Person

Jude the Brother of Jesus

A brother of Jesus and brother of James the Brother of Jesus (Mark 6:3; Matt 13:55), and the author of the short canonical Epistle of Jude. The letter's opening, "Jude, a bond-servant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James" (Jude 1:1, NASB95), modestly identifies the author by his more prominent brother rather than by direct family relation to Jesus, a self-deprecating fraternal humility paralleled in James's letter (which similarly omits the "brother of the Lord" claim). The 25-verse letter is one of the canon's shortest books and is best known for its sharp polemic against false teachers, its citation of the apocryphal 1 Enoch and the Assumption of Moses, and its closing doxology, one of the most beloved benedictions in the New Testament.

Biographical sketch

Family. Listed in Mark 6:3 ("James and Joses and Judas and Simon") and Matt 13:55 (with "Joseph" for Joses) among the brothers of Jesus. The same questions about the precise meaning of "brother" apply as in James the Brother of Jesus, Helvidian, Epiphanian, and Hieronymian readings divide.
Pre-resurrection. With his brothers, Jude was among Jesus's family who did not believe in Him during His earthly ministry (John 7:5).
Post-resurrection. Like his brother James, Jude is presumably among the brothers of Jesus gathered with the apostles and Mary in the upper room (Acts 1:14).
Ministry. 1 Cor 9:5 mentions "the brothers of the Lord" as itinerant Christian workers ("Do we not have a right to take along a believing wife, even as the rest of the apostles and the brothers of the Lord and Cephas?"). This brief reference suggests Jude was an active missionary.
Hegesippus tradition. Eusebius (Eccl. Hist. 3.19-20) preserves a tradition from Hegesippus that two grandsons of Jude were brought before the emperor Domitian (~AD 95) on suspicion of being descendants of David and therefore potential messianic pretenders. The hard-laboring rural Jewish-Christian farmers showed Domitian their calloused hands and their poverty; he dismissed them as harmless and called off the persecution of the Davidic line. The episode, if historical, places Jude's family within the desposynoi ("of the Lord") still active in Jewish Christianity into the late first century.
Identity disambiguation. "Jude" / Ioudas is "Judah", one of the most common Jewish names of the period. The New Testament names several Judases: Judas Iscariot (the betrayer); Judas son of James (Luke 6:16; Acts 1:13, also called Thaddaeus); Judas Barsabbas (Acts 15:22); Judas of Galilee (Acts 5:37); and Judas the brother of Jesus (this entry). Conservative scholarship and the long-dominant tradition identify the author of the epistle with Judas the brother of Jesus on the strength of the opening self-identification "brother of James", naturally referring to the famous James of Jerusalem.

Authorship contribution

The Epistle of Jude, short polemical letter (25 verses, ~ 1 chapter) dated AD 60-80 (conservative) or AD 80-110 (most critical scholarship). Critical scholarship divides on authorship, some retain Jude the brother of Jesus, others treat the letter as pseudonymous on the strength of polished Greek and apparent allusion to a settled deposit of "the faith once for all handed down" (Jude 3) presupposing a developed ecclesial situation. Conservative responses note that the letter's brevity, its sharp Jewish-Christian flavor, the use of (probably original Aramaic) sources for the Michael / devil dispute and the Enoch citation, and the modest self-identification all favor authentic Jacobean-era authorship.
Use of non-canonical sources. Jude 9 alludes to a dispute between Michael the archangel and the devil over the body of Moses, most plausibly drawn from the lost ending of the Assumption of Moses (also called the Testament of Moses). Jude 14-15 quotes 1 Enoch 1:9 directly, attributing the prophecy to "Enoch in the seventh generation from Adam." Critics raise the question: does Jude treat these works as inspired? Conservative scholarship answers no, citation does not equal canonization. Paul cites Greek poets (Acts 17:28; Titus 1:12; 1 Cor 15:33) without endorsing them as Scripture. Jude appears to use 1 Enoch and the Assumption of Moses as widely known Jewish tradition with which his audience would be familiar, and to score a polemical point about divine judgment.
Reception history. Like 2 Peter and James, Jude was among the antilegomena, disputed but ultimately accepted, in the early canonical lists. Its acceptance was hindered for some by the Enoch citation; it was firmly canonized by the fourth century.
Relationship to 2 Peter. Jude and 2 Pet 2 share substantial overlapping material, most obviously in the catalogue of judgment examples (fallen angels, Sodom and Gomorrah, etc.) and the description of the false teachers. The literary relationship is debated: most scholars hold 2 Peter to depend on Jude (the more concentrated form being typically prior to the more diffuse expansion); a minority hold Jude to depend on 2 Peter, or both to depend on a common source.

Theological themes

Contending for the faith. "Beloved... I felt the necessity to write to you appealing that you contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all handed down to the saints" (Jude 3). The letter's pastoral engine: a settled apostolic deposit must be defended against subversion.
Judgment on false teachers. The bulk of the letter is a triple-typology of God's past judgments, the wilderness generation, the fallen angels, Sodom and Gomorrah, Cain, Balaam, Korah, each adduced to forecast the certain judgment of the false teachers infiltrating the church.
The bound angels. Jude 6 ("angels who did not keep their own domain, but abandoned their proper abode, He has kept in eternal bonds under darkness for the judgment of the great day") and 1 Pet 3:19, 2 Pet 2:4 form the New Testament locus for the tradition (rooted in Gen 6:1-4 and developed in 1 Enoch) of disobedient angels presently confined in expectation of final judgment.
The Michael / devil dispute. Jude 9 contributes the singular New Testament glimpse of Michael the archangel disputing with Satan over Moses's body and rebuking him with "The Lord rebuke you" rather than pronouncing direct judgment, a paradigm Jude applies to his addressees, who by contrast "revile the things which they do not understand."
The doxology. Jude 24-25, "Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy, to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen", among the most cited Christian benedictions, used liturgically across traditions.