Author.
Needless to say, the author of this message, of course, was not Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Christ. Here we are talking about a completely different person named Judas. The author of the Epistle of Jude begins it with short words about himself: “Judas, the servant of Jesus Christ, the brother of James” (verse 1).
Most theologians agree that Judas was the brother of the Lord - in the flesh, the son of Mary and Joseph, born to them after Jesus, and, therefore, the word “slave” is applicable to the writer because, although at first Jesus’ brothers did not believe in Him (John 7:5), later, having witnessed His resurrection, they were converted (Acts 1:14). Among them is Judas, who, however, not considering himself worthy to be called the “brother” of Jesus Christ, calls himself His servant.
James, whom Jude calls his brother, was also the brother of the Lord (Matt. 13:55; Mark 6:3), and he was one of the leaders of the Jerusalem church (Acts 15:13) and the author of the epistle of the same name, the epistle of James ( James 1:1).
As for whether Judas was an apostle, then, judging by verse 17, he did not consider himself an apostle, but it is also possible that he wrote so out of modesty. However, the importance of the topic on which he writes shows that he considered himself entitled to touch upon it as if he were really an apostle.
Jude writes his epistle out of genuine love and concern, but there is a certain authority in his tone. He would like to write on a joyful topic: “about the common salvation” (Jude 1:3), but to a much greater extent he is forced to touch on sad things. His love for his brothers, who he saw were under threat of enemy invasion, forced him, after a few joyful words, to proceed to a serious warning.
Message style.
Jude’s style is dynamic, characterized by figurative expressions (“waterless clouds”, “autumn trees” - verse 12; “waves” and “stars”, verse 13). Judas is characterized by the so-called method of triads; some commentators count 18 triads in his message. The most notable of these are the following: “Judas the servant brother” (verse 1); in his address: “those who are called, who are sanctified, are preserved” (verse 1); in his greeting: “Mercy, peace and love” (verse 2); in the description of apostates: “the wicked, turning back the grace of God, denying Jesus Christ” (verse 4); in the examples he gives of other apostates who were subjected to God’s judgment: “the people from the land of Egypt, the angels. Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities" (verses 5-7); in his description of his contemporary heretics - dreamers: “who defile the flesh, reject the rulers, slander the high authorities” (verse 8); in a clarifying description of the latter: “they follow the path of Cain, they give themselves over to the deceitfulness of bribes, like Balaam, they perish in stubbornness, like Korah” (verse 11).
Then Judas goes beyond the triads - “triple images”, strengthening them with new and new metaphors, thanks to which what he said about the apostates sounds in a tone of increasing condemnation. He calls them: “waterless clouds, autumn trees, barren, fierce sea waves, foaming with their shame; wandering stars" (verses 12-13).
We find other examples of triads where Jude speaks of murmurers, dissatisfied with everyone, walking according to their own lusts. (verse 16). They are “a people who separate themselves (from the unity of the faith), natural, without spirit” (verse 19).
Jude often refers to the Old Testament. He talks about the exodus of Israel from Egypt and the subsequent death of many Israelites in the wilderness (verse 5), about Sodom and Gomorrah (verse 7), about the body of Moses (verse 9), about Cain (verse 11), about Balaam (verse 11) , about Korah (verse 11), about Enoch (verse 14), about Adam (verse 14).
Composition, content, teaching
The message can be divided into 4 parts:
- introduction, purpose of the Message (1-4);
- examples of retribution for sins taken from the OT and traditions (5-7);
- warning against false teachers (8-23);
- conclusion (24-25).
The divinely inspired author calls for steadfast adherence to the faith “once delivered to the saints.” He sees the danger threatening the Church from those who abuse Christian freedom. These “dreamers” justify their “debauchery” with “inflated words.” They serve as a temptation at love suppers, turning them into social feasts (“they fatten themselves without fear”). The “dreamers” reject the warnings of their mentors. The spiritual authority of the church leadership means nothing to them. Therefore, the apostle compares them with the fratricide Cain and with Korah, who rebelled against Moses. “These are murmurers, not happy with anything.” By trampling on moral commandments, they actually reject Christ. The harsh tone of the denunciation shows that the temptation of disorder and indifference to moral purity were a serious danger for communities already at the end of the century. Thus, the Epistle of Jude proclaims the inseparability of true faith and fidelity to the ethical commandments of the Gospel.
The message was recognized as canonical no later than the beginning. V. It is in the Muratorian canon, but in the century. Eusebius of Caesarea still classified him as an anti-legomena.
Time to write.
Scholars have different opinions regarding the date of writing of this epistle, since it is not clear from the text who it was addressed to, nor what specific heretical group (or group) Jude had in mind. Most, however, believe that the letter was written between 67 and 80 AD. Perhaps Judas was greatly influenced by the apostle Peter, who wrote his second epistle in 67 or 68. Peter predicted that false teachers would “appear” in the future (2 Pet. 2:1; 3:3), and Jude writes of them as having already “crept” into the Church (Jude 1:4). The Gnostic heresy, which Jude may have been referring to, began to penetrate the churches as early as the first century.
Literature
- Barkley W., Interpretation of the Last. John and Jude, Washington, 1986;
- Bogdashevsky D.I., Epistle of St. ap. Judas, TKDA, 1908, No. 11;
- Bogdashevsky D.I., Judas the Apostle and his Epistle, PBE, vol. 7, pp. 520-27;
- Glagolev A., Conciliar Epistle of the Apostle Jude, TB, vol. 10;
- Ep. Cassian (Bezobrazov), Christ and the first Christ. generation, Paris, 1950;
- The beginning of heresies in the Christian Church (from Schaff F.), M. Mitropolsky, PA, 1861, vol. 6;
- Orlin I.I., Council Epistles of the Apostle James, First and Second Apostle Peter and Apostle Jude, Ryazan, 1903;
- Briggs C., Epistles of St. Peter and St. Jude, NY, 1910;
- JBC, v.2;
- RFIB, t.2;
Purpose of writing.
One main idea runs through the entire message: “Beware of apostates.” In keeping with this warning, Jude strongly exhorts his readers to “contend for the faith” (verse 3). Gnosticism has already begun to rear its head. Here is what Michael Green wrote in connection with his analysis of 2 Peter and Jude:
“Here, in a concise form, are described the main elements and features from which late Gnosticism subsequently emerged: the priority of human knowledge over the demands of morality; an arrogant attitude towards the unenlightened leaders of the Church, interest in various kinds of spiritualistic phenomena, divisions, and finally - voluptuousness and lust.”
Supporters of the nascent Gnosticism, the danger of which Jude warns, rejected Jesus Christ as Lord (verse 4), preached permissiveness (verse 4, 8, 16), did not recognize authorities (verses 8,11,18), followed their sinful desires ( verse 16; 18), were concerned only with their own gain (verses 11-12, 16), they were unspiritual (verse 19), arrogant (verse 16) and boastful (verse 16).
The Gnostics declared everything that belongs to the realm of the spirit to be good, and everything material to be evil. Hence their increased interest in the phenomena of the other world. But they also preached unrestrained fulfillment of carnal desires. Thus, the essence of this apostasy of the Gnostics was that the grace of God was declared “a reason for debauchery.” Judas accused the Gnostics of a “double falling away” - of confessing false teaching and of dissolute behavior.
Gospel of Judas
In 2006, the text of the so-called “Gospel of Judas” was published, causing a sensation throughout the world. An ancient manuscript found at the end of the 20th century has excited the minds of researchers and confused many. Some have declared it to be the missing book of the New Testament, others have certainly rejected it and called it a forgery - and many have decided that the Church was hiding from the world the existence of the text written by Jude. And recently, on the First Channel of Russian television, a film produced by National Geographic* was shown, proclaiming the “Gospel of Judas” as an almost lost book of the New Testament. What exactly is this manuscript, inscribed with the name of the apostle who betrayed Christ, and is there any connection between the new discovery and the known stories about the life of the Lord? The text of the Gospel of Judas is contained in a papyrus codex written in Coptic, which also contains some other non-canonical works, such as the Epistle of Peter to Philip, James, Allogenes and others. The fate of this code is almost detective. It was discovered back in 1983, but due to the opposition of the previous owner it could not be published for a long time, and only in 2001 it was finally purchased thanks to the assistance of the National Geographic Society. An international working group of scientists was immediately created, led by a prominent coptologist, professor at the University of Geneva Rodolphe Kasser. Over the course of five years, project participants were able to read, translate and comment on the text, and then publish it, including on the Internet. Researchers consider the codex to be authentic, date it to approximately 300 A.D. and believe that the Coptic text is a translation and reflects the Greek original of the 2nd century that has not reached us. The competence of the project participants is generally recognized. Still, I would like to raise a number of questions.
Three hundred years, or science fiction of our days
First, what is the basis for such an early and precise dating as “around 300”? Paleography - the science that studies ancient manuscripts - can only help here if there is a corpus of accurately dated manuscripts to which the find under study can be linked. Meanwhile, until 821–823 we have no dated Coptic manuscripts! Therefore, scientists have to act by analogy with Greek handwriting, which undoubtedly influenced Coptic writing, since Greek paleography is much more developed than Coptic. The type of writing in which the “Gospel of Judas” was written was actively used in the 4th–6th centuries. Therefore, it would be much more appropriate, from a scientific point of view, to cautiously vaguely date it to the 4th–5th centuries - and indeed, other researchers are inclined, based on paleographic data, to date this manuscript to a time around the year 400. There are no serious paleographic grounds for such a precise date - “about 300”. Such a date may be caused by the pursuit of sensation and a latent desire to move the manuscript almost to the 3rd century - specifically as close as possible to apostolic times. Of course, the researchers refer to the radiocarbon method, which dates the manuscript of the “Gospel of Judas” between 220 and 340 years old - however, as even the founder of this method, Libby, warned, such an analysis gives serious errors (from 70 to 300 years!) for all short-lived plants samples such as flax, cereals and, of course, papyrus. Secondly, the assertion that the Coptic text is a translation from a Greek original of the 2nd century also has no basis. Indeed, to determine the translational nature of a monument, either the presence of words clearly borrowed from the original language and atypical for the target language is required, or the tracing of syntactic constructions, or the presence of lexical cripples. But, unfortunately, the dictionary of the Coptic language already contains a lot of Greek borrowings - therefore, from the point of view of the dictionary, there are few prospects for serious finds. And thus, the dating of the text of the “Gospel of Judas” to the beginning of the 4th century AD cannot in any way be considered satisfactory.
Well forgotten old?
Only two dating criteria remain - the very content of the ancient codex and the testimony of contemporaries about it. And such evidence of the existence of the “Gospel of Judas” is given by the famous researcher of dubious religious movements of the 2nd century - St. Irenaeus of Lyons in chapter 31 of the first book “Against Heresies.” Already from this description it is clear how vague and confusing the story is contained in the text attributed to Jude: “...Others again say that Cain comes from a higher power, and Esau, Korah, Sodomites and all the same are recognized as their relatives, and therefore they were persecuted Creator, but not one of them suffered harm, for Wisdom took from them back to herself her property. And this, they teach, the traitor Judas knew well, and since he only knew the truth, he accomplished the mystery of tradition, and through him, they say, everything earthly and heavenly was resolved. They also give out a fictitious story of this kind, calling it the Gospel of Judas.” If fragments were found in the found and published text of the “new Gospel” that at least approximately corresponded to the above quote, the question could be considered resolved - yes, this is the same Greek text that was known to St. Irenaeus, we just got it late and in translation. But in the “Gospel of Judas” there is no genealogy, nothing is said about the “taking” of anything by Wisdom, it does not say about the “mystery of the tradition” of Christ and, even more so, about the “resolution of earthly and heavenly things.” Of course, we can refer to the fact that only fragments of the text have reached us, and everything missing is contained in the unpreserved parts. But we can just as well say that, since we do not find telephone wires in ancient cities, the ancient Romans used mobile phones. Therefore, it is possible that the “Gospel of Judas” is just a Coptic remake of the 4th century. And just as it is impossible to refute the existence of a Greek original of the 2nd century, it is impossible to prove it. The situation, from the point of view of the source base, is a stalemate, and only the discovery of a Greek original (if there was one) can resolve it. But even if the “Gospel of Judas” was written before 180 (the time when St. Irenaeus was already writing his books) and in Greek, then, from the point of view of the truth of the recently found text, this does not change anything. Indeed, the time distance between 33 and 180 years is considerable, as much as 150 years. Meanwhile, all four canonical Gospels were written in the 1st century, and this is confirmed by manuscript evidence. For example, the oldest manuscript of the Gospel of John dates back to the 20s of the 2nd century - that is, the scroll was written just thirty years after the evangelist John, while in exile on Patmos, wrote in 95 A.D.: In in the beginning was the Word (John 1 :1). In other words, even if the recently discovered “Gospel” was the very text that Saint Irenaeus quotes, this text still cannot shed light on the history of Christ and the betrayal of Judas. The real Gospels are much more reliable - even from the point of view of simple logic.
Where do the Gospels come from?
Many people who consider only Scripture to be the source of the Christian faith and reject (or simply do not know) Tradition - that is, the entire history of the Church that came before them - are accustomed to the fact that there are only four gospels. It was precisely such people who were shocked by the fact that, it turns out, there are other gospels, and at the same time they are represented by very ancient manuscripts. Considering the tendency to associate the truth and reliability of a text with its antiquity, it is not surprising that the world turned out to be completely defenseless against the apocrypha, since it had long ago lost the criterion of the truth of Holy Scripture. And the criterion is very simple - the very truth of the books of the New Testament is based on the apostolic Tradition, on a clear, obvious apostolic sermon, oral at the beginning and written down only later: “We learned about the arrangement of our salvation not through anyone else, but through those through whom it came before us, the Gospel, which they then preached (orally), then, by the will of God, handed over to us in the Scriptures, as the future foundation and pillar of our faith ,” writes the same Saint Irenaeus. The high authority of the gospels in the time of Irenaeus of Lyons was not questioned even by heretics: “So great is the reliability of these gospels that the heretics themselves bear witness to them and, based on them, everyone tries to confirm their teaching.” In the Church, Scripture arises from Tradition and is inseparable from it. It is even approximately possible to establish who, under what circumstances and for what environment created this or that Gospel: - the holy apostle and evangelist Matthew - in the 40-50s of the 1st century for the Church of Jerusalem; - Holy Evangelist Mark, disciple of the Holy Apostle Peter, - in the 40-50s of the 1st century for the Antiochian community; - Holy Evangelist Luke, disciple of the Apostle Paul, - until 61 of the 1st century for pagan Christians; - Holy Apostle and Evangelist John - around 95 of the 1st century for the Churches of Asia Minor. Similar datings are attested by ancient authors, starting with St. Papias of Hierapolis (2nd century). But who and when testified that it was Judas who wrote this “Gospel”, and when would he have had time to do this? After all, almost immediately after betraying the Teacher, the former student committed suicide. A careful reading of the Gospel of Judas shows that this text belongs to a large group of those apocryphal narratives in which fragments of the gospel truth are mixed with wild fiction, astrological superstitions and mythological fantasies.
It's the other way around
Accordingly, the following legitimate question arises: can the “Gospel of Judas” be trusted? Let us assume that the supporters of the theory about the existence of a Greek original are right, and it really existed, and it was exactly the Greek text with which Irenaeus of Lyons was familiar. What does this supposed text give us for comprehending historical truth? Absolutely nothing. As one scholar has argued, believing that the Gospel of Judas reveals something factual about Judas is like believing that a document written 150 years after George Washington's death reveals the inner truth about George Washington. The fact is that this text is clearly secondary in relation to the gospel narrative, so to speak, a parasitic text. Let's take just a couple of examples. The Gospel of Judas says: “They said: “Teacher, you […] are the son of our God.” Jesus said to them: “How do you know me? Truly I tell you, not a single race of mankind that is among you will recognize me.” Hearing this, the disciples became angry and enraged, and began to blaspheme him in their hearts. Jesus, noticing their lack of understanding, said to them: “Why did worry make you angry? Your god is within you, and […] has stirred up anger [in] your souls. [Let] any of you who is [strong enough] among people appear as a true man and stand before me." This is a reflection (but in a distorting mirror) of two episodes - the confession of Peter - You are the Christ, the Son of the living God (Matthew 16:16 ) and the episode with the healing of the paralytic: Jesus, seeing their faith, says to the paralytic: child! your sins are forgiven you. Some of the scribes sat there and thought in their hearts: Why does He blaspheme so much? who can forgive sins except God alone? Jesus, immediately knowing in His spirit that they were thinking this way in themselves, said to them, “Why are you thinking this way in your hearts?” What's easier? Should I say to the paralytic: your sins are forgiven? or should I say: get up, take your bed and walk? But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins, he says to the paralytic: I say to you, get up, take up your bed and go to your house (Mark 2 :5-11). The Gospel text, quite clear, understandable and motivated, is being transformed in a completely perverted way. It is absolutely impossible to imagine Jesus from the canonical gospels, who refuses to be called the Son of God, and the disciples who were angry with their Teacher. In other words, from the text of the canonical Gospel, a perverted mind can create a fragment of the “Gospel of Judas,” but vice versa, it will not work. Another example is the parable of the sower, clear and transparent: behold, a sower went out to sow; and as he sowed, some fell by the road, and birds came and devoured them; some fell on rocky places where there was little soil, and soon sprang up because the soil was shallow. When the sun rose, it withered and, as if it had no root, withered away; some fell among the thorns, and the thorns grew and choked it; some fell on good soil and bore fruit: one a hundredfold, and another sixty, and another thirty. He who has ears to hear, let him hear! (Matthew 13 :3-9). Now let’s compare it with a fragment from the “Gospel of Judas”: “You cannot sow seed on [a stone] and reap its fruits. [So] also […] the [defiled] race […] and the corruptible Sophia […] the hand that created mortal people, so that their souls would ascend upward to the eternal limits.” The clear and internally logical parable of Christ is here transformed into a muddy mystical-allegorical and inarticulate text. Try to create a parable about the Sower from the “Gospel of Judas” - let’s see what happens. This already proves that the “Gospel of Judas” is a secondary text, built on a deliberate distortion of the meaning of the canonical Gospel. The question arises: why did anyone need to distort the text of the Gospel? The answer to this question has long been well known to science.
Who thinks he knows anything...
To whom is it addressed?
From the tone of the message one can conclude that it was written by one of the Jewish Christian churches somewhere in Palestine. References to the Old Testament and, apparently, to works of non-biblical literature indicate that the readers for whom the message was intended understood well what was being said and did not need additional explanations. Mentions of Egypt, Sodom and Gomorrah, Moses, Cain, Balaam, Korah, Enoch, Adam, and fallen angels also indicate readers' awareness of both the Old Testament and, perhaps, apocryphal literature.
The message is a serious warning to all believers at all times, since they can all fall into the same doctrinal and everyday errors. Yes, this message, which deals with the issue of falling away from the faith, was intended for Jewish Christians living in the 1st century, but it also has significance for the Church as a whole. All believers should be on guard so as not to fall into the net of those who reject Jesus Christ as Lord, encourage them to follow their carnal desires, do not submit to the authorities, sow divisions, and pursue their own selfish goals.
