No, Nobody Condemned Me

         What is Jesus writing on the ground, anyway? All this drama, and I’m distracted by wondering what he’s doing down there in the dust. I’m still waiting to find out.

         The Pharisees are wondering and waiting, too. All this drama—a sinner! caught red-handed! in flagrante delicto!—and an opportunity not only to punish the guilty party, but also to pin this so-called Messiah to the wall…and he seems unconcerned. Not a word about her situation, or his, or theirs; not a parable nor a proverb (unless that’s what he’s doodling in the dust); just this reflective silence. Where’s the judgment? They’re still waiting to find out.

         The woman caught in adultery is wondering and waiting, too. All this drama—the flung-open door, the shouting, the shame—and the fear. What will they do to her? What will Jesus have to say (she doesn’t know him, but she knows OF him, and would have liked to meet him, but not like this, and maybe now not ever)? Right now he’s not saying anything. Where’s the verdict? She’s still waiting to find out.

         I like to imagine the extended silences after each dramatic action in this scene. The Pharisees bursting into Jesus’s teaching session, hauling this woman in with them, “making her stand before all of them” (NRSV). Something about the pacing tells us that she’s just been caught in the act. Something about the pacing—and about the Pharisees—tells us that no matter what Jesus says they should do, they’re itching to start picking up rocks.

         But I like to imagine this long silence. Jesus moving out of his teaching posture, leaning down, everyone watching to see what his next move will be, straining to hear what his next word will be…and there are no words. Barely any noise at all as he runs his finger on the ground: how? Randomly? In patterns? Letters? We don’t know.

         Silence, and waiting, until the Pharisees, impatient and maybe a little embarrassed, begin to question him again. And Jesus convicts them with a single sentence: “Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” That’s the end of that dramatic interlude, and off the Pharisees go. All the people go, one by one.

         But the woman is still there, wondering and waiting. If this man is who everyone says he is, surely he’s not done with her. Surely he has a judgment, a punishment. She wonders. She waits.

         Here’s another long silence. Jesus finishing up whatever it is he’s doing on the ground as the people walk away, glancing up to see the woman there, standing up to look her in the eyes. To see her, really see her. In this silence he prepares to speak, and she braces herself—only to hear him ask where they’ve gone, and did they condemn her or not?

         No, nobody condemned me.

         Neither do I condemn you. Go your way, and from now on, do not sin again.

         I imagine that last silence was the longest one of all. It’s the same silence we experience when we have every right to expect the axe to fall and it doesn’t. It’s the same silence we experience when we’ve been spared the snare that we set for ourselves and in which we deserved to be caught.

         We hear a lot about Advent being a season of expectation, of wondering and waiting. Are we waiting to see if there are words in the dust, words that will vindicate us, as the Pharisees might have waited? Are we wondering if Jesus’s next words will bring us to condemnation and death, as the woman might have wondered?

         Or is this a key Advent reading because what we’re waiting for is not where our story is going? The condemnation we fear and expect (maybe deservedly so) is transformed into grace—and isn’t that the promise of our Savior?

         We’ll always wonder what Jesus is doing down there in the dust. We’re still waiting to find out. Maybe it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter as much as the silence, the waiting, the axe that never falls, the empty snare.

The Reverend Canon Susanna Cates, Canon for Formation and Vocation, Diocese of NJ