Was she there to beg his forgiveness or to worship him for a cleansing already received?
This was the question that sparked all the Bible study I’ve invested in the subject of Jesus and women over the years. (God may have possibly had something to do with this, as well.) The question was prompted by an ambiguous Bible translation, which resulted in a significant misinterpretation.
One day back in the mid-1990s, I was preparing to teach a children’s Sunday school lesson on the story of the sinful woman in Luke 7:36-50. I was taken aback by a statement in the teacher’s manual that Jesus forgave this woman because she had demonstrated a sufficient amount of sorrow for her sin.
In other words, they thought Jesus was saying, “Give her some space, Simon. This woman is working hard at proving to me that she is sorry for her pitiful life. If she grovels long enough and with enough conviction, I’ll forgive her.” (Read More)
