Journalist A.J. Jacobs spent a year stoning adulterers, wearing white, not sitting on certain seats, and growing a beard - all according to the strict laws set down in the Bible.

Month Three: November

They shall be stoned with stones, their blood shall be upon them.

—LEVITICUS 20:27

Day 62.

It’s been more than a month since my mixed- fiber adventure.Time for me to tackle the second item on my list of Most Perplexing Laws: capital punishment.

The Hebrew scriptures prescribe a tremendous amount of capital punishment. Think Saudi Arabia, multiply by Texas, then triple that. It wasn’t just for murder. You could also be executed for adultery, blasphemy, breaking the Sabbath, perjury, incest, bestiality, and witchcraft, among others. A rebellious son could be sentenced to death. As could a son who is a persistent drunkard and glutton.

The most commonly mentioned punishment method in the Hebrew Bible is stoning. So I figure, at the very least, I should try to stone. But how?

I can’t tell you the number of people who have suggested that I get adulterers and blasphemers stoned in the cannabis sense. Which is an interesting idea. But I haven’t smoked pot since I was at Brown University, when I wrote a paper for my anthropology class on the hidden symbolism of bong hits. (Brown was the type of college where this paper actually earned a B+.)

Instead I figured my loophole would be this: The Bible doesn’t specify the size of the stones. So . . . pebbles.

A few days ago, I gathered a handful of small white pebbles from Central Park, which I stuffed in my back pants pocket. Now all I needed were some victims. I decided to start with Sabbath breakers. That’s easy enough to fi nd in this workaholic city. I noticed that a potbellied guy at the Avis down our block had worked on both Saturday and Sunday. So no matter what, he’s a Sabbath breaker.

Here’s the thing, though: Even with pebbles, it is surprisingly hard to stone people.