PART TWO OF TWO:
The same can be said of Origen. Ehrman argues that Origen also is a witness against those two verses. But when one looks at the pericope about the woman taken in adultery (John 7:53-8:11), one can see that Origen clearly is a source against those verses because Origen’s commentary on John is still extant and Origen skips directly from 7:52 directly to 8:12 without missing a beat. Thus we can be very sure that Origen did not know of 7:53-8:11 in the version he used of the Gospel of John. However, we do not have any such commentary by Origen on the Gospel of Luke. We do know that Origen wrote a commentary on Luke (we know this from Jerome) but it is lost.
So, we know from an analysis of Clement and Origen that Ehrman is clearly misrepresenting the evidence and overstating the case. Later Church Fathers (Hilary of Poiytiers and Jerome) who stated both that they knew verses 43-44 and that they do not appear in some manuscripts. They expressly state that they know the two verses actually do appear in some and do not appear in other manuscripts and they both are neutral on the question of authenticity.
But when you look at the earliest Church Fathers in the second century, you see that Justin Martyr clearly knew of verses 43-44, for he cites them. So by about A.D. 155, the verses were known. In the face of this, Bart argues that the verses therefore must have been added prior to A.D. 155. That, however, is merely a bald assertion. The manuscript evidence shows otherwise. Justin knew of the verses. The very next Church Father, Irenaeus of Lyons, writing in about A. D. 180, also knew of the verses. The earliest copy we have of yet another second-century apologist, Tatian, in his Diatesseron (a harmony of the four Gospels), which we have only in Latin in the Codex Fuldensis from the middle of the sixth century (about A. D. 545), also includes Luke 22:43-44. Indeed, we have a Syriac commentary on Tatian by Ephraim from the fourth century and he, too, comments on Tatian’s treatment of Luke 22:43-44 (so we know it was actually in Tatian’s work).
Thus, the three most important figures from the second century—Justin, Tatian, Irenaeus—all knew of this passage. It is not until the middle of the third century that manuscripts begin to omit the two verses. The rise of anti-Christian literature started in the late second century and became prolific in the third century. And every single anti-Christian writer we know of from that period—Celcius, Porphyry and Julian—all single out the Gethsemane narrative and say that Jesus was a weakling, with Porphyry and Julian specifically citing to Luke 22:43-44 to support their mockery of the Savior.
What did early Christians think about what was happening in Gethsemane? They in fact were at a loss to explain what was actually going on. For example, commenting on Matthew’s account, cited to Jesus statement, “Father, remove this cup from me; nevertheless, not my will but thine be done,” Origen said this simply referred to the Jewish nation: when Jesus drinks this cup, the whole Jewish nation will be destroyed. Another explanation will be that Jesus was not acutally weak, he really does not need strengthening, but he is baiting the Devil. If he baits the Devil and the Devil sets off the betrayal, this is how Jesus ultimately will conquer the Devil (a case of divine deception, playing the part to bait the Devil to get Judas to betray him). In their gropings to explain the verses, none of the early Christians actually discuss the Atonement and do not at all mention that in those drops of blood are represented the washing away of the sins of the world.
So what was going on in the third century was the Christians were faced with a problematic passage of scripture, were unable to explain it, and therefore did as was unfortunately too common: they simply omitted the verses from the manuscripts. Arian used verses 43-44 against the Orthodox, arguing the passage proves that Jesus was subordinate to God and is actually susceptible to change, an anathema. Epiphanius not only countered that the Arians were using these verses as a proof text but he also expressly lamented that Orthodox Christians had responded by omitting this passage from their scriptures. Thus he admitted that Orthodox Christians were omitting the verses from their scriptures in the fourth century in light of Arianism because it was a hard saying and Arians were using it to their advantage.
Is it possible that someone between the middle of the second century and the middle of the third century may have omitted those verses for apologetic reasons? In other words, rather than being an anti-Docetic addition, there may in fact have been a Docetic omission of the verses. And the most blatantly anti-Docetic passage in the Gospels is in Luke when Jesus is resurrected. And that is an uncontested verse, where Jesus states, “Behold, a phantasm has not flesh and bones as ye see me have.” Clearly Jesus after his resurrection is showing that he has a physical, corporeal body. That is in Luke and it otherwise is a secure verse. In other words, adding verses 43-44 did not need to be added in an effort to fight against Docetism; there is already plenty there, in Luke.
So we actually have no Church Father stating that the verses were added and we have Epiphanius admitting that the verses actually were there earlier and later were omitted. In either event, we have actual corruption of the scripture texts themselves, not merely divergent views on what they mean, and those corruptions occurred in the very earliest centuries after the death of the Apostles.
