John 8:39

John 8:39 evpoiei/te {B}

It appears that the original text of this verse involved a mixed conditional sentence, with eiv … evste in the protasis, and evpoiei/te in the apodosis (“If you are really Abraham’s children, you would be doing the works of Abraham”). The variant readings arose in an effort to make a more grammatically “correct” condition; thus, instead of evste (î^{66, 75} a B D L T Y 070 1321 ù⁶⁰ it^ff2 vg syr^s), the later text reads h=te (C N W X G D Q L P ¦¹ ¦¹³ it^{a, b, c, e, l, q} cop^{sa, bo} al), which, with evpoiei/te, makes a condition contrary to fact. Other witnesses add a;n, even though in koine Greek “the addition of a;n to the apodosis is no longer obligatory” (Blass-Debrunner-Funk, Grammar, § 360, 1).