page_title: Papias of Hierapolis
section_title: Pericope Adulterae
hierarchical_section_title: Papias of Hierapolis / Fragments / Pericope Adulterae
context_page_description: Papias was a Greek Apostolic Father, Bishop of Hierapolis, and author who lived c. 60– c.130 AD. He wrote the Exposition of the Sayings of the Lord in five books.
  This work, which is lost apart from brief excerpts in the works of Irenaeus of Lyons and Eusebius of Caesarea, is an important early source on Christian oral tradition and especially on the origins of the canonical Gospels.
context_section_description: Eusebius concludes his account of Papias by saying that he relates "another account about a woman who was accused of many sins before the Lord, which is found in the Gospel according to the Hebrews". Agapius of Hierapolis (10th century) offers a fuller summary of what Papias said here, calling the woman an adulteress. The parallel is clear to the famous Pericope Adulterae (John 7:53–8:11), a problematic passage absent or relocated in many ancient Gospel manuscripts. The remarkable fact is that the story is known in some form to such an ancient witness as Papias.
  What is less clear is to what extent Eusebius and Agapius are reporting the words of Papias versus the form of the pericope known to them from elsewhere. A wide range of versions have come down to us, in fact. Since the passage in John is virtually unknown to the Greek patristic tradition; Eusebius has cited the only parallel he recognized, from the now-lost Gospel according to the Hebrews, which may be the version quoted by Didymus the Blind.
  The nearest agreement with "many sins" actually occurs in the Johannine text of Armenian codex Matenadaran 2374 (formerly Ečmiadzin 229); this codex is also remarkable for ascribing the longer ending of Mark to "Ariston the Elder", which is often seen as somehow connected with Papias.
caption: Henri Lerambert [fr],[45] Christ and the Adultress, 16th century
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