And who would you consider a religious authority?

Ah, that is the question because words and books often mean different things to different people.
But since you asked, here are a few links to peruse:
http://www.academia.edu/7928058/The_Historicity_of_the_Pericope_Adulterae_John_7_53-8_11_

“Until recently, it was not thought that any Greek Church Father had taken note of the passage before the 12th Century; but in 1941 a large collection of the writings of Didymus the Blind (ca. 313- 398) was discovered in Egypt, including a reference to the pericope adulterae as being found in “several gospels”; and it is now considered established that this passage was present in its canonical place in a minority of Greek manuscripts known in Alexandria from the 4th Century onwards.” Found here:
http://textus-receptus.com/wiki/Jesus_and_the_woman_taken_in_adultery

“This entire section, Joh 7:53-8:11, traditionally known as the pericope adulterae, is not contained in the earliest and best MSS and was almost certainly not an original part of the Gospel of John. Among modern commentators and textual critics, it is a foregone conclusion that the section is not original but represents a later addition to the text of the Gospel.”
See here: http://oneinjesus.info/2014/05/apologetics-how-we-got-the-bible-part-6-the-woman-taken-in-adultery/

You may be dead sure of your information, but when it comes to ancient manuscripts and their interpretation there are differences of opinion. Just as there are differences of opinion here at Neo’s. Especially when it comes to religion. Religion deals with faith. What is faith? It is a strong belief in God or in the doctrines of a religion, based on spiritual apprehension rather than proof. Thus, your mileage may vary. I’m all for any religion that helps people get closer in a relationship with God/Jehovah/or? I’m opposed to religions that preach forced conversion or brutal punishments for transgressions – Islam for one.

I don’t understand why people can’t seem to deal with the facts of Christianity’s Medieval practices and how they changed to being more tolerant and more forgiving over time. Those were times when too many clergymen and rulers lost their way and used their interpretation of Gospel to justify their intolerance and barbarity. If you haven’t read about the 30 Years War, you should. It was a barbaric religious war that opened people’s eyes to a better way – of living in peace and tolerance with other religious sects. It didn’t happen right away, but the intolerance slowly ebbed away.

The polygamy link reinforces what I wrote: the Romans didn’t practice polygamy. The Church Fathers also wrote “Of the Good of Marriage” about 400 A.D. and in it, marriage is described as between one man and one woman. If a man were to “put away” his wife (divorce her) or vice versa, the man could not have another wife. Vows until death are mentioned at this early time. You can read it yourself here: http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1309.htm

As for the polygamous Anglicans in Africa, that’s hardly a ringing endorsement. The Church of England started, after all, because Henry VIII wanted easy divorces.

What religious authority decided that one?

The story in John 7:53-8-11 of Jesus forgiving the adulteress who was about to be stoned is thought to be a late addition (after 1200) to the NT.

Though I can’t find any concrete examples of Christians practicing stoning of adulteresses in the Middle Ages, there is plenty of evidence that adulterous women were severely punished. Punishments such as being expelled from their homes, their dowries confiscated by their husbands, heads shaven and forced to parade through the streets for shaming. Then, of course, there was the Scarlet A. Not stoning to death but severe punishment in spite of Jesus example in John 7:53-8-11.

My point , though badly made, was that Christians have moderated their beliefs considerably since the 1500s.

@11:28
https://vimeo.com/140402887

This general between all religions.”

Fred has summed up our differences quite succinctly. I think that dismissing the effect of the doctrines of a dominant religion on society and on individuals is dangerous.

During the Borujerdi era, Khomeini was a marginal, even ostracised figure in Qom, known
mostly for his austere lifestyle and his expertise in erfan (mysticism). His lectures attracted a
following, but they also raised suspicions that he was an infidel, perhaps even a Sunni. He
cultivated an air of otherworldliness that entranced his followers, and he disdained his
colleagues, the ‘stupid, reactionary mullahs’. He admired men of action who performed their
religious duty by assassinating members of the regime. Borujerdi held Khomeini at a distance,
fearing that his radicalism might leave the seminary vulnerable to the security services. But
after Borujerdi died in 1961, Khomeini started to raise his voice against the shah.

Khomeini argued that the Quranic concept of the velayate
faqih, ‘the stewardship of the
jurist’, applied not just to widows and orphans (as most scholars believed) but to society as a
whole: the Islamic state should be ruled by a group of clerics; even, he hinted, by ‘a single
man’, though he could not be a monarch, since Islam was inherently hostile to monarchy.

but even before he reached Tehran, Khomeini insisted on his
resignation. The American government was divided between those in favour of a military
coup, and those, like William Sullivan, the American ambassador in Tehran, who saw
Khomeini as a Gandhilike
figure and a potential ally in the fight against communism. The
Soviets assumed that America’s loss would be their gain, and that the shouts of ‘God is great!’,
the sea of turbans and chadors in the streets of Tehran, were merely a faé§ade for socialist
revolution. But Khomeini’s slogan was ‘neither East nor West’,