Once the case has been decided, they take him out to stone him. The stoning place was outside the court [area], as it is stat-ed: Take out the blasphemer. One [man] stands at the courthouse door with flags in his hand, and [another] man sits astride a horse at a distance from him within his sight. [If] someone says, “I have grounds for his acquittal,” that one waves the flags and the horse runs and halts him. Even if he says, “I have grounds for my own acquittal,” they return him, even four or five times, as long as there is substance to his words. [If] they found an argument for his acquittal, they acquit him; if not, he goes out to be stoned. A proclamation goes out before him: So-and-so the son of so-and-so is going out to be stoned be-cause he transgressed such-and-such a prohibition, and so-and-so and so-and-so are his witnesses. Whoever knows any grounds for his acquittal should come forward and present them.

[When] he was approximately ten cubits from the stoning place, they say to him, “Confess, as it is the practice of those who are executed to confess, because anyone who confesses has a share in the World to Come.” For so we find concerning Achan, that Joshua said to him: My son, please give honor to the God of Israel and render confession to him, etc. And Achan answered Joshua and said: I have sinned ... thus [have I done], etc. From where do we know that his confession brought him atonement? Because it says: And Joshua said, “Why have you troubled us? Hashem shall trouble you on this day” —- on this day you are troubled, but you will not be troubled in the World to Come. If he does not know how to confess, they said to him, “Say: Let my death by an atonement for all my sins.” R’ Yehudah says: If he knows that he is the victim of a plot, he should say, “Let my death be an atonement for all my sins except for this one.” They said to him: If so, everyone will say so in order to clear himself.

When he was four cubits from the stoning place, they removed his clothing. They cover a man in front, and a woman [both] in front and back; [these are] the words of R’ Yehudah. But the Sages say: A man is stoned unclothed but a woman is not stoned unclothed.

The stoning place was elevated twice the height [of a man]. One of the witnesses shoves him by his hips; [if] he falls onto his chest, he is turned onto his hips. If he dies from this, it is sufficient; if not, the second [witness] takes the stone and throws it upon his chest. If he dies from this, it is sufficient; if not, his stoning is by all of Israel, as it is stated: The hand of the witness-es shall be upon him first to put him to death, and the hand of the entire nation afterward.  All those who are stoned are hanged; [these are] the words of R’ Eliezer. The Sages say: No one is hanged except for the blasphemer and the idolater. A man is hanged facing the people, and a woman facing the gibbet; [these are] the words of R’ Eliezer. But the Sages say: A man is hanged but a woman is not hanged. Said R’ Eliezer to them: Did not Shimon ben Shatach hang women in Ashkelon? They said to him: He hanged eighty women, and one may not try [even] two in one day.  How do they hang him? They sink a post into the ground, with a beam protruding from it. He places his two hands one upon the other, and hangs him. R’ Yose says: The post is leaned against the wall, and he hangs him in the way that butchers do it.   They release him im-mediately. If he is left overnight, this constitutes a transgression of a negative commandment, as it is stated: And you shall not leave his body hanging overnight for you shall bury him on that day, for one who is hanged is [like] a curse to Hashem, etc.; that is to say, why was this person hanged? Because he blasphemed Hashem; thus the name of Hashem is profaned.

Said R’ Meir: At a time when a person suffers, what expression does the Shechinah use? So to speak, “I am burdened by my head; I am burdened by my arm.” If the Omnipresent is pained so for the blood of the wicked which is spilled, how much more so for the blood of the righteous.  Not only this, but anyone who leaves his deceased [relative] overnight trans-gresses a negative commandment. If he left him overnight for the sake of his honor, in order to bring him a casket or shrouds, he does not transgress. They do not bury him in his ancestral plot. Rather, there were two cemeteries set aside for the court; one for those who were beheaded or strangled, and one for those who were stoned or burned.

[When] the flesh has decomposed, they gather the bones and bury them in their place. The relatives come to inquire after the welfare of the judges and the witnesses, as if to say: We have nothing in our hearts against you, because you have judged correctly. They do not mourn, but they grieve, for grieving is only in the heart.

Four executions were given to the courts: stoning, burning, beheading, and strangulation. R’ Shimon says: Burning, stoning, strangulation, and beheading. This is the procedure for those who are stoned.

[This is] the procedure for those who are burned: They place him in manure up to his knees, and place a coarse scarf inside a soft one and wind it around his neck. This one pulls toward himself and this one pulls toward himself until he opens his mouth. One melts a bar [of lead] and pours it into his mouth; and it descends into his bowels and burns his intestines. R’ Yehudah says: If he dies in their hands they have not fulfilled the commandment of burning. Rather, they force open his mouth with tongs; one melts the bar and pours it into his mouth, and it descends into his bowels and burns his intestines. Said R’ Elazar ben Tzadok: It once occurred with the daughter of a Kohen that she committed adultery, and they surrounded her with bundles of branches and burned her. They said to him: Because the court at that time was not expert.

[This is] the procedure for those who are beheaded: They decapitate him with a sword, in the manner in which the government does. R’ Yehudah says: This is a disgrace. Rather, they place his head on a block and cut it off with an axe. They said to him: There is no more disgraceful manner of death than this.  [This is] the procedure for those who are strangled: They place him in manure up to his knees, and place a coarse scarf inside a soft one and wind it around his neck. This one pulls toward himself and this one pulls toward himself until his life departs.

These are the ones who are stoned: one who cohabits with his mother, or his father’s wife, or [his] daughter-in-law, or with a male, or an animal, or a woman who brings an animal [upon herself]; a blasphemer, an idolater, one who offers of his children to Molech, a practitioner of Ov or a Yidoni; one who desecrates the Sabbath; one who curses his father or mother; one who cohabits with a betrothed naarah; one who instigates [an individual to idolatry], one who leads astray [an entire town], a sorcerer, and a ben sorer umoreh.  One who cohabits with [his] mother is liable for [having transgressed the prohibitions of] a mother and a father’s wife. R’ Yehudah says: He is liable only for a mother. One who cohabits with his fa-ther’s wife is liable for a father’s wife and for adultery, both during his father’s lifetime and after his death, whether she was betrothed or married. One who cohabits with his daughter-in-law is liable for his daughter-in-law and for adultery, both during his son’s lifetime and after his death, whether she was betrothed or married.  One who cohabits with [another] man, or an animal, and a woman who brings an animal [upon herself]: If the person sinned, what did the animal sin? But because a person came to disaster through it, Scripture said that it should be stoned. In addition, so that it should not occur that the animal passes in the street and people say, “This is the one through whom so-and-so was stoned.”