Buzzfeed.
***
"The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and placing her in the midst they said to him, 'Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. Now in the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say?' This they said to test him, that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. And as they continued to ask him, he stood up and said to them, 'Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.'"
Posts
67 comments:
I'm interested in what they do to men who want to have sex with other men. Is there a difference between Christianity and Islam?
Christ also said in Luke 6:29, “And unto him that smiteth thee on the one cheek offer also the other; and him that taketh away thy cloke forbid not to take thy coat also.”
However, what he didn't say was also telling. If you offer the other cheek and it gets smiteth as well, then what do you do? So, Jesus saying, if you don't have sin, then go ahead and cast the first stone and someone with sin then casts the first stone, then what? Are they hypocrites or just Muslims? Hmmm, that would be redundant.
AllenS said...
I'm interested in what they do to men who want to have sex with other men. Is there a difference between Christianity and Islam?
Most likely Christians will do nothing. On the other hand we know that Muslims kill homosexuals. Even Ach-my-dinner jacket says no homosexuals exist in Iran, why? Well, they kill the ones they find.
Sincere question. Where are the feminists and liberals in deploring these actions? It used to be, one could count on liberals to be hyper vigilant against anything that stunk of fascism.
What happened
In Saudi Arabia, they just tie up the adulteress under a dump truck and have it drop a big load of rocks on her. No cartoon instructions needed, the authorities have it all worked out.
What happened?
They would be sharing the same position as the conservatives and that can never happen.
I mean ... agree with the lunatic Sarah Palin?
In the movie The King of Kings, each accuser comes up to Jesus and sees written in the dirt his own sin, and turns and walks away. I love that scene.
Bill,RoT, most excellent rhetorical question!
In Saudi Arabia, they just tie up the adulteress under a dump truck and have it drop a big load of rocks on her. No cartoon instructions needed, the authorities have it all worked out.
Something like drone attacks ... no one takes responsibility for the individual kill. The machine did it. (Funny how that doesn't apply to handguns or semi-automatic rifles.)
BTW -- do they really do it like that in Saudi Arabia?
So the Jews said, “Will he kill himself, since he says, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come’?” He said to them, “You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world.
John 8:22-23
I had some guy tell me something similar on the bus one time.
I got off at the next stop.
Not rhetorical question. It used to be liberals were concerned with individual and human rights. Something has changed. I don't know what it why.
But I think it is more than knee jerk reaction against anything Repubs stand for.
"So the Jews said, “Will he kill himself, since he says, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come’?” He said to them, “You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world.
John 8:22-23
I had some guy tell me something similar on the bus one time.
I got off at the next stop."
2/22/13, 7:02 PM
Did he try to give you his underwear? ( Betamax )
Christianity is the true enlightenment in terms of the status of women.
The cultural problem of what to do about bastard children bedeviled societies for thousands of years. Christianity is the enlightenment.
Christianity proposed two new radical solutions.
The story of Jesus' birth can be interpreted as a parable of how men should react to a woman who becomes pregnant out of wedlock. The story, if viewed this way, counsels men to marry the mother and accept the child, to be generous and forgiving.
Then, Christ, in his time on earth, repeatedly counseled forgiveness for the adulterers and whores.
Christianity is the enlightenment in the view of how the eternal problem of bastardy should be solved. Feminism is undoing this enlightenment and leading us back to barbarism.
But what did he write in the sand?
120 likes is "a decent reaction" on Facebook?
Today George Takei posted a not-very-funny picture of Doritos being sold in the "Hispanic Foods" section of a grocery store. It is current at 43,000 "likes", 3200 comments, and 11,000 shares.
120 likes and 500 shares is "hey, check out this picture of my toddler with spaghetti sauce on his face" territory. Yawn.
You want to stone them?
Take 'em to Vail, man, get 'em some good stuff.
Inga said...
"So the Jews said, “Will he kill himself, since he says, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come’?” He said to them, “You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world.
John 8:22-23
I had some guy tell me something similar on the bus one time.
The Blonde got the same from male rel;atives of Moslem patients.
She reminded them this was America.
Not rhetorical question. It used to be liberals were concerned with individual and human rights. Something has changed. I don't know what it why.
The destruction of the patriarchy in the Christian West.
In other words, feminism.
John, meet Brian
The NT passage makes explicit that Jesus knew how to write, a skill less commonly mastered than that of reading, which was itself not exactly widespread.
I immediately want to know: well, what did he write?! Huh?!
The earliest suggested answers to that question come from Ambrose and Augustine, but, frankly, they're pulling them out of the air. I might as well just make up my own answer:)
Regarding the modern variant, the obstinent refusal of contemporary self-described feminists to even notice, never mind vociferously condemn and work against the on-going, widespread enslavement, imprisonment, mutilation, and murder of women in lands under the control of Islamists, who *justify* these horrors as demanded by Islam, is a bloody pox on their craven heads.
Deuteronomy 22:22 "If a man is found sleeping with another man's wife, both the man who slept with her and the woman must die."
Leviticus 20:10 "If a man commits adultery with another man's wife--with the wife of his neighbor--both the adulterer and the adulteress must be put to death."
What's interesting about the Jesus scene, is that the law had become misogynistic in practice. The man is not being stoned according to the mandates of the law. In fact, I suspect he was standing in the crowd holding a stone.
It takes the power out of it to just read about it. You should see the movie, "The Stoning of Soraya M." It's a true story. The stoning scene is horrifying. I was screaming and crying. It was also brilliant at depicting the mob mentality immune to the input and evidence of others.
Jehovah.
God had given the children of Israel the higher law, but they didn't want it. They wanted to be told everything to do and not do. That was the law of Moses. It was a low of outward performances.
The Pharisees abused the law and turned it into a stick with which to beat people into submission.
Christ reestablished the higher law that Adam, Noah, and Abraham had but that, as said above, Moses was prevented from giving his people.
Christ flipped the hierarchy back to put the person at the top and the law below, as an enabler and nurisher of the person, nit a club to beat the person.
Christianity is the true enlightenment in terms of the status of women.
The problem there is that both of your examples consist of Jesus reforming *Jewish* attitudes towards women, not human attitudes towards women. The Greeks and Romans (i.e., the dominant culture of the area) didn't generally do things that way.
Most of the proposed religious reforms attributed to Jesus can be viewed as the mixture of Greek philosophy with Jewish religion. Which is hardly surprising given that Greece and Rome had occupied the place for so long.
The man is not being stoned according to the mandates of the law. In fact, I suspect he was standing in the crowd holding a stone.
You're making unwarranted assumptions based on, so far as I can tell, nothing. What's your basis for thinking the man involved isn't already dead, or next on the list of victims, or something similar?
Don't you think Jesus would have been a little more specific with the whole "let he who is without sin" line if the adulterer was standing there with a rock? It certainly would have helped drive home his point, no?
All that work: digging, throwing, undigging. Instead, just pile-drive the adulteress into the ground with a large rectangular slab of smooth granite. Kill two birds with one stone, so to speak.
General Sir Charles Napier, "This burning of widows is your custom; prepare the funeral pile. But my nation has also a custom. When men burn women alive we hang them, and confiscate all their property. My carpenters shall therefore erect gibbets on which to hang all concerned when the widow is consumed. Let us all act according to national customs."
The British Empire is now dead. Sati, if diminished, live on. A country that is incapable of balancing its budget has very little chance of curing all of the world's ills.
I'm betting Inga gets stoned.
@kentuckyliz,
I figured that the guy either melted into the crowd of accusers, or was strong enough to get away.
There's an expansion on the Law about adultery that includes a couple of edge cases.
If a man happens to meet in a town a virgin pledged to be married and he sleeps with her, you shall take both of them to the gate of that town and stone them to death—the young woman because she was in a town and did not scream for help, and the man because he violated another man’s wife. You must purge the evil from among you.
But if out in the country a man happens to meet a young woman pledged to be married and rapes her, only the man who has done this shall die. Do nothing to the woman; she has committed no sin deserving death...for the man found the young woman out in the country, and though the betrothed woman screamed, there was no one to rescue her.
If a man happens to meet a virgin who is not pledged to be married and rapes her and they are discovered, he shall pay her father fifty shekels[c] of silver. He must marry the young woman, for he has violated her. He can never divorce her as long as he lives.
(Deuteronomy 22:23-29)
Most of the book of Deuteronomy is a restatement and expansion of the Law.
I was more than a little surprised when I saw this presumption of innocence for the woman, in situations where the level of intent on her part was unclear.
There's also a distinction between a woman engaged and/or married, and a woman not engaged. In that case, both miscreants survive...but divorce is impossible.
In my opinion, this pattern of law would be better than the laws currently enforced in the Islamic world.
1. If the woman is executed, so is the man.
2. If there is room for doubt about the consent of the women, she is not executed.
3. If neither were married or engaged, a marriage is allowed instead of execution.
@Revenant,
I was under the impression that both Roman and Greek society considered women inferior, while the nascent Christian religion did not.
Maybe I'm wrong.
But I'd like to see some evidence of where the Christian attitude towards women came from.
I'm betting Inga gets stoned.
You know...
I would not feel so alll alone
Everybody must get stoned
Yeah...they'll stone you when you're trying to be so good....
That Halibut WAS fit for Jehovah!
But Rainy Day Women #12 and 35 is the worst song on Blonde on Blonde and is arguably the "My Ding-a-ling" of Dylan Songs.
Like most people, I've never written a song good enough to be the worst song on Blonde on Blonde.
So, it's all settled?
The stoning scene in Life of Brian is always worth another look.
Quayle said:
"The Pharisees abused the law and turned it into a stick with which to beat people into submission.
Christ reestablished the higher law that Adam, Noah, and Abraham had but that, as said above, Moses was prevented from giving his people."
Because we don't know much about the Pharasees, they serve as a useful straw man to represent ignorant Jews against which to measure the much more advanced Christians. However, years after his conversion, Paul still claimed that he was a Pharasee. (Acts 23:6). Either Paul was a liar, or a large portion of the New Testament was written by a Pharisee. Incidentally, the Sadducees, bitter rivals of the Pharisees, were the ones who led the plot to kill Jesus.
Revenant said:
"Most of the proposed religious reforms attributed to Jesus can be viewed as the mixture of Greek philosophy with Jewish religion. Which is hardly surprising given that Greece and Rome had occupied the place for so long."
I'm interested in the enlightened feminism of the Romans. How do we know that Roman men treat their women better than Jewish men treated Jewish women? Obviously, Romans were equal opportunity abusers when it came to slaves, so the only women who you could possibly be talking about were free women. Even there, what evidence are you relying on to make that statement?
It is a mistake to take Old Testament statements and attribute them directly to Jews of Jesus day without checking to see how they used those passages. Many of the Jews used the Oral Torah as a tool to interpret the written Torah. Unless we have studied the Oral Torah, it is difficult to understand Jewish practices in Jesus' day.
Yeah...they'll stone you when you're trying to be so good....
Inga FTW. Beat me to the Dylan reference...
Shouting Thomas beat us both to it, Mojo.
Have to agree with Illuminati on the Romans, everything I ever heard was that the men were all about control and toughness.
That would, of course, include all women.
@Quayle, Illuminati - Is it actually possible to carry out a discussion of the differences between the Sadducees and the Pharisees without the Life of Brian skit about the Judean People's Front and the People's Front of Judea constantly playing in your head? Must take an incredible amount of training.
The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and placing her in the midst said to him, “Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. Now in the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say?” Jesus said “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.”
The crowd backs away from the woman, muttering.
Then from out of the back of the crowd a rock flies overhead and bonks the adulteress right on the head.
And Jesus said, "Mother! Behave yourself!"
(Old Catholic joke)
According to the Jewish Encyclopedia because ancient Jewish society was a paternalistic only married women could be guilty of adultery. With the loss of the Temple the "ordeal of guilt" ceremony was no longer an option. Ultimately the punishment was divorce and loss of property.
"Under the Talmudic law the severity of the Mosaic code was in many instances modified, and the laws relating to Adultery came under the influence of a milder theory of the relation of crime and punishment. Indeed, the rabbis went so far as to declare that a woman could not be convicted of Adultery unless it had been affirmatively shown that she knew the law relating to it—a theory that resulted in the practical impossibility of convicting any adulteress. No harm was done by this new view, because the right of divorce which remained to the husband was sufficient to free him from the woman, who, although guilty of the crime, was not punishable by the law. Upon this mild view followed the entire abolition of the death penalty, in the year 40, before the destruction of the Second Temple (Sanh. 41a), when the Jewish courts, probably under pressure of the Roman authorities, relinquished their right to inflict capital punishment. Thereafter, the adulterer was scourged, and the husband of the adulteress was not allowed to condone her crime (Soṭah, vi. 1), but was compelled to divorce her, and she lost all her property rights under her marriage contract (Maimonides, "Yad ha-Ḥazaḳah, Ishut," xxiv. 6); nor was the adulteress permitted to marry her paramour (Soṭah, v. 1); and if she married him, they were forced to separate."
@Bob R: What do you have in mind?
The historian, Josephus, has an extensive discussion about the discussion about the competition between the Pharisees and the Sadducees, but we don't know as much as we would like about their doctrines. According to what I've read, the Sadduceeses were probably more legalistic than the Pharisees. The Pharisees were on the side of the common people.
Sorun said...
All that work: digging, throwing, undigging.
The Islamists evidently are also Keynesians.
If the Treasury were to fill old bottles with banknotes, bury them at suitable depths in disused coalmines which are then filled up to the surface with town rubbish, and leave it to private enterprise on well-tried principles of laissez-faire to dig the notes up again (the right to do so being obtained, of course, by tendering for leases of the note-bearing territory), there need be no more unemployment and, with the help of the repercussions, the real income of the community, and its capital wealth also, would probably become a good deal greater than it actually is. It would, indeed, be more sensible to build houses and the like; but if there are political and practical difficulties in the way of this, the above would be better than nothing.
John M. Keynes,
Book 3, Chapter 10, Section 6 pg.129 "The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money"
@Illuminati - I'm not really very serious. I'm in a field where discussion goes on in the face of mockery - but it's usually not as well done as the Pythons'. Going to church in a college town you hear a lot of close reading of scripture. Not all of it is enlightening. Sometimes a skeptic finds the Pythons a comfort.
@Bob R:
"Going to church in a college town you hear a lot of close reading of scripture. Not all of it is enlightening. Sometimes a skeptic finds the Pythons a comfort."
Interesting comment. I agree, there is a lot of bath water. If we keep looking, somewhere in that bathwater, there is a baby who grew up into Western Civilization.
I'm interested in the enlightened feminism of the Romans.
Er, I didn't claim the Romans were "enlightened feminists". Why would they have to be for my observation to be true? The Jews weren't, the Christians weren't, so why would the Greeks and Romans have to be?
How do we know that Roman men treat their women better than Jewish men treated Jewish women?
Well if the ancient Jews *didn't* treat their women worse than the Greeks and Romans did, the claim that Jesus made things better kind of goes out the window...
Supposedly, death as considered an appropriate punishment for adultery by Jews. The Romans and Greeks generally just divorced or levied civil penalties. Women were second-class citizens, of course, but that held true within Christendom up through the 20th century.
According to what I've read, the Sadduceeses were probably more legalistic than the Pharisees. The Pharisees were on the side of the common people.
Don't forget the Essenes -- the sect Jesus most probably belonged to.
Revenant said:
"Well if the ancient Jews *didn't* treat their women worse than the Greeks and Romans did, the claim that Jesus made things better kind of goes out the window..."
How is that? Perhaps the Jews did treat their women better than the Romans but Jesus still made things better. There was a reason that many of the early converts to Christianity were women. I'm not sure about the Greeks, some of their women were awesome.
Feminists like to condemn Western society, but Bernard Lewis has an interesting discussion in one of his books about how amazed the Muslims visitors to Europe were about how European men respected their women.
Revenant said:
"Don't forget the Essenes -- the sect Jesus most probably belonged to"
I agree, there are similarities between the early Christians and the Essenes. My point is that Jesus was not a radical break from Jewish culture in his day, but was a natural part of it. As R Chatt pointed out, his teaching against stoning women for adultery was mainstream Judaism.
Women were second-class citizens, of course, but that held true within Christendom up through the 20th century.
Baloney. Serious baloney.
How is that?
Because early Christians didn't treat women appreciably better than the Greeks and Romans of the time did.
There was a reason that many of the early converts to Christianity were women.
New cults commonly attract the bulk of their recruits from people who aren't prospering in the present society. It doesn't follow that the cult actually improves their lives, and in fact most don't -- it is just that content people seldom see a reason to make radical changes.
Once Christianity became a more established religion that respectable people could openly belong to, women were rapidly purged from leadership roles. So it goes.
Baloney. Serious baloney.
I shall await, in anticipation of great amusement, your description of this medieval paradise of gender equality. :)
I could give a fuck less about the idiot concept of gender equality.
Maybe you should get a clue.
Read this essay from Judgy Bitch.
It will take some time to purge that idiot indoctrination in utter, malicious stupidity from your head, but you can't start a journey without taking the first step.
One day, after you've emptied the trash from your head, you can thank me.
Christ also said in Luke 6:29, “And unto him that smiteth thee on the one cheek offer also the other; and him that taketh away thy cloke forbid not to take thy coat also.”
In Judaism and Islam this is regarded as condoning sin.
But what did he write in the sand?
"You are the weakest link."
Revenant said:
"New cults commonly attract the bulk of their recruits from people who aren't prospering in the present society. It doesn't follow that the cult actually improves their lives, and in fact most don't -- it is just that content people seldom see a reason to make radical changes"
You have accepted the fact that many of the early Christians were women and that they joined because Christianity offered them something which was otherwise missing in their lives. Obviously, early Christianity offered something better. The question is whether it fulfilled that promise.
For the most part early Christianity did not offer women identical roles in the group. Most of the early church leaders were male. So if that is the equality you are discussing, it was never there. The Christian women were not seeking that. What it did offer women was a doctrine that before God everyone was of equal value. Men and women were both worthy of God's unconditional love. It also taught husbands to love their wives, as Jesus loves the church. Those teachings were cannonized in the Bible and have never changed.
Modern feminism is much different. It is based on Marxist philosophy in which various groups are in intractible competition. The feminist view relationships between men and women as good only if men and women are identical, interchangeable. It is completely different from the Biblical love in which each person in a relationship is valued even more because he/she is different and thus fills a void in the other person's life. In feminism, Christian love which includes a commitment to love and support the other person for better and for worse is missing from the equation. Instead, each person in the relationship seeks his/her own fulfillment, and if a new person offers more, well, good bye baby. Thus, to them marriage is a form of oppression.
Bill, Republic of Texas said...
Sincere question. Where are the feminists and liberals in deploring these actions? It used to be, one could count on liberals to be hyper vigilant against anything that stunk of fascism.
What happened
They became fascists
Adultery is the most common charge placed on women who get raped in Islamic cultures due to the requirement for 4 witnesses to give testimony to exonerate. (4 must testify that is was rape - otherwise the woman "asked for it"). With this requirement, it is not uncommon for women just to commit suicide when accused.
This is pearl of wisdom was brought to the world by Mohammad after his child bride got "lost" from her camel ride tent and came riding up to the raiding group with a hunky stud who had "found" her wandering the desert behind the party. In order to "save" her dignity , the Big M got an emergency telegraph message straight from Al stating that his honey was "innocent" and furthermore, anyone that wanted to accuse her of doing anything untoward had to have 4 witnesses to "prove" guilt.
So now, to prove innocence, a victim has to have a voyeur squad watch the deed. Otherwise she is literally screwed.
In Saudi too, the families usually handle the adultery issues , not the state. They just kill the daughters and not get the court (and public) involved. Sending phone pictures can be fatal there.
What a great culture!
Oh - I see the proper was is to partially bury the woman at a depth between her waist and her shoulders. Guess I was doing it wrong.
Christianity is built on grace. Islam does not have this concept. Christ's point is that we can be forgiven and approach God like our loving father once that is accomplished.
Trey
Aha. The question I have is what did he write in the dirt?
Some Christians believe that the Old Testament controls, except where modified by Jesus, either expressly or by necessary implication.
If it turned out that there is no evidence that Jesus ever taught the forebearance attributed to Him, and if it turned out that there is plentiful evidence that the story about the adulteress was added during the Middle Ages, I wonder how many people would want to go back to the old ways?
My guess is only a few kooks.
PROGRESS!!!1!!!!!!
If it turned out that there is no evidence that Jesus ever taught the forebearance attributed to Him, and if it turned out that there is plentiful evidence that the story about the adulteress was added during the Middle Ages, I wonder how many people would want to go back to the old ways?
I think that it wouldn't be the middle ages, but rather, maybe the first several centuries after Christ.
That said, it is assumed above that the early Christian Church was heavily male dominated, mirroring, to some extent, the Jewish faith from which it is descended. But, there are hints throughout the New Testament that women did have a prominent place in it.
But, maybe even more interesting is the corollary of the thesis of the da Vinci Code, that women were essentially written out of the New Testament by the males who were, by then, running the church several centuries after Christ, and, that is one of the big reasons that the Gospel of Mary was eliminated from the canon when it was closed.
One question that a lot of folks don't ask is: what trap were the scribes and Pharisees trying to set? ("This they said, tempting him, that they might have to accuse him." - John 8:6, KJV)
The most logical explanation I've heard is this: if he answers "No," they accuse him of violating the law of Moses - giving them ammo to discredit the rumor that Jesus was the Messiah, or even a mere prophet. If he says "Yes," they accuse him of violating Roman law, which reserved the authority to implement the death penalty only to the Roman government - Jesus would have been condemned as an insurgent. Jesus gave an answer that had the guaranteed the woman's life but technically didn't upend Mosaic law - none of Jesus' enemies would DARE commit the high blasphemy of claiming to be without sin.
And from this we get the expression "don't throw stones," which means "STFU - only non-Christians are allowed to criticize people."
Post a Comment