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Originally posted by RomanRedneck:
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Jesus taught that it in passing judgment on others, we show ourselves to be guilty.
This is not the case at all. Passing judgment is something we cannot fail to do. It is necessary to pass judgement in order to function as a society and even as an individual within that society. Jesus was not telling us that judging is immoral. He was making it clear that "you will be judged with the judgement with which you judge." In other words, he was exposing the Pharisees as hypocrits. Their judgement was not just. It was hypocritical because they were guilty of the very sin the woman was accused of yet they presented themselves as pure.

When Jesus said "Let him among you who is without sin cast the first stone" he was saying "let him who is among you without THIS SIN cast the first stone." The pharisees were liars, murderers, thieves, and adulterers. Not just in the heart but in actuality. They were wicked men parading as holy and righteous and *THIS* is what Jesus was exposing. Not some moral lesson that its wrong to judge.

Why then did not Jesus himself condemn the woman since Jesus was certainly innocent of that crime? Two things. First of all, Jesus came to us as a man, born of woman, born under the law. He was himself submissive to the law. In other words he was not in a position of legal authority. If he had cast a stone at the woman he would have violated his own position as a man under law. He had no earthly authority to pass a legal judgment against her. Secondly, we are in fact talking about *legal* authority and *crimes*; not particularly sins. The Torah never condemns a person to death for their sins but for their crimes. This is an important distinction. It is for this reason that the Torah cannot be considered a law-code. It does not consistently assign punishments to disobedience. It must be remembered that Israel was originally a Theocracy: Government by the Deity. And Israels state laws reflected this. To disobey the law was to sin because the law was from God but sin was not of the essence of violating the law. What I mean is, there were some laws which were/are inviolable such as "thou shalt not kill" "thou shalt not commit adultery" etc. WHile others were temporary in nature such as "do not boil a kid in its mothers milk" or "if you are passing though a field and find a birds nest with young in it, you may take and kill the young but you must allow the mother to live". These laws are, in the eternal scheme of things, crimes but not sins. Just as today we have many crimes on the books that are not immoral. There is nothing immoral about going over the speed limit, necessarily. Nevertheless, the secular powers that be can and will punish/fine you for a violation of that law. Yet you need not confess it to your priest nor to God. Its not a sin.

In the woman caught in adultery example, the Pharisees were attempting to goad Jesus into saying the woman should die and if possible, actually get him to make it happen. Why? So that they could get him in trouble with the Roman authorities. They had no understanding of the distinction between crime and sin. Jesus did not come to punish crime but to forgive sin. He was concerned about the womans soul while the pharisees appeared to be only concerned about her violation of the law and cared not a a whit about her spiritual condition as a sinner.

My 2 cents.

Jason

Moreover, the injunction to execute a murderer predates the 10 commandments. It was a command given to Noah. "If any man spills a mans blood, by man shall his blood be spilt."
Jason:
You are reading into the text that which is simply not there. There is nothing in the text that justifies your claim that those who accused the woman taken in adultery were guilty of that very same sin. Also, there is nothing in the text to justify your claim that what Jesus really meant to say was "Let the one without the same exact sin as this woman cast the first stone." It is, in my opinion, very dangerous for us to add our own words to the text of Holy Scripture. By the way, it is not my intent to argue that we are unable to determine that Saddam Hussein has committed horrible crimes and that we cannot impose a penalty. However, I don't think it is consistent with the teachings of Christ himself or with the teachings of the Catholic Church to condemn someone as being beyond redemption by killing that person.
Sincerely,
Ryan