Cambridge Greek Testament Commentary

Jude 1:12

οὗτοί εἰσιν recurs again in Jude 1:16; Jude 1:19. As Dr Chase has remarked, it is a favourite phrase in Apocalyptic writings. The seer is shown something and asks what it is? his guide—usually an angel—introduces his explanation by these or like words, cf. Zech. (Jude 1:10 etc.), Revelation 7:14, among Biblical passages. In each of the cases where Jude uses it we may fairly suspect that he is alluding to a passage of some writing. He is certainly doing so in Jude 1:16, and as I think also in Jude 1:19. In these two places he quotes the Assumption of Moses; perhaps he is doing so in Jude 1:12 also: we cannot be certain, for the book is mutilated.

ἀγάπαις, the right reading here. It is the only mention in the N.T. under this name of the love-feasts, which were universally so called a little later. We hear of the germ of this Christian feast, as distinct from the Eucharist, in Acts 2:46 κλῶντές τε κατʼ οἶκον ἄρτον, and of the abuses and confusion which sometimes occurred in connexion with it, in 1 Corinthians 11:18 sqq. At first it was a meal for all members of the Christian community and was celebrated immediately after the Eucharist. In later times it was separated therefrom by an interval of some length. Gradually it came to be regarded as a charitable provision for the poorer members of the congregation.

σπιλάδες. 2 Peter has in the corresponding place σπίλοι, which certainly means spots or stains. The ordinary meaning of σπιλάς is ὕφαλος πέτρα, a sunken rock. In a late, perhaps fourth century, hexameter poem on the virtues of precious stones, attributed to Orpheus, and called the Lithica, there is a description of the agate as κατάστικτος σπιλάδεσσιν (l. 614) mottled with spots, and the Lexicon of Hesychius (which may be dependent on this passage of Jude) gives σπιλάδες = μεμιασμένοι. These two passages (coupled with 2 Peter) constitute all the evidence at present available for rendering σπιλάδες here as “spots.” But the evidence of 2 Peter is rather strong and that of the Lithica (a pagan composition) quite clear. I incline to accept it.

ἑαυτοὺς ποιμαίνοντες. Ezekiel 39:8 (Westcott and Hort) ἐβόσκησαν οἱ ποιμένες ἐαυτούς.

The similes employed by Jude in Jude 1:12-13 are these:

Stains (or rocks). Waterless clouds. Barren trees. Waves.

Wandering stars:
and those in 2 Peter are:

Stains. Waterless springs. Driven mists.

νεφέλαι κ.τ.λ. The clouds are not only useless but purposeless, driven about by winds. Jude accumulates attributes, both here and in the next clause.

φθινοπωρινά. Mayor has carefully investigated the use of this word (which A.V. renders “(trees) whose fruit withereth,” R.V. rightly “autumn trees”) and shows that the word comes from φθινόπωρον, late autumn. This is the time when we expect to find fruit on trees, and therefore the adjective must be taken with the next word ἄκαρπα: the trees have no fruit at the season when they ought to have it, like the barren fig tree in the Gospels.

δὶς�: twice dead: applying to the men rather than the trees. The men are twice dead because they were once dead in sin before baptism and have fallen away from the truth since baptism.

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Cambridge Greek Testament Commentary

Jude 1:12

Old Testament

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