The scandal of the story of the adulterous woman

 In a comprehensive study, I ask God to make it useful to shed light on the occurrence of distortion in a famous text in the Gospel of John,

which is the story of the adulterous woman

. First, Anba Shenouda, thank you, tells us how we can judge a text as distorted? 8:1Now Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. 8:2And early in the morning he came again to the temple, and all the people came to him, and he sat down and taught them.8 :3And the scribes and Pharisees brought to him a woman caught in adultery. And when they had set her in the midst , 8:4they said to him, “Teacher, this woman was caught in adultery, in the very act. 8:5Now Moses in the law commanded us to stone such as these; what do you say?” 8:6They said this to test him, that they might have something to accuse him of. But Jesus stooped down and wrote on the ground with his finger . 8:7And when they continued asking him, he lifted up himself and said to them, “He who is without sin among you, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.” 8:8Then he stooped down again and wrote on the ground. 8:9But when they heard this, being convicted by their own conscience, they went out one by one, beginning at the oldest even to the last. 8:10up himself, and saw no one but the woman, he said to her, “Woman, where are those who accuse you? Has no one condemned you?” 8:11And she said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said to her, “Neither do I condemn you. Go, and sin no more.” Papyrus 66 is the oldest papyrus of the Gospel of John and dates back to the second, meaning that the story was not present in the Gospel of John in the second century AD.The first and second lines of the Gospel of John, chapter 7, verse 52,and in the second line specifically, there are three words at the end of the second line.Joh 7:52 Thenafter​​​​​That point referred to and before it another Three words from John 7/52 and then he started in John 8/12 directly.!!Inbluescriptas follows:Joh8:12ἐν τῇof, which is papyrus 66 (p66). We will continue in the rest of the manuscripts. The story of the adulterous woman is not found in papyrus 75. The story of the adulterous woman is not found in the Vatican manuscript .The same thing here alsoJoh 7:52the adulterous woman isfoundinthe Vatican manuscript and begins in the fourth line in the Gospel of John 8 / 12 directly Joh 8:12ὐτοῖς





















































ὁ ᾿ ἐλάλησε Ιησοῦς λέγων· ἐγώ εἰmicro ἀκολουθῶν ἐmicro φῶς τῆς

Also, the story is not found in the Sinaiticus manuscript. Joh 7:52 Then after that the red line which We put it present and before it the last three words of John 7/52 and then it begins in John 8/12 directly .!! In blue script as follows: Joh 8:12 ἐν τῇ σκοτίᾳ, ἀλλ᾿ ἕξει τὸ φῶς τῆς Also not found in the Washington Manuscript (fifth century) Joh 7:52 απεκριθησαν και ειπαν μη και συ εκ της γαλιλαιας ει ερευνησον και ιδε οτι εκ εκ γαλιλαιας προφητης - ουκ - εγειρεται The story of the adulterous woman is not found in the Washingtonian manuscript and begins in the line immediately following it in the Gospel of John 8/12 Joh 8:12 Πάλιν οὖν ὐτοῖς ὁ ᾿ ἐλάλησε Ιησοῦς λέγων· ἐγώ εἰmicro ἀκολουθῶν God willing, God willing .

English: The New Testament Interpretation at the expense of the British Crabbs Society, fourth edition 2004,
page 235.

The

book The Cultural Background of the Bible (New Testament) Part One, page 250,
by Craig S. Kenner

.

(Joint Arabic Translation) It is a subscription from all sects, and you can confirm this in the first three lines of the introduction to this translation, knowing that it is sold in the Library of Love, meaning that the Orthodox and the Marks Magazine House and other Christian libraries participate in it.

It says in the margin of the story the following

(We do not find John 7/53 - 8/11 in the old manuscripts and in the Syriac and Latin translations. Some manuscripts put this section at the end of the Gospel) . Here is the image, slightly enlarged . Now comes the testimony that shocks any stubborn person and clarifies the truth to those who seek the truth, which confirms from Christian scholars that the story of the adulterous woman is nothing but from an unknown source. Here is the introduction to the Gospel of John from the Holy Bible, translated by the Jesuit Fathers or the Jesuit Order, which is a reference ( it must be added that the work appears, despite all of that, incomplete, as some of the links are not tight and some paragraphs seem disconnected from the context of the speech (3/13-21, 3/31-36, 1/15). Everything goes on as if the writer never felt that he had reached the end. In that, there is a modification of what is in the paragraphs from the entire arrangement. It is likely that the Gospel as it is in our hands was issued by some of the writer’s students, who added chapter 21 to it. There is no doubt that they also added some commentary such as (4/2) and perhaps (4/1, 4/44) (7/39) (11/2) (19/35). As for the story of the adulterous woman (7/53) to ( 8/11) There is a consensus that it is from an unknown source and was inserted at a later time ….) . . What does Bruce Metzger, the greatest New Testament scholar and biblical critic, say about the manuscripts that do not contain the story of the adulterous woman? Let us count these manuscripts to see The text of the New Testament: It's Transmission Corruption and Restoration Second Edition By Bruce M. Metzger Page 223. Translation : The passage is not found in the best Greek manuscripts: It is not found in (p66, p75, א, B, L, N, T, W, X, Δ, Θ, Ψ, 33, 157, 565, 892, 1241). The Alexandrian manuscript and the Ephrem manuscript are useless at this point, but it is most likely that neither of them contained the passage, because there is not enough space in the missing parchments to contain the passage in addition to the rest of the texts. The Old Syriac and the Arabic of Tatian give no information about the passage, and it is also absent from the best Peshitta manuscripts. The sacred books of the ancient Coptic churches also do not contain the passage, since the Sahidic, Akhmimic and Old Bohairic versions lack it. Some ancient Armenian and Georgian manuscripts do not contain the passage. In the West, the passage is absent from the Gothic and many Old Latin manuscripts. Let us now count the manuscripts that do not contain the text: 35 manuscripts at least. Since we have brought Bruce Metzger's words about the manuscripts, let us wisely bring the story of the adulterous woman from the same reference above the page; . .







































At the same time, the Prequel, which is often printed as John 7:53-8:11,
must be judged to be an interpolation of the Fourth Gospel.
This is the judgment of Bruce Metzger, the greatest New Testament scholar in manuscript study and textual criticism, who came up with manuscripts that do not contain the story that he finally and rightly judged to be an interpolation of the Fourth Gospel, the Gospel of John.

Daniel Wallace’s Testimony Daniel Wallace is a professor of New Testament studies at Dallas Theological Seminary and executive director of the Center for the Study of New Testament Manuscripts. Wallace is the general editor of the New Testament in the most recent English translation, the Modern English Bible, which many of you know by the acronym NET Bible. Wallace is considered one of the world’s foremost textual critics, and a leading authority on ancient Greek and textual criticism. His articles have appeared in numerous theological journals and many are posted on bible.org. In a sense, Wallace is the evangelical community’s chosen response to Ehrman. As many of you know, Wallace has written extensive reviews of Ehrman’s book Misquoting Jesus. The last twelve verses of Mark and the adulteress story are both in the same place, and Ehrman is making a valid point. Any practical review of any English translation today will reveal that the longer ending of Mark and the adulteress story are in their usual places. Thus, not only do the King James Version and the New King James Version have the passages (as might be expected), but so do the American Standard Version, the Revised Standard Version, the New Revised Standard Version, the Modern International Version, the Modern International Version, the New American Standard Bible, the English Standard Version, the English Today Version, the New American Bible, the New Jewish Bible, and the New English Translation. Yet the scholars who produced these translations do not believe that these texts are authentic. The reasons are simple enough: they are not in the oldest and best manuscripts, and their internal evidence against their authenticity is indisputable. Why then are they still in the Bibles? The answers to this question vary. Some have suggested that their continued existence in the Bibles is due to a tradition of cowardice. There seem to be good reasons for this. The rationale is typically that no one will buy a copy that does not have these famous passages. And if no one buys it, it will not impress Christians. Some translations have placed the story of the adulteress by papal mandate as a Scriptural passage. The New English Bible and the Revised English Bible place it at the end of the Gospels, rather than its traditional place. Today’s New International Version and the New English Translation place both texts in smaller fonts in parentheses. The smaller format certainly makes them harder for preachers to read. The New English Translation includes a lengthy discussion of the inauthenticity of these verses. Most translations note that these stories are not found in the oldest manuscripts, but such a comment is rarely noticed by modern readers. How do we know this? From the shock waves that Ehrman’s book has caused. On the radio, on television, in interviews with Ehrman, the story of the woman caught in adultery is always the first text presented as inauthentic, and this presentation is designed to alert listeners.










The public’s exposure to scientific secrets about the text of the Bible is nothing new. Edward Gibbon, in his best-selling six-volume book, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, noted that the Johannine Comma, or Trinitarian formula in 1 John 5:7–8, was not genuine. This shocked the British public in the eighteenth century, because their only Bible was the Authorized Version, which contained the formula. “Others had done this before him, but only in scholarly and academic circles. Gibbon did it for the public, in a disturbing language.”[33] But with the publication of the Revised Version in 1885, the Comma was gone. Today, the text is not printed in modern translations, and it hardly attracts any attention.
Ehrman followed Gibbon’s bandwagon by exposing the inauthenticity of Mark 16:9–20 and John 7:53–8:11. But the problem here is a little different. The second text has strong emotional appeal. It has been my favorite non-Biblical passage for years. I can even preach about it as a true historical story, even after I have rejected its literary-canonical fundamentalism. And we know preachers who can’t give it up even though they also have doubts about it. But there are two problems with this way of understanding the subject. First, in terms of the popularity of the two texts, John 8 is the overwhelming favorite, yet its external credentials are significantly worse than Mark 16. This discrepancy is terrifying. Something is missing in our seminaries when one’s feelings are the arbiter of textual problems. Second, the story of the adulteress is very likely not historically true. It is probably a composite of two different stories. Thus, the excuse that one can preach about it because it happened is clearly untrue.
In retrospect, keeping these two stories in our Bibles rather than relegating them to the footnotes seems like a bomb, just waiting to go off. All Ehrman did was light the fuse. One lesson we should learn from the misquotation of Jesus is that those in ministry must bridge the gap between church and academia. We must educate believers. Instead of trying to isolate the laity from critical study, we must armour them. They must be prepared for the hail of fire, for it is coming. The deliberate silence of the church in order to fill more pews in the church will inevitably lead to apostasy from Christ. We should thank Ehrman for giving us a wake-up call.
This is not to say that everything Ehrman writes in this book is of this type. But these three texts Ehrman sees are true . We must stress again: these texts do not change any fundamental doctrine, no central belief. Evangelical scholars have denied their authenticity for more than a century without shifting a single iota of orthodoxy.
However, the four remaining textual problems tell a different story. Ehrman relies on one of two things: either “interpretation” or “evidence,” which most scholars consider, at best, to be questionable.

Listen with your own eyes and see with your own eyes that Daniel Wallace admits that these texts are not original.

 

As for the claim that the story is in the Didasqoliyya,
this is a picture of the page that contains the story of the adulterous woman in the Didasqoliyya

 :

And this is the story as it is in the Gospel of John
8:1 Now Jesus went to the Mount of Olives.
8:2 And early in the morning he came again to the temple, and all the people came to him, and he sat down and taught them.
8:3 And the scribes and Pharisees brought to him a woman caught in adultery. And when they had set her in the midst,
8:4 they said to him, “Teacher, this woman was caught in adultery, in the very act.
8:5 Now Moses in the law commanded us that such should be stoned; but what sayest thou?”
8:6 They said this to test him, that they might have something to accuse him of. But Jesus stooped down and wrote on the ground with his finger.
8:7 And when they continued asking him, he lifted up himself, and said to them, “He who is without sin among you, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.”
8:8 Then he stooped down again and wrote on the ground.
8:9 But when they heard it, being convicted by their own conscience, they went out one by one, beginning at the oldest even to the last, and Jesus was left alone. The woman standing in the middle
8:10 When Jesus had lifted up himself, and saw no one but the woman, he said to her, “Woman, where are those who accuse you? Has
no one condemned you?” 8:11 She said, “No one, Lord.” Jesus said to her, “Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more

.”

The differences between the two stories are clear. The main events in the story are not known, so no one should think that the writer of the Didascalia neglected the main events of the story and included less important events.
The writer did not mention that the woman's sin was adultery, nor did he mention that they said to Christ, according to the law of Moses, this woman must be stoned, nor did he mention that Christ rebuked them by saying, "Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her," nor did he mention that the men went and left Christ with the woman when he

rebuked them. The subject is completely different.

The oldest Arabic manuscript of the four Gospels

is the manuscript of St. Catherine's Monastery (dating back to the ninth century AD). We find in the Arabic manuscript - as we find in the oldest Greek witnesses - the text of John 7:52, immediately after which is John 8:12, and there is no trace of the story of the adulterous woman.There is no correction or comment on its absence from the manuscript. I would like to point out that the importance of this manuscript stems from two things: The first: is that this manuscript is not an individual manuscript, but rather a manuscript that was used for worship in the monastery, as mentioned on the last page of the manuscript. It expresses the texts that they believed in, and it is impossible for there to be an error in the manuscript for this reason. Second: The manuscript was revised twice, as is evident from observing the margins of the manuscript. It seems that it was not revised in its entirety, but only the first part of it. Listen to Bart Ehrman mocking the story of the adulterous woman.

 

The Greek New Testament — non-polytonic

Greek New Testament

This edition reproduces the Greek #### of Nestle-Aland in its 26th edition, and also in its 27th edition which is in the final stages of preparation and offers the same ### #unchanged.
Bold face type is used to identify direct quotes from the Old Testament. The punctuation essentially agrees with that of the Nestle-Aland 26th and 27th editions, with the exception of certain small differences. Such differences generally have no bearing on the division of the ####.
[ ] Brackets in the #### indicate that the enclosed word, words, or parts of words may be regarded as part of the ####, but that in the present state of New Testament ####ual scholarship this cannot be taken as completely certain.
[[ ]] Double brackets in the #### indicate that the enclosed passages, which are usually rather extensive, are known not to be a part of the original ####, but an addition at a very early stage of the tradition They are included with the #### in this way because of their antiquity and the position they have traditionally enjoyed in the church (eg, Jn 7.53–8.11).

http://khazarzar.skeptik.net/biblia/gnt/ u/index.htm
The translation of the above words

The introduction explains that the subject in double brackets is generally known not to be part of the original text , but it was taken at a very early stage and has always played a distinguished role in the history of the church. 
Then it mentions an example of that text under discussion itself, i.e. John. 7:53 to 8:11

Westcott and Hort do not recognize this text at all.





Verse 12 of chapter 8 comes immediately after verse 52 of chapter 7.

 

Peshitta

Aramaic/English Peshitta Interlinear Younan Translation


With a note at the end of the page translating it:
The story of the adulterous woman was never in the original Peshitta and the numbering of the verses reflects the difference between it and the Western version .

 

SBL Greek New Testament



ΚΑΤΑ ΙΩΑΝΝΗΝ 8 (SBL Greek New Testament)

ΚΑΤΑ ΙΩΑΝΝΗΝ 8

SBL Greek New Testament (SBLGNT)

12 οὖν αὐτοῖς [ a ]λέγων· ἀκολουθῶν [ b ]ἐmicro ζωῆς. 13 εἶπον γ μαρτυρία σου οὐκ ἔστιν ἀληθής. 14 Ἰησοῦς ἀπεκρίθη ἐmicro ποῦ ὑπάγω· ὑμεῖς δὲ οὐκ οἴδατε πόθεν ἔρχομαι [ c ]ἢ ποῦ ὑπάγω. 15 ὑμεῖε 16​ ​μόνος οὐκ εἰμί, ἀλλ' ἐγὼ καὶ ὁ πέμψας με πατήρ. 17 ἐν τῷ μαρτυρία ἀληθής ἐστιν. 18 πέμψας με πατήρ. 19 εἰ ἐμὲ ᾔδειτε, καὶ τὸν πατέρα μου [ e ]ἂν ᾔδειτε. 20 ἐν τῷ ἐν τῷ ἱερῷ· καὶ οὐδεὶς ἐπίασεν αὐτόν, ὅτι οὔπω ἐληλύθει ἡ ὥρα αὐτοῦ.
21 Ἐγὼ ὑπάγω καὶ ζητήσετέ με, καὶ ἐν ὑμεῖς οὐ δύνασθε ἐλθεῖν. 22 ἔλεγον οὖν οἱ Ἰουδαῖοι · Ὅπου ἐγὼ ὑπάγω ὑμεῖς οὐ δύνασθε ἐλθεῖν; 23 ἐγὼ ἐκ τῶν ἄνω ἐγὼ οὐκ εἰμὶ ἐκ τοῦ This is the way it is. 24 ἐν ταῖς ἁμαρτίαις ὑμῶν· ἐν ἁμαρτίαις ὑμῶν. 25 ἔλεγον οὖν αὐτῷ· Σὺ τίς εἶ; [ j ]εἶπεν αὐτοῖς ὁ Ἰησοῦς· Τὴν ἀρχὴν [ k ]ὅ τι καὶ λαλῶ ὑμῖν; 26 ἀληθής ἐστιν, κἀγὼ ἃ ἤκουσα παρ' αὐτοῦ ταῦτα [ l ]λαλῶ εἰς τὸν κόσμον. 27 οὐκ ἔγνωσαν ὅτι τὸν πατέρα αὐτοῖς ἔλεγεν. 28​ ​καὶ ἀπ' ἐμαυτοῦ ποιῶ οὐδέν, ἀλλὰ καθὼς ἐδίδαξέν με ὁ [ n ]πατὴρ ταῦτα λαλῶ. 29​ ​τὰ ἀρεστὰ αὐτῷ ποιῶ πάντοτε. 30 λαλοῦντος ταῦτα

John 8 begins at verse 12 and from verses 1 to 11 

the text is completely excluded

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/...version=SBLGNT

English Standard Version
The earliest manuscripts do not include 7:53–8:11 .]

The Woman Caught in Adultery

53[[They each went to his own house,


John 8

1but Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. 2 Early in the morning he came again to the temple. All the people came to him, and he sat down and taught them. 3The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and placed her in the midst. 4They said to him, “Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. 5Now in the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say?" 6This they said to test him, that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. 7And as they continued to ask him, he stood up and said to them, “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.” 8And once more he bent down and wrote on the ground. 9But when they heard it, they went away one by one, beginning with the older ones, and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. 10Jesus stood up and said to her , "Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?" 11She said, "No one, Lord." And Jesus said, "Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more."]]

The text Between brackets, with an explanation that the text is not found in the oldest manuscripts and is an intrusive text because it is placed between brackets


http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/...+8&version=ESV

Common English Bible Critical


editions of the Gk New Testament do not contain 7:53-8:11

.Contemporary English Version John 8:11 don't sin anymore : Verses 1-11 are not in some manuscripts. In other manuscripts these verses are placed after 7.36 or after 21.25 or after Luke 21.38, with some differences in 
the story http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/...fen-CEV-22977b Good News Translation John 8:11 Many manuscripts and early translations do not have this passage (8.1-11); others have it after Jn 21.24; others have it after Lk 21.38; one manuscript has it after Jn 7.36 Many manuscripts and early translations do not contain the text and others place it elsewhere in John and Luke http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/...n8&version=GNT Holman Christian Standard Bible Text in brackets and notes that it is an omitted text John 8:11 Other mss omit bracketed http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John8&version=HCSB#fen-HCSB-26563b New American Standard Bible Text in brackets http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/...8&version=NASB New Century Version Text in brackets and notes that some of the earliest surviving Greek copies do not contain the story http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/...+7&version=NCV New International Version The text is in parentheses and he comments that the earliest manuscripts and many other ancient witnesses do not have John 7:53—8:11. [The earliest manuscripts and many other ancient witnesses do not have John 7 :53—8:11.] http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/...ersion=NIV1984 New King James Version John 7:53 The words And everyone through sin no more (8:11) are bracketed by NU- as not original. They are present in over 900 manuscripts.

The text is in brackets and is not an original text and is found in over 900 manuscripts (all of them forged) 


http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John+7&version=NKJV




http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/...7&version=NKJV

New Living Translation


[ The most ancient Greek manuscripts do not include John 7:53–8:11. ]


The text in brackets and the comment that the oldest Greek manuscripts do not contain the story

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/...07&version=NLT

Today's New International Version

[ The earliest manuscripts and many other ancient witnesses do not have John 7:53—8:11.]

The text in brackets and the comment that the oldest manuscripts and ancient witnesses do not contain the text

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/...7&version=TNIV

Here is the oldest manuscript of the New Testament

Below is an image of page NB (52) of Papyrus 66, a codex of John's Gospel from about AD 200. The begins in the middle of the word εραυνησον (“search”) in John 7:52. On the second line the sentence ends with a punctuation mark and is immediately followed by Παλιν ουν αυτοις ελαλησεν ο Ις (“again Jesus spoke to them”) in 8:12, omitting the Story of the Adulteress . The manuscript has been annotated by a scribe who used diagonal strokes to indicate a word-order variant in the first and second lines, but the Story of the Adulteress is omitted without any notation .

Commentary on it : The papyrus began on page 52 of this manuscript with the letters νησον, which is part of the word ερευνησον translated “search” which is part of John 7:52. Then after the end of this verse you find the manuscript continuing directly on the same page without any missing pages or lines. It begins directly after it with the text of John 8:12. So the story is supposed to be present starting from approximately the third line of this page, but the story is excluded without any notes (the papyrus dates back to the second century).

Wikipedia : The
first surviving Greek manu witness to the pericope is the Latin / Greek diglot Codex Bezae of
the fifth century.

Okay, let's see which ancient manuscripts did not include this story 

. This story was not included in the following manuscripts:
"Papyrus 66 (second century) - Papyrus 75 (third century) - Papyrus 45 (the oldest papyrus of the Gospel of John) - Sinaiticus (fourth century) - Vaticanus (fourth century) - Alexandrian (fifth century) - Ephraimite (fifth century) - Washington manuscript (fifth century) - Sahidic Coptic - Free Coptic - Akhmemite - Armenian - Georgian - Slavic - Diatessaron - Delta - Theta - Most Syriac manuscripts - W - T - N - L - 567 - 157 - 70 - 2193 - 1253 - 33 - 0141 - 1424 - 1333 - 1241- 22 - 0211- 124 - 1242 - 1230 - 828 - 788 - 209 "


What about the manuscripts that contain the text and how they relate to the current text? 

Many of the manuscripts that contain it either contain many differences in the readings, which we will explain, or delete entire parts of the paragraph, or in fact contain only one or two numbers of it, such as manuscript 047, which deletes the numbers 7:53 to 8:2. Manuscript F contains only the last number (8:11). Manuscript B contains only the paragraph until 8:6. Manuscript 0233, the scholar Robinson says, could not read the paragraph because it was damaged, and failed even by using ultraviolet rays. These manuscripts that contain the text also contain signs used to indicate that it is not original and that its authenticity is doubtful, such as manuscripts E, M, S, (between the eighth and tenth centuries AD) and manuscript Lambda (ninth century Oxford and called Chandrovianus), manuscript B (Petropolitanus, ninth century in Leningrad), Omega (ninth century And preserved in Greece) and others. And this is not all, as there are other manuscripts that actually contain the text, but in places other than its current location. Metzger says on this issue: Western church and which was subsequently incorporated into various manu s at various places. Most copyists apparently thought that it would interrupt John's narrative at least if it were inserted after 7.52 (DEFGHKMUGP 28 700 892 ). He continues his words: . Others placed it after 7.36 (ms. 225) or after 7.44 (several Georgian mss.) or after 21.25 (1 565 1076 1570 1582 armmss) or after Luke 21.38 (f13). Others put it after 7:36 (manuscript 225) or after 7:44 (many Georgian manuscripts) or after 21:25 like manuscripts 1 565 1076 1570 1582 and Armenian manuscripts or after Luke 21:38 (imagine they put it inside the text of Luke himself, have you seen this confusion) and this is in the manuscript family f13 and not in one manuscript

















and I will add additional things to what Metzger mentioned, some put it at the end of the Gospel of John like some manuscripts of the manuscript family f1 and 565 and al 23 after 8:12 like al17 after 8:14 like 2691 after 8:20 like 981




Some put it at the end of the Gospel of Luke after the end of the manuscript in different ink such as 1333 which does not contain the text of the story except in this place, while the Gospel of John is devoid of it. The conflict in the location of the story in the manuscripts is clear.
Another point is that there is a manuscript of the Alexandrian type dating back to the sixth and seventh centuries AD that mentions this text (with some differences in the readings) but it also mentions the source that brought it this story in the margin, saying (it was found in the Gospel of Mara, Bishop of Amed). It is likely that this Mara traveled to Alexandria in the middle of the sixth century AD with some of his books, and from a Gospel that contains this story, the copyists added it as a quote from it to this manuscript in the late sixth and early seventh centuries to be the first insertion of the story into the Alexandrian text (the talk is about Bart Ehrman, a student of Metzger and one of the most famous contemporary manuscript scholars now, in his commentary on the subject). The story is not found in the Vatican manuscript or the Alexandrian manuscript, as I explained at the beginning of the subject.

The New Commentary on the Whole Bible

"This story is not included in the best and earliest manuscripts [of John]. In fact, it is absent from all witnesses earlier than the 9th century, with the exception of a fifth century Greek-Latin manuscript. No Greek church father comments on the passage prior to the 12th century.


Jamieson et al, "The New Commentary on the Whole Bible" , Tyndale, Wheaton IL (1990), pp. 247-248

The "Interpreter's One Volume Commentary on the Bible"

" 7:53-8:11 : This passage is omitted or set off in modern editions of the gospel since it does not appear in the oldest and best manuscripts and is apparently a later interpolation. In some manuscripts it occurs after Luke 21:38 "

This text is excluded from modern versions of the Gospel due to its absence from the excellent ancient manuscripts. It is a clearly interpolated text and in some manuscripts it is found after Luke 21:38

The Five Gospels

"The story of the woman caught in the act of adultery...was a 'floating' or 'orphan' story. It is almost certainly not a part of the original text of John, but is a noteworthy tradition nonetheless...While The Fellows [of the Jesus Seminar] agreed that the words did not originate in their present form with Jesus, they nevertheless assigned the words and story to a special category of things they wish Jesus had said and done.”

There is general agreement that the verses from John 7:53 to John 8:11 were not written by the author or authors who wrote the rest of the gospel. It was probably based on a story about the life of Jesus that had been often told, and was passed orally down through the centuries. Copyists then inserted it into various gospels. There is little consensus as to exactly when the forgery was inserted

The story of the adulterous woman was a floating or orphan story and it is certainly not part of the original text of the Gospel of John, but it is nevertheless a tradition that is told...
There is general agreement that the verses from John 7:53 to John 8:11 were not written by the author or authors of the rest of the Gospel of John. They are probably based on a story that was told orally about the life of Christ and was circulated over the centuries and added by copyists to different Gospels. There is some consensus about when this forgery was introduced

The story is told in another way in the Gospel of the Hebrews.