(avg. read time: 30–59 mins.)
Around this time last year, I posted what I called a medial case for the authenticity of Mark 16:9–20. Naturally, such a case raises questions about the other major block of text thrown into doubt in the eyes of most NT scholars: John 7:53–8:11, the Pericope Adulterae (hereafter, PA). The time has come to finally address it.
You will find in many more recent Bible versions some kind of note about John 7:53–8:11. I have a Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible in the NIV (because that was the earliest version available) that has this note before 7:53: “The earliest manuscripts and many other ancient witnesses do not have John 7:53–8:11. A few manuscripts include these verses, wholly or in part, after John 7:36, John 21:25, Luke 21:38 or Luke 24:53.” You will see similar notes in the ASV, CSB, ESV, HCSB, LEB, NABRE, NASB, NET, NJB, NLT, NRSV, and others (I have not even looked at Bible translations in other languages at this point). In support of such notes, Craig Keener, my dissertation reader, said in the notes of my version of the NIV: “As noted in the bracketed NIV text, this passage is missing in most of the oldest manuscripts. It also interrupts the flow of the Gospel’s thought and uses language missing in the rest of the Gospel (such as “the teachers of the law,” a phrase common in the Synoptics but absent in John).” This reflects what he wrote in his commentary:
First of all, its textual history is suspect; one would hardly expect so many early manuscripts to omit such an important story about Jesus were it in their text….
Second, it includes elements of non-Johannine vocabulary, some of them significant (“scribes” appear only here, and its language is closer to that of the Synoptics). The passage also bears more resemblance to the briefer Synoptic controversy stories than the normal story in John, though by itself this would not constitute grounds for dismissal. Finally, it seriously interrupts the flow of thought in John’s narrative. For example, Tabernacles motifs, especially Siloam, continue in 8:12–9:7; one could argue that they would lose little symbolism occurring the day after that feast, but it seems that very few people in the crowded temple in 8:20 have gone home. Granted, scribes may have seen in this context an apt location for the pericope due to Jesus’ discussion of sin (8:21, 24, 34, 46); yet if this story originally did precede that discussion, it may seem curious that no allusion is made to it, in contrast to a somewhat less public event in 5:1–9 to which subsequent allusions appear (5:16, 20; 7:21, 23).1
Similarly, Ben Witherington III, my doctoral mentor, writes:
While these verses are present in most of the medieval Greek manuscripts, they are absent from almost all the early Greek manuscripts of the Gospel of John, with the exception of the Western manuscript D, which is idiosyncratic in other respects as well. These verses are also absent from the earliest Coptic and Syriac Gospels and from many other old manuscripts (Old Latin, Old Georgian, and Armenian ones). The testimony of the church fathers is even more striking. None of them comment on these verses, even when they are making comments seriatim on the Gospel of John—they skip from John 7:52 to 8:12 in such commentaries. None of the Eastern (including Greek) fathers mention the passage before the tenth century A.D. Furthermore, while some manuscripts place these verses after John 7:52, others place them after John 7:44; John 7:36; John 21:25; and even after Luke 21:38. The text of the Gospel reads quite smoothly if one skips from 7:52 to 8:12. The reference to some going home in 7:53 does not fit the context. In short, it was a free-floating tradition, and conservative scribes were looking for a place to insert it into the Gospel text.2
Another point he adds later during his summary prior to direct commentary on the text is that “Even many of the manuscripts that do include mark them off with asterisks or obelisks indicating strong doubt about their authenticity and right to be placed in this Gospel.”3 These same points are made by George R. Beasley-Murray in his Word Biblical Commentary.4
Raymond Brown says in his landmark commentary:
This passage is not found in any of the important early Greek textual witnesses of Eastern provenance (e.g., in neither Bodmer papyrus); nor is it found in the OS or the Coptic. There are no comments on this passage by the Greek writers on John of the 1st Christian millennium, and it is only from ca. 900 that it begins to appear in the standard Greek text. The evidence for the passage as Scripture for the early centuries is confined to the Western Church. It appears in some OL texts of the Gospels. Ambrose and Augustine wanted it read as part of the Gospel, and Jerome included it in the Vulgate. It appears in the fifth-century Greco-Latin Codex Bezae….
The Greek text of the story shows a number of variant readings (stemming from the fact that it was not fully accepted at first), but in general the style is not Johannine either in vocabulary or grammar. Stylistically, the story is more Lucan than Johannine….
A more certain explanation for the localization of the story in the general context of John vii and viii can be found in the fact that it illustrates certain statements of Jesus in those chapters, for example, viii 15, “I pass judgment on no one”; viii 46, “Can any of you convict me of sin?” Derrett, p. 1, who thinks that the key of the story lies in the unworthiness of the accusers and the witnesses, points out that the theme of the admissibility of evidence comes up in the immediate context of vii 51 and viii 13.5
Rudolf Schnackenburg makes many of these same points that we will pass over quoting the details of, which leads him to say, “from the point of view of textual criticism it is certain that the pericope does not belong to the original form of John.”6 Marianne Meye Thompson is quite close to Brown’s commentary until this point at which she extends the argument:
Its varied placement—after John 7:36; 7:44; or 21:25; or even after Luke 21:38 (in f13)—suggests that it had no fixed place in transmission. Where the passage does appear in ancient manuscripts, it is often marked with asterisks or other notations, indicating that the copyists who included the account knew of its problematic textual status. Although the passage does appear in a number of manuscripts—and thus became part of the Vulgate, the Byzantine text, the critical Textus Receptus and translations based on it, such as the KJV—it is not part of the Gospel of John as it was first circulated but was introduced into it at some later point.
Stylistically, the passage is unlike the rest of the Gospel. For example, only here does John refer to “scribes” (8:3), and only here is Jesus addressed as “teacher” (didaskale, 8:4; elsewhere, didaskale is given as the translation of “rabbi”: 1:38; 20:16). The passage is somewhat intrusive, interrupting the flow of Jesus’ discourse in the temple at the Feast of Tabernacles, and it does little to inform the discourses of Jesus at this point or the complaint against him. It is strangely disconnected from both what immediately precedes (the skepticism over Jesus’ status, in 7:40–52) and what follows (Jesus’ declaration of himself as the light of the world, in 8:12).
Probably this self-contained pericope was inserted here because (1) it pictures Jesus as teaching in the temple, the setting of the discourses delivered at Tabernacles (chs. 7–8); (2) it serves as an instance of “judging with right judgment,” demonstrating Jesus’ refusal to enforce a law with which he does not explicitly disagree (cf. 7:22–24); (3) it may illustrate Nicodemus’s point that the law does not judge without first giving someone a hearing (7:51); and/or (4) it anticipates Jesus’ assertion ‘I judge no one’ (8:15).7
After noting similar manuscript evidence to the others, D. A. Carson writes:
All the early church Fathers omit this narrative: in commenting on John, they pass immediately from John 7:52 to 8:12. No Eastern Father cites the passage before the tenth century. Didymus the Blind (a fourth-century exegete from Alexandria) reports a variation of this narrative, not the narrative as we have it here. Moreover, a number of (later) manuscripts that include the narrative mark it off with asterisks or obeli, indicating hesitation as to its authenticity, while those that include it display a rather high frequency of textual variants. Although most of the manuscripts that include the story place it here … some place it instead after Luke 21:38, and other witnesses variously place it after John 7:44; John 7:36; or John 21:25. The diversity of placement confirms the inauthenticity of these verses. Finally, even if someone should decide that the material is authentic, it would be very difficult to justify the view that the materially is authentically Johannine: there are numerous expressions and constructions that are found nowhere in John, but which are characteristic of the Synoptic Gospels, Luke in particular…8
And so on we could go with commentators on John. Of course, as with the ending of Mark, the commentators tend to reuse the arguments of Bruce Metzger.9 There is some tension among these commentators as to whether the PA is clearly out of place where it is or if it is placed where it is because the supposed later author thought it fit best here. Either way, the PA is thus stuck in a “heads I win, tails you lose” situation. Still, what all of these commentators agree on is that the PA is inauthentic.
What, then, should we say about the PA? Some, like Daniel Wallace, have insisted that the case against the authenticity of this text is so strong that we ought to excise it from the Bible altogether. In this view, this is simply removing what should not have been there in the first place. Most scholars (as far as I have seen), think it is not authentic to the Gospel of John, but they also think that it should be kept in Scripture for some reason, usually having to do with how the majority of the Church for the majority of history has had the PA in their Bibles. This is not usually decisive for other text-critical decisions they make or support, where they will often favor minority readings against majority ones, but it is what it is. Some others, myself included, think that the PA belongs where it does, even if the transmission history thereof is certainly peculiar, and that we need not treat it as second-class Scripture or Scripture with asterisks.
As with Mark 16:9–20, I will be making a “medial” case for the authenticity of the PA. This is distinguished from whatever one might think is a “minimal” case (e.g., only reviewing evidence from the first three or four hundred years of Christian history or only Greek texts from that time) and from something better approximating a “maximal” case reviewing the evidence more comprehensively.10 My scope will be restricted to the Greek manuscripts (so without consideration of the Old Latin, the Palestinian Aramaic lectionary, and so on) before the year 1000 (more specifically, ones that I could personally verify), simply to have a nice round cutoff date, and to witnesses among the Church Fathers and other teachers before 1000 whose works are readily available online. To make my case, I will first examine the external evidence, including evidence for the placement to see what kind of support there really is for the notion that this text was “free-floating” for centuries, as well as other claims that have been made. Second, I will consider internal evidence and rebut overconfident claims made against this text. Finally, I will turn to the matter of what the best explanation is for the complicated textual history of this pericope.
External Evidence
Manuscripts
First, let us begin with a snapshot of the Greek evidence provided by Maurice Robinson, who has researched the textual evidence more extensively than anybody else. By his count, there are 1,495 continuous-text manuscripts of John that contain some or all of the PA, 495 lectionary mss containing some portion of the PA (usually 8:3–11), 268 continuous-text mss lacking the PA, and 677 lectionary mss that could have contained the PA but did not.11 The balance of sheer numbers is not so hilariously tilted as it was in the case of Mark 16:9–20, but still 84.8% of continuous-text Greek mss include the PA and 42.2% of relevant lectionary mss include the text. We will not be looking at versional evidence, but it is more complicated. Also, our scope for this medial case will mean that the vast, vast majority of these manuscripts will be excluded. That includes both manuscripts that feature the PA and those that do not.
But before we lay out the manuscripts and other witnesses, it is important to clarify some points that often get obscured, whether by the notes like the NIV example noted above or by scholars. One, a common point made that we noted in the Mark 16 analysis is that “manuscripts should be weighed, not counted.” This is, of course, true, but the way many apply it is not so much to look for multiple, independent lines of attestation, which is what the principle really means. Rather, they treat it as if some manuscripts just matter that much more than others, so that, in the case of Mark 16, two manuscripts from before the year 1000 “outweigh” well over 100 witnesses (only counting those I could confirm) of various kinds and locales from before the year 1000 (not to mention the many, many more after that cutoff). Unfortunately, it all too often is that way with the Nestle-Aland text that is the basis for most modern translations. Robinson notes that NA27/28 sides with readings that have only one noted Greek witness in thirty-three cases, two noted Greek witnesses in eighty-eight cases, and three noted Greek witnesses in 210 cases, as well as two instances (in Acts 16:12 and 2 Pet 3:10) where there is no Greek attestation.12 While the case from multiple lines of external evidence is not as overwhelmingly strong for the PA as for the ending of Mark, I will show that it is better than the common impression would have it.
Two, something should be said about the reliance on the “earliest” manuscripts. On the one hand, we will see later that the argument against the PA’s authenticity is in some tension with the reliance on later texts for making the claim about its inauthenticity based on how it was supposedly “free-floating.” On the other hand, the earliest texts are not always of better quality than later texts. Gregory Lanier counteracts this common assumption well in his chapter in Myths and Mistakes in New Testament Textual Criticism.13 After all, late witnesses, including those beyond our scope, have demonstrably preserved early readings. And the early texts extant today were not the only ones around in those days. They tend to come from Egypt, where the climate is more conducive to the extra-long-term survival of mss, especially for texts made of papyrus.
Three, much like the misleading multiplication of endings of Mark, notes like those from the NIV are misleading in how they suggest how viable the argument is for different placements of the text of the PA. It should be noted that our restricting of the scope to manuscripts before 1000 means that there will be no witnesses in the following lists that move the text after 7:36 (MSS 225 and 1128, the only witnesses I know of with such placement, were written in the 12th century). The placement after 7:44 is only cited as appearing in some Georgian manuscripts. The number of Greek witnesses to its placement after 21:25 is also reduced, since most members of the stream of texts dubbed “Family 1”—MSS 1, 22, 118, 131, 205, 209, 1278, and 2886—were written after 1000 (this also applies to 20, 1141, and 2900, which place the PA here). The attestation of its presence after Luke 21:38 was already restricted to one stream of texts dubbed “Family 13,” but those texts are also excluded by our parameters (namely, the texts are MSS 13, 69, 124, 346, 543, 788, 826, 828, and 983; 1689 is also part of this family, but it features the PA at the traditional position). There is literally only one manuscript that has 8:3–11 (not the whole PA) appearing after the end of Luke or between Luke and John, which is MS 1333. It is also excluded, as it was written in the 1000s. But that manuscript is significant for reasons that will become clearer later in that it says above the text of 8:3–11 that it is to be read on October 8th for the feast of St. Pelagia of Antioch. Moreover, it identifies that text as coming from John.
To be clear, my cutoff date is not meant to indicate some value judgment about manuscripts after 1000; it is simply a nice round cutoff. But remember this: if anyone tries to convince you that earlier is necessarily better, and thus that later is worse, and those same people try to tell you that John 7:53–8:11 was some kind of free-floating text, their entire case is built primarily on late texts. Those texts do hint at what characterized some earlier texts, but the claim assigns a lot of weight to a few much later texts and relatively little weight to an overwhelming amount of representatives across history.
As it stands, we have a few witnesses to the placement of the PA after John 21:25 that fall in our parameters, which are all minuscules from the 10th century: 135, 564, 1076, 1078, 1582, 2193. These six manuscripts, the last two of which are part of Family 1, are interesting, but they are outliers, being indicative of a secondary development in the placement of manuscripts. Even so, they indicate something significant about why this text was moved, just like MS 1333.
The external evidence is stronger for the PA being excluded from the Gospel of John before 1000 than for it appearing after John 21:25, but it is not necessarily all it is cracked up to be. We first need to distinguish between those manuscripts that more definitively attest to the text’s absence from their version of John from those that lack it but could possibly have had it once somewhere else, if we are not to discount the notion of it being a “free-floating” text outright. Let us first list the latter category and then we will explore what we mean in these cases.
Papyri (2): P66 (2nd or more often 3rd), P75 (2nd or more often 3rd)
Uncials (2): N (6th), 0250 (7th/8th)
Minuscule (1): 565 (9th)
The testimony of the papyri is often relied on for declarations of what early witnesses said. Indeed, John is the text with the most extant papyri witnesses of any NT text. But of the nineteen or twenty (depending on when P122 is dated) papyri that are confidently dated before the earliest manuscript featuring the PA, only these two feature the relevant portion of text from chs. 7 and 8. Still, the value of their testimony in adjudicating the PA is limited. It is true that they do not feature the PA at the location of 7:53–8:11, but if we are to take seriously the idea that this was a “floating” text, we cannot definitively say that they did not feature the PA elsewhere. The relevant portion of John 21 is not preserved in these texts, and they are otherwise incomplete, so we do not know that the PA did not appear elsewhere. I myself am not inclined to think the PA did appear in these manuscripts, but I want to be clear that we cannot necessarily speak definitively on this point, and I would think those who think the text was a “free-floating” story should be willing to grant this possibility, if their hypothesis is to have any merit. The same applies to Codex Petropolitanus Purpureus (N) and 0250, but it should be noted that 0250 is not a normal continuous text anyway. MS 565 omits the PA at its usual location, but it may have been at the end of the Gospel after a note that is currently at the damaged part (which would have made it the earliest witness to this placement). The note is similar to others that featured the text at the end of the Gospel, and so it also appears to have been included there in the manuscript(s) the scribe was working from.
Now here are the witnesses that we can more confidently say lacked the text altogether.
Uncials (15): א (4th), B (4th), A (5th), C (5th), T (5th), W (5th), 0211 (7th), Le^ (8th), Ψ (8th/9th), Δ^ (9th), Θ (9th), Y (9th), Fe (9th/10th), X (10th), 0141 (10th)
Minuscules (9): 33 (9th), 63 (10th), 106 (10th), 151 (10th), 584 (10th), 773 (10th), 2768 (10th), 2907 (10th)
There are two manuscripts here that are confidently dated before the earliest manuscript witness of the PA, as well as four others that are in the vicinity. Again, I am not saying that earliest is best, but that is the evidence as we have it. But even here, there is some complication. A and C are missing the text and its surrounding portions, but it is concluded based on spacing calculations that they would not have been able to include the PA where the text is missing (A is missing 6:50–8:52 and C is missing 7:3–8:34). The texts with a ^ symbol are witnesses that nevertheless offer indirect testimony for the PA’s presence in predecessors. Both Le and Δ have blank spaces left for the text, which tells us that the PA was in one or more mss the scribes were using, as they were aware of it. MS 565 sort of straddles the line I have drawn between these types of witnesses, but I have already commented on it above. Although scholars tend to note complicating factors for witnesses that could be cited in favor of the PA, they do not often note these issues.
Now let us consider the manuscripts that include the PA or some portion thereof (due to fragmentation of the manuscript) in its traditional place:
Uncials (16): D (5th), 047 (8th), 0233 (8th) Ee* (8th), Fe (9th)[the last two verses, as there is a lacuna here], Ge (9th), He (9th), Ke (9th), M* (9th), U (9th), V (9th), Λ* (9th), Π* (9th), Ω* (9th), Γ (10th), S* (10th)
Minuscules (54): 461^ (9th), 892 (9th), 1143 (9th), 2224 (9th), 399* (9th/10th), 1424^ (9th/10th), 14 (10th), 24 (10th), 27 (10th), 29 (10th), 34* (10th), 100 (10th), 144 (10th), 161 (10th), 262* (10th), 274 (10th), 299 (10th), 338 (10th), 364 (10th), 371 (10th), 411 (10th), 478 (10th), 481 (10th), 568 (10th), 652 (10th), 771 (10th), 875 (10th), 942 (10th), 1077 (10th), 1079 (10th), 1110 (10th), 1120 (10th), 1166 (10th), 1172 (10th), 1203 (10th), 1223 (10th), 1225 (10th), 1281 (10th), 1392 (10th), 1421 (10th), 1426 (10th), 1452 (10th), 1458 [includes 7:53–8:2, but not 8:3–11] (10th), 1507 (10th), 1816 (10th), 2324 (10th), 2369 (10th), 2414* (10th), 2545 (10th), 2812 (10th), 2860 (10th), 2929* (10th), 2937 (10th), 2939 (10th)14
The texts marked with a ^ symbol are two examples from our timeframe that have the PA in the margin nearest where it traditionally appeared. In the case of MS 1424, it has a note accompanying it that it is not in some manuscripts, but it is in the ancient ones. The move to the margin appears to be for easier reading going from 7:52 to 8:12. After all, the lection for Pentecost tended to involve John 7:37–52 (or some portion thereof) with 8:12 as its conclusion. We have already seen that others moved the text elsewhere, and, at least for some, this was for the purpose of not interrupting the Pentecost lection (others who followed the mss in question may have simply done so because their exemplar placed it at the given location).
Texts marked with * feature some symbol(s) around the text that I could confirm. But these need to be broken down further. Codex Basilensis (Ee) does not mark 7:53–8:11 with all the same symbols. The start of 7:53 features a “jump/skip” symbol, which is an instruction for a lector, not a scribe, to skip ahead to 8:12 for the reading (where there is a “restart/resume” symbol). The asterisks do not begin until 8:2, and they then appear in the margins until 8:11, which is followed by the aforementioned “restart” symbol and a telos/“end” symbol appears at the end of 8:12 to signify that it is the end of the reading (the same symbol appears on the next page at the end of 8:20 and at various other places in the manuscript). A + symbol appears near the beginning of 8:3, which is the same symbol that appears near the beginning of 7:37 and before Jesus begins to speak in 8:12. All of this raises the question of why, if the asterisks are, by very nature, supposed to signify a text being suspect, they begin at 8:2 and not at 7:53. (For color images, see the pages here, here, and here; see the manuscript more generally here)
Codex Tishendorfianus III (Λ) is similar to Basilensis, but the jump symbol is at the beginning of 8:3, where the asterisks also begin, whereas the “restart” symbol is at the beginning of Jesus’s speech in 8:12, rather than the start of the sentence. (See the pages here, here, and here; more generally, see here.) There is also a note about how it is missing from some manuscripts but it is present in ancient witnesses (cf. MS 262). Codex Petropolitanus (Π) is lacunose after 8:6, but it includes the text up to that point with asterisks beginning at 8:3.
Codex Campianus (M) is not as frequently marked as E, but it features the same jump symbol at the end of 7:52 (albeit faintly), and then it features asterisks here and at the beginning of 8:12, where it is accompanied by a “restart” symbol. There is also a + symbol along with a large capital at the beginning of 8:3 (as well as in the margin opposite from the other markings at the end of 7:52). A similar large capital appears at the beginning of Jesus’s speech in 8:12 (but not the start of the sentence as a whole).
Codex Vaticanus 354 (S) does feature obeli next to this entire pericope, the same markings it has next to John 5:4. This does appear to be a case of using symbols to indicate something textually suspect. The same can be said for Codex Athous Dionysiou (Ω), as well as MS 34 (where there is a note to this effect). (Fun fact: these mss feature Mark 16:9–20 without such markings.)
MS 399 has most of the text marked in the margins. I say “most” because the marks appear in the margins for the entirety of one page, which covers about the last half of 8:1 to the end of the passage, and the last line contains the first part of 8:12 as well. The end of 8:12 is marked with a telos symbol like we have seen elsewhere (with the beginning of the reading being at 7:45). The obelus marks here are not the same as what one sees for John 5:4 (where they are asterisks).
MSS 2414 and 2929 have the simplest markings. The first has a single asterisk near the start of the passage without any clear indication of what it means. The second only features a “jump” symbol at 7:53 and a beginning symbol at 8:12.
In summary, among our manuscripts from the time we are considering, we have a total of 105 mss where I could confirm the contents. Of those, 66.7% feature the PA or some portion in its traditional spot, 22.9% can be confidently stated to have not include the PA at all, 4.8% may or may not have included it somewhere but do not currently feature it in what is extant, and 5.7% include it after John 21:25. Our primary candidates for its traditional placement and its complete absence are represented by texts of diverse lineages, although the majority of texts in both categories are considered “Byzantine,” which should be evidence enough that the majority of mss often regarded as belonging to such a body of texts do not constitute a monolith, as they are often treated (particularly in the NA apparatus). What is further curious about this is that commentators should so often state how we have no evidence of the text in the East until the tenth century and yet that it should already predominate the “Byzantine” texts.
It is also peculiar how Bezae is treated. I do not put any extreme weight on its testimony, but those who put such weight on its unique Greek reading of the participle in Mark 1:41 (as Bart Ehrman is wont to do) will then turn around and devalue it when it comes to this text. Scholars will also rely on generalized characterizations of Bezae as having an apparent tendency to add to its text. But this is built almost entirely on the fact that the “Western” text of Acts is longer than the “Eastern” text(s) (see here for an introduction to this issue). But as a matter of fact, there are plenty of instances in which it presents a shorter reading, and as my aforementioned link briefly notes, it sometimes represents texts in Acts known to more ancient teachers. Regardless, it is still a testimony that earlier texts the scribe used featured the PA, as the other manuscripts attest that their exemplars did not feature the PA.
Lectionaries
Unlike with my Mark analysis, this time I have foregone even a pitiful list of lectionaries that I could verify like I did last time. I am thus unsure how many of the lectionaries noted in Robinson’s tabulation are from before the year 1000. But in any case, since placement is one of the major issues raised about its authenticity, lectionary texts cannot help us in this regard. They can only help with determining whether or not a text was included in the lectionary cycle, and this one clearly was in many cases. Specifically, the text was typically included as part of lectionary liturgy assigned to fixed dates, or the Menologion (as opposed to the cycle of readings associated with the movable dates of the seasons like Advent, Christmas, Lent, Easter, and Pentecost). As indicated above, one occasion it was often read for (particularly in the Byzantine liturgy) was on October 8 for the feast of St. Pelagia of Antioch.
Church Fathers and Teachers
Now we must consider the Early Church Fathers and later teachers. And here, we should be more careful than Metzger and his followers have been. The mere absence of reference is not necessarily suggestive. Christian teachers whose works are not entirely extant were under no obligation to cite every text in their extant works (or even in their non-extant ones). People will find whatever significance they want in the fact that Origen’s fragmentary commentary on John never quotes from this text, although his direct commentary on the relevant portion of the surrounding text in both chs. 7 and 8 is no longer extant. Plenty of others never reference the text, but the sheer absence says nothing for or against the text. We cannot assign any great weight to the frequently made statement of how Eastern fathers did not cite or comment on the text without any frame of reference for when they were supposed to have done so and did not. How many extant Eastern commentaries on John are there from before the year 1000 at all? Unfortunately, we are never told. There certainly are some that I note below, but these are from well before the tenth century. So what complete or pertinently extant commentaries in the centuries-long gap are there that do not feature this text?
It should be noted, though, that some absences are more significant than others. John Chrysostom left a seemingly complete set of homilies on the Gospel of John, but he left 7:53–8:11 without comment, as in Homily 52 he skipped from 7:52 to 8:12. Likewise, Cyril of Alexandria has a commentary on John wherein all the pertinent commentary is extant, and he skips from 7:52 to 8:12 (this also applies to Theodore of Mopsuestia’s commentary). Nonnus of Panopolis produced a paraphrase of John that contains no hint of 7:53–8:11. Still, we are lacking a direct argument from any teacher in this area against the authenticity of the text. But it would not be surprising if the manuscripts these authors used lacked the text.
On the other hand, here, in rough chronological order, are the witnesses who reference the PA:
Did. apost. 7 (summary with a partial quotation of 8:10–11);
Pacian of Barcelona, Ep. 3.39 (alludes to a clearly textual story);
Ambrosiaster, Quaestiones Veteris et Noui Testamenti 102.1 (allusion to the story in general);
Const. ap. 2.24;
Ambrose of Milan, Ep. 26, esp. 11–20 (extensively quoted; maybe the earliest example of something resembling a running commentary on the text and he notes how “famous” it is);15 74.6 (citing “go and sin no more”);
Pseudo-Ambrose, Apologia David (Altera)16 1 (refers to the story as a Gospel-reading [euangelli lectio]), 5 (the latter quotes 8:11);
Didymus the Blind, Comm. Eccl. 223.7;
Augustine, Tract. Ev. Jo. 33; Faust. 22.25 (alluding to John 8:6–8); 33.1 (referring to the story as a whole and based on words of Faustus); Incomp. nupt. [On Adulterous Marriages] 2.5, 7, 14;
Jerome, Pelag. 2.17 (quoting 8:6–7, 10–11);
Prosper of Aquitaine, Call of All Nations 1.8;
Peter Chrysologus, Serm. 115;
Sedulius, Carmen Paschale 4;
Leo the Great, Serm. 62.4;
Gelasius, Ep. 100;17
Gregory the Great, Moralia on Job 1.16; 14.3418
Some of these references bear closer examination. The earliest reference from the Didascalia Apostolorum is typically dated to the early third century from Syria. It is extant today only in Syriac. It references the PA as an example of forgiveness, clearly expecting the audience to be familiar with it. According to R. Hugh Connolly’s translation, the relevant part of ch. 7 admonishes the bishops (with the quote in bold):
But if thou receive not him who repents, because thou art without mercy, thou shalt sin against the Lord God; for thou obeyest not our Saviour and our God, to do as He also did with her that had sinned, whom the elders set before Him, and leaving the judgement in His hands, departed. But He, the Searcher of hearts, asked her and said to her: Have the elders condemned thee, my daughter? She saith to him: Nay, Lord. And he said unto her: Go thy way: neither do I condemn thee. In Him therefore, our Saviour and King and God, be your pattern, O bishops, and do you imitate Him, that you may be quiet and meek, and merciful and compassionate, and peacemakers, and without anger, and teachers and correctors and receivers and exhorters; and that you be not wrathful, nor tyrannical; and that you be not insolent, nor haughty, nor boastful.19
The Apostolic Constitutions, which is supposed to be from the same provenance, builds on the Didascalia. These witnesses attest to an awareness in the East of the PA long before the earliest direct Greek manuscript evidence in the West. But to be fair, this reference does not tell us directly about the text of John, only that the story was well known early on one side of the Mediterranean long before the next reference on the other side of the Mediterranean with Pacian.
Ambrose’s references are also noteworthy. The latter text shows by the proximity of references to 8:11 and 12 in the same letter that the PA occupied its traditional place in the ms(s) Ambrose was familiar with. The former text represents the earliest extant running commentary on the PA.
Augustine is noted for his statement in Incomp. nupt. 2.7. He claims that some are so weak in their faith that they scratch out the Lord’s pardon to the adulteress from their books. That is, this story is not featured in their mss for fear of making adultery seem permissible. I have no real interest in defending Augustine’s claim, but I would not be surprised if it happened sometimes in the ancient world. It is difficult for me to get too surprised by how people use Scripture to excuse sins. Conversely, in our own day, it is hardly unheard of for people to simply say that this text or Mark 16:9–20 is inauthentic as a workaround to dealing with the text more straightforwardly when people have questions or raise issues (I was once guilty of this, in fact). Moreover, we can see from Tractate 33 that Augustine found this text in its traditional place..
Jerome in Against the Pelagians notes that the story is present in many Greek and Latin manuscripts of his time, which shows that he is aware that there are others where it is not present. While I have not listed the Vulgate above, it should be noted that Jerome included this text in his Latin translation, and at its traditional location, after he had consulted Greek mss and corrected known Latin readings in light of the Greek where there was a different meaning (see his Preface to the Gospels). Moreover, it is notable that he used what were considered old Greek mss in 383. He was also familiar with mss from multiple locations during his ministries in Rome and Bethlehem.
The distribution of witnesses is not nearly as impressive as the ending of Mark. But it is notable that by the third century a Syrian witness can assume that the story was well known, by the fourth century it was in manuscripts on the other side of the Mediterranean in Spain, and then we see witnesses distributed in France, Italy (largely in Rome), North Africa (where it was known by both Augustine and his Manichean adversary Faustus), Palestine, and, eventually, most Byzantine texts, even before 1000. Jerome in particular attests to how in manuscripts that were old back then he found the PA where he placed it in the Vulgate. We have limited evidence prior to this point of 1000 that it appeared in multiple locations. Its movement to other textual locations is a secondary development.20 The movement seems to be motivated by lectionary concerns so as to make the Pentecost lection involving John 7:37–52 and 8:12 easier. Some of the manuscript markings assisted such purposes while keeping the PA at the location of 7:53–8:11.
Internal Evidence
Vocabulary
Just like with the ending of Mark, the most common internal evidence appealed to against the authenticity of the PA is supposedly non-Johannine vocabulary. Of course, to say that these words are “non-Johannine” is to bias the analysis in the first place. After all, it is assumed that if the external evidence justifies calling the text non-Johannine, then the internal evidence should bear that out, and so the unusual vocabulary is something scholars latch onto for justification. Here are the terms of supposedly “non-Johannine” vocabulary in question:
“Olives” [ἐλαιῶν] (8:1)
ὄρθρος (8:2)
“scribes” [γραμματεῖς] (8:3)
μοιχεία (8:3)
μοιχεύω (8:4)
αὐτόφωρος (8:4)
κύπτω (8:6, 8)
καταγράφω (8:6)21
ἐπιμένω (8:7)
ἀνακύπτω (8:7, 10)
ἀναμάρτητος (8:7)
κατακύπτω (8:8)
“elders” [πρεσβύτεροι] (8:9)
καταλείπω (8:9)
κατακρίνω (8:10, 11)22
That is fifteen words used eighteen times in a text that totals 171 words in NA28. Such a figure is meant to sound shocking, but no context is given. On the one hand, I mean that no context for the use of the words is given. There are plenty of instances in which an author may use a word in only one place or in only one restricted pericope. I defy anyone who makes this argument to answer the following challenge: tell me how many of these words should have been used elsewhere but were not, and, conversely, tell me what words should have been used in their place here if John actually wrote this story. If you cannot reliably answer this, can you admit that this is not a reliable metric of authorship?
Nowhere else does John mention the Mount of Olives, nor adultery, nor Jesus’s stances of straightening up, stooping down, or so on. Where else does John use a phrase like “without sin” that he used completely different words for? John does elsewhere use κρίνω more often, but that is true also of Matthew and Luke, who also use the term here. Speaking of which, sometimes much has been made of the use of the unusual term ὄρθρος to signify time of day, since Luke is the only other author who uses this term in the NT, and this is supposed to be a signal of the Lukan origins of the story.23 And this is because Luke uses the term … a grand total of twice (Luke 24:1; Acts 5:21). Apparently only Luke knew this word. The one I have seen referenced the most in the commentaries is the use of “scribes.” But again, I renew my challenge: tell me where this was absolutely supposed to have been used and it was not. Or are we really supposed to think that “scribes” was not in John’s vocabulary simply because in 15,000+ words with a lot of words repeated frequently (including most of the words used in this story) he did not use it more than once in the best-case scenario?
On the other hand, I mean that no comparison is given for a sense of scale. Consider the examples of John 2:13–22 and 4:1–12 with words listed that appear nowhere else in John.
John 2:13–22:
πωλέω (2:13, 16)
βοῦς (2:14, 15)
κερματιστής (2:14)
φραγγέλιον (2:15)
σχοινίον (2:15)
ἐκχέω (2:15)
κέρμα (2:15)
κολλυβιστής (2:15)
ἀνατρέπω (2:15)
τράπεζα (2:15)
ἐμπόριον (2:16)
ζῆλος (2:17)
κατεσθίω (2:17)
νάος (2:19, 20, 21)
τεσσεράκοντα (2:20)
οἰκοδομέω (2:20)
That is sixteen words used twenty times in a text that totals 168 words in NA28. Anyone dedicated enough to a theory of an attentive interpolator could say that this was a case where he was clever enough to get away with it, unlike where the manuscript tradition supposedly suggests he was sniffed out with the PA. One could also say that many of these words are more common in the Synoptics or Luke specifically. And considering how often scholars find it problematic that a confrontation in the temple complex happens here and not prior to Jesus’s crucifixion, surely this should have been a dead giveaway that it has been inserted here completely out of place. (This is not what I actually think, of course. See my analysis here.)
John 4:1–12
καίτοιγε (4:2)
Samaria [Σαμάρεια] (4:4, 5, 7)
Sychar [Συχάρ] (4:5)
πλησίον (4:5)
χωρίον (4:5)
Jacob [Ἰακώβ] (4:5, 6, 12)
ὁδοιπορία (4:6)
τροφή (4:8)
Samaritan [Σαμαρῖτις] (4:9 [2x])
συγχράομαι (4:9)
δορεά (4:10)
ἄντλημα (4:11)
φρέαρ (4:11, 12)
βαθύς (4:11)
θρέμμα (4:12)
That is fifteen words used twenty-one times in a text that totals 208 words in NA28. If one objects that these terms are, often, situation-specific, I refer you to the list from 7:53–8:11. While other texts are not this high in ratios of terms used only in one similar range, other texts could be construed as having relatively high ratios (such as 18:1–12 and 20:16–27, as well as 5:1–13 [excluding 5:3b–4]). Again, as with arguments concerning the vocabulary of Mark 16:9–20, these claims are weak in their justification, and it is well past time to let them go.
Style
Beyond the use of vocabulary, some also point to tendencies in style as pertinent evidence. As with the Markan text, scholars tend to overestimate their ability to sniff out a phony style. Thus, Christ Keith has gone so far as to claim that the similarities in style between the PA and the rest of John are the result of an attentive interpolator imitating John’s style.24
The most common claim I have seen in this regard is how supposedly problematic it is that John uses the conjunction δὲ so often here (eleven times), in contrast to οῦν, which appears once. If that sounds like an odd argument to you, it is because it is. The former conjunction appears more often in John outside of the PA anyway. Other dense uses of it appear in 5:2–13; 6:2–16; 7:2–14; 11:1–13; 18:14–25; 19:12–25. Conversely, the latter conjunction completely disappears from chs. 14, 15, and 17, and it is also not present in 1:1–20; 2:1–17; 3:1–24; 4:12–27; 5:1–9; 5:20–6:4; 10:26–38; and 11:22–30. Other instances in which the former significantly outnumbers the latter include 6:1–12; 9:37–10:6; 10:38–11:5; and 15:27–16:11. I am unsure where this argument originally came from, but other scholars need to know that someone has poisoned that waterhole.
Variants
I am not sure that this necessarily counts under internal evidence, but some (such as Brown and Carson cited above) have claimed that the high number of variants within the PA point to its inauthenticity. Yet again, no comparison is given for scale. We simply must take their word for it. But as a matter of fact, if you look beyond the apparatus of NA28, you will be aware that there are texts with similar or even higher occurrences of variants in their traditions. If one wants to be anachronistic and use verse segments, the twelve-verse segments immediately before and after this text have as many, if not more, variants (and I have not done anything resembling a complete collation). It is almost as if the number of variants after a text was written tells us nothing about its authenticity or lack thereof.
Narrative Continuity
A more valuable piece of internal evidence is whether or not the PA fits the larger story of John, particularly in light of where it is placed. Thus, there is a common claim that the PA does not fit the story or interrupts the flow. Keith, with his notion of an attentive interpolator, has argued against this well in his aforementioned work (and elsewhere, like his published dissertation) for someone who thinks that the story was not written by John. But let us test this idea by looking at how the narrative goes without and with the PA.
Jesus last spoke in 7:38. After a narrator’s interjection at 7:39, from 7:40 until 7:52 the narrative is occupied with others speaking or taking action about him:
7:39 Now he said these things concerning the Spirit which the ones who have faith in him were about to receive; for the Spirit was not yet [given/received], because Jesus was not yet glorified. 40 Then some of the crowd, after hearing these words, were saying, “This man is truly the prophet,” 41 others were saying, “This man is the Christ [Messiah],” but others were saying, “No, for does the Christ come from Galilee? 42 Did the Scripture not say that from the seed of David, and from Bethlehem the village where David was [born] the Christ is coming?” 43 Therefore, there was a division among the crowd because of him. 44 Now some of them were wanting to arrest him, but no one put hands on him.
45 Then the officers came to the chief priests and Pharisees and those ones said to them, “Why did you not bring him?” 46 The attendants answered, “Never has a man spoken thus.” 47 Then the Pharisees responded to them, “Have you not also been deceived? 48 Have any of the rulers or Pharisees believed [had faith] in him? 49 But this crowd who does not know the law are under God’s curse.” 50 Nicodemus, the one who came to him previously, being one of them, said, 51 “Does our law condemn the man unless it first hears from him and knows what he is doing?” 52 They answered him saying, “Are you also from Galilee? Examine [the Scriptures] and see that a [the?] prophet does not arise from Galilee.” 8:12 Then again Jesus spoke to them saying, “I am the light of the world; the one who follows me will by no means walk in darkness but will have the light of life.” 13 Therefore, the Pharisees said to him, “You testify about yourself; your testimony is not true [or valid].”
I suppose one could describe the relationship between 7:52 and 8:12 as one of “flowing” if the image one has in mind is that of whitewater rapids or water flowing down a waterfall. The scene has abruptly shifted apropos of nothing with the “them” being ambiguous, considering that in this context it could seem that Jesus has apparated into the midst of the leaders and is speaking to them. If the implication is that Jesus has continued speaking to the same crowd without a change of scene, John, in this scenario, would have left this rather obscure. Indeed, without a transition of some kind, it seems that it is the scene with the leaders that has intruded on the story (compare with 11:47–57, which is followed by a clear transition with 12:1).
By contrast, with 7:53 we have a clear change of scene as it signals everyone leaving the stage, which is then followed by a new scene the next day when a crowd gathers around Jesus again. Let us begin with the last part from 7:52, include the story, and then add 8:12–13 again:
7:52 They answered him saying, “Are you also from Galilee? Examine [the Scriptures] and see that a [the?] prophet does not arise from Galilee.”
53 Then each one went to his home, 8:1 but Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. 2 Then early in the morning [around dawn] again he came into [or appeared publicly in] the temple, and all the people were coming to him, and after sitting down he began to teach them. 3 But the scribes and Pharisees brought [historic present] a woman caught at adultery, and after standing her in the middle 4 they said [historic present] to him, “Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of committing adultery; 5 now in the law Moses commanded us to stone such women. What, then, do you say?” 6 Now they were saying this for the purpose of testing him, in order that they should have [grounds] to accuse him. But Jesus, after stooping down, began writing with his finger into the earth/ground. 7 But when they persisted asking him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let the sinless one among you be first to throw a stone at her.” 8 And again after stooping down he was writing into the earth/ground. 9 But the ones who heard began to go out one by one, beginning from/with the elders, and he was left along with the woman who was in the middle. 10 Then after straightening up Jesus said to her, “Woman, where are they? Did no one condemn you? 11 Then she said, “No one, Lord.” Then Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.” 12 Then again Jesus spoke to them saying, “I am the light of the world; the one who follows me will by no means walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” 13 Therefore the Pharisees said to him, “You testify about yourself; your testimony is not true [or valid].”
Regardless of my commentary or anyone else’s, I put it to you to tell me which version you think has a better narrative flow to it. In this case, we have a clear transition with the crowd dispersing and Jesus going outside the city. This action provides at least one in-text instance of how Jesus came here with his disciples before 18:1–2 (where it says he often came here). 8:2 narrates the resumption of Jesus’s teaching activity after a crowd has gathered, and then 8:3 begins the chief part of the story that interrupts his teaching. He will then resume his teaching in 8:12, as signified by the use of “again,” but he waits until after the group that interrupted him has dispersed. The scribes and Pharisees bringing the woman to him to test him makes sense in light of the immediately preceding scene, where the leaders were looking for a reason to arrest him while Nicodemus represented a voice calling for observing proper procedure. It also fits with the questioning of his authority in the vicinity of this story in 7:15–24. “The ones who heard” are the group that brought the woman, and they are the ones who disperse, as the crowd who first assembled to hear Jesus in 8:2 had no reason to leave. The presence of the crowd does not contradict the note that Jesus and the woman are alone in some smaller space or relative to those who had intruded on the scene beginning in 8:3. (In this way, the PA is similar to what I have noted in response to Mark Goodacre’s claim about Matt 8:1–4 being incoherent due to “editorial fatigue.”) The points here about judgment and sin anticipate Jesus’s subsequent recorded teaching, such as 8:15, 21, 24, 34, and 46, and they also fit with the preceding text of 7:22–24, not to mention Nicodemus’s own point in 7:51. Nor indeed does this story do anything to interrupt the flow and progression of controversy stories in this part of John from his arrival in Jerusalem earlier in ch. 7 to the attempt to stone him at the end of ch. 8 to the controversy around his healing of the blind man in ch. 9, which reflects the worsening situation since the last controversy of his healing on the Sabbath in ch. 5 (where he also told someone to “sin no more” [5:14]). Other links to other parts of John could be listed to show how this text fits in John, but we need to not pursue such matters in detail here.25
On the other hand, if we are to take seriously the idea that this was a floating anecdote, one must wonder what kind of floating story begins with “and each one went to his house, but Jesus went to the Mount of Olives.”26 Imagine having no context for that. That is the situation you would be facing if you lived back when this story was supposedly freely floating around before someone decided to place it in between what is now 7:52 and 8:12, and others put it where the beginning fits worse.27
The internal evidence tells us nothing solidly against the authenticity of the PA. Really, it suggests the opposite, particularly because of how well it fits in John’s story. In my opinion, it is unlikely that anyone would regard the case from internal evidence as being strongly against the PA if they were not already convinced by the curious external evidence and the misleading ways it has been presented. Of course, as we have seen, the internal evidence that is supposedly against the PA’s authenticity has also been misleadingly presented because scholars have not tended to do comparisons and have not provided context that would justify the claims being made.
What Is the Best Explanation?
There are other more complicated notions on the origin of the PA from those who do not think it is authentic that we have not analyzed here. But our options to explain both how the PA is part of John and how it came to be omitted from so many extant manuscripts essentially reduce to three. One, it was once an independent story, which scholars often describe as “floating,” that after long centuries, somehow, came to have a more-or-less settled place in 7:53–8:11 in most extant manuscripts. Two, as represented by Keith, an attentive interpolator brought this independent story into John and generally made the text seem Johannine through conforming it to his style, but other placements of the story are attributable to lectionary concerns. Three, the PA was original to John, but its omission from many manuscripts and its relocation in later ones stem from lectionary considerations, which, in some cases, may have also led to confusion about the markings (as it has even today with exaggerated claims about “asterisks and obeli” and what they signify).
Let us evaluate these different explanations by the criteria of the best explanation that I have outlined previously. First, we have background plausibility, meaning the degree to which an explanation is implied by the background knowledge taken for granted. Second, there is explanatory scope, which is the extent of the data in question that is explained. Third, one must also consider explanatory power or how clearly/effectively data is explained. Fourth, even if all other explanatory factors are equal, it helps to have simplicity, which is the ability of a hypothesis to avoid positing unnecessary ad hoc ideas or justifications. Fifth, secondarily (i.e., not as decisively), it helps for an explanation to provide illumination, meaning that the hypothesis is both informative in other areas of research and predictive in light of its expectations.
Despite how often it is stated that the PA was a floating story that was essentially smuggled into its current placement, its background plausibility is remarkably low. The force of the internal evidence is vastly overstated, especially because the PA fits the narrative continuity, and the arguments from vocabulary and style would dictate that other parts of John be regarded as interpolations if such arguments were not simply specious in the first place. In terms of external evidence, far too much weight is placed on relatively few late mss and how they place the text, but this notion of it as a “floating” story is implausible not only because the vast majority of mss tell against it and the evidence in support is late (the earliest being in the tenth century), but also because Ambrose, Augustine, and Jerome in their various ways attest its traditional placement. Moreover, apart from begging the question on Mark 16:9–20 (which I have analyzed elsewhere), it is implausible that a text of this extent would suddenly be admitted however long after John was written and then be accepted by the vast majority of extant witnesses.
In terms of explanatory scope, as I said, this theory rests a lot of its weight on the varied placement in much later mss, but it cannot sufficiently explain how the vast majority of mss somehow signify that a placement just so happened to win out, and it cannot explain how well the story fits John, much less how a story that begins with people going home was a free-floating narrative. Its explanatory power is remarkably weak, as it must rely on misleading presentations of the internal evidence and the external evidence (both in terms of witnesses to placement and what the markings in mss actually signify). It is especially bad for those who think it better resembles Luke and yet, except for one late stream of tradition (and not completely even there), it has invariably been attributed to John when it has been attributed. It would seem that the explanation has simplicity merely for being simplistic, but its ad hoc elements arise in saying it just so happens that this story was inserted here and that it came to be accepted here as opposed to other placements. It also requires ad hoc to explain why this “floating” story of Jesus made it into the Gospels but others did not. Likewise, it provides no illumination. Its predictive power is awful, as what one would reasonably expect if it were a floating story is not the case on either internal or external levels, and the tests used for internal evidence are not reliable when applied elsewhere.
What about the second explanation? It attempts to account for shortcomings of the previous one in that it grants that the internal evidence points to the PA fitting John—or, rather, being made to fit John—and can well enough explain the varied placement. Of course, its background plausibility still suffers because the most similar precedent (by far) that it can point to amounts to begging the question on the authenticity of Mark 16:9–20. The other examples adduced are also questionable, particularly in that the Septuagintalisms of the NT are not cases of authors trying to insert their own imitations into an otherwise established text. Moreover, the reason that Keith has given for its insertion is to respond to challenges against Jesus’s authority based on there being no evidence that he wrote anything. If ever there was such a challenge (there was for the apostles in Acts and from opponents in the era of the early Church because of their lack of education, but this was not clearly so for Jesus from the same critics), this would be but a singular example unassisted by other insertions. Why not instead try a lost Gospel claimed to be written by Jesus himself? More significantly, we have the Legend/Story of Abgar (Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 1.13; The Doctrine/Teaching of Addai), which presents Jesus as sending a letter but does not necessarily present him as putting pen to papyrus; rather, he is presented as dictating the letter (more clearly in the Doctrine of Addai than Eusebius). If this was such an issue, especially in the Syrian world where it is sometimes supposed that this story originated because of the reference by the Didascalia Apostolorum and the related story from Papias, surely this story would have been a place to state such a matter without ambiguity and it would be a story others would appeal to. And we are apparently supposed to think it was a pressing issue because of how it motivated an interpolator to commit quite intentional fraud for the purpose of making both opponents of Christians and other Christians think that this was part of the Gospel.
The explanatory scope is better than the previous one in that it does try to explain the continuities in the internal evidence, and it can explain some of the external evidence, but the supposed origin of the PA does not explain how it came to be the predominant reading by far. Its explanatory power is questionable because now even marks of consistency with the Gospel are not signals of authenticity but are signs of an attentive interpolator, which, if applied consistently, would mean that other cases like those I cited above could simply be explained as an interpolator “getting away with it.” Indeed, one could say that any work was the work of an interpolator. The explanation for its insertion is also rather weak; indeed, the effect of this story on previous generations shows that what was supposed to be the motivation for inserting it has left little impact compared to what is actually more prominent in the story. And even when it comes to the matter of Jesus writing, it has been the case much more often that people have asked what Jesus wrote than they have pointed to it as an example of his authority because of his ability to write (of which I am not currently aware of any example, but others are welcome to cite them). As for the criterion of simplicity, one can see the ad hoc nature of this explanation less so in its claims about transmission history than in its claims about how the story became introduced into John. That is, Keith must suppose that there were at least two stages involved: one in which the story was composed for the purpose he claims, and another in which someone else, the attentive interpolator, decided to closely imitate the style of John in order to insert it between 7:52 and 8:12 (and he would have gotten away with it, too, if it were not for those meddling manuscripts). Thus, it has at least two levels of ad hoc involved, and it would still need to explain how this story, unlike others (such as the Legend of Abgar), uniquely became included in a Gospel, and in the middle of one at that. The supposed illumination provided by this explanation amounts to, as I have said before, question-begging or linking to inadequate analogies. It does not give us any sort of useful predictions of what to expect elsewhere, unless, again, you think Mark 16:9–20 is an example.
Finally, we come to the explanation I have been arguing for. Its background plausibility concerning internal evidence is high, given how well it fits with John. It also fits with the vast majority of extant external evidence. It is unfortunate that we have lost manuscripts that were old even to the generation of Ambrose, Augustine, and Jerome due to natural decomposition (and who knows how many were lost to intentional or incidental destruction in the years prior to their time), and so the earlier manuscript record is distorted by the fact that Egypt’s climate is more conducive to extra-long-term survival for mss than most other places in the Mediterranean and our now-earliest witnesses tend to come from there. But we have indirect testimony from these other figures telling us that early mss did contain the PA, and we know that between the third and fourth centuries it was supposed to be well known to audiences of writers as far flung as Syria and Spain. The confusion about markings for lectors in our own day well enough attests to the plausibility that scribes using a lector’s copy might be confused by such markings. And we know that John 7:37–52 and 8:12 were used for Pentecost readings.
Its explanatory scope is supreme because it explains the internal evidence, the fact that the PA is in the majority of extant mss, and even its absence in some mss as well as its relocation in some later ones (not to mention mss that move the text to the margin). The movement after 7:36 much later kept it from interrupting the Pentecost reading, as did moving it to after the end of John to maintain its link with the Gospel. The movement after Luke 21:38 is also motivated by lectionary considerations, since Luke 21:12–19 was read for October 7 while the PA was read for October 8, and the end of ch. 21 is the next best point for insertion. In some cases, including several examples that are beyond our scope, what is marked or moved is 8:3–11 and not 7:53–8:2, as the former was most often the liturgical reading (see the twelfth-century MS 105 as one example; cf. MS 1458 cited above). Its explanatory power is supreme as well, as it does not require misleading presentations of the internal or external evidence, no extraneous factors are needed to explain how it got where it is, and it can appeal to markings like (but not necessarily limited to) those that are present in the mss available today.
There is a potential challenge to simplicity as well as plausibility in that someone might question if such lectionary considerations would have been at work early enough to cause issues like we see among earlier mss (and so, one might argue, the appeal to the factor is ad hoc here). We have seen in our analysis on Halloween how preachers like John Chrysostom observed the calendar in how they preached on certain days (and this is also shown by homilies on Pascha, as we have seen here). And there are indications of lectionary practices going at least as far back as Justin Martyr (1 Apol. 67) in our extant evidence. It is likely that lectionary systems, like the calendars of feasts, developed in stages so that major feasts—particularly Christmas, Easter/Pascha, and Pentecost—would have certain texts linked to them for lections earlier than other feasts.28 It is not possible to say for sure when John 7:37–52 and 8:12 first became linked with the Pentecost lection, but it is not ad hoc to suggest its influence among early mss; it is simply a question of how far back the practice goes, as we can see it clearly had an influence on marked mss later (and lectionaries had been established in the ancient Church, along with the order of “lector”). As lectionary mss were later developments than continuous-text mss, lectors needed signals as to what to read for a given occasion, signals which have been misread by some scribes (like some modern scholars) as indicating a questionable text. It is even possible that there were multiple origin points of such confusion as scribes read their copies used by lectors that had markings that they mistook for instructions to skip copying 7:53–8:11 or 8:3–11. Conversely, to address a point that further undermines the probability of the other explanations, if by the time the PA was supposedly added to John the text of 7:37–52 and 8:12 was already read for Pentecost, why in the world would someone insert this text here? On the other hand, if lectionary systems had to work with a text that already existed, it is understandable how complications arose when developers of the lectionary wanted to end the Pentecost reading on a positive note with 8:12. We should also remember that Pseudo-Ambrose mentions that the PA was a Gospel-reading.
As for illumination, the predictive power of this explanation manifests especially in many of the markings that we have observed already that too many have mistook as marking the PA as textually suspect. It also points us to how other texts have been affected by such lectionary considerations and the occasional confusion caused thereby. Similarly, John 9:38 and the beginning of 9:39 is missing from the early manuscripts P75, א (initially), and W, apparently because this text was marked to draw a lector’s attention and the scribes mistook it as marking something suspect. MS 225, a witness after 1000 that is cited for support of the PA’s varied location, includes John 13:3–17 after Matt 26:20 for lectionary usage. Of course, no other text of this size has been so affected among so many manuscripts, but that appears to be due to its unique situation of interrupting a range of text that had been chosen for the Pentecost lection.
Since the case favors the originality of the PA, even if it does have a curious transmission history, I say again that we might as well treat it as it is: Scripture. It is not second-class Scripture or Scripture with asterisks. Let us go forth and deny it no more.
Craig S. Keener, The Gospel of John: A Commentary (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2012), 735–36.
Ben Witherington III, John’s Wisdom: A Commentary on the Fourth Gospel (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1995), 164.
Ibid., 362.
George R. Beasley-Murray, John, rev. ed., WBC 36 (Nashville: Nelson, 1999), 143.
Raymond E. Brown, The Gospel According to John (I–XII), AB 29 (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1966), 335–36.
Rudolf Schnackenburg, The Gospel According to St John, vol. 1: Introduction and Commentary on Chapters 1–4, trans. Kevin Smyth (New York: Crossroad, 1982), 182.
Marianne Meye Thompson, John: A Commentary, NTL (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2015), 178–79.
D. A. Carson, The Gospel According to John (Nottingham: Apollos; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1991), 333.
Bruce M. Metzger, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, corrected ed. (Stuttgart: United Bible Societies, 1975), 219–20.
For example, see James Snapp Jr.’s work, particularly his “A Frensh Analysis of John 7:53-8:11 with a Tour of the External Evidence” available at: https://www.academia.edu/43898919/A_Fresh_Analysis_of_John_7_53_8_11_2017_edition_. He also has many posts related to the subject at his site The Text of the Gospels. The most thorough case I am aware of so far, though, is John David Punch, The Pericope Adulterae: Theories of Insertion & Omission: An Academic Essay in Theology (London: Lambert Academic Publishing, 2012). Maurice Robinson is presently working on a massive multi-volume work on the text. Less extensive, but still packed with information, is Maurice A. Robinson, “The Pericope Adulterae: A Johannine Tapestry with Double Interlock,” in The Pericope of the Adulteress in Contemporary Research, ed. David Alan Black and Jacob Cerone, LNTS 551 (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2016), 115–45.
Robinson, “Pericope Adulterae,” 118.
Ibid., 116 n. 7.
Gregory Lanier, “Dating Myths, Part Two: How Later Manuscripts Can Be Better Manuscripts,” in Myths and Mistakes in New Testament Textual Criticism, ed. Elijah Hixson and Peter Gurry (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2019), 110–31.
I have not been able to see the contents of MS 882. I know that it is a text of the Gospel of John with commentary from John Chrysostom’s homilies, but Chrysostom never commented on the PA. Without being able to look at the contents, I do not know if that means that the text features the pericope but no commentary, since Chrysostom never provided any, or if the text is absent because Chrysostom did not comment on it. A few more mss I have listed are claimed to mark the text with asterisks, obeli, or what have you, but since other markings I note here have been misread, I do not comment on these instances here without being able to see the markings for myself.
It concerns Ps 51. See CSEL 32,2:359.
See CSEL 35:455.
There are also later references from the Venerable Bede, as well as from Nicon, namely in “On the Impious Religion of the Vile Armenians,” the latter of which concerns the omission of the PA in Armenian texts. But they are either not easily found online, or they open up issues beyond our scope. The same applies to other earlier refences I have seen cited but could not track down a primary text reference for. The much earlier second-century Eastern witness of Papias is also sometimes cited as testifying to this story or something like it (e.g., Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 3.39.17, but I have not listed it above because of how indirect it is and the complicated issues that come with it here and in other sources. See Snapp’s analysis for more.
Available online at: https://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/didascalia.html.
Even though Christ Keith regards this text as an interpolation, he still argues that the original placement of the text is where it currently is in translations. Chris Keith, “The Initial Location of the Pericope Adulterae in Fourfold Tradition,” NovT 51 (2009): 209–31.
As a matter of fact, most texts do not use this unique verb (unique for the NT, that is), but the more common γράφω. Robinson, “Pericope Adulterae,”120.
I am admittedly confused by what significance Thompson sees in her observation of the use of the vocative διδάσκαλε here. She notes that it is used as a translation in the other instances, but one of those is after the first use of the term “Rabbi,” and the other is after a different form “Rabbouni.” Is she under the impression that John would have provided a translation of “Rabbi” every time? Because that is obviously not true (1:49; 3:2, 26; 4:31; 6:25; 9:2; 11:8). Nor is the term “Teacher” only used in sentences where “Rabbi” is also used (3:10; 11:28; 13:13–14).
Keith himself does not think this, but he cites it is as significant to the reasoning in Christ Keith, “The Pericope Adulterae: A Theory of Attentive Insertion,” in The Pericope of the Adulteress in Contemporary Research, ed. David Alan Black and Jacob Cerone, LNTS 551 (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2016), 94–95.
Keith, “Pericope Adulterae,” 96–104. One of the examples he adduces for this phenomenon elsewhere is Mark 16:9–20. Naturally, I think he is begging the question there, and upholding a questionable theory by appeal to a questionable claim about another text is problematic. The use of Septuagintalisms in the NT is another matter, as that is different from inserting texts into otherwise established texts, as he thinks happened with the two NT examples. It is beyond my scope to address claims about Luke 22:43–44. For now, I refer my reader to Snapp’s work here.
See Robinson, “Pericope Adulterae,” 131–42.
The quote from Witherington above that the reference to “some” going home not fitting the context is an inaccuracy because the text says “each one” and not “some.”
Consider how abrupt it is to have this beginning while Jesus is still speaking in John 7:36. Or look at its placement after the story of the Gospel has been resolved in 21:25. It could have arguably fit after 7:44, but not with what is now 7:45–52 following it. And it certainly does not fit after Luke 21:38 if one were to suppose that was where it originated once upon a time, despite zero witnesses before the year 1000 telling us as much.
For some examples of such arguments, see Robinson, “Pericope Adulterae,” 144 n. 83. Relatedly, see Tommy Wasserman, “Liturgical Influences on the Text of the New Testament,” in Why We Sing: Music, Word, and Liturgy in Early Christianity; Essays in Honour of Anders Ekenburg’s 75th Birthday, VCSup 177 (Leiden: Brill, 2022), 49–79.