Why remove John 8:1-11 in the NWT if these verses speak highly of Jesus
by I_love_Jeff 21 Replies latest watchtower bible
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Designer Stubble
Because Jesus was COMPASSIONATE here and the organization is not. Many facing a JC were likely quoting from this scripture and the GB does not like that. With this gone from the Bible, the younger generation will soon not even know it was once in there - and they can DF without hesitation and compassion. It is a CULT - let's not forget that!
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I_love_Jeff
I do agree!
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Zoos
With this gone from the Bible, the younger generation will soon not even know it was once in there
Exactly!
I just read a thread on Yahoo! Answers about the old Youth book claiming masturbation causes homosexuality. A young(ish) JW chimed in, " I've never heard, read, or had even a remote insinuation of this preposterous assertion. Lie #1001018382828 about JWs."
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20131126121603AApQTp3
It doesn't take long for the old teachings (or scriptures) to fade from the collective memory of the group.
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CyrusThePersian
This is a rare instance where the New World Translation is actually correct. The reason the Pericope Adulterae (as this passage is called) isn't in there is because it doesn't belong there.
Even though the passage is quite old (the story may even date back to nearly the time of the Apostles; Papias, as quoted by Eusebius, may have referred to the story) there is evidence that the story doesn't belong in John.
For one thing the story (or pericope) doesn't appear in either the Codex Sinaiticus or the Codex Vaticanus, the oldest complete New Testament manuscripts we have. It appears for the first time in the much later Codex Bezae of the fifth century. For another, it has words and phrases that are not found in other places in John. For instance, the term "scribes and Pharisees" in verse 3, while common in the synoptics, isn't a Johannine phrase.
Even though the story may fit nicely with Jesus' teachings, if it doesn't belong there, it shouldn't be there, at least from an academic point of view.
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Cold Steel
The question is, was this an addition to the scripture? Did it actually happen? Both John and Moses warned against adding or deleting things from the words of their books. Making those determinations, however, is always risky unless one has all of the originals. Was this story purposely deleted in earlier accounts, or purposely added in later accounts? Was the addition taken from one account and incorporated into another? It sounds genuine. And though most scholars reject the apocryphal Gospel of Thomas, many acknowledge that it most likely contains some of the actual words of Jesus. But where did they come from and how did they get into a Gnostic gospel account?
The passages in question in the Gospel of John account may have been in the original, purged for some reasons, then restored to later accounts. Or they may have come from an account John or one of the other writers wrote and which were removed when some factions argued over the rest of the content. We've lost a great deal of what the ancient Christians thought and believed, and some of these were later recorded as heresies. Some early authorities may have been uncomfortable with Jesus essentially nullifying one of Moses' laws from God, then where does one draw the line? If one must be free from sin to cast the first stone, then no one would be stoning anyone, and this might be misconstrued as being against the Law of Moses; therefore, for political reasons, the story had to be redacted so as to mollify the Jews or constrain justice. The possibilities are endless. But if one believes that the salient points of the scriptures were passed down as a matter of Providence, the best policy, as I see it, are to leave it alone. We can't always conclude that the earliest versions of anything are the most accurate, as some of the Bible's stories (like the story of the great flood) are found in Babylonian texts that are older than any version of the Torah known to date. Yet I believe the biblical story of Noah and discount the accounts of Gilgamesh. If the JWs feel compelled to remove John 8:1-11, they also should remove the story of Noah and add the account of Gilgamesh.
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DATA-DOG
The GB say that something was wrongfully removed if it supports Jwism, but say it was wrongfully added if it does not help their cause. So JEHOVAH was removed from the NT by Satan, and John 8:1-11 was added, but God preserved the bible... The WTBTS cause the truth to be spoken of abusively.
DD
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Perry
Evidence for John 7:53-8:11 (Manuscripts including, or referring, to this passage)
Didascalia Apostolorum (Syriac quotation from the account, circa 3rd century. Does not state what gospel, if any, it was in) End Note 8
- D (Bezae Cantabrigiensis, 5th century)
- Papias of Hierapolis (refers to a story of Jesus and a woman "accused of many sins" circa 125 A.D.) End Note 2
- Didymus the Blind (refers to the passage being found in "several gospels", lived circa 313-398 A.D.)
- Pacian (370 A.D.) cites the passage. End Note 10
- B (Vaticanus, circa 4th century, which didn't include the passage, marked the end of chapter 7 with an "umlaut" indicating that an alternative reading was known)
- Jerome (says that the passage was found in "many Greek and Latin manuscripts" in Rome and the Latin West, late 4th century)
- Many other Latin Fathers including Ambrose End Note 7 , John Chrysostom, and Augustine (all speak of the passage as being canonical. Augustine claims that some may have excluded it earlier to avoid the idea that Christ had sanctioned adultery, 4th and 5th centuries) End Note 12
- A majority of the Old Latin and Latin Vulgate (perhaps mostly due to Jerome's influence)
- Apostolic Constitutions (alludes to the account, late 4th century; document partially based on the Didascalia Apostolorum)
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KiddingMe
Marked
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CyrusThePersian
Hi Perry!
Most of the references you gave are quite late and have little impact in proving the authenticity of the pericope adulterae. The one reference that is significant is Papias (as quoted by Eusebius, a 4th century exegete).
If we can trust Eusebius, he states that Papias, who lived in the late first century into the early second century, wrote of the existence of a story of a woman accused of many sins that was found in what Papias called "The Gospel of the Hebrews".
There is some evidence that the pericope is very old, and may even date back to nearly the time of the apostles, if we can believe Eusebius. However, whether it belongs in the book of John remains in doubt.
CyrusThePersian