diff --git a/build.xml b/build.xml
index 6f35bf1..46971d5 100644
--- a/build.xml
+++ b/build.xml
@@ -36,7 +36,8 @@
 
   <property name="maven.deploy.goal" value="org.apache.maven.plugins:maven-gpg-plugin:1.1:sign-and-deploy-file" />
   
-  <property name="compiler.source" value="1.8" />
+  <property name="compiler.release" value="8" />
+  <property name="compiler.source" value="1.${compiler.release}" />
   <property name="compiler.target" value="${compiler.source}" />
 
   <target name="init">
@@ -76,6 +77,7 @@
           debug="on"
           classpath="@{classpath}"
           includeantruntime="false"
+          release="${compiler.release}"
           source="${compiler.source}"
           target="${compiler.target}"
           >
diff --git a/junit.changes b/junit.changes
index 2b89d67..81e3596 100644
--- a/junit.changes
+++ b/junit.changes
@@ -1,3 +1,10 @@
+-------------------------------------------------------------------
+Thu Sep 21 07:53:02 UTC 2023 - Fridrich Strba <fstrba@suse.com>
+
+- Let ant build with --release 8 if the compiler knows that option.
+  This allows us to avoid incompatible exception declarations
+  in ObjectInputStream.GetField.get(String,Object) in java >= 20
+
 -------------------------------------------------------------------
 Thu Mar 23 17:18:10 UTC 2023 - Fridrich Strba <fstrba@suse.com>
 
diff --git a/junit.spec b/junit.spec
index 1dc2af3..10ec989 100644
--- a/junit.spec
+++ b/junit.spec
@@ -110,7 +110,7 @@ class test {
 
 }
 EOF
-javac -cp %{buildroot}/%{_javadir}/%{name}.jar test.java
+javac -source 8 -target 8 -cp %{buildroot}/%{_javadir}/%{name}.jar test.java
 java -cp %{buildroot}/%{_javadir}/%{name}.jar: test 2>&1 | \
    grep 'Exception in thread "main" java.lang.AssertionError: Hello world from junit'