Jesus Challenge to the Death Penalty

Many christians have understood this story as representing jesus challenge to the death penalty. Many popular conception that it is an illustration of the way that we should refrain from judging other people's sins. To argue that would be to prove far too much, denying the legitimacy of judicial actions. Within the old testament, the person who cast a stone was making a self maledictory judgment,. declaring that if they were guilty of false or unjust witness, the same judgment would come back upon them. The command of the law was that the witnesses should be the first to cast stones in such an execution.