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In John 7:53-8:11 we have the account of 'Jesus and the woman taken in adultery'

53 Then they all went home, 1 but Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. 2 At dawn he appeared again in the temple courts, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them. 3 The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group 4 and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. 5 In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” 6 They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him. But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. 7 When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” 8 Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground. 9 At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. 10 Jesus straightened up and asked her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” 11 “No one, sir,” she said. “Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin.”

Many modern translation include notes like this one (NIV).

"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."

And some translations print the entire passage in italics to indicate that it is most probably not an original passage.

Read this article for more full explanation for and against.

My question is if this is a later addition then what implications does this have? Does is invalidate biblical infallibility? Does it change any moral or religious applications to this passage?

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aceinthehole
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  • Related: http://christianity.stackexchange.com/questions/2987/what-is-the-practical-application-of-the-story-of-the-woman-caught-in-adultery – Flimzy Sep 28 '11 at 09:20
  • Also related: http://hermeneutics.stackexchange.com/questions/68/is-john-753-811-inspired – Jon Ericson Feb 06 '12 at 20:17
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    This is two questions (1. was it a later addition, 2. does it invalidate infallibility). The first is a good question. The second is primarily opinion based. – Flimzy Apr 17 '15 at 14:22
  • A note on infallibility: just because something didn't happen, doesn't mean it's not true. – OrangeDog Jun 03 '19 at 14:23

4 Answers4

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Forgive me for answering my own question…

There are several scenarios I can think of regarding this passage.

  1. John himself added this passage later on.
  2. John told this story enough that later his followers thought it appropriate to add this passage to John’s account.
  3. This account was so common among early Christians and fit so well at this point in John’s gospel that the early Christians felt is appropriate to add this story here.
  4. John himself had written this account elsewhere, and his followers later combined it with the rest of his Gospel.

If any of these explanations are true, or something similar happened, it would not invalidate the truth of the account historically, or otherwise. Likewise, just because the very earliest manuscripts do not contain these words exactly it does not necessarily follow that it is not true or any less inspired.

aceinthehole
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  • If very early manuscript do not contain this, does it mean that it's part of the scripture? +1 for the reasoning. – user4951 Dec 14 '11 at 11:26
  • @user4951 it's part of the scripture if the church decided it was part of the scripture. They did, so it is. – OrangeDog Jun 03 '19 at 14:19
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    As it's also sometimes found in Luke, then of your options 3 is probably the only likely one. – OrangeDog Jun 03 '19 at 14:24
  • I disagree. #3 does not necessarily indicate that the account is accurate. – Andrew May 17 '22 at 09:00
  • @OrangeDog The "church" deciding what is and is not scripture sets a very dangerous precedent. What if they did that today? – Andrew May 17 '22 at 09:01
  • @Andrew that's literally what happened. Why does it make a difference whether it's decided in 400 BC, or 170 AD, or 363 AD, or 1522 AD, or 1830 AD? – OrangeDog May 17 '22 at 09:24
  • @OrangeDog Yes and no. I don't even know where to begin. Are you not at all aware how "the church" has corrupted scripture, doctrine, and tradition since the beginning? Today there are so-called "apostles" and "bishops" who continue to do so. The difference is that in the beginning, the first and second hand witnesses were still alive. A group of people thinking they have the right to add stuff in based on stories they heard is another matter entirely and potentially violates some of the most severe commandments of all. – Andrew May 18 '22 at 13:34
  • @Andrew the first and second-hand witnesses of Genesis, Exodus, etc, were most certainly not alive in 400 BC when the composition of the Torah was decided. Nor were the first- or second-hand witnesses of Jesus alive in 170 AD when the New Testament was first compiled, and certainly not in 363 AD when it reached the final composition we have today (or at least until 1522 if you follow the Lutheran tradition). – OrangeDog May 18 '22 at 13:45
  • @Andrew in short, it's always been "the church" that decided what the scripture, doctrine, and tradition were since the beginning. You can disagree on who has authority over "the church" at any particular time, but it was always "the church" that was the writer and arbiter of scripture. – OrangeDog May 18 '22 at 13:49
  • @OrangeDog I strongly reject your claim that the Torah was decided in 400 B.C. It was way way earlier than that. The firsthanders may not have been alive in 170 A.D., but the second and third hand witnesses surely were. They would have accessed the texts as was handed to them; this is why the earliest manuscripts are most likely correct. They would have had access to the original texts, unlike those hundreds of years later. Deciding which texts to include and being able to modify the texts in any way are 2 extremely different things. – Andrew May 20 '22 at 21:38
  • @OrangeDog Therefore, no, "the church" never decided doctrine nor tradition for all of the rest of us, only ever Christ and the apostles (and the prophets and scribes of old). Nobody else has ever had such authority, that is one of the church's most detrimental fallacies. – Andrew May 20 '22 at 21:43
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Of the first scenario, John himself added this passage later on:

The earliest surviving manuscript to contain the Pericope Adulterae is from the late fourth or early fifth century, although there are hints that the pericope was known already in the fourth century. There is little doubt the Gospel existed for centuries without this passage, so we can rule out the possibility of John having added the passage himself, as an afterthought.

Of the second scenario, John told this story enough that later his followers thought it appropriate to add this passage to John’s account:

Whoever added this passage lived centuries after the original author and could not have known what he talked about.

Jumping forward to the fourth scenario, John himself had written this account elsewhere, and his followers later combined it with the rest of his Gospel:

We know that John's Gospel was originally anonymous, and it appears that it was attributed to the apostle John around 180 CE, quite a few decades after the gospel was written. We do not know who the author really was, so even if he did write other related material, it is improbable that Christians would have known the manuscripts to have the same source, especially after a period of centuries.

This leaves us the third scenario, This account was so common among early Christians and fit so well at this point in John’s gospel that the early Christians felt is appropriate to add this story here:

It is not necessary for the pericope to be in common usage for early Christians to feel is appropriate to add this story somewhere in the gospel accounts. John 7:53-8:11 is likely to have been the location where it was first inserted, but some manuscripts have it elsewhere in John's Gospel. Clare K. Rothschild notes in Paul in Athens, page 104, that it was also at one stage added in Luke's Gospel, one place being after Luke 21:38 and another being after Luke 24:53.

Does it invalidate biblical infallibility?

Only to the extent that it causes us to recognise that not everything we read in the Bible was there from the beginning. It could be said that God inspired others to add material with moral or religious application, although it could also be asked why God did not so inspire the original authors. But even if the passage is not truly inspired, it has the same moral and religious applications today.

Dick Harfield
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I suspect the early church fathers found no provocative revelation in this addition, if it is indeed an addition, to have concern about inclusion. Mark 16:9-20 seems to have been questioned early on as to its accuracy as part of the original text. Jerome states he had early sources without these verses; conversely, Irenaeus is found quoting from these verses (16:19). As I read it, I judge little inconsistence in the teaching of Jesus, or his responses to legal practitioners and the Pharisees. It might have gotten less attention had it been included in the Book of Matthew rather than Book of John considering the agenda of the Matthew sect (overtly confrontational with the Pharisees being the norm).

Jim Mac
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  • Welcome to the site. We are glad you decided to participate. Please see What this site is about and How this site is different to help you learn how the site works. Also see the [help] and take the [tour] to learn the site functions. I hope to see you post again soon. –  Dec 31 '14 at 06:14
  • Jerome both acknowledged that textual variants existed that did not contain the pericope adulterae and defended its inclusion in the Vulgate. See http://textualcriticism.scienceontheweb.net/FATHERS/Jerome2.html – Paul Chernoch May 21 '21 at 13:18
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I believe that if any part of the Bible was changed in a way that matters, God would make sure the oldest complete New Testament we have, the Codex Vaticanus (note: Sinaiticus could be older but has missing books and added books and unlike Vaticanus wasn't necessarily always with the church) would have the right reading.

The Codex Vaticanus does not include this passage and the passage is as such not to be viewed in higher regard than the Didache or works by an elder in the 5th century.

agarza
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Samuel Pevsner
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