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From: fsks@unc.UUCP (Frank Silbermann)
Newsgroups: net.religion.jewish
Subject: Re: Stoning
Message-ID: <508@unc.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 28-Jun-85 14:29:05 EDT
Article-I.D.: unc.508
Posted: Fri Jun 28 14:29:05 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 30-Jun-85 03:31:12 EDT
References: <612@sfmag.UUCP> <11333@brl-tgr.ARPA> 
Reply-To: fsks@unc.UUCP (Frank Silbermann)
Distribution: net
Organization: CS Dept., U. of N. Carolina at Chapel Hill
Lines: 28
Summary: 


> In article <612@sfmag.UUCP> samet@sfmag.UUCP (A.I.Samet) writes:
> >
> >   1) The sin of male homosexuality is punishable by death  by skila
> >   (stoning).  Of  the  4  methods   of execution, skila is the most
> >   severe.  The only other sexual offenses punishable by  skila  are
> >   certain  types  of  incest, and  having  sex  with  an animal. By
> >   contrast, adultery is punishable by lesser forms of execution.
  
> Was this not true in biblical (Roman occupation) times? I ask because
> there is a well-known New Testament Christian story most commonly
> referred to as "The woman taken in adultery". [The story is that Jesus
> comes across a scene in which a woman who had been caught in adultery is
> about to be stoned to death. He intervenes, says "Let he who is without
> sin cast the first stone", and the crowd disperses. He then forgives the
> woman.]
> 
> Anyway, this incident depicts a woman guilty only of adultery being
> subject to stoning, supposedly in a typical 1st-century Jewish
> community. Would it be that the distinction between the different death
> sentences was not made until later, or only by an official court, like
> the Sanhedrin (if they would get involved in such), and not in an
> ordinary village?

Maybe that's why Jesus stopped the stoning -- it was illegal under
Jewish law.

	Frank Silbermann