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GENERAL AUDIENCE OF 13 AUGUST During the General
Audience on Wednesday, 13 August, John Paul II delivered the following
address.
1. The affirmation Christ made during the Sermon on the Mount regarding
adultery and desire, which he called "adultery of the heart," must be
analyzed from the very beginning. Christ said: "You have understood that
it was said: 'You shall not commit adultery'" (Mt 5:27). He had in mind
God's commandment, the sixth in the Decalogue, included in the so-called
second Table of the Law which Moses received from God-Yahweh.
First of all, let's place ourselves in the situation of the audience
present during the Sermon on the Mount, those who actually heard the words
of Christ. They are sons and daughters of the chosen people—people
who had received the law from God—Yahweh
himself. These people had also received the prophets. Time and time again
throughout the centuries, the prophets had reproved the people's behavior
regarding this commandment, and the way in which it was continually
broken. Christ also speaks of similar transgressions. But he speaks more
precisely about a certain human interpretation of the law, which negates
and does away with the correct meaning of right and wrong as specified by
the will of the divine legislator. Above all, the law is a means—an
indispensable means if "justice is to abound" (Mt 5:20). Christ desires
such justice to be "superior to that of the scribes and Pharisees." He
does not accept the interpretation they gave to the authentic content of
the law through the centuries. In a certain way, this interpretation
subjected this content, or rather the purpose and will of the legislator,
to the varied weaknesses and limits of human willpower deriving precisely
from the threefold concupiscence. This was a casuistic interpretation
which was superimposed on the original version of right and wrong
connected with the law of the Decalogue. If Christ tends to transform the
ethos, he does so mainly to recover the fundamental clarity of the
interpretation: "Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the
prophets; I have not come to abolish but to fulfill" (Mt 5:17).
Fulfillment is conditioned by a correct understanding, and this is
applied, among others, also to the commandment: "You shall not commit
adultery."
2. Those who follow the history of the chosen people in the Old
Testament from the time of Abraham will find many facts which witness to
how this commandment was put into practice. As a result of such practice,
the casuistic interpretation of the law developed. First, it is well known
that the history of the Old Testament is the scene for the systematic
defection from monogamy. This fact must have a fundamental significance in
our understanding of the prohibition: "You shall not commit adultery."
Especially at the time of the patriarchs, the abandonment of monogamy was
dictated by the desire for offspring, a very numerous offspring. This
desire was very profound, and procreation as the essential end of marriage
was very evident. This was so much so that wives who loved their husbands
but were not able to give them children, on their own initiative asked
their husbands who loved them, if they could carry "on their own knees,"
or welcome, his children born of another woman, for example, those of the
serving woman, the slave. Such was the case of Sarah regarding Abraham
(cf. Gn 16:2) or the case of Rachel and Jacob (cf. Gn 30:3). These two
narratives reflect the moral atmosphere in which the Decalogue was
practiced. They illustrate the way in which the Israelite ethos was
prepared to receive the commandment, "You shall not commit adultery," and
how such a commandment was applied in the most ancient tradition of this
people. The authority of the patriarchs was the highest in Israel and had
a religious character. It was strictly bound to the covenant and to the
promise.
The commandment, "You shall not commit adultery," did not change this
tradition. Everything points to the fact that its further development was
not limited by the motives (however exceptional) which had guided the
behavior of Abraham and Sarah, or of Jacob and Rachel. For example, the
lives of the most renowned Israelites after Moses, the kings of Israel,
David and Solomon, show the establishing of real polygamy, which was
undoubtedly for reasons of concupiscence.
3. In the history of David, who also had other wives, we are struck not
only by the fact that he had taken the wife of one of his subjects, but
also by the fact that he was clearly aware of having committed adultery.
This fact, as well as the king's repentance, is described in a detailed
and evocative way (cf. 2 Sm 11:2-27). Adultery is understood to mean only
the possession of another man's wife, but it is not considered to be the
possession of other women as wives together with the first one. All Old
Testament tradition indicates that the real need for monogamy as an
essential and indispensable implication of the commandment, "You shall not
commit adultery," never reached the conscience and the ethos of the
following generations of the chosen people.
Against this background one must also understand all the efforts which
aim at putting the specific content of the commandment, "You shall not
commit adultery," within the framework of the promulgated laws. It is
confirmed by the books of the Bible in which we find the Old Testament
legislation fully recorded as a whole. If we consider the letter of such
legislation, we find that it takes a determined and open stand against
adultery, using radical means, including the death penalty (cf. Lv 20:10;
Dt 22:22). It does so, however, by effectively supporting polygamy, even
fully legalizing it, at least indirectly. Therefore, adultery was opposed
only within special limits and within the sphere of definitive premises
which make up the essential form of the Old Testament ethos. Adultery is
understood above all (and perhaps exclusively) as the violation of man's
right of possession regarding each woman who may be his own legal wife
(usually, one among many). On the contrary, adultery is not understood as
it appears from the point of view of monogamy as established by the
Creator. We know now that Christ referred to the "beginning" precisely in
regard to this argument (Mt 19:8).
4. Furthermore, the occasion in which Christ took the side of the woman
caught in adultery and defended her from being stoned to death is most
significant. He said to the accusers: "Whoever of you is without sin, let
him throw the first stone" (Jn 3:7). When they put down the stones and
went away, he said to the woman: "Go, and from now on, sin no more" (Jn
8:11). Therefore, Christ clearly identified adultery with sin. On the
other hand, when he turned to those who wanted to stone the adulteress, he
did not refer to the precepts of Israel's law but exclusively to
conscience. The discernment between right and wrong engraved on the human
conscience can show itself to be deeper and more correct than the content
of a norm.
As we have seen, the history of God's people in the Old Testament
(which we have tried to illustrate through only a few examples) took place
mainly outside the normative content contained in God's commandment, "You
shall not commit adultery." It went along, so to speak, side by side with
it. Christ wanted to straighten out these errors, and thus we have his
words spoken during the Sermon on the Mount.
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