The Story of the Story of the Adulterous Woman

The account of the woman caught in adultery and brought to Jesus is a well-known textual variant and problem.  Eventually obtaining a place in the Gospel of John (7:53—8:11) in the vast majority of manuscripts of the middle ages, it is typically judged by NT textual critics to be an insertion initiated at some point, and so not a part of the authentic or “original” text of GJohn.[i]  Now Jennifer Knust and Tommy Wasserman have produced a milestone work on the passage that covers an unrivalled breadth of evidence and issues, analysing not only the text-critical data (in great detail) but also the references to the passage in ancient commentaries, sermons, and letters, as well as its use in Christian liturgy and art:   To Cast the First Stone:  The Transmission of a Gospel Story (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2019).

The passage appears in no extant Greek manuscript of the Gospel of John before the fifth century Codex Bezae (a Latin/Greek bi-lengual manuscript of the Gospels and Acts).  It may have been inserted into the GJohn as early as sometime in the third century, but direct evidence for this is lacking.[ii]  Some have argued that the text is original to GJohn but was omitted due to the supposed embarrassment of an account of Jesus letting an adulterous woman go free.  But in detailed and meticulous analysis (esp. chapters 1-4) Knust and Wasserman show that this is (to put it mildly) most improbable.  As they note, ancient copyists copied what was before them, and didn’t act typically as editors.  Moreover, if there was a variation-unit, the typical copyist action was to include a variant rather than omit it.  So, on this basis alone, insertion of the Pericope Adulterae is much more probable than its omission.  But they show there is even more evidence to support this.

Indeed, once early Christians were aware of the story, and whether they knew it as a part of the GJohn or from some other source (e.g., some early writers ascribe it to the Gospel of the Hebrews), they took to the story enthusiastically, typically seeing it as a powerful lesson in Christian mercy.  Far from embarrassed about the story, it was prized, whether or not it was thought to be part of the GJohn.

In chapters 5-6, Knust and Wasserman trace the differing history of the passage in the Christian East and West.  Their judgement is that the passage may well have entered the textual stream of the GJohn in a Greek manuscript, perhaps as early as the third century, but that it was in the West and in Latin manuscripts that the passage began to obtain a secure and increasingly accepted place where it is traditionally known.

Chapters 7-8 survey meticulously the liturgical uses of the passage, and early Christian scholarly views about it, and also the references to the passage in the medieval liturgy and sermons.  One conclusion from this is how the liturgical use of the passage came earlier in the Latin West than in the Greek East, but that, in the end, the liturgical usefulness of the passage overcame any initial doubts about it.  Liturgy, in short, had a significant role in the passage securing such a firm place in the traditional text of GJohn.

As Knust and Wasserman acknowledge, however, it is still not entirely clear why the passage was so successfully incorporated into the text of the GJohn, although their study goes farther than any other in offering some clues and suggestions.  But, certainly, the evidence presented in this book confirms the view that a surprising textual fluidity continued to characterize the transmission of some NT writings much later than sometimes supposed.  Actually, as Knust and Wasserman repeatedly note, the earliest extant evidence reflects a generally careful and conscientious copying of the NT writings, surprisingly, perhaps even a more careful copying, with less of a readiness to accommodate insertions, than in the Byzantine period![iii]

This handsomely produced and amazingly broadly researched volume is now the “go-to” book on the passage.

 

[i] See, e.g., Bruce M. Metzger, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, Second Edition (Stuttgart:  Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 1994), 187-89.  The latest edition (28^th) of the Nestle-Aland Greek text of the NT follows the previous pattern of retaining the account in the traditional place in GJohn, but within double brackets, signalling that, though part of the traditional text of GJohn, it is not “original”.  Other recent editions of the Greek NT, specifically The Greek New Testament, SBL Edition, ed. Michael W. Holmes (Atlanta:  Society of Biblical Literature, 2010), and The Greek New Testament, ed. Dirk Jongkind (Cambridge/Wheaton IL:  Cambridge University Press/Crossway, 2017) choose to place the text in the textual apparatus.  For a survey on scholarship on the passage, see Chris Keith, “Recent and Previous Research on the Pericope Adulterae (John 7.53—8.11),” Currents in Biblical Research 6 (2008): 377-404

[ii] Chris Keith, The Pericope Adulterae, the Gospel of John, and the Literacy of Jesus, NTTSD 38 (Leiden: Brill, 2009), proposed that it was added then to show that Jesus was able to write.

[iii] On the early transmission of the GJohn, see now Lonnie D. Bell, The Early Textual Transmission of John:  Stability and Fluidity in Its Second and Third Century Greek Manuscripts, NTTSD 54 (Leiden: Brill, 2018).