BELIEF THAT THE ULTIMATE AUTHORITY OVER US WANTS US TO ACT THAT WAY.
I think the reason they don't like it is because they don't really favor those things more than they hate belief in God, the possibility or the reality of God. The fact is, most of them hate God more than they love equality and justice and democracy. That has been one of the greatest self-imposed guarantees of defeat on the American left since at least the rise of Marxism within it and even earlier in the wrongly named, rationally absurd "free thought" of the kind for which Thomas Paine was a major figure.* That Paine was a major and enthusiastic participant in the French Revolution - a disaster that led to the Reign of Terror and the military despotism of Napoleon before it led the the often violent and chaotic history of France up to recent decades - certainly is more telling about him than the slogans gleaned from his writing. As can be seen in the life of Jefferson and the other Founders, words are cheap as compared to reality. I don't believe any of them really believed in equality or democracy, I think they didn't really believe in those things they claimed to because they didn't believe they were founded in the most absolute of possible sources, in the mind of the Creator who Jefferson invoked when it suited his purpose in defending the break with England.
* I have been pointing out, more and more, that "free thought" is another of the things which such "free thinkers" will jettison in their adherence to materialistic-atheistic of scientism because free thought is impossible within their framing of materialism, of physical causation being the entirety of reality. I have never found such an advocate of such "freedom" under that framing who could come to any defense of or explanation for where freedom could come from within their ideological framing. Far from supporting democracy, human dignity, human rights, their framing destroys any durable belief in those.
I have come to be unsurprised how many American leftists have been enthusiasts for violence, bloodshed (vicariously in most cases, most of the biggest, fattest enthusiasts for violent "action" have been soft-handed cowards) and for dictators under whom they have chosen not to live. The surprise would be for those who are against those, in that case having to borrow moral positions that their ideological framing is more capable of undermining than providing.
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