Abstract
This paper examines the toxic capital offense texts requiring the death penalty for adultery delineated in the legal documents of the Old Testament in Leviticus 20:10 and Deuteronomy 22:20-22. The Mosaic Law is compared with the genre of other ancient Near East law codes. A narrative reading of these biblical laws is elucidated through the story of Jesus and the adulterous woman in John 8:1-11. A Christotelic, polyphonic interpretation of this account is used to reveal how Jesus interpreted those laws as a case law demonstration of his narratological legal hermeneutic of Matthew 5:27-28. Jesus upends the patriarchal purity culture of sacrificial religion, which traumatized the adulterous woman in this story through co-suffering solidarity with the victim while radicalizing the sin spectrum to include all sin and all people. As the fulfilment of the Law, Jesus subverted the purity system of law and replaced it with the “royal law” of love of God and compassionate love toward neighbour. Implications of all this for restorative community healing, relationally based therapeutic care, a positive role for the Church and a hermeneutical priority of love and compassion are then set out.
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