The Pericope de Adulterae of GJohn, (henceforth PA) a Latin designation of the "passage of the adulteress (John 7:53-8:11) is the narrative about Jesus of Nazareth's encounter with a woman who is condemned for some sin to which Jesus forgives and excuses her transgression. However, this is not the specific narrative we read in GJohn, but the lack of textual substance and narrative detail, here, is deliberate and represents the unreliable textual character of John 7:53-8:11. Numerous crucial details, such as who condemned the woman, the woman’s transgression, the dialogue between whoever brought forth the charge of transgression and Jesus of Nazareth, Jesus writing on the ground and other staple Johnainne details have been discarded by scholarship to be not autographical to the text of the pericope de adulterae in GJohn. Leading scholars of NTTC, such as Daniel Wallace, Bart D. Ehrman, Bruce Metzger and the bulk of New Testament scholarship agree that John 7:53-8:11, is “one of the clearest examples of New Testament corruption.” We will provide a thorough overview as to why this scholarly consensus remains uncontested.
Interestingly, an overlooked piece of evidence is minuscules. Broadly speaking, minuscules of the Gospel of John normally include the PA. However, this is not unprecedented for several reasons: 1) The minuscule script is dated relatively late to around the 8th-9th century and 2) The minuscule script is under the Byzantine notation, which, geographically, is already dependent on the Byzantine text-form, which according to scholarship, was steadily developed to standardise passages recognized as autographically problematic such as the Longer Ending of Mark (Mark 16:9-20) Even more telling, is that the earliest miniscule manuscript of the New Testament, the Uspenski Gospels or MS 461 initially leaves out PA from the script, until a later hand added the passage as a marginal addition (via process of Byzantine standardisation) However, what makes the minuscule script unique, is the divergent biblical placements of John 7:53-8:11 that is present in the script. The most remarkable example is Family 13, a group of Greek minuscule manuscripts of the New Testament dated between the 11th and 15th that all uniformly place John 7:53-8:11 after Luke 21:38! Among other locations that John 7:53-8:11 has been placed in minuscule scripts include, after John 7:44, John 8:12, 7:36, 8:20, 8:13, 8:14, 10:36, Luke 24:53 and at the end of GJohn (21:25)
The variable biblical placements of John 7:53-8:11, according to text-critical methodology and principle is unassailable instantiation to the textual history of PA that has even perplexed scholars, such as Rius-Camps to assign the composition of the PA to John Mark, the author of GMark. Overall, while Greek New Testament minuscules generally include PA, because of Byzantine notation, they do so variably, either placing John 7:53-8:11 in different narrative locations in the Gospel of John, or an entirely separate text such as GLuke, that speaks to the problematic textual character of John 7:53-8:11.
Recently, many scholars have attempted to elucidate how lectionaries may contribute as evidence pour ou contre the PA. Surprisingly, Byzantine church liturgy and service skipped over the story of Jesus and the adulteress, as fourth-century Christians preachers, John Chrysostom and Cyril of Alexandria, stated to have followed their Byzantine liturgical cycles, but neither even allude to PA. If the basic character of the Byzantine lectionary system is dated to the 4th century, this signifies that Byzantine Christians neglected the passage of the adulterous woman in their liturgy until the pericope was present in virtually all continuous-text manuscripts around the end of the first millennium. Byzantine Christians likely felt that PA was not original to GJohn until the majority of late 8th-9th century Byzantine manuscripts began to canonize the story in the narrative of GJohn (via process of standardisation) However, what is more astonishing is that around the 8th century and onwards, when majority of manuscripts of the Byzantine text-type would have welcomed the pericope de adulterae in their pages, the Byzantine lectionary system continued to leave out the Pericope de Adulterae in their liturgical cycles! The Byzantine lectionary system, is geographically bound to the Byzantine text-form and yet PA, which is canonically included by the Byzantine text-form adduces a remarkably slow reception in the Byzantine liturgy for potentially iconoclastic reasons. Nevertheless, we must conclude that the Byzantine lectionary system from the 4th century may support the consensus of NT scholarship.
All things considered, manuscripts, ancient versions, minuscules, and lectionaries by and large, yield a dawning consensus. So far, the external evidence substantiates the proposition that the Pericope de Adulterae was not present in the autograph of GJohn, or even the early text of John. Whether, a four-hundred year period of a silent Johannine narrative to which not a trace of attestation can be identified, or the vast majority of geo-independent ancient versions that uniformly omit PA or the minuscules that present radically-divergent biblical placements of PA in the New Testament or the absence Byzantine lectionary system and liturgical cylces of early Byzantine christians, running adjacent to the Byzantine text-form which canonically places PA in GJohn 7, the veracity of the textual consensus must be inculcated.
To commence, the passage is wholly absent from over 100 Greek manuscripts ranging across the first millennium according to Zane C. Hodges. This is prominent since the Byzantine text-form of the pericope de adulterae is attested relatively later than the 1st millennium. More importantly, however is that PA is lacking in the best Greek manuscripts for text-critical inquiries, especially those of Johannine relevance: Such manuscripts include three authoritative papyri of John: 𝔓39, 𝔓75, and 𝔓66. 𝔓75, dated between 175 ─ 225 AD, is the earliest known copy of the Gospel of Luke and is one of the earliest copies of John known to us. Although the single-quire codex includes Johannine passages such as 7:46-9:2, we observe that the PA is entirely omitted. Nextly, 𝔓66, typically dated around 200 A.D. is one of the oldest considerable portions of the Greek New Testament and the earliest extant reading of John 7 - 8 with about 92% of John preserved in the papyrus, evidently established as one of the most authoritative manuscripts of John in our repository. Even including a wider range then 𝔓75 (Jn 6:35-14:26) we find that the PA is wholly unattested in 𝔓66. Lastly, we have 𝔓39, a 3rd century fragment that present an important yet more sophisticated witness of the PA. The fragment of 𝔓39 is a double-sided sheet that only includes John 8:14-22. The top and bottom of the text on the sheet are intact and the papyrus even includes page numbers which allows the paleographer to follow the extant pattern of 25 lines per page back to the beginning of John. However, if the papyrus shares the same 25 lines per page with Codex Sinaiticus, the pericope simply could not fit as including the passage would add one more whole line to each page yielding 26 lines per page. Assuming the general consistency of the scribe, there would be an insuperable contrast in the papyri and 𝔓39’s agreements with Sinaticus and Vaticanus would surely adduce dissimilarity in lines per page according to Slade and Wilson. Along with this, 𝔓39 is a representative of the Alexandrian text-type which paradigmatically does not include the PA in the Alexandrian text-form. For such reasons, it's rather certain that 𝔓39 omitted the PA alike 𝔓39's contemporary Alexandrian papyri. Furthermore, when we explore Greek uncials and codexes, we observe much of the same textual pattern. Codex א, or Sinaiticus, the earliest complete copy of the Greek New Testament and a primal codex authority, omits the reading of John 7:53-8:11 in folio 252, that was written by scribe A. The exact transcription of א reads as follows:
7:52 απεκριθη ϲαν και ειπον αυτω · μη και ϲυ εκ τηϲ γαλιλαιαϲ ει · εραυ νηϲον και ϊδε · ο τι προφητηϲ εκ τηϲ γαλιλαιαϲ ουκ εγειρεται
8:12 παλι ουν αυτοιϲ ελαλη ϲεν ο ιϲ λεγων · εγω φωϲ ειμι του κοϲμου ο ακολουθων εμοι · ου μη περιπατηϲη εν τη ϲκοτια αλλ εχει το φωϲ τηϲ ζωηϲ
The same reading can be adduced in Codex B, or Vaticanus also dated around the early 4th century, which omits John 7:53-8:11 after 7:52. Additionally with Vaticanus, two-dot-plus-bar ‘distigme-obelos’ symbols in the codex signals the location of added varie lectiones, which ostensibly hints at the uncertainty of the scribe of B and was chosen to be omitted likely for text-critical principle or a potentially critical exemplar of Vaticanus. To conclude, we have other important uncials that do not include the PA, of which are: Alexandrinus (5th century), Ephraemi Rescriptus (5th century), Borgianus (5th century) Regius (8th century), Petropolitanus Purpureus (6th century), Washingtoniensis, Monacensis, Cordethanius, Athous Lavrensis, and Sangallensis of which only two are defective.
The multifarious papyri and codexes ranging the 2nd to 10th centuries all corroborate the omission in the early text of John. From here, one may ask when does the Pericope de Adulterae even bear attestation in the Greek MSS or any manuscript tradition? Surprisingly, we observe our first ever MS witness approximately four hundred years after the autograph of GJohn that is, Code Bezae Cantabrigiensis (D), a fifth-century codex which includes the Gospels, Acts and 3 John. Such a deep void between the autograph of GJohn and Codex Bezae, shakes the claim of originality. However, what may be more alluring, is the unparalled tendency of D to add interpolated material to any other Greek MSS. For indeed, the PA is hardly, the only singular reading initially discovered in D. D is the only extant manuscript with story of Jesus speaking to a man who was working on the Sabbath after Luke 6:4 (28 words long); adds the specific number of steps which Peter walked on the street when an angel released him from prison (Acts 12:10), and it is the 1st manuscript to contain the longer ending of Mark (16:9–20). These examples suggest D as a text with an fluid textual transmission and highly contaminated text-form, that has attested numerous unique singular readings and interpolated material. This fact somewhat diminishes D as a informative witness to the PA's debut in Codex Bezae Cantabrigiensis.
As for the ancient versions of the tetraevangelium, there is complete resonance with results with the manuscript witnesses. Firstly, Tatian’s Diatessaron dated to around 170 A.D. which is eight decades after GJohn is written, is a unified narrative of the tetraevangelium. Tatian’s autograph, which we can reconstruct from Ephram of Nisibe's commentary on the Diatessaron does not mention any narrative reminiscent of the PA, but mentions other pericopes such as Johnainne cleaning the temple, the cursing of the fig tree, and the Nicodemius dialogue. What is even more striking is that the Diatessaron contains non-biblical material, which illustrates a scribal tendency to accept material even non-canonical, rather than leave out potential euangelion. If such is the case, then had Tatian of Syria or Diatessaronic scribes encountered PA, there is sufficent prior probability that the PA would added to the gospel harmony. However, left with no attestations of PA in Tatian’s Diatessaron or Nisibe’s commentary, it’s certain that Tatian of Syria was not aware of PA, thereby making the Diatessaron, the earliest version of the Gospels to which we find no remnant of the adulterous woman. Additionally, The Diatessaron was widely circulated for centuries in Syria, which sheds light on why, possibly the only manuscript-fragment of the Greek Diatessaron or Dura Parchment 24 was found in modern-day Syria.
Furthermore, it is telling that the majority of Syriac versions, which were influenced by the Diatessaron, support the Diatessaronic omission of PA, namely the Old Syriac, Sinaitic, Peshitta, and Harclean editions, with only the Palestinian Syriac diverging from this trend. However, this can easily be explained by the fact that Palestinian Syriac is assigned later than the other Syriac Version around the mid to late 5th-century. Additionally, Burkitt notes that the Palestinian Syriac demonstrates few remarkable agreements with the other Syriac versions such as the Sinaitic Syriac, which is telling since the Palestinian Syriac community in Egypt would have probably had inhabitants of the Sinaitic community near Cairo. Furthermore, Palestinian Syriac is believed to be based on the Greek text of the Caesarean text-type, while all other Syriac versions noted are faithful representatives of the Western text-form. Therefore, Meztger and Ehrman correctly contend that the Palestinian Syriac is not only dated later, but is quite independent of the other Syriac versions.
As for the ancient Coptic versions of the Gospels, the Sahidic Coptic dialect dated to between the third and fourth century does not evince the passage of the adulteress. Even in later manuscripts such as MS M.569, an eighth-century Sahidic tetraevangelium, the leaves includes the whole of GJohn except for PA, and is neither strictly Alexandrian, but adduces a number of Western readings. On the other hand, Boharic Coptic within its rudimentary form is dated somewhat later then Sahidic Coptic, to around the fourth and fifth century which is strictly identified by scholars as “proto-Boharic.” However, standard Boharic Coptic is attested relatively late, typically after the first millennium which is corroborated by the majority of our Bohairic Coptic manuscripts which date within this time period (the earliest extant complete Gospel codex was copied in A.D. 1174) However, when we ponder into proto-Boharic versions of the Gospel of John, we find that the PA is entirely omitted. A well-known example is Papyrus Bodmer III, a fourth-century proto-Boharic papyrus codex containing most of the Gospel of John with some lacunae and the opening chapters of Genesis, and is the earliest New Testament manuscript of the Boharic version, in which we discover the PA wholly absent from the codex. It is only when we survey Boharic manuscripts outside the close of the 1st millennium, that the PA begins to make an appearance in the Boharic MSS tradition. However, setting aside the very late dating of such a development, when we prod into late-Boharic manuscripts of the tetraevangelium, several Coptic fragments such as Huntington MS 20 dated to the thirteenth century, do not include the passage of the adulterous woman. Even in late-Boharic manuscripts where the PA is placed in John, such as Huntington MS 17, dated to the 12th century, Constantin von Tischendorf, a influential German biblical scholar who observed the fragment asserts that PA was a marginal addition by a later editor, a editorial habit attested too often in ancient versions.
Lastly, in manuscripts of Sub-Achmimic Coptic, a sub-dialect of Achmimic, PA utterly lacks attestation. All in all, Boharic Coptic, Sahidic and sub-Achmimic represent paradigmatic Alexandrian omission of PA. Other later though ancient versions of the New Testament such as Old Georgian, Armenian and Slavonic manuscripts corroborate the later placement of the pericope de adulterae. In the Western Church, several Old Latin (a, f, l*, q) and Gothic manuscripts further testify to this consensus.
External Evidence: Ancient Versions
External Evidence: Minuscules
External Evidence: Lectionaries
Conclusion
The Pericope de Adulterae, otherwise known as John 7:53-8:11 is the passage about Jesus of Nazareth's encounter with a woman who is condemned for some sin to which Jesus forgives and excuses her transgression. The ambiguous quiddity of such a summary is not deliberate, but solely instantiates the unreliable textual character. For indeed, numerous crucial details, such as who condemned the woman, the woman’s transgression, the dialogue between whoever brought forth the charge of transgression and Jesus of Nazareth, Jesus writing on the ground and other narrative details have been determined to “textually insecure” and therefore must be discarded when formulating an accurate and autographical summary of the pericope de adulterae. Even more ironic, however, is including the words, “autographical” and “pericope de adulterae” in the same sentence, as leading scholars including Daniel Wallace, Bart D. Ehrman, Bruce Metzger and the bulk of New Testament scholarship contend that John 7:53-8:11, is “the clearest example of New Testament corruption.” We will provide a thorough overview as to why this scholarly consensus is certain and uncontested.