Article February 15, 1936 Issue

Forgiveness versus Condemnation

KATHERINE PUFFER

A graphic picture is presented to the reader in the eighth chapter of John, where it reads, "And Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst." Briefly the writer delineates a picture of majestic triumph, of divine wisdom victorious over trickery and hate, of the calm and peace of supersensual consciousness.

The preceding verses tell the story of the woman taken in adultery who was brought to Jesus to see what his pronouncement upon her sin would be. Would he ignore the Mosaic law which said that such should be stoned? The intent of the scribes and Pharisees who thus tempted him was that they might have an excuse to accuse Jesus. But he responded not to their machinations. There was no condemnation, no accusation, in the great law of Love under the sway of which Jesus' life and teaching were ordered. His pure consciousness of man as God's child could not associate true being and sensuality. Accusing belonged to those who were thinking on the same plane as the adulteress, that is, believing that there is pleasure and profit in sin. To Jesus, man was the offspring of Soul, not of sense, and he left to the disordered thinking of his enemies and of her accusers the impossible task of righting one wrong with another.

What a challenge to their moral status when he said, "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her"! How unable they were to meet the challenge! What must have been revealed to each accuser when he was forced, momentarily at least, to tear the veil from his own thinking and behold its vileness; for had he not probably sinned many times! One would like to think that this self-searching under the challenge of the Christ, Truth, would have a permanently elevating effect on the hearers. Self-righteousness had received a rebuke!

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