Moses commanded that such a woman must be stoned to death is literally “Moses commanded us to stone such ones.” The Greek phrase “such ones” is feminine and so equivalent to “such women” (New English Bible); Revised Standard Version translates merely “such” and Moffatt “such creatures.” Good News Translation shifts to the singular for the sake of English style. Whether one chooses singular or plural, it should be indicated that “such” refers to women. The command “to stone” such women was a command to put them to death, and Good News Translation makes this clear. Jerusalem Bible does the same, “to condemn women like this to death by stoning.” There may be a complication involved in combining the phrases In our Law and Moses commanded, for in a sense Moses also gave the Law. Therefore it may be necessary to translate “When Moses gave us our laws, he commanded us” or “Moses gave a commandment to us in our laws, saying.” Or it may be necessary to state the content of the commandment as direct discourse, for example, “Moses commanded us, You must stone such a woman to death.”

Several translations fill out the question Now, what do you say? Revised Standard Version translates “What do you say about her?”; New English Bible “What do you say about it?”; and New American Bible “What do you have to say about the case?” In this question the pronoun you is emphatic; the questioners are attempting to set Jesus over against Moses. The conjunctive adverb Now is not understood in a temporal sense but as a kind of adversative, for example, “But what do you say?” or “On the other hand, what do you say?”

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on the Gospel of John. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1980. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .