For nearly a century, scholars have wrestled with the presence of Lukanisms in the Pericope Adulterae ( John 7:53-8:11) even as the manuscript evidence clearly indicates this account was not originally part of the Third Gospel. A comparison of the version of this pericope found in Papias and the Didascalia with the pericopae associated with the Lukan special material (or “L source”) reveals remarkable similarities in style, form, and content. In light of these discoveries, we conclude that Papias and the Didascalia preserve a primitive form of the Pericope Adulterae that was originally part of the L source behind Luke’s Gospel, shedding light on the tradition history of this pericope as well as the nature of L.
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See B.M. Metzger, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament (2nd ed.; New York: United Bible Societies, 1994) 187-189. This consensus is nevertheless (unsuccessfully) challenged from time to time; see, for instance, J.P. Heil, “The Story of Jesus and the Adulteress ( John 7,53-8,11) Reconsidered,” Biblica 72 (1991) 182-191. For a response to Heil in defense of the consensus, see D.B. Wallace, “Reconsidering ‘The Story of Jesus and the Adulteress Reconsidered’,” NTS 39 (1993) 290-296, for a response to which see J.P. Heil, “A Rejoinder to ‘Reconsidering “The Story of Jesus and the Adulteress Reconsidered’ ” ( John 7.53-8.11),” EgT 25 (1994) 361-366.
K. Paffenroth, The Story of Jesus according to L ( JSNTSup 147; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1997) 143. To some degree, Paffenroth’s argument is both a confirmation and a substantial expansion of an earlier effort by D.M. Parrott to demonstrate the thematic unity of the L parables (D.M. Parrott, “The Dishonest Steward (Luke 16.1-8a) and Luke’s Special Parable Collection,” NTS 37 (1991) 499-515). As with Ehrman’s reconstruction of PAeast, we hope that those who disagree with various details of Paffenroth’s work will nevertheless find this study useful and amenable to their own research into the history of PA.
A. Denaux and R. Corstjens, The Vocabulary of Luke: An Alphabetical Presentation and a Survey of Characteristic and Noteworthy Words and Word Groups in Luke’s Gospel (Biblical Tools and Studies 10; Leuven: Peeters, 2009) 444 judge the phrase ὄρθρος to be “characteristic of Luke.”
R.E. Brown, The Gospel according to John (2 vols.; AB 29; New York: Doubleday, 1966) 1:333.
H.J. Cadbury, The Style and Literary Method of Luke (HTS 6; Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1920) 142-144.
Wallace, “Reconsidering,” 292. Keith, “Recent Research,” 382 cites Heil’s linguistic links to Johannine style to assert “PA demonstrates as strong linguistic connections with Johannine material as it does with Synoptic material,” yet he seems to have been unaware of Wallace’s rebuttal of these links; Wallace’s article does not appear in the bibliography of Keith’s paper.
M. Dibelius, From Tradition to Gospel (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1935) 98, 165. For a pronouncement story, see V. Taylor, The Formation of the Gospel Tradition (2nd ed.; London: Macmillan, 1935; repr. 1960) 83-84; R. Schnackenburg, The Gospel According to St. John (New York: Crossroad, 1982) 2:169. For a controversy story, see A.T. Lincoln, The Gospel According to Saint John (BNTC; London: Continuum, 2005) 528; W.L. Petersen, “ΟΥΔΕ ΕΓΩΣΕ [ΚΑΤΑ]ΚΡΙΝΩ: John 8:11, the Protevangelium Iacobi, and the History of the Pericope Adulterae,” in Sayings of Jesus: Canonical and Non-Canonical: Essays in Honor of Tjitze Baarda (ed. W.L. Petersen, J.S. Vos and H.J. de Jonge; Leiden: Brill, 1997) 191-221; cf. 206.
Parrott, “The Dishonest Steward,” 510. See also Paffenroth’s statement that this characteristic “transcends formal categories” (According to L, 110).
Paffenroth, According to L, 112-113. On Luke’s tendency to omit details, cf. Cadbury, Style of Luke, 79-83, and Taylor, Formation, 208, in which Taylor concludes that Luke, in his redaction, tends to shorten accounts, replace direct speech with indirect, delete personal and place names, and remove superfluous details.
T.W. Manson, The Sayings of Jesus: As Recorded in the Gospels According to St. Matthew and St. Luke Arranged with Introduction and Commentary (London: SCM, 1937) 282. Paffenroth, According to L, 159 uses “The Gospel of the Outcast” as the title for the entirety of the L material.
B.M. Metzger and B.D. Ehrman, The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption, and Restoration (4th ed.; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005) 319-320.
Keith, Literacy of Jesus, 130-139. For a defense of the view that the lectionary system caused the displacement of PA from its “original” location in John 7:53-8:11 because it interrupts the feast lesson for Pentecost, see M.A. Robinson, “Preliminary Observations Regarding the Pericope Adulterae Based upon Fresh Collations of Nearly All Continuous-Text Manuscripts and All Lectionary Manuscripts Containing the Passage,” FN 13 (2000) 35-59.
M.S. Goodacre, Goulder and the Gospels: An Examination of a New Paradigm ( JSNTSup 133; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1996) 366.
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For nearly a century, scholars have wrestled with the presence of Lukanisms in the Pericope Adulterae ( John 7:53-8:11) even as the manuscript evidence clearly indicates this account was not originally part of the Third Gospel. A comparison of the version of this pericope found in Papias and the Didascalia with the pericopae associated with the Lukan special material (or “L source”) reveals remarkable similarities in style, form, and content. In light of these discoveries, we conclude that Papias and the Didascalia preserve a primitive form of the Pericope Adulterae that was originally part of the L source behind Luke’s Gospel, shedding light on the tradition history of this pericope as well as the nature of L.
All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
---|---|---|---|
Abstract Views | 731 | 105 | 18 |
Full Text Views | 165 | 4 | 1 |
PDF Views & Downloads | 142 | 11 | 3 |