Matthew Poole and continuators on John 8:5

5 Now Moses in the law commanded us, that such should be stoned : but what sayest thou ?

Moses in the Law, Lev. 20.10. commanded, that such Malefactors should be put to death; but we read of no Law commanding this kind of death. And their Rule was, that when the Law had set no kind of death for an Offence, there the mildest kind of death was to be their Punishment, which they counted Strangling to be: But they ordinarily entituled Moses to their Traditional Additions tothe Law; & death being commanded by the Law, as the Punishment of such Offenders, they took themselves to be at liberty to determine the kind of death, as Prudence, and reason of State ruled them; so as probably, they seeing that that sin grew very frequent amongst them, they appointed Stoning to be the kind of death such Malafactors should be put to. The manner of which we are told was this: The Guilty Person was to be carried up to some High Places, and thrown down from thence headlong by such as Witnessed against him; then they threw stones at him till they had killed him (if not killed by the fall); or covered him, if he were dead. This they tell our Saviour Moses commanded, because he had commanded in the general, that such a Person should dye; and their Sanhedrim had determined this particular death to such Malefactors:

But they would know what our Saviour said to this.

Marginal references: Deut. 2[illegible: 1 letter].22.