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CAMBRIDGE GREEK TESTAMENT FOR
SCHOOLS AND. COLLEGES
GENERAL Eprror: R. ST JOHN PARRY, B.D.,
FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE
THE SECOND EPISTLE GENERAL OF
PETER
AND
THE GENERAL EPISTLE OF
JUDE
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
London: FETTER LANE, E.C.
C. F. CLAY, MANAGER
€vinburgh: roo, PRINCES STREET
Berlin: A. ASHER AND CO.
Leipsig: F. A, BROCKHAUS
Pets Work: G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS
Bombay and Calcutta: MACMILLAN AND CO.,, Lrp.
All rights reserved
THE SECOND EPISTLE GENERAL OF
PETER
AND
THE GENERAL EPISTLE OF
JUDE
Edited by
MONTAGUE RHODES JAMES, Lirt.D.,
Provost of King’s College, Cambridge
WITH INTRODUCTION AND NOTES
Cambridge :
at the University Press
IQ12
ἕ be ee ee SATHER
Cambridge:
PRINTED BY JOHN CLAY, M.A,
AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS
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PREFACE
BY THE GENERAL EDITOR
pus General Editor does not hold himself respon-
sible, except in the most general sense, for the
statements, opinions, and interpretations contained in
the several volumes of this Series. He believes that
the value of the Introduction and the Commentary
in each case is largely dependent on the Editor being
free as to his treatment of the questions which arise,
provided that that treatment is in harmony with the
character and scope of the Series. He has therefore
contented himself with offering criticisms, urging the
consideration of alternative interpretations, and the
_ like; and as a rule he has left the adoption of these
suggestions to the discretion of the Editor.
The Greek Text adopted in this Series is that of
Dr Westcott and Dr Hort with the omission of the
marginal readings. For permission to use this Text
the thanks of the Syndics of the Cambridge University
Press and of the General Editor are due to Messrs
Macmillan & Co.
Trinity CoLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE
Oct. 1912.
Vit ' 792234
a3
PREFATORY NOTE
N the Introduction and Notes to these Epistles
I have derived a large amount of help from the
work of Professor J. B. Mayor (The Epistle of St Jude
and the Second Epistle of St Peter, 1907), and also
from that of the late Professor C. Bigg (in the Inter-
national Critical Commentary, 1901), and also from the
admirable articles by Dr Chase in Hastings’ Buble
Dictionary.
I have thought it important, in view of the fact
that the book will be used by schoolboys, to make the
notes brief, and to be sparing in the number of refer-
ences and illustrations.
It is not usual or desirable that in books such as
the present one new and untried theories should be
advanced: but I have ventured to make some sugges-
tions as to the Assumption of Moses and the Apocalypse
of Peter.
M. R. J.
Oct. 1912
CONTENTS
PAGE
INTRODUCTION . ix
The οὐ ν Sabieades 2 Peter and J ute x
Explanation of the Connexion . : x xii
2 Prerer.
External Evidence : . ὃ ’ ; xvii
Internal Evidence. Relation to 1 Peter . xxii
Resemblances of Phrase and il woal
between 1 Peter and 2 Peter. xxii
Differences . ; ἢ ἴ ‘ Xxlil
Relation to other Writhies: Josephus. XXV
The Apocalypse of Peter . ; i , xxvi
Other Indications of Late Date. , XXVili
Date. Other Writings attributed to St
Peter ‘ ; j Xxx
Can 2 Peter be called: a Senery 4 ee Xxxii
Contents of the Epistle . ἢ ‘ : ΧΧΧΙ͂Υ
THE EPISTLE OF JUDE.
The Author : ‘ ' ; Ἶ ᾿ XXXVi
External Evidence ; 7 ; 3 : XXXVili
Contents . ; p ΧΧΧΙΧ
Apocryphal Writings trigked be J ade,
The Assumption of Moses. ᾿ ; xl
The Book of Enoch ; ; Ἶ xlv
Tue Fatse TEACHERS OF 2 PETER AND JUDE. xlviii
MANUSCRIPTS AND VERSIONS . 2 ἢ ; liii.
CoRRUPTIONS IN THE TEXT OF THE TWO EPISTLES liv
ADDITIONAL Notes.
The Apocalypse of Peter . ; ; ; lvii
The Apocalypse of Baruch ERA ay lviii
TEXT . ; ; : : : Z : : : 1
Notes ὰ , ‘ : ; : : ; . 9
‘InpEx ; : ‘ Ἶ : ; , : : 44
INTRODUCTION
The reading of most of the Epistles in the New Testament is
a difficult task for young students. The subjects with which
they deal are to a great extent abstract—things of the mind,
Words such as justification, grace, glory, and even faith, convey
no very clear idea to a beginner. A proper name or a bit of
narrative is welcomed as a relief.
This is very natural. The real value of the Epistles can only
emerge when more of life has been experienced : and yet it ought
to be interesting at any period of life to know what were the
thoughts of such men as Peter, Paul and John about the
meaning of the facts which they spent their lives in telling to
men all over their world. We shall be more apt to realize the
living interest of the Epistles if we recollect that the men who
wrote them were not trained from an early age to use a certain
kind of language, but were for the most part making for them-
selves the vocabulary which they used.
The abstract words of which I spoke—grace, justification, and
the rest—were not, as now, smooth stones from the brook, worn
down by constant attrition, but were rather blocks freshly
hewn from the quarry. By their first readers these letters were
most anxiously looked for ; every word was of importance ; and
they would determine the line of action and mould the daily life
of a whole community. Moreover, on these documents, next to
the reports of our Lord’s own life and teaching, the foundation of
the whole enormous structure of Christian theology has been
raised. They have ruled the lines along which millions of
Christian lives have moved. The Gospels are the most important
x INTRODUCTION
books in the world, and the Epistles are only less important
than the Gospels. “Une espérance immense a traversé la terre.”
The Epistles are among the first books written to show what
effect this hope ought to have upon the lives of ordinary men and
women.
A beginner may perhaps have some notion of this: but I am
sure that it will be good for him to remind himself of it, and to
insist upon attaching some definite meaning to the words he
reads. It is not to be expected that he will get as much out
of them at an early stage of his career as will come in after
years ; but at least, in setting out upon the study of these
writings, he should start with the conviction that the writer
whose work he is to read had a very clear idea of what he meant:
that his words were addressed to simple people ; that the mean-
ing of them can be attained in a measure by the simple as well
as by the clever of our own days; and that it is well worth
attaining.
Tur CoNNEXION BETWEEN 2 PETER AND JUDE.
The Epistles before us (2 Peter and Jude) must be studied
together. It has long been recognized that there is a close
connexion between them. No one can read the second chapter
of 2 Peter and the Epistle of Jude without seeing that the
authors must have used a common source, or else that one of
them has borrowed from the other.
An examination into this connexion is of primary importance :
for the result of it must very materially affect our view of the
value and authenticity of the two Epistles. We will therefore put
this question at the head of our investigation, and will begin by
placing side by side the words and passages in which the
similarity is most strongly marked.
2 Peter ii. Jude
1. False teachers τὸν ἀγορά- 4, Impious men stealing in:
σαντα αὐτοὺς δεσπότην ἀρνούμενοι. τὸν μόνον δεσπότην καὶ κύριον ἡμῶν
᾿Ἰησοῦν Χριστὸν ἀρνούμενοι.
2. ἀσέλγεια. 4. ἀσέλγεια.
2 PETER AND JUDE xi
2 Peter ii.
3. ols τὸ κρίμα ἔκπαλαι οὐκ
ἀργεῖ.
4, God spared not the angels
who sinned but imprisoned them
els κρίσιν τηρουμένους.
᾿ς 4, σειροῖς ζόφου.
6. Sodom and Gomorrha He
destroyed, making them ὑπόδειγμα
μελλόντων ἀσεβέσιν.
10. τοὺς ὀπίσω σαρκὸς ἐν ἐπι-
θυμίᾳ μιασμοῦ πορευομένους καὶ
κυριότητος καταφρονοῦντας.
11. Rash and heady, these
men δόξας οὐ τρέμουσιν βλασφη-
μοῦντες, ὅπου ἄγγελοι ἰσχύϊ καὶ
δυνάμει μείζονες ὄντες οὐ φέρουσιν
κατ᾽ αὐτῶν παρὰ Κυρίῳ βλάσφημον
κρίσιν.
12. οὗτοι δὲ, ὡς ἄλογα ζῷα γε-
γεννημένα φυσικὰ εἰς.. φθοράν, ἐν
οἷς ἀγνοοῦσιν βλασφημοῦντες, ἐν
τῇ φθορᾷ αὐτῶν καὶ φθαρήσονται.
18. σπίλοι καὶ μῶμοι ἐντρυφῶν-
τες ἐν ταῖς ἀπάταις (or ἀγάπαι:)
αὐτῶν συνευωχούμενοι ὑμῖν.
15. καταλείποντες εὐθεῖαν ὁδὸν
ἐπλανήθησαν ἐξακολουθήσαντες τῇ
ὁδῷ τοῦ Βαλαὰμ. ..ὃς μισθὸν ἀδικίας
ἠγάπησεν.
17. οὗτοί εἰσιν πηγαὶ ἄνυδροι
καὶ ὁμίχλαι ὑπὸ λαίλαπος ἐλαυνό-
μεναι.
17. οἷς ὁ ζόφος τοῦ σκότους τε-
τήρηται.
18. ὑπέρογκα γὰρ ματαιότητος
φθέγγομενοι.
ἀγαπητοί.
2. μνησθῆναι τῶν προειρημένων
ῥημάτων ὑπὸ τῶν ἁγίων προφητῶν
καὶ τῆς τῶν ἀποστόλων ὑμῶν ἐν-
τολῆς τοῦ κυρίου καὶ σωτῆρος.
8. τοῦτο πρῶτον γινώσκοντες
ὅτι ἐλεύσονται ἐπ᾽ ἐσχάτων τῶν
ἡμερῶν ἐν ἐμπαιγμονῇ ἐμπαῖκται
κατὰ τὰς ἰδίας ἐπιθυμίας αὐτῶν
πορευόμενοι.
Jude
4, οἱ πάλαι προγεγραμμένοι eis
᾿ τοῦτο τὸ κρίμα.
6. The angels who left their
habitation εἰς κρίσιν μεγάλης
ἡμέρας τετήρηκεν.
6. δεσμοῖς.. ὑπὸ ζόφον.
7. Sodom and Gomorrha πρό-
κεινται δεῖγμα πυρὸς αἰωνίου.
7. (These cities) ἀπελθοῦσαι
ὀπίσω σαρκὸς ἑτέρας.
8, 9. σάρκα μὲν μιαίνουσιν, κυριό-
τητα δὲ ἀθετοῦσιν, δόξας δὲ βλασφη-
μοῦσιν. ὁ δὲ Μιχαὴλ ὁ ἀρχάγγελος,
ὅτε τῷ διαβόλῳ διακρινόμενος διελέ-
Ύετο περὶ τοῦ Μωυσέως σώματος,
οὐκ ἐτόλμησεν κρίσιν ἐπενεγκεῖν
βλασφημίας.
10. οὗτοι δὲ ὅσα μὲν οὐκ οἴδασιν
βλασφημοῦσιν, ὅσα δὲ φυσικῶς ὡς
τὰ ἄλογα ζῴα ἐπίστανται, ἐν τού-
τοῖς φθείρονται.
12. οὗτοί εἰσιν οἱ ἐν ταῖς ἀγά-
παις ὑμῶν σπιλάδες συνευωχούμενοι.
11, τῇ ὁδῷ τοῦ Καὶν ᾿ ἐπορεύθη-
σαν, καὶ τῇ πλάνῃ τοῦ Βαλαὰμ
μισθοῦ ἐξεχύθησαν.
12. νεφέλαι ἄνυδροι ὑπὸ ἀνέμων
παραφερόμεναι.
18. (ἀστέρες πλανῆται) οἷς ὁ
ζόφος τοῦ σκότους εἰς αἰῶνα τετήρη-
ται.
106. καὶ τὸ στόμα αὐτῶν λαλεῖ
ὑπέρογκα.
17. Ὑμεῖς δέ, ἀγαπητοί,
μνήσθητε τῶν ῥημάτων τῶν προει-
ρημένων ὑπὸ τῶν ἀποστόλων τοῦ
κυρίου ἡμῶν ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ.
18. ὅτι ἔλεγον ὑμῖν ᾿Ἐπ᾽ ἐσχάτου
χρόνου ἔσονται
ἐμπαῖκται
κατὰ τὰς ἑαυτῶν a gow πορευό-
μενοι.
xii INTRODUCTION
There are, besides this central passage, other striking resem-
blances scattered through the text of the two Epistles. Thus
2 Peter Jude
1. 12. Διὸ μελλήσω ἀεὶ ὑμᾶς 5. Ὑπομνῆσαι δὲ ὑμᾶς βούλο-
ὑπομιμνήσκειν περὶ τούτων, καίπερ μαι, εἰδότας ἅπαξ πάντα.
εἰδότας.
I. 5. σπουδὴν πᾶσαν παρεισ- 8. πᾶσαν σπουδὴν ποιούμενος.
ενέγκαντες.
Ill. 1, 14, 17. ἀγαπητοί. 8, 17, 20. ἀγαπητοί.
ΠΙ. 14, σπουδάσατε ἄσπιλοι 24. τῷ... δυναμένῳ. . ὑμᾶς... στῆ-
καὶ ἀμώμητοι αὐτῷ εὑρεθῆναι ἐν σαι κατενώπιον τῆς δόξης αὐτοῦ
εἰρήνῃ. ἀμώμους.
EXPLANATION OF THE CONNEXION.
Now the connexion between the two Epistles will not be
denied. How is it to be explained? As was mentioned above,
there are three possibilities, viz. :
(a) 2 Peter and Jude were using a common source, written
or oral.
(Ὁ) Jude borrowed from 2 Peter.
(c) 2 Peter borrowed from Jude}.
With regard to (a). We may dismiss the idea that both
writers used a single oral (or spoken) source. The resemblances
of vocabulary are so minute that we could only entertain the
notion by supposing that both writers heard the words spoken
simultaneously—that both took notes of a discourse spoken in
their presence. κω
It is a more plausible view that both used a single written
source. But a great objection to this theory is the fact that if
we take away from Jude the portions common to it and 2 Peter,
1 The fourth possibility, namely that the passages in question are
interpolations, is one which, though it has been seriously advanced,
need not be considered at any length. An examination of the
language of 2 Peter such as has been carried out by Professor Joseph
Mayor shows quite clearly that the similarities between it and Jude
extend over the whole Epistle and are not confined to the particular
passage i. 1—iii, 2.
2 PETER AND JUDE xili
so little of the Epistle remains that one cannot see why it
should have been written or preserved in preference to the
source whence it was taken. Nor-is it at all easy to imagine
what the source can have been or by whom it was written. If
it was so important that a great apostle and a venerated
apostolic teacher both thought it worth while to borrow largely
from it, how does it happen that the source itself has dis-
appeared and left no trace of its existence ?
The possibility remains that the prediction quoted in both
Epistles (2 Peter iii. 3, Jude 17—18) of the coming of the
mockers may have been drawn from a third source: but if it
should appear that one writer did borrow from the other, then it
is a simpler and more probable supposition that the prediction
_ was part of the matter borrowed.
On the whole, then, we dismiss explanation (a) as improbable,
and we are left to consider the other two possibilities that
2 Peter is indebted to Jude, or that Jude is indebted to
2 Peter.
Each of these views has found many supporters of ability
and distinction. To myself it seems likely that a majority of
those who have regarded Jude as the borrower have been
influenced by the feeling that, if 2 Peter is the borrower, that
Epistle can hardly be regarded as the genuine work of the
Apostle, and that it would be a disastrous admission to allow
that a work which could be called spurious had found its way
into the New Testament. The feeling is natural enough : but it
should not be allowed to influence us in the search for the
truth. We shall see later on that great difficulties have been
felt at various stages in the history of the Church with regard to
the authenticity and canonicity of 2 Peter, on other grounds
besides the possibility of its indebtedness to Jude.
But whatever may have been the attitude of those who
approached the question, it does seem to me that the supporters
of the priority of 2 Peter have failed to explain some of the
principal difficulties which confront them. There is one passage
at least in 2 Peter which appears to be almost certainly secondary
in relation to the corresponding passage in Jude. |
2 Peter b
XiV
INTRODUCTION
This is 2 Peter ii. 11 compared with Jude 9:
They quake not at glories,
blaspheming, whereas angels,
who are greater in strength and
power, do not bring against them
before the Lord (various reading
from the Lord) a railing accusa-
tion.
and they blaspheme glories.
But Michael the archangel,
when he was speaking with the
devil in controversy about the
body of Moses, did not presume
to bring against him a railing
accusation, but said ‘‘ The Lord
rebuke thee.”
Both writers are here illustrating the attitude of certain false
teachers with regard to dignities (whether angelic or earthly)
by contrasting it with the conduct of Angels. But while in
2 Peter the illustration leaves us at a loss with regard to the
incident referred to, the illustration in Jude is quite clear and
definite.
It has been supposed that 2 Peter is referring to the Book of
Enoch. Two passages have been suggested. In one, the four
great Archangels bring to God the complaint of men about the
oppressions of the Giants, and receive God’s sentence against
the Angels whose offspring the Giants were. The point of the
illustration is that the Angels refer the complaint to God,
instead of themselves dealing with the sinful Angels. This
explanation requires the (probably true) reading παρὰ Κυρίῳ. In
the other passage the Angels, called the Watchers, receive the
judgment of God against the sinful Angels, and commission
Enoch to announce it to the culprits. In other words, they
shrink from announcing judgment to their fellows, but commit
the task to a mortal. This interpretation requires us to read
παρὰ Κυρίου.
It is possible that one or other of these explanations may be
right: but it will not be denied that the allusion is a very
obscure one. Nor does it seem applicable to the particular
offence which is here reproved, that of βλασφημία, or evil-
speaking.
As to Jude, on the other hand, no doubt exists as to the
allusion. We have it on good and early evidence that it is taken
from a book called the Assumption of Moses (of which more
hereafter): and it is appropriate; for Satan had indeed
2 PETER AND JUDE xv
blasphemed Moses, calling him a murderer, and perhaps also
God, calling Him a liar.
It is possible, to be sure, that Jude, writing with 2 Peter
before him, and not taking the point of the allusion, substituted
for it one which was clearer.
But I submit that by far the more natural view is that 2 Peter
is here putting into more general terms, and thus obscuring, an
allusion in Jude which the writer considered to be of doubtful
authority.
The probability that this is the case is increased by Kioto
consideration. Jude seems pretty clearly to quote the Asswmp-
tion of Moses in one or two other places in the Epistle. One of
these quotations recurs in 2 Peter in a form a little more remote
from the original (Jude 16 τὸ στόμα αὐτῶν λαλεῖ ὑπέρογκα, 2 Peter
ii. 18 ὑπέρογκα yap ματαιότητος φθεγγόμενοι)". This is intelligible
if 2 Peter quotes it through the medium of Jude: it is very
difficult to believe that the converse process took place, and that
Jude, penetrating the obscure allusions in 2 Peter, referred back
to the original source of them.
Another aspect of the question, from the point of view of
general probability, leads us to the same result. Assuming the
dependence of one Epistle upon the other, we can put the possi-
bilities of priority and genuineness in all their forms, as :
(a) Both Epistles are genuine, and Jude borrows from
2 Peter.
(Ὁ) Both Epistles are genuine, and 2 Peter borrows from Jude.
(ὁ) Both Epistles are spurious, and Jude is the borrower.
(d) Both Epistles are spurious, and 2 Peter is the borrower.
(e) 2 Peter only is genuine, and Jude is the borrower.
(f) 2 Peter only is genuine, and 2 Peter is the borrower (1.6.
St Peter borrows from a spurious letter of Jude).
(g) Jude only is genuine, and Jude is the borrower.
(A) Jude only is genuine, and 2 Peter is the borrower.
(a), (6) are tenable suppositions. The difficulty of (a) is
that (as was said above) so little is left of Jude after
1 See further p. xlv.
b2
xvi INTRODUCTION
the borrowings from 2 Peter have been removed, that it
is difficult to account for its preservation.
(Ὁ) is tenable. Its ultimate reception or rejection must
depend on other considerations.
(c), (@) are possible, but less likely than (a), (Ὁ). As to (ce):
if Jude be the borrower and also spurious, one cannot
imagine how it came to be written. This difficulty is
but slightly lessened by the adoption of (qd).
(e) To this the same remark applies.
(f) Extremely unlikely. Under what circumstances could a
spurious Jude be so introduced to St Peter as to gain
credit with him ?
(g) Again, it is most unlikely that a spurious letter of
St Peter could gain credence from Jude.
(A) Tenable, and, like (Ὁ), depends for ultimate reception
upon other considerations.
Yet again, looking at the matter from the point of view of
general probability: in view of the brevity of Jude, and of its
likeness to 2 Peter, it is very difficult to imagine why it should have
been deemed worthy of preservation if it were later than 2 Peter.
We must remember that many Epistles of Apostles and apostolic
men have almost certainly been lost: from St Paul’s extant
letters we can divine the existence of important letters written
by him to leading Churches, which we no longer have. Jude
is not definitely addressed to any special Church, nor is there a
tradition that any particular community held it in high estima-
tion.
To put the matter quite shortly, it is very difficult to account
for either the writing or the continued existence of Jude (a short
work by a person of whom little is known), except on the sup-
position that it is a genuine work of the man whose name it
bears. No such difficulty exists in the case of 2 Peter, which
both contains more matter than Jude, and is current under a
widely-known and honoured name. So far as the present
argument goes, both Epistles may be genuine: Jude almost
certainly zs.
XVii
2 PETER.
EXTERNAL EVIDENCE.
We have seen reason for thinking that 2 Peter is later than
Jude, and has borrowed from it. This state of things is con-
sistent with a belief in the genuineness of 2 Peter. It is quite
possible that the Apostle made use of the Epistle of Jude, whom
he must have known and respected: and it would not be
strange that he should make no acknowledgment of the bor-
rowing. In older times Isaiah quoted a passage from Micah
(Isa. 11. 1—4, Mic. iv. 1—3). Passages from earlier prophets are
to be found in the later chapters of Jeremiah. The Gospel of
St Mark is extensively used in Matthew and Luke. The idea of
property as connected with an author’s writings is not ancient,
and was certainly not present to the minds of the New
Testament writers. There is, in short, no difficulty and
nothing derogatory in supposing that Peter borrowed from
Jude without acknowledgment.
But, apart from the borrowing from Jude, is the genuineness
of 2 Peter clearly established ? The answer to this question must
be in the negative. We will examine the history of the Epistle
and its reception.
Complete collections of the early quotations and criticisms of
the Epistle will be found in the commentaries of Professor Bigg
and Professor Joseph Mayor (to mention the two most recent
English editions). It will be sufficient to summarize their
results here and to quote the most important.
The phrases which are quoted from the Apostolic and sub-
Apostolic Fathers (Clement of Rome, Barnabas, Hermas,
Ignatius, Polycarp, Melito, Justin Martyr, Tatian, Irenaeus,
the Martyrdom of Polycarp), as indicating an acquaintance with
2 Peter, are wholly inconclusive. One expression which occurs
in several of these writers as a quotation, Ἡμέρα Κυρίου ὡς
χίλια ἔτη (2 P. iii. 8), is a Jewish commonplace : something very
like it is in Psalm xe. 4: ‘ta thousand years in thy sight are but
as yesterday.”
XVili INTRODUCTION
There are two or three cases, on the other hand, where a
reminiscence of the Epistle does seem probable.
In the Apology of Aristides (possibly as early as 129—130 a.p.)
we have ἡ ὁδὸς τῆς ἀληθείας ἥτις τοὺς ὁδεύοντας αὐτὴν εἰς τὴν
αἰώνιον χειραγωγεῖ βασιλείαν. This may combine recollections of
two passages, 2 Peter ii. ἡ ὁδὸς τῆς ἀληθείας and i. 11 ἡ εἴσοδος
eis τὴν αἰώνιον βασιλείαν.
In the Letter of the Churches of Vienne and Lyons (177—179
A.D.) preserved by Eusebius (Hist. Eccl. v. 1) this sentence
occurs (v. 1. 45): ὁ δὲ διὰ μέσου καιρὸς οὐκ ἀργὸς αὐτοῖς οὐδὲ
ἄκαρπος ἐγένετο. In 2 Peter i. 8 οὐκ ἀργοὺς οὐδὲ ἀκάρπους καθ-
ίστησιν. This is a marked resemblance. The same Epistle
uses the word ἔξοδος to mean death, as does 2 Peter i. 15, and
also has resemblances to the language of the Apocalypse of Peter,
of which book more will be said.
Theophilus of Antioch (+ 183—-185) has two phrases which recall
2 Peter: (1) ὁ λόγος αὐτοῦ φαίνων ὥσπερ λύχνος ἐν οἰκήματι
συνεχομένῳ ἐφώτισεν τὴν ὑπ᾽ οὐρανόν. 2 Peter i. 19 λόγον ᾧ
καλῶς ποιεῖτε προσέχοντες ὡς λύχνῳ φαίνοντι ἐν αὐχμηρῷ τόπῳ.
(2) οἱ δὲ τοῦ θεοῦ ἄνθρωποι πνευματοφόροι πνεύματος ἁγίου καὶ
προφῆται γενόμενοι. 2 Peter i. 21 ὑπὸ πνεύματος ἁγίου φερόμενοι
ἐλάλησαν ἀπὸ θεοῦ ἄνθρωποι.
Immediately after this date, in the writings of men who were
younger contemporaries of Theophilus, we find quite clear
evidence of the use of the Epistle. Thus we are distinctly told
by Eusebius in the fourth century and by Photius in the ninth,
that Clement of Alexandria (died about 213 a.D.) wrote notes
upon ali the Catholic Epistles in a lost work of his called the
Hypotyposes, or Outlines.
We have a Latin version, made by Cassiodorus or Cassiodorius
in the sixth century, of some notes by Clement on 1 Peter, 1,2 John
and Jude. Cassiodorius contradicts Eusebius and himself, saying
that Clement had not commented on 2 Peter, 3 John or Jude.
But his utterances are confused, and the testimony of Eusebius
is to be preferred. One or two phrases in Clement’s extant
works recall 2 Peter, but there is no overt quotation in them.
Hippolytus of Rome, who may have died about 225 a.D., has
2 PETER xix
several expressions which come very close to the language of
2 Peter, e.g. (on Daniel iii. 22) ᾧ yap ἄν τις ὑποταγῇ τούτῳ καὶ
δεδούλωται, 2 Peter ii. 19 ᾧ γάρ τις ἥττηται τούτῳ δεδούλωται.
Origen, who died in 253, says of Peter that he left one Epistle,
which is acknowledged, “ and perhaps a second also : for there
are doubts about it.” The quotations from 2 Peter or allusions
to it (about eight in all), which are found in Origen’s works, all
occur in works which are only preserved in a Latin version :
and it is possible that these are due to the translator (Rufinus
of Aquileia) and not to Origen himself. One phrase, however,
which is characteristic of Origen’s manner, and probably due to
him, may be quoted. He is speaking (in his Homilies on
Joshua) of the trumpet-blasts which preceded the fall of Jericho,
and compares the utterances of the apostles to trumpets.
“ Peter, too,” he says, “sounds aloud with the two trumpets of
his Epistles.”
Firmilian, Bishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia, writing to
Cyprian about the middle of the third century, makes unmis-
takable allusion to 2 Peter. So does Methodius of Patara in
Lycia late in the same century.
The Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius, written about 324,
is the source to which we go for a well-considered expression of
the opinion of that day as to the reception and status of the
various writings in the New Testament. He speaks of the two
Epistles of Peter together, and after saying that the First is of
acknowledged authority, and was used by the elders of old time
in their writings, says : “That which is circulated as the second
Epistle has been handed down to us as not canonical (οὐκ
ἐνδιάθηκον), but yet, since it has appeared useful to many, it
has been held in estimation (ἐσπουδάσθη) along with the other
Scriptures.”
In another place, in classifying the Scriptures of the New
Testament as acknowledged (ὁμολογούμενα), disputed (ἀντιλεγό-
μενα), and spurious (νόθα), he puts 2 Peter into the second class.
“ Of the books which are disputed, but yet well known to most
(γνωρίμων τοῖς πολλοῖς) the Epistle of James is in circulation,
that of Jude, and the Second Epistle of Peter.”
XX INTRODUCTION
Jerome, whose authority became. paramount in the Western
Church through his great work of translating the Bible into
Latin, expresses no doubt as to the authenticity of the Epistle
in the letter to Paulinus, which was throughout the Middle Ages
used as a preface to the Latin Bible. But in a collection of
short notices of Church writers usually known as De viris
ulustribus (rauch of which is borrowed from Eusebius) he says of
Peter that “he wrote two Epistles which are called Catholic: of
which the Second is denied by very many to be his, because of
the disagreement (dissonantia) of its style with that of the First.”
We need not prolong the list of testimonies drawn from the
Fathers! ; but a word must be said as to the ancient versions of
the New Testament into other languages. It is important to
notice that 2 Peter was not included in any Syriac version
older than the Philoxenian, of the sixth century. Again, the
present Latin text of the Epistle, as Dr Westcott points out,
“ not only exhibits constant and remarkable differences from the
text of other parts of the Vulgate, but also differs from the
First Epistle in the renderings of words common to both.” And
he continues, “ When it further appears that it differs no less
clearly from the Epistle of St Jude in those parts which are
almost identical in the Greek, then the supposition that it was
received into the Canon at the same time with them (1.6. 1 Peter
and Jude) at once becomes unnatural.”
One interesting bit of evidence pointing in the same direction
has been deduced by Dr Chase from the great Vatican manuscript
of the Greek Bible, written in the 4th century, and known as B.
This venerable book, like other manuscripts, divides the various
books of the Bible into chapters or sections, by means of num-
bers marked in the margin. Now in the Catholic Epistles there
1 It may be well to mention quite shortly a number of important
authorities of somewhat late date who express no doubt as to the
Epistle and reckon it as Canonical:
Athanasius, d. 373 (Alexandria),
Cyril of Jerusalem, d. 386 (Palestine),
Gregory of Nazianzus, d. about 391 (Asia Minor),
Didymus, d. 394 (Alexandria),
The 3rd Council of Carthage, 397 (Africa),
Augustine, d. 430 (Africa).
2 PETER xxi
are two such sets of chapter-numberings, one older than the
other. “This twofold division’is found in all the Catholic
Epistles except 2 Peter,” from which we conclude that the
manuscript from which B was copied, and which furnished the
older set of chapter-numbers, did not contain 2 Peter.
We must not altogether neglect the argument from silence.
It is very noteworthy that some of the early Church-writers, of
whom we have considerable remains, do not seem to have known
the Epistle. Irenaeus is one of these: yet it must not be for-
gotten that the Epistle of the Churches of Vienne and Lyons
seems to quote 2 Peter, and that Irenaeus stood in close con-
nexion with the author of this. Tertullian, many of whose
works we possess, is another important instance. Yet here
again some who lived in his time and in his country seem
certainly to have known the Apocalypse of Peter, a writing which
we are to consider in connexion with the Epistle; I mean the
writers of the Passion of St Perpetua (about A.D. 203).
The Latin fragment called the Muratorian Canon, which
expresses the views of some member of the Roman Church
about 170 a.D. as to the authority of the N.T. books, has
suffered from corruptions, and is difficult to understand in many
places. The author of this appears certainly to mention the
Apocalypse of Peter, and to omit the Second Epistle. Efforts
have been made so to emend the text as to introduce a mention
of 2 Peter: but I cannot think that they are either necessary
or successful.
On the whole we may say that the external evidence (with
which we. have been dealing) shows that a very hesitating recep-
tion was accorded to 2 Peter by those writers of the early
centuries who were best qualified to judge, and that it is weaker
than can be produced in favour of any writing of similar import-
ance in the N.T,
In later times, at the period of the Reformation, such men as
Luther, Calvin and Grotius felt great doubts as to the authen-
ticity of the Epistle. Grotius put forward the untenable con-
jecture that the author was Symeon, Bishop of Jerusalem, who is
- said to have been crucified in Trajan’s time at the age of 120.
xxii INTRODUCTION
INTERNAL Evipence. RELATION TO 1 PETER.
We have now to consider the internal evidence afforded by
2 Peter as to its authenticity and genuineness. It will be useful
among other things to enquire how far it resembles the First
Epistle, which was of acknowledged authority, and also to ex-
amine certain likenesses to writings of later date which have
been pointed out.
With regard to the First Epistle (1 Peter) we must bear in
mind that St Peter’s claim to be considered the author of this
has also been contested.
For an investigation of the authenticity of 1 Peter this is not
the place: I shall content myself with the statement that its
position in comparison with that of 2 Peter is exceedingly strong.
The question before us is whether 2 Peter so resembles it in
style or in thought as to justify us in assigning both writings
to the same author.
In considering the question of style I shall avail myself of the
exhaustive examination so admirably carried out by Professor
Joseph Mayor in pp. lxviii—ev of his edition of 2 Peter and
Jude.
RESEMBLANCES OF PHRASE AND VOCABULARY BETWEEN
1 PETER AND 2 PETER.
The salutation. 1 Ῥ. 1. 2. 2P.i. 2. χάρις ὑμῖν καὶ εἰρήνη
πληθυνθείη. (An imitator, be it noted, is by no means unlikely
to copy exactly such accessories as. this: or a salutation may be
following a common form.)
2 Peter i. 3 τοῦ καλέσαντος ὑμᾶς dia δόξης. Cf. 1 Peter i. 15,
ii. 9, 21, ili. 9, v. 10, in all of which God’s calling is spoken of.
2 Peter ii. 18 ἐν ἐπιθυμίαις σαρκὸς ἀσελγείαις (and ii. 2).
1 Peter iv. 3 πεπορευμένους ἐν ἀσελγείαις, ἐπιθυμίαις.
2 Peter i. 16 ἐπόπται. 1 Peter ii. 12 ἐποπτεύοντες (and iii. 2).
2 Peter ii. 14 ἄσπιλοι καὶ ἀμώμητοι. 1 Peter i. 19 ἄμωμος
καὶ ἄσπιλος.
2 Peter ii. 14 ἀκαταπαύστους ἁμαρτίας (v.l. for ἀκαταπάστου-).
1 Peter iv. 1 πέπαυται ἁμαρτίας.
2 PETER Xxili
Of a total of 100 words which are common to the two epistles
there are very few which appear to constitute what can be called
a striking resemblance. They are the following:
ἀναστροφή, twice in 2 Peter, six times in 1 Peter: five times
elsewhere in N.T.
ἀπόθεσις, once in each epistle, nowhere else in N.T.
ἀρετή, thrice in 2 Peter, once (in the plural) in 1 Peter: once
elsewhere in N.T.
ἀσέλγεια, thrice in 2 Peter, once in 1 Peter.
ἄσπιλος, once in each epistle : twice elsewhere in N.T.
DIFFERENCES.
Words used in 1 Peter and not in 2 Peter. These amount to
369, of which 59 occur only in 1 Peter and not elsewhere in N.T.
Words used in 2 Peter and not in 1 Peter. These are 230
in number, of which 56 do not occur elsewhere in N.T.
There is enough here to justify the assertion (current as we saw
above in Jerome’s day) that there is a dissonantia between the
styles of the two epistles: that “at all events the Greek of the
one is not by the same hand as the Greek of the other” (Mayor).
But this is not conclusive. St Peter may have employed Sil-
vanus (1 Peter v. 12) to write the First Epistle in Greek at his
dictation ; and may have employed another man as the vehicle
of the Second. Are there, we must now ask, such differences or
such similarities of thought as to help us to a conclusion ?
For the answer to this question, again, Mayor’s edition affords
most valuable material.
Under the head of resemblances he points out three topics
which are common to the two epistles: the Second Coming, the
saving of Noah from the Flood, Prophecy.
As to the first: 2 Peter speaks of it mainly as the day of
judgment and of destruction of the elements, and “seems to
look forward to its being put off for an indefinite period.”
1 Peter dwells on it as the time for the revelation of Jesus
Christ, of reward of the faithful, of glory and rejoicing, though
the judgment of the wicked is also mentioned.
’ As to the second: 2 Peter speaks of the Flood of water as
Xxiv INTRODUCTION
illustrative of the possibility of a coming destruction of the
world by Fire: and again, as a punishment of the ungodly in
the ancient world, when Noah—a preacher of righteousness—
was saved. 1 Peter uses the deliverance of Noah as an illustra-
tion of baptism. Two similarities of language occur: both
epistles speak of the μακροθυμία of God—1 Peter in connexion
with the Flood, 2 Peter in connexion with the final Fire. Both
use the words δι᾽ ὕδατος---Ἰ Peter of the saving of Noah, 2 Peter
of the constitution of the present earth.
The third topic, Prophecy, is treated of in the following pas-
sages in the two epistles: 1 Peter i. 11, 2 Peteri. 21. It is not
possible in this case to trace a marked resemblance or a marked
discrepancy between the two writings. There is a touch of
similarity between the statements of 1 Peter that it was re-
vealed to the prophets ὅτι οὐχ ἑαυτοῖς ὑμῖν δὲ διηκόνουν αὐτὰ ἃ νῦν
ἀνηγγέλη ὑμῖν, and that of 2 Peter, οὐ γὰρ θελήματι ἀνθρώπου
ἠνέχθη προφητεία ποτέ, κ-.τ.λ.
Under the head of Differences Mayor points out that, while
1 Peter is full of allusions to the words and acts of our Lord,
2 Peter has but very few such allusions. The following are all
that can be collected under this head :
The allusion to the Transfiguration. 1. 16.
The prophecy of Peter’s own death. i. 14.
The creeping-in of false prophets. ii. 1. (Also in Jude.)
Denying the Lord. ii. 1. (Also in Jude.)
The last state worse than the first. ii, 20. (Matt. xii. 45.)
The day of the Lord as a thief in the night. iii. 10.
(Matt. xxiv. 43.)
These are mostly utterances of judgment, and severe in tone.
1 Peter on the other hand dwells especially on love, faith, hope
and joy as connected with the thought of Jesus Christ.
Again, when we turn to the O.T., 1 Peter is full of allusions and
quotations. In 2 Peter only five passages are marked as quota-
tions by Hort: to which Mayor adds nine or ten other allusions.
This is a strong point.
It is worth while to quote Mayor’s final conclusion (p. cv)
“On the whole I should say that the difference of style is less
2 PETER XXV
marked than the difference in vocabulary, and that again less
marked than the difference in matter, while above all stands the
great difference in thought, feeling, and character, in one word, of
personality.”
2 Perer. RELATION TO OTHER WRITINGS. JOSEPHUS.
It was said above that suggestions had been made that 2 Peter
showed obligations to certain writings of later date.
First among these is the Antiquities of Josephus (completed
about A.D. 94). Dr Edwin Abbott has pointed out very marked
resemblances, as he considers them, between the Preface to this
work and 2 Peter, and again in Josephus’ description of the last
words of Moses (Ant. iv. 8.2). The most striking of these are
the use of the phrases : μύθοις ἐξακολουθήσαντες,---οἷς κακῶς ποιή-
were μὴ προσέχοντες,---ἀρετή οὗ the excellence of God: and the
saying of Moses to the general effect that he leaves behind him
laws for the people that they may not take to evil courses.
We have also the words τὴν μεγαλειότητα τοῦ θεοῦ, θεοῦ φύσις,
and a number of coincidences in the use of quite ordinary words
and particles.
It is possible to make a rather imposing list out of the
materials: but upon examination it will be found that very
few of the examples are strong. They do not include the most
characteristic features of the Petrine vocabulary, and they are
not evidence of borrowing zdeas. It would be possible, moreover,
to construct a very similar list of 2 Peter’s coincidences with the
language of Philo!: and in the Preface to the Antiguties
Josephus is himself under an obligation to Philo.
The true view of the resemblances probably is that they are to
be reckoned as belonging to the ordinary literary Greek of the
time, and not as evidence of use of the works of one writer by
the other?
1 ¢.g. in the case of ἀρετή used of God.
2 The phraseology of an inscription of about a.p. 22 (a decree of
the town of Stratonicea in Caria) cited by Dr Deissmann (Bible
. Studies, p. 360) shows similar resemblances to the language of 2 Peter
(e.g. πᾶσαν σπουδὴν εἰσφέρεσθαι, τῆς θείας δυνάμεως dperds).
XXVi INTRODUCTION
THE APOCALYPSE OF PETER.
There is another writing under the name of St Peter which
shows undoubted resemblances in language to 2 Peter, but
whose spuriousness is universally acknowledged. This is
the Revelation or Apocalypse of Peter. It does not exist in its
entirety: there are a few quotations from it in early ecclesias-
tical writers, and there is also a considerable fragment in Greek,
which was discovered in Egypt in 1886—7, and published in
1892 along with portions of the Book of Enoch and of the Gospel
of Peter}.
The book is very frequently spoken of by ancient writers
and enjoyed a high reputation, The Letter of the Churches
of Vienne and Lyons has probably derived some expressions
from it. So, quite certainly, has the Passion of Perpetua.
Clement of Alexandria wrote comments upon it: the Mura-
torian Canon mentions it (adding that “some of our number
refuse to have it read in church”), but, as we saw, does not
speak of 2 Peter at all. Methodius (who does quote 2 Peter)
quotes the Apocalypse as a “divinely inspired writing.” Macarius
Magnes (probably in the fourth century) quotes it, but not as
authoritative. In the time of Sozomen (a fifth-century ecclesi-
astical historian) it was still read once a year in some churches
in Palestine. Eusebius classes it among the spurious writings.
It was a short book, equal in length to the Epistle to the
Galatians, and it is evident from the quotations that the chief
subjects treated in it were the state of souls, especially sinful
souls, in the next world, and the final judgment. The fragment
we possess begins with the closing words of what is most likely
a prediction of our Lord’s about the end of the world. Then we
find the Twelve with our Lord, upon a mountain. They ask
Him to show them one of the righteous who have departed out
of the world. Two men appear in a glorified form and great
beauty, which is described in very glowing terms. Next, Peter
is shown the abode of the blessed, and thereafter the place of
1 There are many editions, e.g. Robinson and James, Cambridge,
1892; Preuschen, Antilegomena, 1901. On a recent discovery of
another text see the Additional Note, p. vii.
2 PETER XXVli
torment, to which the greater part of the fragment is devoted.
The punishment of various classes of sinners is described, and
the principle enunciated that the torment corresponds to the
sin.
The book draws its materials, to some extent, from Greek
sources. Those who were initiated into the Orphic mysteries were
taught to believe in punishments and rewards allotted very much
on the lines which are laid down in this Apocalypse. In this lies
the explanation of what has been noted in the Apocalypse,
namely, that there are similarities between it and the Sixth
Aeneid. The truth is that in that book Virgil also is employing
Orphic literature.
The influence of the Book of Wisdom is also, to me, very
perceptible in the Apocalypse.
The following phrases and passages in the Apocalypse show
marked similarity with 2 Peter.
§ 1. πολλοὶ ἐξ αὐτῶν ἔσονται ψευδοπροφῆται 2 Pet. ii. 1.
δόγματα ποικίλα τῆς ἀπωλείας διδάξουσιν 3 Be
τὰς Ψυχὰς ἑαυτῶν δοκιμάζοντας. ii. 8 (ψυχὴν δικαίαν...
ἐβασάνιζεν).
ὁ θεὸς...κρινεῖ τοὺς υἱοὺς τῆς ἀνομίας. li. 3 (οἷς τὸ κρίμα
ἔκπαλαι οὐκ ἀργεῖ).
§ 2. The Apostles go εἰς τὸ ὄρος i, 18.
ἐξελθόντων ἀπὸ τοῦ κόσμου ἔξοδον i, 15.
ποταποί εἶσι iii. 11,
§6. I saw ἕτερον τόπον αὐχμηρὸν πάνυ i. 19,
κολαζόμενοι ii. 9.
οἱ βλασφημοῦντες τὴν ὁδὸν τῆς δικαιοσύνης ἢ...
ς- 24 . τῶν a ~ 11, 2, 15, 21.
οἱ ἀφέντες τὴν ὁδὸν τοῦ θεοῦ
ἀμελήσαντες τῆς ἐντολῆς τοῦ θεοῦ ii. 21, iii. 2.
§8. βόρβορος §15. ἐκυλίοντο ii. 22.
Fragment in Macarius Magnes
The heaven and earth are to be judged 111. 10, 12.
The principle of 2 Peter ii. 19 ᾧ γάρ ris ἥττηται τούτῳ δεδούλωται
(which is itself perhaps derived from Wisdom xi. 16, xii. 2, 27,
‘xvi. 1, 2) underlies a great part of the Apocalypse.
XXVill INTRODUCTION
In view of these passages it has been held that the two
writings come from the same hand, or that one is under an
obligation to the other. To me it seems safest to class them
together as works composed in the same circle but not neces-
sarily by the same author, and as perhaps containing expan-
sions of teaching which tradition—possibly trustworthy—had
handed down as coming from the Apostle.
OTHER INDICATIONS OF LATE ΠΑΤΕ,
The result of our investigations so far has been to suggest that
2 Peter is not a genuine work of the Apostle. It is unlike 1 Peter
(whose claims to be regarded as genuine are strong), it borrows
from Jude, it resembles another undoubtedly spurious Petrine
work. In addition to this its reception in early times was
by no means general: strong doubts were felt about it in the
3rd and 4th centuries,
Other indications which confirm the idea of its late date are
(a) The allusion to the Epistles of Paul (iii. 15, 16). First,
the definite mention of the writings of one N.T. author by
another is unique, and, in itself, rather suspicious, Paul and
Luke mention writings of their own (and Luke speaks of others
unnamed who have drawn up narratives of the life of Christ):
but the reference here, partly commendatory, partly warning, is
of a different kind. It points, moreover, to a time when Paul’s
Epistles were collected and read by Christians; and it is difficult
to resist the feeling that the words ὡς καὶ rds λοιπὰς γραφὰς
do place the Epistles on a level with Scripture. Is this a state
of things easily conceivable before 64 A.D., the probable date of
St Peter’s martyrdom ?
(6) Again, take the words of the mockers (iii. 4) who say
“Where is the promise of His coming? for, since the fathers fell
asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of
creation.” These words surely point to a time when the first
generation of Christian witnesses had passed away. It is pos-
sible, of course, to regard the passage as referring to the more
ancient prophets: yet this is not satisfactory. It is more natural
to look upon it as the expression of the thought of the actual
2 PETER Xxix
writer—a man living after the date of the apostles and eye-
witnesses of Christ. A further indication of the same kind
is given in the words τῶν ἀποστόλων ὑμῶν (111. 2), which may
include the writer, but, again, are more naturally interpreted as
drawing a distinction between the writer and the Apostles. If
this is the case, we must admit that the writer was inconsistent
with himself: see the notes on i. 1—3.
(ec) The reference in 1. 14 to our Lord’s prophecy of St Peter’s
death is most naturally explained (on the assumption that the
Epistle is not by St Peter) by a reference to the Gospel of St John
(xxi. 18). But if he is referring to the written Gospel we must
place him after 100 a.p.!
(α) The description of this Epistle as ‘‘the Second” written
by the author gives to me the same impression as does the
reference to Paul: namely that the First Epistle had been long
current and was of recognized authority. But there is nothing
in this that can be described as a proof of late date, and it must
be remembered that certain critics of distinction (e.g. Dr Zahn)
take the view that the “‘first epistle” here mentioned was not
our 1 Peter, but a lost letter addressed to the church (whatever
that was) to which 2 Peter was written.
(e) In i. 15 the writer speaks of a further work which he
proposes to put forth, the effect of which will be to keep alive in
the minds of his hearers, after his death, the remembrance of his
teaching. Some have thought that the work here referred to is
the Gospel of Mark, which, according to a probably true tradition,
contains the teaching of St Peter. In that case we should here
have another reference to a N.T. book, and another suspicious
feature in a writing which we already regard with more than
suspicion. But we must also allow for the possibility that by
the promised writing we are to understand the Apocalypse which
told of the παρουσία of Christ (cf. i. 16) or even the Preaching of
Peter (see below): for I think we must exclude the Gospel of
Peter, which seems to have nothing in common with 2 Peter.
(f) The reference to the Transfiguration (i. 17, 18) is yet
1 For another possible explanation of the allusion see the notes
in loc.
2 Peter ¢
XXX INTRODUCTION
another instance of overt confirmation of other N.T. literature ;
precious if occurring in a work of unquestioned authority, but
operating unfavourably in this case.
Datr. OTHER WRITINGS ATTRIBUTED TO St PETER.
On the whole Professor Mayor inclines to place the date of
2 Peter somewhere in the second quarter of the second century,
ὦ.6. between 125 and 150 a.p. To myself it seems that this may
be slightly too late, and that the first quarter (100—125) is a
very possible date. In assigning this earlier date I am in-
fluenced by the consideration of the other Apocryphal writings
connected with St Peter’s name: the Apocalypse, the Preaching,
the Gospel, and the Acts}.
The Apocalypse we have already examined and have seen that
its language shows strong likenesses to 2 Peter. We have to
consider next the book called the Preaching (Knpuypa) of Peter.
Of this we have important fragments quoted by Clement of
Alexandria: in the principal passage the religions of the Greeks,
the Egyptians, the Jews, and the Christians are described and
contrasted. Now, it seems fairly clear that the Apology of
Aristides is indebted to the Preaching: the Apology has been
dated at 129—130 or 140. In it we have also found (p. xviii) what
seems a clear reference to 2 Peter. Ido not think it is possible
to trace resemblances between the language of 2 Peter and of the
Preaching. Yet the following may be cited.
Preaching. The Greeks by worshipping creatures as gods
ἀχαριστοῦσι τῷ θεῷ διὰ τούτων ἀρνούμενοι αὐτὸν εἶναι. 2 Peter ii. 1
τὸν ἀγοράσαντα αὐτοὺς δεσπότην ἀρνούμενο. And also there is
an emphatic reference to the prophetic scriptures as foretelling
the circumstances of our Lord’s life. Cf. 2 Peter i. 19.
The Preaching does not seem to have been in any way a
heretical work. Its origin has been with probability assigned
to Egypt, on the ground of the references to Egyptian idol-
worship, with which the writer seems to have been familiar.
1 The fragments of the Apocalypse, Preaching, and Gospel may be
consulted in Preuschen’s Antilegomena, 1901; the Acts in Lipsius-
Bonnet, Acta Apost. Apocrypha τ.
2 PETER XxXxi
The Apocalypse has likewise been assigned to Egypt. The mix-
ture of Jewish and Greek ideas which it displays was certainly
to be found there in great vigour.
The Gospel of Peter is of a different complexion. It was
probably written about 150 a.D., and seems certainly to have
used all our four Gospels. It is characterised (in the fragment
which we possess of it) by a violent hatred of the Jews, and also
by a wish to show that the sufferings of our Lord in His Passion
were only apparent: in other words, that His human body was
not really a body like ours, but only a seeming one: in yet other,
and technical, language, the author held the Docetic view of the
Incarnation. This doctrinal tendency caused an orthodox bishop
(Serapion of Antioch, a.D. 190—203) to denounce and condemn
the book as heretical. Here again no important resemblance of
thought or language to 2 Peter can be found. It is likely enough
that the Gospel was written in Syria.
Lastly the Acts of Peter. There are apocryphal Acts of Peter
current in profusion, in many languages and of many dates: but
those with which we are here concerned exist partly in Latin and
partly in Greek (and Coptic), and were written perhaps as late
as 200 a.D. (but as I think somewhat earlier) by a person who,
though he may not have left the Church, clearly held the Docetic
view of our Lord’s person. In this book there is an account of
the Transfiguration which evidently echoes the language of 2 Peter
(in the words “Dominus noster volens me maiestatem suam
videre in monte sancto,” cap. xx). Wehavein it also the story of
a prophecy by our Lord of St Peter’s crucifixion, —altogether
different from that in John xxi.—which was possibly suggested
by the language of 2 Peter. These Acts are the latest of the
writings which we are considering.
It seems to me that these Petrine apocrypha fall into two
groups. The earlier consists of the Apocalypse and the Preaching
(and 2 Peter), which may have been written in Egypt in the first
quarter of the second century: the later of the Gospel, followed
at some interval by the Acts, which may both come from Asia
Minor, Of these the Apocalypse and 2 Peter are most closely
allied, while the Preaching is used in 130 or so by a man
c2
XXxli INTRODUCTION
(Aristides) who also knew 2 Peter. The Gospel, whether by
accident or not, shows no trace of 2 Peter; but the Acts do.
They, however, were written at a time when 2 Peter was cer-
tainly current.
I have referred above to the possibility that the earlier group
of Petrine apocrypha may contain true reminiscences of the
Apostle’s teaching. This may be especially true of the Preaching,
but it is also to be kept in mind with regard to the Hpistle and the
Apocalypse. We have not, at the date which I assign to these
writings, reached the epoch of the active production of Christian
apocrypha, and the earliest of such pure inventions as we do pos-
sess differ from the Petrine group in that they are “ tendency-
writings,” composed for the purpose of inculcating some peculiar
form of doctrine. There is then the possibility that some frag-
ments of genuine Petrine matter may be contained in all three
of these writings.
CaN 2 PETER BE CALLED A ForGuERyY ?
But the question remains: Is not the writer of 2 Peter guilty
of forgery in issuing a document under St Peter’s name which
St Peter did not write? It is quite certain that such a pro-
ceeding, if carried out in our time, could not be qualified by any
other name. But in the second century the situation was a very
different one. We must consider the habits of the time. There
are in existence a large number of writings belonging to the
years immediately preceding the composition of 2 Peter, which are
fathered upon Jewish patriarchs and prophets or upon pagan seers,
What was the intention of their real authors with regard to them?
and how were they regarded by their readers? Take, for in-
stance, the Apocalypses which were written soon after the destruc-
tion of Jerusalem: those of Ezra (2 Esdras in our Apocrypha)
and Baruch. Their ostensible authors are men who lived at the
time of the other great catastrophe of the Holy City, under
Nebuchadnezzar, and they try to explain the causes of the
present troubles of Israel and hold out prospects of a future
re-establishment of the polity and of happiness in another world.
They are meant to come to the oppressed people like a cheering
2 PETER Xxxiii
strain of music out of the distance, or the beloved and familiar
voice of one no longer seen, bringing the message which that
voice would have spoken in life. They are no more meant to
deceive than is an ancient folk-tale that tells of the perils
and ultimate triumph of a hero: and to such tales they may
fairly be likened, except that they have a more serious purpose
and a more sacred form. But just as the children who hear the
fairy tale believe it, and as it passes into the daily dramas of
their games, so but few decades passed before these Apocalypses
were put on a plane which their writers had not intended them
to occupy, and were ranked with the ancient scriptures, which
they were only designed to recall and interpret. This result
shows the mischievous nature of the device innocently adopted
by the Apocalyptic writers. There was danger inherent in it.
As soon as the Christian Church began to regard certain of its
early representatives in the same light as the patriarchs and
prophets of Israel, and to look upon their writings as “Scripture,”
the possibility of using their names as the names of Jewish
heroes had been used came into existence, and along with it
came the danger inherent in the device. At first, as I have
suggested, the non-authentic writings that were fathered upon
the Apostles were such as may have embodied real reminiscences
of their teaching. But very soon the device was employed with
the mischievous purpose of gaining credence for special forms of
doctrine for which insufficient support was to be found in the
older scriptures. It is in these circumstances that we are justi-
fied in applying the name of forgery to apocryphal writings.
Applying these considerations to 2 Peter, I think of it as the
work of a man who was confronted with a special crisis, Two
forms of false teaching were current in his circle: one that of the
Libertines, the other that of the deniers of the Second Coming.
There was need that the members of his church should be reminded
of the teaching of the first preachers of the word upon these points.
Those preachers had predicted the coming of false teachers, and
had inculcated the uncertainty of the time of the Second Coming,
on the authority of our Lord Himself. To meet the danger of
the Libertine teaching he borrows and expands the words of an
XXXiv INTRODUCTION
Apostolic writer (Jude) who himself refers back to the Apostles :
to meet the other error he quotes, it may be, real words of St Peter
or else an ancient writing in the prophetic manner : and he puts
the whole of his warning into the form of a letter from St Peter,
feeling that he is taking the attitude which St Peter himself would
have taken, and, perhaps, knowing that he is to a great extent
using words which were handed down to him as St Peter’s own.
If there were an element of conscious deceit connected with
the writing, it must have lain principally in the manner in which
the Epistle was introduced to the Church. If it was produced
as a new discovery, or if a romance was invented to explain its
having been previously unknown, then we cannot wholly acquit
the writer. But if the document were recognized by those to
whom it was read as a crystallizing of oral apostolic teaching
put forward to meet a particular difficulty, we shall be still able,
even if we dislike the device which the writer adopted, to
think of him as a man of sincere purpose and not as a designing
impostor.
CoNTENTS OF THE EPISTLE.
The contents of the Epistle, shortly summarized, are as follows:
i. 1. Greeting to the sharers of the writer's faith.
2—4. The knowledge of God, who has called you, makes it
possible for you to attain the highest life and partake of the
Divine nature and escape the corruption of the world.
5—7. -Let your belief in God lead you to cultivate certain
virtues, culminating in Love. -
8. This process will make your knowledge of God and Christ
of practical and operative value.
9—11. Neglect of it induces blindness of the soul. Beware of
this and make your calling a reality. This will lead you into Life.
12—15. It will be my care to remind you of this as long as I
live (which will not be long), and to provide you after my death
with the means of remembering.
16—19. My teaching to you was not based on delusion but on
my: personal experience, for I witnessed the Lord’s glory. And
that sight made me the surer of the value of the prophets.
2 PETER XXXV
You rightly value their guidance in the dark interval which
precedes the full day.
20, 21. Remember that prophesy i is not a matter of private
interpretation, any more than, when first uttered, it came at the
will of those who uttered it.
ii. 1—3. But, besides true prophets, there were false prophets
in Israel, and so there will be among you. Their immoral life
will bring discredit on the Christian name. But they will not
remain unpunished.
4—9. God did not spare the angels who sinned by lust, nor
the men before the Flood (who also sinned by lust), nox the
cities of the Plain. Yet in these instances punishment was not
indiscriminate. Noah and his family were saved from the Flood,
and Lot from Sodom. Both of them had protested against the
wickedness around them. So we see that it is in God’s power
and is His practice to destroy the wicked and deliver the good.
10, 11. The false teachers are very bold and high spoken,
and make light of the leaders of the Church, but they will come by
a fall.
12—16. They give themselves up to animal enjoyment and will
die the death of brutes. They make the assemblies for worship
the means of dissipation, and of pecuniary gain for themselves,
reminding us of Balaam.
17—19. Unproductive of any good, they do actual harm,
especially to those newly turned from paganism, and this
under the specious name of Christian freedom, whereas they are
really slaves to their vices.
20—22. The pity is that they ever became Christians at all.
They have lost all the reality of the Christian life, and their end
is worse than their beginning.
iii. 1,2. This is the second letter I have written to you: both
are meant to keep alive in your minds the messages of the
prophets and apostles which you have heard.
3, 4. And especially remember that they warned you of men
of loose life, who should rise up among you and should deride
the idea of our Lord’s return to judgment.
‘5—7. They forget that the world is created subject to change.
XXXVi INTRODUCTION
There was a great catastrophe in the old time when the whole
race of men was wiped out by a flood of water, and we believe
that another is to come when fire will be the instrument of
destruction.
8,9. And as to the delay of the Second Coming. Time has
no place with God. A thousand years are nothing to Him. He
is waiting in order to give all men a chance of repentance.
10—13. Nevertheless He will come when He is least expected :
and should not that thought lead you to prepare yourselves for
His coming, in your life-walk ? you must be righteous if you are
to inhabit a kingdom of righteousness.
14—16. Try then to keep a clear conscience before God, and
think of Him as the God who waits patiently to ensure your
salvation. That is the teaching of my brother Paul in his letter
to you; and in his other letters he has much to say on these
topics, which must be studied with care, since, like the other
scriptures, they have put wrong ideas into the minds of ill-informed
readers, who are not grounded in the faith.
17—18. Yow are forewarned: keep to your principles and
grow in the knowledge of Christ: to whom be glory.
THE EPISTLE OF JUDE.
Tur AvutTHOoR, DATE, AND DESTINATION.
The author of the Epistle of Jude describes himself in his
opening words as a servant of Jesus Christ and brother of James.
By this James it is usually held that we are to understand
James the Brother of the Lord, author of the Epistle and first
Bishop of Jerusalem, who, according to the story preserved by the
early Church historian Hegesippus, ended his life a martyr,
having been precipitated from a pinnacle of the Temple shortly
before the siege and destruction of Jerusalem. This Jude or Judas
will therefore be identical with the person mentioned in Matt.
xiii. 55 as a Brother of Jesus. He is the last in the list there
given, “James and Joses and Simon and Judas,” and last but one
in Mark vi. 3. The controversy that has been waged over the
meaning of the words “ Brother of the Lord” need not occupy us
JUDE XXXVii
here. It has been held that they were (a) sons of Joseph by a
former marriage, and so older than Jesus ; (Ὁ) sons of Joseph and
Mary, younger than Jesus ; (6) not really brothers at all but cousins.
We gather from 1 Cor. ix. 5 that more than one of them was
married}.
As to the life of Judas or Jude, the Brother of the Lord,
we know absolutely nothing. But there is a story, told by
Hegesippus and preserved by Eusebius, about two of his
grandsons. Domitian had ordered all descendants of David to
be put to death. These men were therefore informed against by
certain heretics, as being of the seed of David and of the kindred
of the Christ. They were brought before Domitian, who, like
Herod, had heard of the “coming” of Christ, and was afraid that
it implied a political disturbance. The men confessed their
descent from David, and being further questioned, stated that
they owned between them property to the value of 9000 denarii
invested in land, which they cultivated themselves ; and showed
their horny hands as a proof. Asked concerning the kingdom of
Christ, they said that it was not temporal or terrestrial, but
would come at the end of the world when Christ should
return to judge the quick and dead, and reward every man
according to his works. Domitian discharged them unharmed,
and revoked his edict against the Davidic clan.
The two men became bishops of churches, and survived till
the time of Trajan. Eusebius does not give their names, but in
another source they appear as Zoker and James: and it is
probable that this additional detail is derived from Hegesippus.
If Jude’s grandsons were alive in Trajan’s reign, what do
we gather as to Jude’s own date? Mayor gives the following
estimate, on the hypothesis that Jude was younger than our
Lord.
Jude may have been born in 10 A.D., may have had sons before
35 a.D., and grandsons before 60 a.p. In the first year of
Domitian (81 a.D.) he would have been 71. If the Epistle was
written in 80 A.D. he would have been 70 and his grandsons
. 1. For a full discussion see Lightfoot’s Galatians, 252 sqq., and
Mayor on the Epistle of St James, v. sqq.
XXXVili INTRODUCTION
about 20. There is nothing in the story to indicate at what
time in Domitian’s reign the interview took place.
If Jude was older than our Lord and was born shortly before
6 B.c., and if his Epistle was written between 75 and 80, he
would be an old man (85 or so) but not incredibly old: his
grandsons would be over 40 when brought before Domitian.
As to Jude’s position in the Christian community, and as to
the special Church to which his Epistle is addressed, we are
quite in the dark. ‘Two points only emerge. Jude writes as one
whose word will command respect: and he is known—at least
by name, but probably more familiarly—to his readers. In v. 3
he speaks of having already contemplated writing to them in
more general terms about the Christian hope, when the sudden
appearance of false teachers among them compelled him to write
at once, and to meet the special crisis, the Epistle which we
have. We-may naturally deduce from his words that the con-
templated writing would have been something in the nature of a
pastoral Epistle.
We may place the community to which he writes very much
where we please: Dr Chase’s conjecture that it was at or near
the Syrian Antioch is as good as any. There is no reason for
confining our view to Palestine.
EXTERNAL EVIDENCE.
The external evidence for the Epistle of Jude may be given at
less length than that which concerns 2 Peter. We have seen
reason for thinking that 2 Peter copies Jude, and that 2 Peter
may be assigned to the first quarter of the second century. It is
therefore an early witness to the existence of, and to the respect
felt for, Jude.
In the Teaching of the Apostles or Didaché, a second-century (?)
document, there is a probable allusion to Jude 22: Did. ii, 7
ov μισήσεις πάντα ἄνθρωπον, ἀλλὰ ods μὲν ἐλέγξεις, περὶ δὲ ὧν
προσεύξῃ, οὺς δὲ ἀγαπήσεις.
The Epistle of Polycarp and Martyrdom of Polycarp (155 a.p.)
give the same form of greeting as Jude 2 ἔλεος (ὑμῖν) καὶ εἰρήνη
καὶ ἀγάπη πληθυνθείη.
JUDE ΧΧΧΙΧ
The Muratorian Fragment of about 170 Α.Ὁ. says: ‘“ Epistola
sane Iudae et superscripti Iohannis duae in catholicis habentur.”
There are quotations with and without specification of source
in the Paedagogus and Stromateis of Clement of Alexandria, and
also comments (from the Hypotyposes, in a Latin version) on
the text. Tertullian names the Epistle. Theophilus of Antioch
and Athenagoras (cir. 180) probably allude to passages in it.
Origen mentions it with commendation: and in another place
with the words “if anyone should accept the Epistle,” words
which point to doubts being entertained of its authority.
Eusebius classes it with James as controverted but well-
known and recognized: and elsewhere as not mentioned by
many old writers, but yet as having been publicly used in the
churches. It exists in the Old Latin but not in the Syriac
(Peshitto) version.
The opposition to it indicated in the words of Origen and of
Eusebius seems to have been due to its use of apocryphal —
writings. This, at least, is the reason definitely given by Jerome.
The nature of the objection shows that it arose in an age when
criticism had begun, and therefore not in the very earliest times.
We may fairly think of it as having been most vigorous in the
great Antiochene school, where Christian scholarship was
strongest, and may couple this idea with the fact of the
exclusion of the Epistle from the Syriac version.
CoNTENTS.
The contents of the Epistle may be shortly summarized thus :
1,2. Greeting. Mercy, peace, love to you.
3. I was engaged in writing to you generally about our
common salvation when circumstances compelled me to desist
from this and write at once urging you to stand fast to your
faith.
4. For I hear that false teachers have made their appearance
among you, men whose final destiny was long ago foreseen (by
Enoch): whose teaching amounts to a perversion of grace into
~ lust and a denial of their Redeemer.
x] INTRODUCTION
5—7. I warn you against following them. Remember that
Israel, redeemed (as you have been) from Egypt, perished in the
wilderness. (This applies to their fate and yours if you follow
them.) Then again, remember the punishment of the angels who
(like these teachers) were guilty of backsliding: and that of the
cities of the Plain who were ruined (like these) through lust.
8—11. Besides their other evil courses these men have
no respect for authority, celestial or human; they are highly
abusive. How different from Michael the chief angel, who did
not rail against even the fallen angel, but appealed to God.
These men, I say, are abusive, and also brutally ignorant. They
recall the angry disobedience of Cain, the covetousness of
Balaam, the rebelliousness of Korah.
12, 13. Greedy and unproductive, they are men who might
have been useful had they kept within bounds; but they have
strayed hopelessly from the path.
14—16. Their end was foreseen (as I said) by Enoch the
primeval seer: speakers of hard things he called them, and so
they are.
17—19. Yousee that this crisis was not unforeseen. Besides
Enoch, the Apostles predicted the coming of such men. They
are the “separators” you have read of, and though they arrogate
to themselves the name of “spiritual” they are just the reverse.
20—23. Follow them not: keep your faith as it was taught to
you: pray: keep in communion with God: look to Jesus Christ.
Do your best to save those who have joined or are likely to join
the false teachers: but there is danger in the contact with them:
be alive to that.
24, 25. And so to Him who is able to preserve you from all
such danger be glory.
APOCRYPHAL WRITINGS QUOTED By JUDE. THE ASSUMPTION
oF Mosss.
Two Jewish apocryphal writings, the Asswmption or Ascension
of Moses and the Book of Enoch, are indisputably quoted by Jude:
a fact which, as we have seen, operated unfavourably with some
JUDE ΧΙ
upon the reception of his Epistle. Something shall be said here
as to the nature and contents of both these books.
But with regard to the difficulty which has been felt by many
as to the use of apocryphal books by New Testament writers, it
may be remarked that it is less a matter for surprise that they
should be quoted at all than that they should be quoted so
seldom ; and, further, that in all probability if we possessed the
Jewish apocryphal literature in a more complete state than we
do, we should recognize the existence of a good many more
allusions to it than we now can. It is clear, for instance, that
portions of the imagery of the Revelation of St John are
derived from the Book of Enoch, and that St Paul was acquainted
with, and alludes to, more than one apocryphal book. The men-
tion of Jannes and Jambres (2 Tim. iii. 8) may be due to such a
book : the same Assumption of Moses which Jude quotes seems to
be cited in Gal. 111. 19. And the allusion to the “ Rock which
followed” Israel in the wilderness is at least derived from Jewish
legend. Again, the influence of the Wisdom of Solomon is
clearly perceptible in James and in Hebrews, and it is probable
that Enoch is quoted in 1 Peter as well as in Jude. In the
Christian writings which stand next in date to the N.T. (e.g. the
Epistles of Barnabas and Clement) the use of apocryphal writings
is conspicuous. A long process of criticism was needed before the
claim of these books to an authority resembling that of the O.T.
was finally set aside, and the ill effects of using them recognized.
The men of the first century had no such means as we now
possess of judging whether a writing presented to them as
ancient, and enjoying the respect of large circles, really deserved
that respect or not.
We need not then think it derogatory to the good sense of
Jude or to the worth of his Epistle that he should have made
use of books which were valued in his day and which he had
been brought up to regard with reverence.
His first plain allusion to the Assumption of Moses is in the
well-known 9th verse—a passage which has probably excited
more curiosity than any other in the minds of his readers. It
’ runs thus:
xii INTRODUCTION
“But Michael the archangel when he was speaking with the
Devil in controversy (or when, contending with the Devil, he was
speaking) about the body of Moses, did not presume to bring
against him a railing accusation, but said The Lord rebuke thee.”
Now that this illustration is drawn from the Asswmption of
Moses is expressly attested by several writers of early date who
knew that book, namely Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Didymus.
Quotations from the same book are made by the first two of these
three writers, and by others of later date.
The name of the book occurs in several lists of apocryphal
writings, together with a statement of its length, which shows
it to have been of the same length as the Revelation of St John.
In 1861 a large fragment of an old Latin version of it was
discovered in a palimpsest manuscript at Milan by Ceriani, the
celebrated Librarian of the Ambrosian Library. This fragment
which may contain the first third, or rather more, of the whole
book, gives us the means of judging of its date and character:
and a recent editor, Dr R. H. Charles}, considers it to have been
written between A.D. 7 and 29, by a member of the Pharisaic
party in Palestine, who wished to urge upon his fellow-believers
the adoption of a policy of quietude and patience, as opposed
to that spirit of national self-assertion and rebellion against
Rome, which ultimately led to the destruction of Jerusalem.
The portion of the book which we have in a continuous form
unhappily does not contain the episode quoted by Jude. The
contents of it, shortly summarized, are these:
In the 120th year of Moses and 2500th year of the world
Moses calls Joshua to him and gives him the charge over the
people, seeing that his own death is at hand. Joshua is to take
into his keeping the books (probably the Pentateuch) which
Moses will give him. Then a long prophecy of the course of
Israel’s history is given by Moses, bringing it down to the times
of Herod the Great, and the domination of the Sadducean party.
Thereafter (at a time which is really in the future as regards the
actual writer of the book) a terrible tyrant—a sort of Antichrist—
is to come and persecute the faithful, and, after this, the final
1 The Assumption of Moses, 1897.
JUDE xliii
judgment of Israel’s enemies and their deliverance is to take
place. ,
Upon hearing this and the announcement of Moses’ approaching
death Joshua is overwhelmed with grief, falls at Moses’ feet,
and utters a lament over the departure of his master, and his own
unfitness to succeed him. Moses raises him up, sets him in his
own seat, and comforts him by an assurance of God’s faithfulness
and the continuance of His care for Israel, whom He will never
forsake. And here the fragment ends.
The rest of the story of the book as known to Jude has to
be pieced together from various short quotations made by church
writers, ὦ
It must be remembered that in the long fragment the scene is
laid, not on the mountain where Moses died, but in the camp.
There is reason for thinking that in the book Joshua next
accompanied Moses to the mountain, and Moses saw the land of
promise. Then Joshua returned to announce the death of Moses
to the people, and to summon Caleb. The people from below
saw a cloud of light surrounding and covering the place where
Moses was. Michael with other angels came to receive his soul,
and bury his body. It is probable that just before the moment
of death Moses held a dialogue with God, in which he refused to
allow his soul to be separated from his body, like that of other
men, by the angel of death, and that God eventually kissed him,
and at the kiss his soul left the body (this at least is a constant
feature of the story in rabbinic tradition).
At this point, perhaps—certainly after the moment of the death
of Moses—we may place the contest between Michael and Samael
or Satan. Michael and his angels were preparing to bury Moses,
when Samael appeared and said that the body was his, because
he, Samael, was the Lord of matter. Michael withstood him
with the words “For of His Holy Spirit all we were created,”
and again “ From the face of God His Spirit went forth and the
world came into being.” In other words Samael is not the Lord
of matter; all things were created by God. And probably it was
in connexion with this that Michael charged Samael with having
-done his best to mar that creation: for we are told that he
xliv INTRODUCTION
accused the devil of having inspired the serpent to become the
means of Adam and Eve’s transgression.
But Samael had another accusation in reserve. Moses, he
said, was not deserving of burial at all: he was a murderer, for
he had slain the Egyptian (see Exod. ii.). This blasphemy
doubtless kindled the wrath of Michael, but he restrained
himself, and instead of retorting that Samael was a murderer
from the beginning, he said, ‘“‘The Lord rebuke thee, O slanderer
(SuaBore),” in the words of the angel in Zech. iii.1
It is most likely that at this reply Samael fled in confusion.
We gather that his object in trying to obtain possession of the
body of Moses was that the Israelites might be induced to make
a god of it and worship it.
After the flight of Samael the angels proceeded with their task.
It seems that Joshua and Caleb may have been witnesses of the
dispute, as they certainly were of the concluding scene. They
were now borne up by the Spirit into the air and saw a marvellous
sight : Moses appeared in two forms. One (the soul) was being
carried up by angels into Heaven; the other—the body—was
being buried in a rocky gorge, also by the hands of angels. Of
these two witnesses, one, Caleb, was unable, owing to his more
earth-bound character, to see so clearly or so much as Joshua,
but descended to earth sooner. Joshua, however, remained until
all was accomplished, and upon his return to the camp described
all that had passed to the people. One detail of the story was
that so pure was the body of Moses that the angels contracted
no ceremonial uncleanness from contact with it, and needed not
to purify themselves.
It is not beyond hope that some further light may be thrown
upon the course of this very interesting story by future researchers.
In the mean time the above must stand as the best and fullest
reconstruction I am able to provide.
1 One authority tells us that Satan ‘‘also said that God had been
guilty of deceit, in bringing Moses into the land which He had sworn
that he should not enter.”’ It is not clear that this is taken from
the Assumption. It would supply good ground for an accusation of
blasphemy on the part of Michael: but the words κρίσιν βλασφημίας
do not (probably) mean more than a railing accusation.
JUDE xlv
But the verse which has served as our text so far is not the
only allusion in Jude to the Assumption of Moses. In v. 16,
immediately after the express quotation from the Book of
Enoch, we read, “ These are murmurers, grumblers, walking after
their own lusts, and their mouth speaketh great swelling words,
respecting persons for the sake of profit.” The clauses which I have
italicized have been thought (and, as it seems to me, quite
rightly) to be quotations from the Assumption. In the Latin
fragment we have a prediction of the domination of a set of men
(pretty certainly the Sadducees) whose vices are described at
some length (Chapter vit.). It is said (vu. 7) that they will be
qguerulost, which corresponds to Jude’s μεμψίμοιροι, and in VII. 9
os eorum loquetur ingentia cf. Jude, τὸ στόμα αὐτῶν λαλεῖ ὑπέρογκα.
And earlier in the book (v. 5), where a similar class of wicked
rulers is being prophesied, it is said of them erunt mirantes
personas cupiditatum (perhaps locupletum or nobilitatum) et
acceptiones munerum (Jude θαυμάζοντες πρόσωπα ὠφελίας χάριν).
Further (and this point has not, I think, been noticed before)
in Jude 19 we have the words Οὗτοί εἰσιν of ἀποδιορίζοντες
(rendered “These are they that make invidious distinctions,”
Mayor). In the verse of the Asswmption quoted above (VII. 7)
the word querulosi is immediately preceded by eaxterminatores,
which has usually been taken as meaning “destroyers,” but
which, I think, is probably a too-literal rendering into Latin of
the same Greek word ἀποδιορίζοντες that is used by Jude; or at
the least, of a word of similar sense.
Tue Book or ENocH.
The other apocryphal book which is certainly quoted by Jude
is the Book of Enoch. My account of this may be shorter,
inasmuch as the book is extant in a complete form, and accounts
and editions of it are accessible without much difficulty!
The Book of Enoch as we have it (and apparently as Jude also
had it) is a book of considerable length, made up of portions
belonging to various dates,—from about 160 B.c. to a time not
1 e.g. R. H. Charles’s edition, 1893.
2 Peter d
xlvi INTRODUCTION
later than the Christian era. We possess it in an Ethiopic
version (made from Greek and this, again, from Hebrew), and
also a portion of the text in Greek, discovered in 1886—7 in
Egypt; besides smaller fragments in Greek and Latin. Its con-
tents are very various. At the beginning is an account of the
sin of the angels who mingled with the daughters of men and
begat the race of giants: of how Enoch was commissioned to
denounce to them their guilt and its punishment: of how he
was conducted by angels over the universe, and was translated.
In other sections of the book there are disquisitions on the
movements of the heavenly bodies, visions of the history of
Israel, parables, the story of the birth of Noah, and prophecies
of various kinds. The influence of the book is perceptible in
several parts of the N.T., and not least in the Revelation of
St John.
This very interesting writing or collection of writings is known
as the Book of Enoch, par excellence; there is another important
Revelation of Enoch (usually called the Secrets of Enoch) which
exists only in Old Slavonic: and there is a third very much later
Vision in Armenian. But the older Book of Enoch was long
regarded with great veneration in the Christian Church: and
indeed has, both in itself, and because of the use made of it by
Christian writers, a strong claim on our respect.
The use made by Jude of noch is considerable in proportion
to the length of his Epistle. Most obvious is the quotation in
v. 15: “To execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that
are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they
have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which
ungodly sinners have spoken against him.” The Greek of this,
as it appears in the Egyptian MS., is as follows: Zn. i. 9 ὅτι
ἔρχεται σὺν τοῖς (ταῖς) μυριάσιν αὐτοῦ καὶ τοῖς ἁγίοις αὐτοῦ ποιῆσαι
—_—_———
ecm τ a
, \ , Ν > , ‘ > =. ‘ ΄ os
κρίσιν κατὰ πάντων, καὶ ἀπολέσει τοὺς ἀσεβεῖς Kai ἐλέγξει πᾶσαν
΄ ‘ , cas ᾿» 2A τ δον > > σι
σάρκα περὶ πάντων «τῶν» ἔργων αὐτῶν ὧν ησέβησαν Kat αὐτοῦ
ἁμαρτωλοὶ ἀσεβεῖς, which differs from Jude, but has in common
therewith the words I have underlined. The Ethiopic, as
translated by Dr Charles, reads: “And lo! He comes with ten
JUDE xlvii
thousands of His holy ones to execute judgment upon them, and
He will destroy the ungodly and will convict all flesh of all that
the sinners and ungodly have wrought and ungodly committed
against him.”
The clause περὶ πάντων τῶν σκληρῶν ὧν ἔλάλησαν κατ᾽ αὐτοῦ is
not from Zn. i., but, as it seems, from xxvii. 2 περὶ τῆς. δόξης
αὐτοῦ σκληρὰ λαλήσουσιν.
The introductory phrase of Jude, “Enoch the seventh from
Adam,” occurs in Zn. lx. 8 “My grandfather was taken up, the
seventh from Adam.”
No less certain, though less obvious, is the use made of Enoch
in v. 6 “And the angels which kept not their own dignity but
left their proper dwelling-place hath He reserved unto the judg-
ment of the great day in eternal chains under darkness.”
The story of these angels, who came to earth and mingled with
the daughters of men, occupies a large place in the early chapters
of Enoch, and besides the general allusion, Jude is the debtor to
Enoch for some phrases: Zn. xii. 4 speaks of the angels “who
have abandoned the high heaven and the holy eternal place”: in
x. 5 are the words, “Cover him (7.e., Azazel, one of the principal
offenders among the angels) with darkness, and let him dwell
there for ever”: x. 12 “Bind them...until the day of their
judgment”: xxii. 11 “unto the great day of judgment.” And
in liv. 3 sqq. the immense chains prepared for the hosts of Azazel
are shown to Enoch.
Passing over other less striking resemblances to Hnoch (which
will be recorded in the notes on the text of the Epistle) we have
a third clear instance of quotation in v. 13, “wandering stars, to
whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever.” ᾿Αστέρες
πλανῆται, be it noted, in this verse, does not mean planets in our
sense of the word, but stars which have deserted their appointed
orbits. Compare Zn, xviii. 14, where Enoch is shown “the
prison of the stars and the powers of heaven; and the stars
that are rolling in the fire are those which have transgressed the
precept of the Lord in the beginning of their rising, for they went
not forth in their season, and He was wroth with them and
bound them until the season of the accomplishment of their sin,
d 2
xlviii INTRODUCTION
ten thousand years.” And xxi. 2 sqq., “I beheld...a place of
disorder (ἀκατασκεύαστον) and terrible...and there I saw seven
stars of the heaven bound....These are those of the stars of
heaven which transgressed the command of the Lord, and were
bound here until they fulfil ten thousand years.” In later
chapters (lxxx., lxxxvi., lxxxviii., xc.) are allusions to the sin
and punishment of stars (which, however, here represent the
sinful angels): they are bound in an abyss which is narrow,
deep, horrible and dark.
It may be remarked that this bringing together within the
limits of a short Epistle of so many passages from different parts
of Enoch argues that Jude must have known the book very
intimately and regarded it with great veneration.
Tor Fatse TEACHERS OF 2 PETER AND JUDE.
One of the sayings anciently attributed to our Lord, but not
recorded in the Gospels, is ‘“ There shall be schisms and heresies.”
Whether He uttered the words or not, they are almost a common-
place in the writings of the Apostles, and especially in those of
Paul. There were, indeed, bound to be differences and divisions
80 soon as a new outlook upon life was opened up to the world at
large. Men of all races and classes were being invited to
become members of a single community: that community had
only the most rudimentary organization, and was constantly
being confronted with questions to answer and moral problems
to solve. The moment that one of its answers or decisions was
rejected or disputed, schism or heresy began. These two words,
familiarized to us by the Litany, are invested with a mysterious
and sinister atmosphere. We are tempted when we hear them
to imagine men who take a demoniac pleasure in devising evil
doctrines and misleading the simple. In truth, there were
schismatics and heretics who seceded from the Church from
motives of ambition or with a view to sensual enjoyment ; but
there were also many who acted from honest conviction. Of the
latter kind were some of those whom we hear of in the New
Testament; I am thinking principally of the Judaizers—the
JUDE xlix
reactionary party. We know the terms in which St Paul
speaks of them. If we may judge, however, from the language
of Jude and 2 Peter the schismatics with whom the writers of
these two Epistles had to do were of a lower order.
Let us see what are the main accusations brought against them.
Jude says that they changed the grace of God into lasciviousness
and denied our Lord (4), indulged in fleshly lusts (7, 8), spoke
evil of dignities (8, 9), were greedy of gain (11, 16), discontented
and conceited (16).
2 Peter repeats these accusations (except that of discontented-
ness), but lays more stress upon the luxurious habits of these
persons, and adds that they promise liberty to their hearers
(ii, 19). In iii. the writer speaks of men who throw doubt upon
the Second Coming; it is not clear that they are the same
persons who are attacked in ii.
There are two features here which may point to unor-
thodox teaching on the part of the accused; but the main
stream of the invective is directed against their general conduct
and bearing. Of the two charges which relate to teaching, the
first is expressed rather differently in the two Epistles: in Jude
we have “‘ denying our only Master and Lord Jesus Christ”; in
2 Peter, “denyingithe Master that bought them.” To be sure
this may be but another reference to conduct : the false teachers
deny Him in their lives ; indulge in practices incompatible with
the rules He has laid down. So Titus i. 16, Θεὸν ὁμολογοῦσιν
εἰδέναι, τοῖς δὲ ἔργοις ἀρνοῦνται. But 2 Peter connects it with
the bringing in of αἱρέσεις ἀπωλείας, and with both writers it
seems to be the head and front of offending. And since we know
that erroneous teaching as to our Lord’s Person was rife in early
times, there is no good reason to doubt that such teaching is
aimed at here. There were various typesofit. Simon Magus—a
shadowy and problematical figure enough—is represented as
thrusting Jesus aside altogether and arrogating to himself the
position of a divine being. Cerinthus, who is traditionally said
to have been contemporary with St John, held, in common with
other men who had been brought up in Jewish circles, that
Jesus was only associated with the Divine Power at His baptism,
] INTRODUCTION
and deserted by it at His crucifixion. Again, the docetic teachers
denied the objective reality of the Incarnation. The human
life of our Lord was but an appearance: His body was not
tangible: He did not eat or drink: He was not really crucified.
The apocryphal Acts of John, a product of this school of thought,
put these words into John’s mouth, “Sometimes when I would
lay hold of Him, I met with a material and solid body, and
again at other times when 1 felt Him, the substance was im-
material and bodiless.” Another form of teaching, the offspring
of a mixture of pagan ideas, both Greek and Oriental, with
Christianity, made Him one of a multitude of supernatural
beings, one link in a mystic genealogy proceeding from the
Supreme Being, and thus—even if unintentionally—detracted
from the unique significance of His Person. Such teaching—it
is roughly labelled as ‘“ Gnostic ”--was commonly combined
with a docetic view of the Incarnation. These were the
main tendencies of unorthodox teaching about our Lord, and
any of them might be described as a denial of the Master.
The other charge is that of “promising liberty to their
followers.” This is stated openly in 2 Peter; a phrase in Jude,
“turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness,” may perhaps
be taken to be of the same import. Either of two evils may
have been in the mind of the writers. There is, first, the
exaggeration of the Christian liberty which St Paul preached—
the making into it a “cloke for licence.” A man might say
that restrictions such as those laid down in the Apostolic decree
of Acts xv. were not binding upon enlightened persons like him-
self, though very proper for weaker brethren: and this would
lead him to unrestrained intercourse with the heathen, to the
eating of meats offered to idols, and so forth: in fact, to the
practices which are condemned in the earlier chapters of the
Revelation, and are there associated with the names of Balaam
and of the Nicolaitanes. Secondly, there is the view that since
the body, in common with all other material things, is evil, no
abuse of it can affect the soul, of which it is the temporary
prison. A tradition preserved by Clement of Alexandria
attributes to Nicolaus the deacon, the supposed founder of the
JUDE li
Nicolaitane sect, the precept ‘“ Abuse the flesh.” Some (in-
cluding probably Nicolaus himself) interpreted this to mean
“Mortify the flesh,” and lived an ascetic life: others indulged
themselves in every gratification of the senses and called this
abusing the flesh. It is to such antinomians (of whom there were
many groups in the second and third centuries, distinguished by
the names of their leaders or their special tenets!) that the words
of our Epistles would best apply.
The other excesses attributed in Jude and 2 Peter to the false
teachers are characteristic of many who have combined high
pretensions with low aims. They have arrogated to themselves
the right to speak, in defiance of the constituted authorities
with whom they have quarrelled; they have traded on the
readiness of their simple-minded hearers to supply them with
bodily comforts ; and they have jealously insisted on a recog-
nition of their own superiority. Such teachers might be only
schismatics, not heretics: that is, their doctrine might be
orthodox enough, and only their attitude towards the main
body of the Church incorrect. But we have seen that there is
ground for thinking them to have held wrong views upon cardinal
points of Christian theology and conduct.
Denunciations of false teachers are found in other parts of the
New Testament. We remember the “wolves in sheep’s clothing”
and the “false Christs” of the Gospels. These are special
forms of error combated by St Paul in Colossians and Ephesians,
and mentioned in Philippians. The Pastoral Epistles are full of
invective, which reminds us far more closely of 2 Peter and Jude
in its general tone: only here little is said of sensuality and
impurity ; indeed, we are told that some of the teachers are
ascetics, “forbidding to marry and commanding to abstain from
meats” (1 Tim. iv. 3). Covetousness, however, and mercenary
1 Notably the Carpocratians, with regard to whom Clement of
Alexandria says ‘‘It was ἃ propos of these and similar heresies,
I think, that Jude in his epistle said prophetically: Likewise also
these filthy dreamers (for not even in their dreams do they approach
.the truth) down to and their mouth speaketh great swelling words”
(Strom. mm. 2, p. 515).
lii INTRODUCTION
practices are mentioned more than once. In the Epistles of
St John the denial that Jesus is the Christ, and the denial of
His coming in the flesh, are specially mentioned. In the
Revelation of St John, as noted above, the teachers of Balaam
and of the Nicolaitanes are singled out. What one notices is
that the accusations of our Epistles and of the Pastorals are,
generally speaking, vaguer than those found elsewhere, and that
it is extremely difficult to draw a distinct or consistent picture
from them.
Nothing has been said so far as to those who questioned the
Second Coming (2 Pet. iii.). The passages quoted in the notes
show that there were some Jewish thinkers of not very dis-
similar views. But we are also reminded of the teaching of
Hymenaeus and Philetus (2 Tim. ii. 17, 18), ‘‘ who concerning
the truth have erred, saying that the resurrection is past
already.” Similar to this is the doctrine attributed in an early
book, the Acts of Paul, to Demas and Hermogenes, that “the
resurrection has already taken effect in our children (ze. that in
our children our own life is perpetuated) and that we rise again
by attaining to the knowledge of the true God.” That is a
view not unknown to philosophers of our own days. We cannot
wonder that all such teachings should have been strongly con-
demned by the first preachers of Christianity, when we consider
their probable effect either upon men who had been always
brought up to look for a day of reckoning, or upon those who
had just been assured that such a day was coming, and coming
shortly. The sudden removal of such an incentive to watchful-
ness and sobriety would in the large majority of cases be highly
mischievous, and we see from his concluding words that the
author of 2 Peter regarded the matter from that point of view,
“Seeing then that these things are to be destroyed, what
manner of men ought you to be in holy conversation and godly
life ?”
JUDE liii
MANUSCRIPTS AND VERSIONS.
Of the Greek manuscripts written in uncial letters!, which
contain the Catholic Epistles including 2 Peter and Jude, the
three oldest give us the complete text, viz.
δὲ Sinaiticus, at Petersburg: Ivth century.
A Alexandrinus, at the British Museum: vth century.
B Vaticanus, at Rome: Ivth century.
Besides these
C Codex Ephraemi rescriptus, at Paris, vth century,
contains the greater part of the text ;
K Mosquensis, at Moscow, 1xth century ; and
Lin the Biblioteca Angelica at Rome, 1xth century (late),
are complete ;
and P Porfirianus Chiovensis, at Kief, rxth century, is nearly
complete.
Investigation of the “cursive” or minuscule manuscripts is
still progressing. A recent editor of the text of our two Epistles
(J. de Zwaan, Leiden, 1909) appears to distinguish four im-
portant groups, each headed by a single manuscript, which I will
enumerate :
13. Paris, Bibliotheque Nationale Gr. 14: 1x—xth cent.
27. London, British Museum, Harleian MS. 5620: xvth
cent.
214. Lambeth Palace Library 1182: x11—x1th cent.
100. Moscow 334: xith cent.
Of ancient Versions into other languages the most important
for our purpose are
I. The Old Latin, z.e. the Latin version or versions anterior to
the revision made by St Jerome. The principal remains of this
for our Epistles are in
(a) The Palimpsest of Fleury, Paris, Bibliothéque Nationale
(Latin, 6400 G) of the vth century, which contains
2 Pet. i. 1 to ii. 7.
1 4,6. roughly speaking, in capitals. Such manuscripts are classed
by themselves as belonging to an earlier period than those which are
in cursive or minuscule letters, i.e. in ordinary running hand. The
*‘uncials” are distinguished by letters of the alphabet, the “ cursives”
by numerals.
liv INTRODUCTION
(6) The Freising fragments at Munich of the vith century,
containing 2 Pet. i. 1—4.
(c) The passages quoted in two collections of Biblical texts
called the Speculum Augustini and the Speculum
Pseudo-Augustini.
(2) Quotations made by Lucifer, bishop of Cagliari in
Sardinia, who died in 371.
II. The Philoxenian Syriac Version, made for Philoxenus,
bishop of Mabug or Hierapolis, about 508. This was the first
rendering into Syriac of our Epistles.
III. The revision of this made by a successor Thomas of
Harkel (Heraclea), about a century later and called the Hark-
lensian.
IV. The Egyptian or Coptic Versions, namely the Lower
Egyptian, formerly called Memphitic, now usually Bohairic, and
the Upper Egyptian (in a different dialect), formerly called
Thebaic, now Sahidic. The former is complete, the latter
fragmentary.
CoRRUPTIONS IN THE TEXT OF THE Two EPISTLES.
The Greek text of both these Epistles contains some doubtful
passages. The text of the N.T. differs from’ that of classical
authors in this, that we have so many copies, versions and
quotations from it going back to a very early date, that there
are very few places in which we are justified in saying that the
text is corrupt, and in calling in the help of conjecture to restore
it. But both in 2 Peter and in Jude there are such places.
(1) The first is in 2 Peter iii. 10 καὶ γῆ καὶ ra ἐν αὐτῇ ἔργα
εὑρεθήσεται. This is the reading of the two earliest Greek MSS.
ὃς and B and of the later uncials KP as well as of one of the
Syriac versions. The older Egyptian version (called Sahidic)
reads οὐχ etpeOnoera. The second-best uncial as we may call
it (A) and another (L) with two versions reads κατακαήσεται,
another good uncial (C) ἀφανισθήσονται. Later MSS. (followed
by our Received Text) give καυθήσεται or κατακαυθήσονται. The
Latin Vulgate omits the clause.
JUDE lv
The words as they stand do not yield a right sense: that is
certain. We need instead of εὑρεθήσεται a word which shall
mean “destroyed” in some form. The simplest way of mending
the passage is to insert ovy as the Sahidic version does: and
this may after all be the right solution. The negative may
have been omitted by the writer himself or by his first copyist.
The phrase οὐχ εὑρεθῆναι in a similar connexion may be illus-
trated from Apocalyptic writings. Thus Daniel xi. 19 has: καὶ
προσκόψει καὶ πεσεῖται καὶ οὐχ εὑρεθήσεται. Rev. xvi. 20 καὶ
πᾶσα νῆσος ἔφυγεν, καὶ ὄρη οὐχ εὑρέθησαν (cf. xii. 8 οὐδὲ τόπος
εὑρέθη αὐτῶν ἔτι ἐν τῷ οὐραν ᾧ) : XVill. 14 καὶ πάντα τὰ λιπαρὰ καὶ
τὰ λαμπρὰ ἀπώλετο ἀπὸ σοῦ, καὶ οὐκέτι οὐ μὴ αὐτὰ εὑρήσουσιν
(this being ἃ periphrasis for the passive): xviii. 21 βληθήσεται
Βαβυλὼν....καὶ od μὴ εὑρεθῇ ἔτι : XX. 11 ἔφυγεν ἡ γῆ καὶ οὐρανός,
καὶ τόπος οὐχ εὑρέθη αὐτοῖς. Compare also the passage quoted
from the Sibylline Oracles in the note on this verse. A passage
from the “Second Epistle of Clement,” quoted in the Note on
the Destruction of the World by Fire (p. 35), gives ground for
another suggestion.
Another way, very simple in itself, but producing a very forced
turn of language, is to read the sentence as a question (Weiss),
“the earth and the works that are therein, shall they be found?”
The other readings of the MSS. κατακαυθήσεται and the like
give the right sense, but do not in any way account for the
presence of εὑρεθήσεται. This must be the oldest reading: it
could not have been changed into any of the others.
Other conjectures which are worth mentioning are
punoera or some compound of it (Hort),
ἀρθήσεται,
πυρωθήσεται.
βρασθήσεται, De Zwaan (1909).
Another, not, I think, recorded in print, was suggested by the
late Henry Bradshaw, and is worth recording, ra ἐν αὐτῇ ἔργα
ἀργὰ εὑρεθήσεται.
(2) In Jude 5 “I wish to remind you...drz Κύριος (or Ἰησοῦς)
λαὸν ἐκ γῆς Αἰγύπτου σώσας τὸ δεύτερον τοὺς μὴ πιστεύσαντας
ἀπώλεσεν."
lvi INTRODUCTION
Κύριος is read here by NC and the mass of later copies.
Ἰησοῦς by AB, five cursive MSS., the Latin, Egyptian, Ethiopic
versions and several Fathers. ὁ θεὸς by another small group.
᾿Ιησοῦς is the “best attested” reading in the view of Hort, but
“‘can only be a blunder.” His explanation is interesting. It is
that the original text had
ὅτιό AdON, etc.,
that the letters or1o were wrongly read as otic (ic being the
universal early abbreviation for Ἰησοῦς) and also perhaps as
otikc (abbreviation for Κύριος).
(3) In Jude 22, 23, is the hardest passage of all. Let us first
take the reading of the Received Text and Authorized Version.
καὶ οὺς μὲν ἐλεεῖτε διακριν ὀόμενοι
οὗς δὲ ἐν φόβῳ σώζετε ἐκ τοῦ πυρὸς ἁρπάζοντες, μισοῦντες καὶ
τὸν ἀπὸ τῆς σαρκὸς ἐσπιλωμένον χιτῶνα.
Then the text of Tischendorf and Tregelles (which is that of
the “Alexandrine” MS., A)
καὶ ovs μὲν ἐλέγχετε Stax pivopevous
os δὲ ca tere ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζοντες
ods δὲ ἐλεᾶτε ἐν φόβῳ, μισοῦντες K.T.X.
Then that of Westcott and Hort (which is that of the Vatican
MS. B):
καὶ ods μὲν ἐλεᾶτε διακρινομένους ow ere ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζοντες
ods δὲ ἐλεᾶτε ἐν φόβῳ, μισοῦντες κ.τ.λ.ῖ
To these we must add:
ἐξ ods μὲν ἐλεᾶτε διακρινομένους
οοὗς δὲ σώζετε ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζοντες
ods δὲ ἐλεᾶτε ἐν φόβῳ, μισοῦντες K.T.Xr.
(.e. as A, but with ἐλεᾶτε for ἐλέγχετε in the first clause).
C ods μὲν ἐλέγχετε διακρινομένους
ods δὲ σώζετε ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζοντες ἐν φόβῳ μισοῦντες.
1 De Zwaan, II Petrus en Judas (1909), reads οὖς μὲν ἐλεᾶτε
* Scaxpivopevous*, ods δὲ ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζετε “ἐν φόβῳ“, and apparently
regards the marked words as interpolations.
JUDE lvii
In these various texts one principal difference is that some
(AX) give three clauses, others (textus receptus, BC) only two.
The Latin, Egyptian, Ethiopic and Armenian versions have
three clauses, Clement of Alexandria two. The Syriac versions
agree with him.
The text of B is very awkward: we must translate it thus:
And those on whom you have compassion as waverers, save,
snatching them from the fire: but on others have com-
passion in fear, etc.
That is, we must take the first ods as a relative pronoun and
the second as a demonstrative; and the first ἐλεᾶτε as indicative
and the second as imperative.
Hort’s suggested remedy is to omit the first ἐλεᾶτε and render
“and some who are waverers save...but on others have com-
passion in fear, etc.”
It is almost as simple to suppose that ods (δὲ) has dropped out
after διακρινομένους, which ends with the same letters. And it is
rather difficult to account for the presence of ἐλέγχετε.
On the whole, if a satisfactory interpretation of the words can
be given, I incline to agree with Mayor in adopting the text of A,
which keeps ἐλέγχετε and gives three clauses}.
ADDITIONAL NOTE
The Apocalypse of Peter.
Since my account of this Apocalypse (pp. xxvi—xxviii) was
printed, more light has been thrown upon it by the discovery of
a large portion of the text in an Ethiopic version. Particulars of
this will be found in a series of articles by me in the Journal of
Theological Studies for 1910-11 (vol. x11.). In the new portions
there are two passages which recall 2 Peter. One is a description
of the final fire, upon which great stress is laid; the other relates
an appearance of Moses and Elias on the Holy Mountain and the
1 The threefold division is supported, perhaps, by the Didache,
see p. Xxxviii.
lviii INTRODUCTION
utterance of a voice from Heaven. The relation of this section
of the Ethiopic to the Greek text described on p. xxvi has yet to
be determined. The fact that both in 2 Peter and in the Apoca-
lypse there is mention of a scene on the Holy Mountain, and of
a voice from Heaven, is noteworthy.
I may add that I now incline to the view—previously enter-
tained by more than one critic—that the Greek fragment is
really a portion of the Gospel of Peter, which had incorporated,
with some changes, a large section of the Apocalypse; the
latter having been already current for some time as a separate
book.
The Apocalypse of Baruch.
Another early writing, I have recently noticed, has some
notable coincidences of language with 2 Peter. This is the
Apocalypse of Baruch}, a book of considerable length and great
interest, which exists in a complete form only in a Syriac
version. It is Jewish, not Christian, in origin, and the latest
date assigned to it in its present form is 130 a.p. The portion
of it which contains the coincidences I have referred to is the
concluding section (chapters Ixxviii.—lxxxvii.), which gives us
the text of an Epistle addressed by Baruch to the nine and a half
tribes who had been deported across the Euphrates in the First
Captivity.
The resemblances I have noted are these :
Ixxviii. 2. The greeting “ Mercy and peace.”
» 5. Wherefore I have been the more careful to leave
you the word, of this epistle before I die
(2 Pet. i. 12, 18).
» 7. For if ye so do these things, He will continually
remember you (2 Pet. i. 10).
In what follows, especially in lxxxiii., there are warnings of the
coming judgment, and exhortation against worldly thoughts :
Ixxxiv. 1. Behold, I have therefore made known to you
these things while I live...and I will set
1 I quote from Dr R. H. Charles’s edition of 1896.
ADDITIONAL NOTE lix
before you some of the commandments of
His judgment, before I die.
Ixxxv. 8. Again moreover the Most High also is long-
suffering towards us here (2 Pet. iii. 9).
9. Before therefore judgment exact its own...let us
prepare our soul (2 Pet. iii. 11).
The prophet, like the Apostle, has been warned of his speedy
departure from this world, and it is possible that the passages
I have quoted are only accidentally similar to the phrases in
2 Peter. But they deserve to be noticed, and further investiga-
tion may show that there is a real connexion between the two
writings.
3)
δὲ ὶ
ὯΝ ἐς
Veit
Ne
eens = ὅμως
Ἰὰ ,-
ἊΝ ἘΝ ὑμδον
, τ ὡς : A ne
Be wo | Hoi ae
ede aes i ait peeling tie eae ae ee
oe weeTeN me! ee As hear raise ὁ ae
Pe ee
τὰν ae A faye pent ipa # oe ΤῊΣ
if ale ae wah ἀλη
: a Ἢ ‘oh i pid dis ἀν ἐπὶ ΠΝ wha τω ἘΣ
iad cy eee oe ee at : ἱ ὅν -
TTETPOY B
1 ΙτσΣιμὼν Πέτρος δοῦλος καὶ ἀπόστολος ᾿Ιησοῦ
Χριστοῦ τοῖς ἰσότιμον ἡμῖν λαχοῦσιν πίστιν ἐν δικαιο-
ἴον n al an ? a a
σύνῃ τοῦ θεοῦ ἡμῶν καὶ σωτῆρος Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ"
Ξχάρις ὑμῖν καὶ εἰρήνη πληθυνθείη ἐν ἐπιγνώσει τοῦ
θεοῦ καὶ ᾿Ιησοῦ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν, ϑὼς πάντα ἡμῖν τῆς
θείας δυνάμεως αὐτοῦ τὰ πρὸς ζωὴν καὶ εὐσέβειαν δε-
δωρημένης διὰ τῆς ἐπιγνώσεως τοῦ καλέσαντος ἡμᾶς
διὰ δόξης καὶ ἀρετῆς, δι’ ὧν τὰ τίμια καὶ μέγιστα ἡμῖν
> , , “ \ / , /
érayyéApata δεδώρηται, iva διὰ τούτων γένησθε θείας
κοινωνοὶ φύσεως, ἀποφυγόντες τῆς ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ ἐν ἐπι-
θυμίᾳ φθορᾶς. δκαὶ αὐτὸ τοῦτο δὲ σπουδὴν πᾶσαν
παρεισενέγκαντες ἐπιχορηγήσατε ἐν τῇ πίστει ὑμῶν
τὴν ἀρετήν, ἐν δὲ τῇ ἀρετῇ τὴν γνῶσιν, δὲν δὲ τῇ
Ἑ \ > / > \ iol > / \ ς
γνώσει τὴν ἐγκράτειαν, ἐν δὲ τῇ ἐγκρατείᾳ τὴν ὑπο:
/ > δὲ a e A \ > / 72 δὲ ΖΝ
μονήν, ἐν δὲ τῇ ὑπομονῇ τὴν εὐσέβειαν, Ἰὲν δὲ TH
> / \ / > \ a / \
εὐσεβείᾳ τὴν φιλαδελφίαν, ἐν δὲ TH φιλαδελφίᾳ τὴν
a) \ a ς / 4
ayarny' ὅὃταῦτα yap ὑμῖν ὑπάρχοντα Kal πλεονάζοντα
οὐκ ἀργοὺς οὐδὲ ἀκάρπους καθίστησιν εἰς τὴν τοῦ
la) fal le) /
κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ ἐπίγνωσιν" ϑᾧ yap μὴ
/ “ > / /
πάρεστιν ταῦτα, τυφλός ἐστιν μυωπάζων, λήθην λα-
βὼν τοῦ καθαρισμοῦ τῶν πάλαι αὐτοῦ ἁμαρτιῶν.
10616 μᾶλλον, ἀδελφοί, σπουδάσατε βεβαίαν ὑμῶν τὴν
κλῆσιν καὶ ἐκλογὴν ποιεῖσθαι᾽ ταῦτα γὰρ ποιοῦντες
οὐ μὴ πταίσητέ ποτε" ᾿ἰοὕτως γὰρ πλουσίως ἐπιχο-
/ MEM ς Μ > \ 77 /
ρηγηθήσεται ὑμῖν ἡ εἴσοδος εἰς THY αἰώνιον βασιλείαν
τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν καὶ σωτῆρος ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ.
2 Peter A
‘Qinci;ate: ¢ BTUZTOAM [1 12
+.
12 Διὸ μελλήσω ἀεὶ ὑμᾶς ὑπομιμνήσκειν περὶ Tov-
των, καίπερ εἰδότας καὶ ἐστηριγμένους ἐν τῇ παρούσῃ
3 / 13 δί δὲ ε n 93° of ls ae /
ἀληθείᾳ. ἔκαιον δὲ ἡγοῦμαι, ἐφ᾽ ὅσον εἰμὶ ἐν τούτῳ
τῷ σκηνώματι, διεγείρειν ὑμᾶς ἐν ὑπομνήσει, "εἰδὼς
ὅτι ταχινή ἐστιν ἡ ἀπόθεσις τοῦ σκηνώματός μου,
\ \ ς 4 ς A > a \ 2o / /
καθὼς καὶ ὁ κύριος ἡμῶν ᾿Ιησοῦς Χριστὸς ἐδήλωσέν
pot’ ΞΦσπουδάσω δὲ καὶ ἑκάστοτε ἔχειν ὑμᾶς μετὰ τὴν
ἐμὴν ἔξοδον τὴν τούτων μνήμην ποιεῖσθαι. Mod γὰρ
σεσοφισμένοις μύθοις ἐξακολουθήσαντες ἐγνωρίσαμεν
ὑμῖν τὴν τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ δύναμιν καὶ
παρουσίαν, ἀλλ᾽ ἐπόπται γενηθέντες τῆς ἐκείνου μεγα-
λειότητος. λαβὼν γὰρ παρὰ θεοῦ πατρὸς τιμὴν καὶ
’ n > / > n “Ὁ ς \ na
δόξαν φωνῆς ἐνεχθείσης αὐτῷ τοιᾶσδε ὑπὸ THs peya-
n / ¢ e; e
λοπρεποῦς δόξης ὋὭὍ vids μου ὁ ἀγαπητός μου οὗτός
3 > ὃ > \ ὑδό 18 \ 4 \ \
ἐστιν, εἰς ὃν ἐγὼ εὐδόκησα,-- δ καὶ ταύτην τὴν φωνὴν
ἡμεῖς ἠκούσαμεν ἐξ οὐρανοῦ ἐνεχθεῖσαν σὺν αὐτῷ ὄντες
> “oe ee ees δ τὰ β , \
ἐν τῷ ἁγίῳ ὄρει. “Kati ἔχομεν βεβαιότερον τὸν προφη-
τικὸν χόγον, ᾧ καλῶς ποιεῖτε προσέχοντες ὡς λύχνῳ
a U ΄
φαίνοντι ἐν αὐχμηρῷ τόπῳ, ἕως οὗ ἡμέρα διαυγάσῃ
Ν / 3 / > a δί c a 20 a
καὶ φωσφόρος ἀνατείλῃ ἐν ταῖς καρδίαις ὑμῶν" “τοῦτο
rn A / a
πρῶτον γινώσκοντες ὅτι πᾶσα προφητεία γραφῆς ἰδίας
> 4 > / 91 > \ θ 7 > ,
ἐπιλύσεως ov γίνεται, ov yap θελήματι ἀνθρώπου
ee / , 2 WE, TT, ΄ ole
ἠνέχθη προφητεία ποτέ, ἀλλὰ ὑπὸ πνεύματος ἁγίου
/ x, / 3 \ a ἊΝ
φερόμενοι ἐλάλησαν ἀπὸ θεοῦ ἄνθρωποι.
2 τ ἘΠ γένοντο δὲ καὶ ψευδοπροφῆται ἐν τῷ λαῷ, ὡς
\ 2 € a Μ ὃ ὃ ὃ 4 ivf 4
καὶ ἐν ὑμῖν ἔσονται ψευδοδιδάσκαλοι, οἵτινες παρεισά-
»
ἕξουσιν αἱρέσεις ἀπωλείας, καὶ τὸν ἀγοράσαντα αὐτοὺς
δεσπότην ἀρνούμενοι, ἐπάγοντες ἑαυτοῖς ταχινὴν ἀπώ-
λειαν᾽ Ξκαὶ πολλοὶ ἐξακολουθήσουσιν αὐτῶν ταῖς ἀσελ-
γείαις, A οἵς ἡ ὁδὸς τῆς ἀληθείας ΒλΔοφΦημηθήοσετδι" ὅκαὶ
> / a / ς a > 4 ἐ
ἐν πλεονεξίᾳ πλαστοῖς λόγοις ὑμᾶς ἐμπορεύσονται" οἷς
2 16] TETPOY B 3
\ 7 4 > > Cal \ ς 3 / > nr ’
TO κρίμα ἔκπαλαι οὐκ ἀργεῖ, καὶ ἡ απώλεια αὑτῶν ουὅ
/ 4.? \ « Θ \ ae e U >
νυστάζει. “εἰ yap ὁ θεὸς ἀγγέλων ἁμαρτησάντων οὐκ
> / 3 \ Lal , , /
ἐφείσατο, ἀλλὰ σειροῖς ζόφου ταρταρώσας παρέδωκεν
εἰς κρίσιν τηρουμένους, "καὶ ἀρχαίου κόσμου οὐκ ἐφεί-
σατο, ἀλλὰ ὄγδοον Νῶε δικαιοσύνης κήρυκα ἐφύλαξεν,
lal U
κατακλυσμὸν κόσμῳ ἀσεβῶν ἐπάξας, "καὶ πόλεις Σοδό-
pov καὶ Γομόρρας τεφρώσας κατέκρινεν, ὑπόδειγμα
μελλόντων ἀσεβέσιν τεθεικώς, "kal δίκαιον Λὼτ κατα-
πονούμενον ὑπὸ τῆς τῶν ἀθέσμων ἐν ἀσελγείᾳ ἀνα-
στροφῆς ἐρύσατο,-- ϑβλέμματι γὰρ καὶ ἀκοῇ δίκαιος
ἐνκατοικῶν ἐν αὐτοῖς ἡμέραν ἐξ ἡμέρας ψυχὴν δικαίαν
ee 4 > / 9 to K , > -“ >
ἀνόμοις ἔργοις ἐβασάνιζεν,-- ϑοἶῖδεν Κύριος εὐσεβεῖς ἐκ
πειρασμοῦ ῥύεσθαι, ἀδίκους δὲ εἰς ἡμέραν κρίσεως
κολαζομένους τηρεῖν, Ῥμάλιστα δὲ τοὺς ὀπίσω σαρκὸς
> > / an / \ 7,
ἐν ἐπιθυμίᾳ μιασμοῦ πορευομένους καὶ κυριότητος κατα-
A / > / / 3 /
φρονοῦντας. Toruntai, αὐθάδεις, δόξας ov τρέμουσιν,
βλασφημοῦντες, "ὅπου ἄγγελοι ἰσχύϊ καὶ δυνάμει μεί-
ἕονες ὄντες οὐ φέρουσιν Kat αὐτῶν [παρὰ Κυρίῳ]
βλάσφ “ 12 φΦ ὃ / ε ar “a Ἢ
μον κρίσιν. obra δέ, ὡς ἄλογα Soa γεγεν
νημένα φυσικὰ εἰς ἅλωσιν καὶ φθοράν, ἐν οἷς ἀγνοοῦσιν
βλασφημοῦντες, ἐν τῇ φθορᾷ αὐτῶν καὶ φθαρήσονται,
18 ἀδικού θὸν ἀδικίας" ἡδονὴν ἡγού )
μενοι μισθὸν ἀδικίας" ἡδονὴν ἡγούμενοι τὴν
ἐν ἡμέρᾳ τρυφήν, σπίλοι καὶ μῶμοι ἐντρυφῶντες ἐν
ταῖς ἀπάταις αὐτῶν συνευωχούμενοι ὑμῖν, “opOar-
μοὺς ἔχοντες μεστοὺς μοιχαλίδος καὶ ἀκαταπάστους
ἁμαρτίας, δελεάζοντες ψυχᾶς ἀστηρίκτους, καρδίαν
γεγυμνασμένην πλεονεξίας ἔχοντες, κατάρας τέκνα,
1δ καταλείποντες εὐθεῖαν ὁδὸν ἐπλανήθησαν, ἐξακολου-
θήσαντες τῇ ὁδῷ τοῦ Βαλαὰμ τοῦ Βεὼρ ὃς μισθὸν
3 ὃ / > , 16" δὲ ¥ ἰδί /
ἀδικίας ἠγάπησεν éreyEw δὲ ἔσχεν ἰδίας παρανομίας.
4 , Ba a
ὑποζύγιον ἄφωνον ἐν ἀνθρώπου φωνῇ φθεγξάμενον
A2
4 ΕΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ [2 τό
ἐκώλυσεν τὴν τοῦ προφήτου παραφρονίαν. οὗτοί
> ν ee ee fates te 7, ᾽
εἰσιν πηγαὶ ἄνυδροι καὶ ομίχλαι ὑπὸ λαίλαπος ἐλαυ-
νόμεναι, οἷς ὁ ζόφος τοῦ σκότους τετήρηται. BimrépoyKa
γὰρ ματαιότητος φθεγγόμενοι δελεάξουσιν ἐν ἐπιθυμίαις
σαρκὸς ἀσελγείαις τοὺς ὀλίγως ἀποφεύγοντας τοὺς ἐν
πλάνῃ ἀναστρεφομένους, "ἐλευθερίαν αὐτοῖς ἐπαγγελ-
͵ , \ lal « U a (ee e /
λόμενοι, αὐτοὶ δοῦλοι ὑπάρχοντες τῆς φθορᾶς" yap
’ , > \ ?
τίς ἥττηται, τούτῳ δεδούλωται. 33εἰ γὰρ ἀποφυγόντες
τὰ μιάσματα τοῦ κόσμου ἐν ἐπιγνώσει τοῦ κυρίου καὶ
σωτῆρος ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ τούτοις δὲ πάλιν ἐμπλακέντες
ἡττῶνται, γέγονεν αὐτοῖς τὰ ἔσχατα χείρονα τῶν πρώ-
tov. “xpeittov γὰρ ἦν αὐτοῖς μὴ ἐπεγνωκέναι τὴν
“ x “
ὁδὸν τῆς δικαιοσύνης ἢ ἐπιγνοῦσιν ὑποστρέψαι ἐκ
“Ὁ θ / ε a ς / > eo 22, /
τῆς παραδοθείσης αὐτοῖς ἁγίας ἐντολῆς" @ovpBéBnnev
_ σι 9 “ / , 2 ’
αὐτοῖς TO τῆς ἀληθοῦς παροιμίας Κύων ἐπιοτρέψδο ἐπὶ
» ea
TO ἴδιον €2Z€pama, καί “Ts λουσαμένη εἰς κυλισμὸν Bop-
βόρου.
’ a
8 ‘Tav’rnv ἤδη, ἀγαπητοί, δευτέραν ὑμῖν γράφω
, “-“
ἐπιστολήν, ἐν αἷς διεγείρω ὑμῶν ἐν ὑπομνήσει τὴν
εἰλικρινῆ διάνοιαν, Ξξμνησθῆναι τῶν προειρημένων ῥημά-
των ὑπὸ τῶν ἁγίων προφητῶν καὶ τῆς τῶν ἀποστόλων
ὑμῶν ἐντολῆς τοῦ κυρίου καὶ σωτῆρος, ὅτοῦτο πρῶτον
γινώσκοντες ὅτι ἐλεύσονται ἐπ᾽ ἐσχάτων τῶν ἡμερῶν
ἐν ἐμπαιγμονῇ ἐμπαῖκται κατὰ τὰς ἰδίας ἐπιθυμίας
αὐτῶν πορευόμενοι “καὶ λέγοντες Ποῦ ἐστὶν. ἡ ἐπαγ-
a > A
γελία τῆς παρουσίας αὐτοῦ ; ἀφ᾽ ἧς yap οἱ πατέρες
ἐκοιμήθησαν, πάντα οὕτως διαμένει ἀπ᾽ ἀρχῆς κτίσεως.
δλανθάνει γὰρ αὐτοὺς τοῦτο θέλοντας ὅτι οὐρανοὶ ἦσαν
\ a» “ὃ \ ὃ > “ὃ a
ἔκπαλαι καὶ yn ἐξ ὕδατος καὶ δι’ ὕδατος συνεστῶσα
a a θ a ‘ 6§ » © ¢ / / ὕδ
τῷ τοῦ θεοῦ λόγῳ, °OL ὧν ὁ τότε κόσμος ὕδατι κατα-
θ \ 3 ῇ a χ δὲ “ > \ > 2 a a
κλυσθεὶς ἀπώλετο᾽ "oi δὲ νῦν οὐρανοὶ καὶ ἡ γῆ τῷ αὐτῷ
3 18] TIETPOY B 5
λόγῳ τεθησαυρισμένοι εἰσὶν πυρὶ τηρούμενοι εἰς ἡμέραν
/ VS / a Hi Aye ? θ 4 838:
κρίσεως καὶ ἀπωλείας τῶν ἀσεβῶν ἀνθρώπων. ν
δὲ τοῦτο μὴ λανθανέτω ὑμᾶς, ἀγαπητοί, ὅτι μία ἡμέρα
Tapa Κγρίῳ ὡς χίλια ἔτη καὶ γχίλιος ἔτη ὡς ἡμέρὰ μία.
%ov βραδύνει Κύριος τῆς ἐπαγγελίας, ὥς τινες βραδυτῆτα
ς “ > \ a ? e a \ / ‘
ἡγοῦνται, ἀλλὰ μακροθυμεῖ εἰς ὑμᾶς, μὴ βουλόμενός
Twas ἀπολέσθαι ἀλλὰ πάντας εἰς μετάνοιαν χωρῆσαι.
ΧΦ Ή ξε, δὲ ἡμέρα Κυρίου ὡς κλέπτης, ἐν ἧ οἱ οὐρανοὶ
ῥοιζηδὸν παρελεύσονται, στοιχεῖα δὲ καυσούμενα λυ-
θήσεται, καὶ γῆ καὶ τὰ ἐν αὐτῇ ἔργα εὑρεθήσεται.
11 a Ὁ / / ὺ ὃ a τῷ A
Τούτων οὕτως πάντων λυομένων ποταποὺς δεῖ ὑπάρ-
xew [ὑμᾶς] ἐν ἁγίαις ἀναστροφαῖς καὶ εὐσεβείαις,
᾿ξπροσδοκῶντας καὶ σπεύδοντας τὴν παρουσίαν τῆς
τοῦ θεοῦ ἡμέρας, δι’ ἣν OYpanoi πυρούμενοι λυθήσονται
καὶ στοιχεῖα καυσούμενα τήκετδι᾽ 13κδινοὺο δὲ oYpanoyc
Kal TAN KAINHN κατὰ τὸ ἐπάγγελμα αὐτοῦ προσδοκῶμεν,
> ΐ ὃ ͵7 a 14 , > /
ἐν οἷς δικαιοσύνη κατοικεῖ. Διό, ἀγαπητοί,
ταῦτα προσδοκῶντες σπουδάσατε ἄσπίλοι καὶ ἀμώ-
μητοι αὐτῷ εὑρεθῆναι ἐν εἰρήνῃ, καὶ τὴν τοῦ κυρίου
a / a e
ἡμῶν μακροθυμίαν σωτηρίαν ἡγεῖσθε, καθὼς Kal ὁ aya-
πητὸς ἡμῶν ἀδελφὸς Παῦλος κατὰ τὴν δοθεῖσαν αὐτῷ
7 4 e a 16 ¢e \ > 4 > “a
σοφίαν ἔγραψεν ὑμῖν, "as καὶ ἐν πάσαις ἐπιστολαῖς
λαλῶν ἐν αὐταῖς περὶ τούτων, ἐν αἷς ἐστὶν δυσνόητά
ἃ a a
τινα, ἃ οἱ ἀμαθεῖς καὶ ἀστήρικτοι στρεβλοῦσιν ὡς Kal
\ \ \ \ \ 2O/ ἈΚ δ 2 /
τὰς λοιπὰς γραφὰς πρὸς THY ἰδίαν αὐτῶν ἀπώλειαν.
17 “ἢ »-» 3 3 / , 4 θ
μεῖς οὖν, ἀγαπητοί, προγινώσκοντες φυλάσσεσθε
ἵνα μὴ τῇ τῶν ἀθέσμων πλάνῃ συναπαχθέντες ἐκπέ-
a“ / a
ante τοῦ ἰδίου στηρυγμοῦ, Bad&dvete δὲ ἐν χάριτι Kal
γνώσει τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν καὶ σωτῆρος ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ.
> Aes, 4 / \ a lal
αὐτῷ ἡ δόξα καὶ νῦν καὶ eis ἡμέραν αἰῶνος.
ΙΟΥΔΑ
> ’ a n n
1 Ἰούδας ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ δοῦλος, ἀδελφὸς δὲ ᾿Ιακώ-
βου, τοῖς ἐν θεῷ πατρὶ ἠγαπημένοις καὶ ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστῷ
τετηρημένοις κλητοῖς" “ἔλεος ὑμῖν καὶ εἰρήνη καὶ ἀγάπη
πληθυνθείη.
8.4 at / an δ) UA /
γαπητοί, πᾶσαν σπουδὴν ποιούμενος γράφειν
ὑμῖν περὶ τῆς κοινῆς ἡμῶν σωτηρίας ἀνάγκην ἔσχον
γράψαι ὑμῖν παρακαλῶν ἐπαγωνίζεσθαι τῇ ἅπαξ πα-
ραδοθείσῃ τοῖς ἁγίοις πίστει. “παρεισεδύησαν γάρ
τινες ἄνθρωποι, οἱ πάλαι προγεγραμμένοι εἰς τοῦτο τὸ
κρίμα, ἀσεβεῖς, τὴν τοῦ θεοῦ ἡμῶν χάριτα μετατιθέντες
εἰς ἀσέλγειαν καὶ τὸν μόνον δεσπότην καὶ κύριον ἡμῶν
Ἶ a xX \ > / δ a δὲ ς a
ησοῦν Χριστὸν ἀρνούμενοι. πομνῆσαι δὲ ὑμᾶς
βούλομαι, εἰδότας ἅπαξ πάντα, ὅτι Κύριος λαὸν ἐκ γῆς
Αἰγύπτου σώσας τὸ δεύτερον τοὺς μὴ πιστεύσαντας
ἀπώλεσεν, δἀγγέλους τε τοὺς μὴ τηρήσαντας τὴν ἑαυ-
a > \ > > / » eae 4 > / >
TOV ἀρχὴν ἀλλὰ ἀπολιπόντας TO ἴδιον οἰκητήριον εἰς
7 ‘ ec / “ de ) e \ / /
κρίσιν μεγάλης ἡμέρας δεσμοῖς ἀϊδίοις ὑπὸ ζόφον τετή-
ms 7 ς 45 \ Γό ὶ « \ > a
ρηκεν᾽ Τὼς Σόδομα καὶ Τόμορρα καὶ ai περὶ αὐτὰς
πόλεις, τὸν ὅμοιον τρόπον τούτοις ἐκπορνεύσασαι καὶ
ἀπελθοῦσαι ὀπίσω σαρκὸς ἑτέρας, πρόκεινται δεῖγμα
πυρὸς αἰωνίου δίκην ὑπέχουσαι. S‘Opolws μέντοι
20] ΕΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ ΙΟΥΔΑ 7
καὶ οὗτοι ἐνυπνιαζόμενοι σάρκα μὲν μιαίνουσιν, κυριό-
τητα δὲ ἀθετοῦσιν, δόξας δὲ βλασφημοῦσιν. *O δὲ
MiyaHA ὁ ἀρχόγγελοο, ὅτε τῷ διαβόλῳ διακρινόμενος
fa) / /
διελέγετο περὶ τοῦ Μωυσέως σώματος, οὐκ ἐτόλμησεν
κρίσιν ἐπενεγκεῖν βλασφημίας, ἀλλὰ εἶπεν Ἐπιτιμήοδι
coi Κύριοο. ᾿ϑΟὗτοι δὲ ὅσα μὲν οὐκ οἴδασιν βλασφη-
a Ψ \ a ς \ Ψ A
μοῦσιν, ὅσα δὲ φυσικῶς ὡς TA ἄλογα ζῷα ἐπίστανται,
> U 0 / 11 2 3 a “ “ ὃ al a
ἐν τούτοις φθείρονται. “oval αὐτοῖς, ὅτι τῇ ὁδῷ τοῦ
Καὶν ἐπορεύθησαν, καὶ τῇ πλάνῃ τοῦ Βαλαὰμ μισθοῦ
ἐξ 10 \ a 3 Xx / a K \ > )λ
ἐξεχύθησαν, καὶ τῇ ἀντιλογίᾳ τοῦ Kopé ἀπώλοντο.
1ῷ οὗτοί εἰσιν οἱ ἐν ταῖς ἀγάπαις ὑμῶν σπιλάδες συν-
ευωχούμενοι, ἀφόβως €EayTOYC TIOIMAINONTEC, νεφέλαι
+ ς a" ee / /
ἄνυδροι ὑπὸ ἀνέμων παραφερόμεναι, δένδρα φθινοπω-
\ A δὶ > θ 7 3 θέ 13 4
pwa ἄκαρπα δὶς ἀποθανόντα ἐκριζωθέντα, Ξκύματα
+ / > / e lal > ,
ἄγρια θαλάσσης ἐπαφρίζοντα τὰς ἑαυτῶν αἰσχύνας,
ἀστέρες πλανῆται οἷς ὁ ζόφος τοῦ σκότους εἰς αἰῶνα
τετήρηται. 1’ προφήτευσεν δὲ καὶ τούτοις ἕβδο-
μος ἀπὸ ᾿Αδὰμ Ἕνωχ λέγων ᾿Ιδοὺ ἦλθεν Κύριος ἐν
Ariaic μυριάοιν αὐτοῦ, ᾿ὅποιῆσαι κρίσιν κατὰ πάντων
> an a
καὶ ἐλέγξαι πάντας τοὺς ἀσεβεῖς περὶ πάντων τῶν
ἔργων ἀσεβείας αὐτῶν ὧν ἠσέβησαν καὶ περὶ πάντων
a lal 2 % > > Se > ee.
TOV σκληρῶν ὧν ἐλάλησαν KAT αὐτοῦ ἁμαρτωλοὶ ἀσε-
βεῖς. Ἰθοὕτοί εἰσιν γογγυσταί, μεμψίμοιροι, κατὰ
τὰς ἐπιθυμίας αὐτῶν πορευόμενοι, καὶ τὸ στόμα αὐτῶν
λαλεῖ ὑπέρογκα, θαυμάζοντες πρόσωπα ὠφελίας χάριν.
μεῖς δέ, ἀγαπητοί, μνήσθητε τῶν ῥημάτων τῶν
προειρημένων ὑπὸ τῶν ἀποστόλων τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν
3 n ae 18 7 ΝΜ e an > ee , /
Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ" “ore ἔλεγον ὑμῖν “Em ἐσχάτου χρό-
al an /
vou ἔσονται ἐμπαῖκται κατὰ tas ἑαυτῶν ἐπιθυμίας
΄ A > a οὗ 7ὔ] ? « 3 ὃ
πορευόμενοι τῶν ἀσεβειῶν. UTOL εἰσιν οἱ ἀποδιο-
ρίζοντες, ψυχικοί, πνεῦμα μὴ ἔχοντες. “Ο Ὑμεῖς δέ,
8 ΕΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ ΙΟΥΔΑ [20
ἀγαπητοί, ἐποικοδομοῦντες ἑαυτοὺς τῇ ἁγιωτάτῃ ὑμῶν
7 \
πίστει, ἐν πνεύματι ἁγίῳ προσευχόμενοι, “᾿ ἑαυτοὺς ἐν
> a 6
ἀγάπῃ θεοῦ τηρήσατε προσδεχόμενοι TO ἔλεος TOU
lA ς a > A a ? \ > 7 2K \
κυρίου ἡμῶν ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ εἰς ζωὴν αἰώνιον. αἱ
ods μὲν ἐλεᾶτε διακρινομένους σώζετε ἐκ πγρὸς ἁρπά-
zonTec, “ods δὲ ἐλεᾶτε ἐν φόβῳ, μισοῦντες καὶ τὸν ἀπὸ
τῆς σαρκὸς ECTIIAWMENON YIT@NA.
fal a ?
*4T δὲ δυναμένῳ φυλάξαι ὑμᾶς ἀπταίστους καὶ
στῆσαι κατενώπιον τῆς δόξης αὐτοῦ ἀμώμους ἐν ἀγαλ-
λιάσει “μόνῳ θεῷ σωτῆρι ἡμῶν διὰ ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ
μόνῳ θες τῆρι ἡμῶν διὰ ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ
a / a
τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν δόξα μεγαλωσύνη κράτος καὶ ἐξουσία
πρὸ παντὸς τοῦ αἰῶνος καὶ νῦν καὶ εἰς πάντας τοὺς
αἰῶνας" ἀμήν.
NOTES ON THE SECOND EPISTLE
OF ST PETER.
I. 1. Σιμών. This is the reading of the Vatican MS. B, of many
cursive MSS. and of the Versions: but an important group including the
uncials SAKLP reads Συμεών. This latter form occurs in but one
other passage in N.T., Acts xv. 14, where James the brother of the
Lord says ‘‘ Symeon hath declared unto us,” etc. It is the Hebrew
form of the name, while Σίμων would pass muster among Greeks and
Latins: Simo, derived from σιμός simus (snub-nosed), occurs as a
slave-name in the plays of Plautus and Terence.
Simon, then, is the commoner form of the name, and, if it were the
original reading here, one cannot see why Symeon should have been
substituted for it. Westcott and Hort, in deference to the Vatican
MS., give Simon a place in the text: but, with Mayor and Bigg,
I venture to prefer Symeon. Its presence here is one of the few
features which make for the genuineness of the Epistle. It does not
occur in the spurious Petrine writings, and may be a true reminiscence
of a habit of the Apostle.
SovAos καὶ ἀπόστολος. δοῦλος stands alone in Jude and James.
ἀπόστολος alone in 1 Pet.: δοῦλ. and ἀπ. together in Rom. Tit.
τοῖς ἰσότιμον ἡμῖν λαχοῦσιν πίστιν ἐν δικαιοσύνῃ τοῦ θεοῦ ἡμῶν Kal
σωτῆρος ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ.
No local Church is named.
λαχοῦσιν implies that faith is the gift of God (cf. Ro. xii. 3, 1 Co.
xii. 9), not due to human merit. The author of the Wisdom of Solomon
speaks of Solomon as having been allotted a good soul (viii. 19 ψυχῆς
ἔλαχον ἀγαθῆΞ) : not an ‘ orthodox” thought.
ἰσότιμον ἡμῖν. ‘ Conveying the same privileges to you as it does to
us (the Apostles).’”” The word has a civic sense: cf. a passage quoted
by Field (and others) from Josephus (Antiquities xii. 3. 1) ἐν αὐτῇ τῇ
μητροπόλει ᾿Αντιοχείᾳ πολιτείας αὐτοὺς ἠξίωσε καὶ τοῖς ἐνοικισθεῖσιν
ἰσοτίμους ἀπέδειξε Μακεδόσι καὶ Ἕλλησι. Cf. Tit. i. 4 κοινὴν πίστιν.
10 IT PETER {1 1—
ἐν δικαιοσύνῃ. Best taken with ἰσότιμον. The equality is due to
the justice of God, who makes no distinction between the Apostles
and the rank and file of the Church.
τοῦ θεοῦ ἡμῶν καὶ σωτῆρος I. X. Are both God the Father and
God the Son spoken of here, or is the Son alone intended? Probably
the latter: for note that the two substantives θεός and σωτήρ have but
the one article: and that in three other places in this Epistle we
have the phrase τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν καὶ σωτῆρος "I. X., viz. i. 11, ii. 20,
iii, 18: also in iii. 2 τοῦ κυρίου x. σωτῆρος : in all of which the
κύριος and σωτήρ must apply to one person. It would thus be in
accordance with our author’s habit to join the θεός and σωτήρ here.
On the other hand, in v. 2, if we accept the reading of most
authorities we have a distinction made between the Father and the
Son, in the words τοῦ θεοῦ καὶ Ἰησοῦ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν. And the direct
connexion of θεός with ᾿Τησοῦς Χριστός has no certain parallel in N.T.
Yet, in the second century, Ignatius, in the preface to his letter to
the Ephesians speaks of Jesus Christ as ὁ θεὸς ἡμῶν : and his date is
near that which we assign to 2 Peter.
2. χάρις ὑμῖν kal εἰρήνη πληθυνθείη. Identical with the saluta-
tion in 1 Pet. i. 2. χάρις and εἰρήνη without the verb are the rule in
the Pauline salutations. See on Jude 1. Jude has the verb but
differs in the substantives.
ἐν ἐπιγνώσει. For a very full treatment of this word see Dean
Robinson’s excursus in his Comm, on Ephesians.
Grace and peace will be increased as the knowledge of God grows.
τοῦ θεοῦ x. Ἰησοῦ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν. This is the reading of most
MSS.: but the uncial P, some important Latin MSS., and some good
cursives omit τοῦ θεοῦ καὶ ᾿Ιησοῦ, giving merely τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν or
τ. K. ἡμ. I, Χ.
There is some reason for preferring the shorter form, since the
phrase is one which was much more likely to be expanded than
abbreviated : but the weight of authority is difficult to resist. Itis a
very odd feature that the Sahidic version leaves out the whole verse.
8. ὡς. It is a question whether we ought to place a comma or 8
full stop immediately before this word. If a comma, then we must
take this sentence with the preceding one and translate, ‘‘ May
grace and peace be multiplied, etc....(as it surely will) seeing that
His divine power has given, etc.” and come to a full stop at the
end of v. 4. If a full stop, we must render thus, ‘‘ Seeing that His
divine power has given, etc....you must give all diligence, etc.”
The next full stop will then be at the end of v. 5. It is, however,
awkward in this case to give a proper sense to the words καὶ αὐτὸ τοῦτο
15] NOTES τ
δὲ inv. 5. They are better suited to the beginning of a Greek sentence.
I think the comma is to be preferred. ©
This is a case in which the early MSS., devoid of punctuation, do
not help us.
θεία δύναμις does not occur elsewhere in N.T., but is very common
in philosophical writings. It is also found (along with several other
coincidences of language with 2 Peter) in an inscription of Stratonicea
in Caria, mentioned in the Introduction (p. xxv, note).
The divine power has supplied us with all that is needed for life
and godliness (ζωή is probably life in this world, not in the next)
by means of the knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory
and excellence. Probably ws means the Apostles. Christ called them
to Him by showing them His glory (as at the Transfiguration), and
His ἀρετή, His inner perfection, in His life and teaching. Thus, if
the readers of the Epistle come to know Him, they will be in a
position to live soberly and godly in this present world.
διὰ δόξης κ. ἀρετῆς. So BKL and a few other authorities: NACP
and most versions read ἰδίᾳ δόξῃ x. ἀρετῇ. A majority of editors
(including the most recent) prefer the latter reading.
ἀρετή is rarein N.T. It only occurs in 1 Pet. ii. 9 ὅπως τὰς ἀρετὰς
ἐξαγγείλητε τοῦ ἐκ σκότους ὑμᾶς καλέσαντος, where it may be rendered
by ‘‘mighty works” or ‘‘praises”: in Phil. iv. 8 εἴ τις ἀρετὴ καὶ
εἴ ris ἔπαινος, ταῦτα λογίζεσθε : and in verse 5 of this chapter.
4. 8 ὧν has been taken in three ways: (1) of ‘‘us” the Apostles,
(2) of ra πρὸς ζωὴν καὶ εὐσέβειαν, (3) of δόξα καὶ ἀρετή. This last seems
by far the best: Christ calls us by His excellence and gives us
(δεδώρηται is active) the promises, which help us to attain likeness
to Him.
γένησθε θείας κοινωνοὶ φύσεως. Though the author here uses a
phrase more characteristic of Greek philosophy than of the Bible,
his meaning is really that of John i, 12 ἔδωκεν αὐτοῖς ἐξουσίαν τέκνα
θεοῦ γενέσθαι. For the phrase compare Plato, Protagoras 322 a ὁ
ἄνθρωπος θείας μετέσχε μοίρας. The condition necessary to this par-
taking of God’s nature is expressed in the next sentence, ἀποφυγόντες,
etc. The corruption consists in lust, and is in “ the world.” St James
(i. 21) and St John (1 Jo. i. 16) speak to the same effect.
δ. καὶ αὐτὸ τοῦτο δέ. The two passages usually quoted to exemplify
the use of αὐτὸ τοῦτο are (1) Xenophon, Anab. 1. 9. 21 καὶ yap αὐτὸ
τοῦτο οὗπερ αὐτὸς ἕνεκα φίλων ᾧετο δεῖσθαι, ws συνεργοὺς ἔχοι, καὶ αὐτὸς
ἐπειρᾶτο συνεργὸς τοῖς φίλοις κράτιστος εἶναι, (2) Plato, Protag. 310 Ε
«αὐτὰ ταῦτα καὶ νῦν ἥκω παρά σε. In both these passages, as in our
text, the phrase means ‘‘for this very reason.’’ God has put within
12 IT PETER [1 5—
your reach the means of participating in His nature: this fact ought
to incite you to exertion on your side.
παρεισενέγκαντε. This compound usually has the force of
“smuggling in, bringing in by stealth’: but it does not seem
practicable to give it such a meaning here. εἰσφέρεσθαι σπουδήν
without the παρά is, as Mayor shows by a number of examples, a
common phrase in later Greek.
ἐπιχορηγήσατε. The best English equivalent here is perhaps
“provide.” The virtues enumerated immediately afterwards are to
be the contribution of man to meet what God gives. We have the
verb again in i, 11, and three times in the Pauline Epistles (2 Cor.
ix. 10 6 ἐπιχορηγῶν σπέρμα τῷ σπείροντι... Gal. iii, 5 ὁ ἐπιχορηγῶν
ὑμῖν τὸ πνεῦμα. Col. ii. 19 πᾶν τὸ σῶμα διὰ τῶν ἁφῶν...ἐπιχορηγούμενον
καὶ συνβιβαζόμενον).
ἐν. The force of the preposition is not clear. It may import that
each of the virtues named is to be infused or grafted into that which
precedes. But the order in which the virtues are set out does not seem
to bear very strict investigation. The base on which all is founded is
belief in Christ, and the culmination is love to God and man. The
intermediate steps, we feel, might admit of variation or addition.
Hight in all are named: after πίστις comes ἀρετή. We may take this
in the general sense of virtue (our list seems to put some words of
larger import at the beginning) or give it a more special meaning of
strength and bravery in the domain of morals. The former is pre-
ferable.
6. γνῶσις. Mayor well compares Joh. vii. 17 ἐάν τις θέλῃ τὸ
θέλημα αὐτοῦ ποιεῖν, γνώσεται περὶ τῆς διδαχῆς. Only, here, the
knowledge that will come of ἀρετή is not only knowledge about God,
but knowledge of Him and of His will.
ἐγκράτεια. Control over self in all matters.
ὑπομονή. On this St James lays great stress (i. 3, 4 and 12), and so
does St John in the Apocalypse (e.g. i. 9, ii. 2, 3, 19, etc.). We may
think of itas meaning to the early Christians two things in particular
—endurance under persecution, and patient waiting for the Return of
the Lord. Perhaps the latter meaning was the one more present to the
writer’s mind: he speaks at length about it in the third chapter.
εὐσέβεια, like ἀρετή, is so general a word that it is puzzling. We
have it in 1 Tim. vi. 11, along with other words of this list: δίωκε δὲ
δικαιοσύνην, εὐσέβειαν, πίστιν, ἀγάπην, ὑπομονήν, mpaimrabiay. Our
author has used it in verse 3, and we shall not be far wrong if we
render it in both places as ‘‘ godly conduct.”
7. φιλαδελφία. It is interesting to see how this word has been
1 10] NOTES 13
transformed in meaning under Christian (and Jewish) influences,
To the Greek proper it meant only the affection of a brother for his
own actual brother. In a Jewish book (2 Maccabees xv. 14) we find
the prophet Jeremiah called φιλάδελφος, because he “prays much for
the people.” Thus to the Jew, all the nation were beginning to be
thought of as brethren. In the N.T. no expression is more familiar
to us than ‘the brethren” applied to those who are united in a
common belief. We are reminded of φιλαδελφία and ἀγάπη by the
passage 1 John iv. 20 ἐάν τις εἴπῃ ᾿Αγαπῶ τὸν θεόν, καὶ τὸν ἀδελφὸν
αὐτοῦ μισῇ, ψεύστης ἐστίν.
With this list of virtues may be compared (besides 1 Tim. already
quoted) Gal. v. 22. In the Shepherd of Hermas, written early in the
second century, is a genealogical tree of virtues which somewhat
resembles ours: Πίστις, ᾿Ε ἰγκράτεια, ᾿Απλότης, ᾿Ακακία, Σεμνότης, ᾿Εἰπι-
στήμη, ᾿Αγάπη.
8. If these qualities be in you and increase (the idea of growth is
in πλεονάζοντα) they will indeed prevent you from being either
inactive or unfruitful in what relates to (or in gaining) the knowledge
of our Lord. The words οὐκ ἀργοὺς οὐδὲ ἀκάρπους are quoted in the
Letter of the Churches of Vienne and Lyons (see p. xviii).
9. On the other hand their absence makes a man spiritually blind,
or at least short-sighted.
μυωπάζων (the more natural form of the word would have been
μυωπιάζων, cf. μνωπία) means screwing up the eyes in order to see, as
a short-sighted man does. It limits the word τυφλός, and does not
emphasize it.
λήθην λαβών, etc. He forgets the cleansing of his former sins,
which took place when he was baptized. A phrase in Heb. 1. 3
combines two of the words used here “" δι᾽ ἑαυτοῦ καθαρισμὸν ποιησάμενος
τῶν ἁμαρτιῶν ἡμῶν." Among other passages quoted by Mayor, one
from 1 Cor. vi. 11 is specially apt: καὶ ταῦτά τινες ἦτε ἀλλὰ ἀπελούσασθε,
ἀλλὰ ἡγιάσθητε. The man’s forgetfulness of the cleansing he received
in baptism paralyses his efforts to put away evil habits.
10. διὸ μᾶλλον. With this blessing and this curse in view, you
should be the more eager to do your part—the part which God allows,
and indeed requires from you—in making effective the call which has
come to you from Him. As Christians you are called and chosen:
but that fact does not render exertion on your part unnecessary. You
must walk worthily of the calling wherewith you were called (Eph. iv, 1)
(where however κλῆσις is not parallel to καλέσαντος of v. 3 here).
ταῦτα refers back to the list of virtues.
οὐ pr πταίσητέ ποτε. St James (iii. 2) says πολλὰ γὰρ πταίομεν
τά ID PETER [1 10—
ἅπαντες. Our author does not mean that his readers will be sinless : he
is thinking of such final stumbling as the Psalmist speaks of, ‘* my feet
were almost gone, my treadings had well-nigh slipped.” Your pro-
gress will be continuous, he says, and your entrance into the (future)
kingdom of glory triumphant. Compare the words of Aristides quoted
on p. xviii.
11. εἴσοδος would most naturally mean the place of entrance, but
here, as in Heb. x. 19 and elsewhere in N.T., it clearly means the
action of entering.
12. Διό. Seeing the great issues which hang upon all this.
μελλήσω del ὑπομιμνήσκειν. “41 shall be about to remind you
always” is undoubtedly a very awkward phrase. The R.V. gives
‘¢T shall be ready always to put you in remembrance,” but from the
context one would judge that the writer is speaking of something
which he means to do forthwith. The only parallel in N.T. is
Matt. xxiv. 6 μελλήσετε ἀκούειν πολέμους.. ὁρᾶτε, μὴ θροεῖσθε, where
the sense seems to be ‘‘ you must be prepared to hear of wars.”
The difficulty was felt by some authorities (the late uncials KL
and the late Syriac versions) which give οὐκ ἀμελήσω (adopted by
the A.V. “I will not be negligent”): two Latin authorities have
the equivalent of οὐ μελλήσω. There is no old authority for the
reading which really seems preferable, namely μελήσω, suggested by
Dr Field of Norwich: but it is possible that the Greek lexicographer
Suidas (or his source) had this passage in mind when he wrote
μελήσω, σπουδάσω, φροντίσω. Two other lexicographers, Hesychius and
Photius, give the same interpretation of μελλήσω, which is undoubtedly
a mistake, whether of their own, or of the scribes who copied out their
works.
In other places of the N.T. where ἔμελεν or μέλει occur (Jo. xii. 6,
1 P. v. 7, Matt. xxii. 16), many MSS. write ἔμελλεν, μέλλει.
ἐστηριγμένους ἐν τῇ παρούσῃ ἀληθείᾳ. παρούσῃ is not easy to
interpret satisfactorily. We may render ‘‘ the truth which has come
to you” as in Col. i. 5, 6 τοῦ εὐαγγελίου τοῦ παρόντος els ὑμᾶς : but
els ὑμᾶς is needed: or ‘‘the truth which is within your reach,”
cf. Deut. ‘‘The word is very nigh unto thee.” An interesting suggestion
is that of Spitta, which would emend the word to παραδοθείσῃ, com-
paring Jude 3 τῇ ἅπαξ παραδοθείσῃ τοῖς ἁγίοις πίστει.
13, 14. It is the more necessary for me to remind you, since I
shall not be long with you.
ἐν is here used of the instrument.
ταχινή, speedy: we may take it to mean that the change is to come
soon, and also that it will be sudden and violent when it comes:
1 15] NOTES 15
certainly the former. ὁ καιρὸς τῆς ἀναλύσεώς μου ἐφέστηκεν says St Paul
at a similar time, 2 Tim. iv. 6. ee
ἀπόθεσις τοῦ σκηνώματος. In N.T. the metaphor is employed in
2 Cor. v. 2—4. The word occurs 1 Pet. iii, 21 σαρκὸς ἀπόθεσις ῥύπου.
The verb is common, e.g. ἀπέθεντο τὰ ἱμάτια, Acts vii. 58.
καθὼς kal ὁ κύριος ἡμῶν “I. X. ἐδήλωσέν μοι. We have of course
an account of one occasion on which our Lord spoke of St Peter’s
death, and predicted that it would be a violent one (possibly even by
crucifixion) in Joh. xxi. 18, 19. It has been usual to interpret our
passage as referring to that. On the other hand, it is urged that the
point of the prophecy in John is the violent death, while here the
writer seems to say that he has been told that he is to die shortly.
There is a famous and ancient legend that St Peter fleeing from the
Neronian persecution at the instance of the brethren met our Lord
just outside the gates of Rome, and asked whither He was going
(Domine, quo vadis?). “41 am about to be crucified again” (ἄνωθεν
μέλλω σταυρωθῆναι in the oldest form of the story) was the reply:
and Peter turned back and fulfilled his destiny. The Lord’s words
here have been variously interpreted. (a) Since you flee I am come
to be crucified in your stead ; (b) more probably : It is ordained that
you are to be crucified, and I suffer in the person of all my disciples
who suffer; (c) the word ἄνωθεν is not impossibly the origin of the
story that Peter was crucified head downwards.
Possibly this legend may have been in the mind of the writer of
2 Peter.
15. σπουδάσω δὲ καὶ Exdorore...‘‘I will take measures (besides
reminding you while I am alive) that you shall have the means of
reminding yourselves of these truths whenever you please, after my
death.” In other words, ‘‘I will leave my teaching with you in
a permanently accessible form”—in some written work which the
writer means to provide. What work is meant? Not the Epistle;
the future σπουδάσω excludes that; and, besides, the context shows
that the promised work was to be one which would strengthen the
reader’s belief in the truth of Christianity: it would contain some
narrative of facts (see v. 16).
It has been strongly urged that the Gospel of Mark is here meant.
The probably true tradition of its origin, which goes back to a personal
disciple of the Lord, John the Presbyter, represents Mark as dependent
upon Peter for his information, and Clement of Alexandria adds that
Peter’s hearers at Rome begged Mark to put the substance of the
-Apostle’s discourses into writing, and that the record was subsequently
confirmed and authorized by Peter. This relation between Peter and
Mark would justify the expressions in our text.
16 II PETER [1 15—
There are other possibilities. If 2 Peter is not the work of the
Apostle the reference to St Mark’s Gospel is as likely as ever: but we
can also conceive that another pseudo-Petrine work is meant, e.g. the
Preaching of Peter (see Introd.) which may very well have contained
both religious instruction, and also some narrative portions: or, just
possibly, the Apocalypse of Peter, which contained teaching about the
παρουσία of Christ (see v. 16).
16—18. Remember that we Apostles had ocular evidence for the
truth of what we preach to you, for instance at the Transfiguration,
when we saw the glory and heard the voice.
μύθοις ἐξακολουθήσαντες is one of the phrases common to this
- Epistle and to Josephus’ Preface to the Antiquities of the Jews, § 3,
οἱ ἄλλοι νομοθέται τοῖς μύθοις ἐξακολουθήσαντες τῶν ἀνθρωπίνων ἁμαρτη-
μάτων εἰς τοὺς θεοὺς τὴν αἰσχύνην μετέθεσαν.
σεσοφισμένοις. Not common in the passive. I think Christian
belief is here contrasted with heathen.
ϑύναμιν καὶ παρουσίαν. The power and (second) coming of the
Lord, cf. Matt. xxiv. 30 ἐρχόμενον...μετὰ δυνάμεως καὶ δόξης πολλῆς.
The Transfiguration, immediately afterwards described, was an
anticipation of the glory of the second coming.
ἐἔπόπται has here practically the same sense as αὐτόπται in Lue, i. 2.
It is an interesting word, being that used for those who were admitted
to the final stages of initiation at Eleusis. For the verb see 1 P. ii. 12,
iii. 2.
17. λαβὼν yap.... There is an anacoluthon here: λαβών has no
verb. It is probable that the writer had intended to complete the
sentence by writing ἐβεβαίωσεν τὸν προφητικὸν λόγον (in v. 19)—for
v. 18 is a parenthesis.
ὑπό. Mayor would read ἀπό, for which the only authorities are
the Syriac versions and the Latin Vulgate (delapsa a). μεγαλοπρεποῦς
δόξης, a reverential paraphrase, as Dr Bigg calls it, for God. Similar
phrases are found in Jewish apocryphal books, e.g. Enoch xiv. 18, 20,
a lofty throne...and the Great Glory (ἡ δόξα ἡ μεγάλη) sat thereon.
In the Testament of Levi (in the book called the Testaments of the
Twelve Patriarchs) ἣ μεγάλη δόξα abides in the highest heaven of all.
Also in the Epistle of Clement of Rome (ix. 2) Let us look steadfastly
at those who perfectly served τῇ μεγαλοπρεπεῖ δόξῃ αὐτοῦ.
Ὃ vids μου ὁ ἀγαπητός pov οὗτός ἐστιν, εἰς ὃν ἐγὼ εὐδόκησα. The
words are reported thus in the Gospels:
Matt. xvii. 5 οὗτός ἐστιν ὁ vids μου ὁ ἀγαπητός, ἐν ᾧ εὐδόκησα"
ἀκούετε αὐτοῦ.
Mark ix. 7 οὗτός ἐστιν ὁ vids μου 6 ἀγαπ., ἀκούετε αὐτοῦ.
Luc. ix. 35 οὗτός ἐστιν ὁ vids μου ὁ ἐκλελεγμένος, αὐτοῦ ἀκούετε.
1 19] NOTES 17
Compare the words at the Baptism :
Matt. iii. 17 οὗτός ἐστιν ὁ vids wou ὁ ἀγαπητός, ἐν ᾧ εὐδόκησα.
Mark i. 11 σὺ εἶ ὁ vids μου ὁ ἀγαπ., ἐν σοὶ εὐδόκησα.
Luke iii. 21, identical with Mark.
The words of the Epistle agree most closely with the form in Matt.,
but stand alone in the position they assign to οὗτός ἐστιν, and in giving
ἐγώ, and εἰς dv.
18. ἐν τῷ ἁγίῳ ὄρει. It was the Transfiguration that made the
mountain holy (Bigg), just as the vision of the Burning Bush made
that site ‘“‘holy ground” (Exod. iii. 5). The “holy hill” par
excellence of the O.T. is Mount Sion.
It is interesting to note that the Acts of Peter (see Introd.) make
St Peter select the story of the Transfiguration as the subject of a
special discourse, perhaps from a recollection of the passage before
us; there, too, the phrase holy mountain is used.
19. καὶ ἔχομεν. It is best to connect this sentence with the pre-
ceding. ‘‘ The vision and the voice confirmed, and still confirm to us
the authority of the prophets.” Other commentators make these
words the starting-point of a new topic. ‘*‘ We Apostles had the
evidence of the vision: you have what is better, because more per-
manent—the evidence of Scripture.”
It is worth noting that both in Peter’s speeches in the Acts
(ii. 111.) and also in the fragments of the apocryphal but early
Preaching of Peter, great stress is laid on the evidence of prophecy;
so also in 1 Peter i. 10—12.
ᾧ καλῶς ποιεῖτε προσέχοντεθ. Josephus Ant. x1. 6. 12 again
has the same phrase, ols ποιήσετε καλῶς μὴ προσέχοντες.
λύχνῳ φαίνοντι ἐν αὐχμηρῷ τόπῳ. There are two good instances
of a similar phrase applied to an individual prophet. Our Lord says
of John Baptist (Joh. v. 35), He was ὁ λύχνος ὁ καιόμενος καὶ φαίνων :
and in 4 Esdras (2 Esdras of our Apocrypha) xii. 42 the people say
to Esdras, ‘‘ (thou alone hast survived of all the prophets) sicut
lucerna in loco obscuro”’ (we no longer possess the book in Greek).
avxpnpe. The meaning, dark or dusky, which is undoubted here,
is not the original one; the word properly means dry and parched.
The Apocalypse of Peter has our phrase, clearly in the sense of dark :
ΠΤ saw a rorov...atvyunporarov, and those in it had their vesture dark,
σκοτεινόν.. κατὰ τὸν ἀέρα τοῦ τόπου."
ἕως οὗ ἡμέρα διαυγάσῃ, etc. Compare the refrain in the Song of
Solomon, ‘‘ Until the day break and the shadows flee away.”
«φωσφόρος ἀνατείλῃ. Mal. iv. 2 speaks of the Sun of righteousness
arising: in the Benedictus, Luc. i. 79, the Christ is ἀνατολὴ ἐξ
2 Peter B
18 II PETER [1 19—
ὕψους : the ancient hymn quoted in Eph. v. 14 says, ἐπιφαύσει σοι
ὁ Χριστός. These passages (except the last) point to the Second
Coming as being meant by the dawn of day. But the words in your
hearts make us think of the expression of our Lord, ‘‘ the Kingdom of
God is within you.” The writer is addressing people who, though
Christians, have not necessarily attained to the fullest understanding
of the Gospel. The language should not be so pressed as to imply
that it had not even dawned upon them as yet. The study of Scripture
will be a help to them until God fully enlightens their hearts.
20. τοῦτο πρῶτον γινώσκοντες. The same words recur in iii. 3.
mwaca—ov. Hebraistic for οὐδεμία.
προφητεία γραφῆς prophecy of Scripture—included, contained in
Scripture.
ἰδίας ἐπιλύσεως οὐ γίνεται. Words productive of much dispute.
The principal meanings assigned to them have been:
(a) Prophecy is not to be interpreted by private individuals
apart from the Church,
(Ὁ) It is not to be interpreted by man apart from the Holy -
Spirit.
(c) Does not come from human ingenuity: is not a successful
attempt to solve a difficulty, originated by the prophet
himself.
(4) It could not be interpreted by the prophet himself. He did
not always know the meaning of the vision he saw. Daniel
and Zechariah, for example, ask what it is that is shown
to them.
(6) Prophecy is not confined, not subject to, a single inter-
pretation ; it is capable of many fulfilments besides the
immediate and local one.
Something similar is said in iii. 16. Unlearned persons wrest the
Scriptures to their own destruction. There seems to be in both
passages a warning against unauthorized interpretation of prophecy.
The writer goes on here to assign a reason why prophecy is not ἐδίας
ἐπιλύσεως. ‘' For it was not at any time conveyed by the will of
man.’ The prophets themselves could not prophesy when and as they
pleased. If that was the case, how little can you expect to interpret
their prophecies without God’s help! Note that the aid of Christ
Himself.was required to ‘‘open”’ the Scriptures to the first disciples
(Luc. xxiv. 25 etc., 44 etc.). Thus the warning against private and
unauthorized exposition of prophecy seems to be most prominent;
but there may be also contained in the passage the greater truth that
prophecy is capable of several and ever-widening fulfilments,
2 1] NOTES 19
θελήματι ἀνθρώπου is opposed to ἀπὸ θεοῦ.
Theophilus of Antioch, in a passage quoted on p. xviii, seems to
paraphrase this verse, as well as to allude to v. 19.
ὑπὸ πνεύματος ἁγίου φερόμενοι, cf. θεοφόρητος, θεοφορεῖσθαι, the
latter verb being often used of prophets by Philo, Justin, etc., quoted
by Mayor. It may be right to emphasize the absence of the article
from πνεῦμα, ** borne by a holy spirit” of wisdom. Cf. Wisdom
vii. 22.
II. So far we have had but an introduction to the writer’s chief
topic. Throughout he has had in view the warning of his readers
against a particular danger: so he has begun by insisting on their
keeping firm in the right way. Now he begins to enlarge on his special
subject, leading up to it by the mention of prophecy. The value of
prophecy, he says, cannot be exaggerated, though its use must be
guarded. But there was false prophecy in Israel, and false teaching
is now coming in upon the new Israel.
It is here also that the writer begins most clearly and continuously
to use another source, the Epistle of Jude. There have been, in his
first chapter, resemblances to its language (see Introd.), but from the
point we have reached the parallels are much closer.
ψευδοπροφῆται. The primary force of ψευδο- in ψευδοπροφῆται and
ψευδοδιδάσκαλοι is not that the prophets and teachers utter what is
false, but that they are sham prophets and sham teachers—they do
not deserve the name. But of course the reason why they are so
called is because they teach what is false.
ἐν τῷ λαῷ, Israel, λαόν Jude 5.
παρεισάξουσιν in an evil sense: παρεισφέρω was used in a good
sense ini. 5. Cf. παρεισάκτους ψευδαδέλφους in Gal. ii, 4.
αἱρέσεις ἀπωλείας. αἵρεσις is used in a neutral sense in Acts, of
the Sadducees, of the Pharisees, and by an adversary, Tertullus, of
the Christians: in xxiv. 14 Paul speaks of τὴν ὁδὸν ἣν λέγουσιν αἵρεσιν,
again not necessarily in an abusive sense. In his Epistles the thing is
deprecated. 1 Cor. xi. 18, 19 couples αἱρέσεις with σχίσματα : Gal. v. 20
with διχοστασίαι, so that it seems equivalent to “schism.” In Tit. iii. 10
αἱρετικὸν ἄνδρα... .παραιτοῦ the context shows that what is meant is an
opinionated and disputatious person. By the time of Ignatius (110)
it is clearly used in our sense of heresy. He warns the Trallians
‘“‘to abstain from the noxious herbs of heresy,’’ and says to the
Ephesians ‘‘ Among you no heresy dwells.” Here the general meaning
is put out of doubt by the addition of the word ἀπωλείας, so that it is
possible to hold that the writer could conceive of αἱρέσεις that were
not * destructive.”
B2
20 IT PETER [2 1—
ἀπώλεια is a favourite word with our writer, occurring again in this
verse and in ii. 3, iii. 7, 16.
καὶ, emphatic. Even denying.
τὸν ἀγοράσαντα αὐτοὺς δεσπότην ἀρνούμενοι, Jude 4.
The parallel with Jude forbids us to think that the incident of
Peter’s denial of his Master is referred to.
dyopdcavra. 1 Cor. vi. 20 ἠγοράσθητε yap τιμῆς. Rev. v. 9
addressed to the Lamb ἐσφάγης καὶ ἠγόρασας τῷ θεῷ ἐν τῷ αἵματί cov.
In Acts xx. 28 this purchasing is ascribed to the Father, to whom
the title δεσπότης is applied wherever else it is used in N.T. (e.g.
Lue. ii. 29, Acts iv. 24, Rev. vi. 10). Accordingly, some understand
δεσπότης of the Father here, and some of the Son. The phrase in
Jude is τὸν μόνον δεσπότην καὶ κύριον ἡμῶν "I. X., which at first sight
seems plainly to mean One Person, and that the Son: but there
again it is pointed out that κύριος is one of the words which in such a
sentence can stand without an article, so that two Persons might be
meant. I incline to interpret both passages as referring to the Son.
Note that δεσπότης and ἀγοράζειν give point to the word δοῦλος 80
often used by the Apostles of themselves.
2. ἀρνούμενοι. They deny by their lives that Christ is their Master,
and also in some cases by their teaching: for many who had grown up
in the strong Monotheism of the Jews and had accepted Christianity
to some extent, denied the divinity of Christ. In 1 Joh. ii. 22 we
read of some who denied that Jesus was Christ.
ἐξακολουθήσουσιν as i. 16.
Sv ods ἡ ὁδὸς τῆς ἀληθείας βλασφημηθήσεται. This thought, of
bringing discredit on the Christian name, is not uncommon in N.T.:
Rom. ii. 23-4, iii. 8, Tit. ii, 5, James ii. 7: cf. Acts xix.9. We know
that, as a matter of fact, the most ghastly stories of the excesses of
the Christians were current in Roman society. Though the greater
part of these tales were due to the fact that Christians met secretly
for worship, it is possible that the proceedings of the teachers described
here may have supplied some material that was not fictitious.
There is a coincidence of language here with the Apocalypse of
Peter, § 7, of βλασφημοῦντες τὴν ὁδὸν τῆς δικαιοσύνης (see below, v. 21),
and also, as noted on p. xviii, with the Apology of Aristides.
The ‘way of truth” is a phrase due to Ps. cxix. 30.
8. Kal ἐν πλεονεξίᾳ «.7.. A distinguishing mark of the false
teachers was that they sought to make money: not merely to be
supported by their hearers, which, as we see from St Paul’s letters,
was not considered wrong. ἐμπορεύεσθαι is usually to traffic in some-
thing : not quite so here: ‘‘ you” are the source of profit to them.
2 4] NOTES 21
πλαστοῖς usually ‘‘fictitious,” as of a false accusation: here
probably the thought is not so much of the falsity of the teaching, as
of insinuating address: what St Paul in 1 Thess. ii. 5 calls λόγος
κολακείας. He mentions πρόφασις πλεονεξίας in the same place.
ἔκπαλαι again in iii. 5.
4sqq. εἰ γὰρ ὁ θεός x.7.d. to the end of v.10. The sentence has
a different climax to that which we expect. The protasis is,
roughly, this: “ Speedy punishment awaits these men. For if God
did not spare the angels...nor the old world at the Flood...nor Sodom
and Gomorrah,”—the natural apodosis would be, “ He will not spare
these false teachers.” But asa matter of fact the writer’s thought is
diverted, when he comes to his second example (of the Flood), to the
preservation of Noah; and, at his third example, to the saving of
Lot. And so in his apodosis he puts the saving of the righteous
from among sinners in the /irst place, though he does not omit the
punishing of the wicked.
Note that his examples vary from those in Jude, who has (1) the
people saved out of Egypt, (2) the angels, (3) Sodom and Gomorrah.
The first example in Jude is obscurely expressed, and perhaps this is
why our writer substitutes another for it.
Note also the recurrent participial construction :
Taprapwoas παρέδωκεν... ἐφύλαξεν---ἐπάξας.. .τεφρώσας κατέκρινεν.
ἀγγέλων ἁμαρτησάντων κιτ.λ. The example is taken from the
Book of Enoch. See Introd. p. xlvii.
σειροῖς ζόφου ταρταρώσας παρέδωκεν (Jude, δεσμοῖς ἀϊδίοις ὑπὸ
ζόφον τετήρηκεν) There is a curious question of reading here:
ABC have σειροῖς and NS σιροῖς : KLP, the Latin Vulgate, the
Syriac, and one Egyptian version σειραῖς. σιροῖς or σειροῖς means
pits, specially underground receptacles for the storage of grain. We
do not find the word in that portion of Enoch which exists in Greek,
but we read of angels and stars being confined underground in
wildernesses—in the glens (νάπαι) of the earth and in various
abysses.
σειραῖς “ chains,’ answers to the δεσμοῖς of Jude, and chains are
specially mentioned in Enoch ; but here again the word σεῖραί does
not occur. Both words are uncommon, but σειροῖς is the more
unusual: σειραῖς would be an “ elegant” word for chains, and it is
rather characteristic of our writer to refine the vocabulary of Jude ;
but in strength of attestation σειροῖς has the better claim to be adopted.
τηρουμένους. Another reading κολαζομένους τηρεῖν (the words
occur again in v. 9) has rather strong attestation (SA, the Latin and
Egyptian version; against BCKLP). Our author’s style does not
22 II PETER [2 4—
forbid us to think that he may have repeated the words just as he
has repeated οὐκ ἐφείσατο in vv. 4 and 5 and κόσμος in v. 5.
5. ἀρχαίου κόσμου. ὁ τότε κόσμος iii. 6. The absence of the
article here is noticeable: in the next verse again it is absent (πόλεις
Σοδόμων x.7.d.). Ecclus. xvi. 7 οὐκ ἐξιλάσατο περὶ τῶν ἀρχαίων γιγάν-
των.
ὄγδοον with seven others: αὐτόν is commonly added in these
phrases.
Νῶε δικαιοσύνης κήρυκα. The ancient writing which lays most
stress on Noah’s preaching is the Sibylline Oracles, Book 1. (a Jewish
book altered by a Christian), which devotes some fifty lines to two
addresses of Noah. There is also an allusion to it in 1 Peter iii, 20
in the word ἀπειθήσασιν.
5,6. As in the next chapter, the destructive agencies of water and
fire are here placed side by side.
6. πόλεις Σοδόμων. The genitive, as in wrbs Romae, is of apposition.
τεφρώσας. Examples are quoted from Dion Cassius describing an
eruption of Vesuvius, and from Lycophron (who in his so-called play
the Alexandra or Cassandra heaps together all the obscure words he
can find): 1. 227 τεφρώσας γυῖα Anuvaly πυρί. This means ‘reduce
to ashes.” The passage in Dion Cass. means ‘‘ covered with ashes.”
καταστροφῇ κατέκρινεν is the reading of the large mass of
authorities, BC alone omitting καταστροφῇ, and P reading xaré-
orpewev. The meaning would be either ‘‘condemned by overthrow-
ing” or ‘‘condemned to overthrow” (the latter unclassical, but
paralleled by Matt. xx. 18 xaraxplvovow αὐτὸν θανάτῳ). I think the
word should be restored to the text.
ὑπόδειγμα μελλόντων ἀσεβέσιν τεθεικώς -- 76 πρόκεινται δεῖγμα
πυρὸς αἰωνίου. For ἀσεβέσιν (BP) the bulk of authorities read ἀσεβεῖν,
induced probably by the presence of μελλόντων, with which an infinitive
is expected. A good parallel to these verses is in 3 Maccabees ii. 4,
5 (in a prayer of the high-priest Simon) :
Σὺ τοὺς ἔμπροσθεν ἀδικίαν ποιήσαντας ἐν οἷς καὶ γίγαντες ἦσαν ῥώμῃ
καὶ θράσει πεποιθότες διέφθειρας, ἐπαγαγὼν (cf. ἐπάξαΞ) αὐτοῖς ἀμέτρητον
ὕδωρ. Σὺ τοὺς ὑπερηφανίαν ἐργαζομένους Σοδομίτας...πυρὶ καὶ θείῳ
κατέφλεξας, παράδειγμα τοῖς ἐπιγενομένοις καταστήσας.
The date of 3 Mace. is uncertain, but it is a Jewish book, probably
written about the Christian era.
7. ὑπὸ τῆς τῶν ἀθέσμων ἐν ἀσελγείᾳ ἀναστροφῆς. The structure
reminds us of the clause i. 4 τῆς ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ ἐν ἐπιθυμίᾳ φθορᾶς.
ἀθέσμων again in iii. 17, and nowhere 6186 in N.T. ἔκθεσμος is used
by Philo of the inhabitants of the cities of the plain.
2 10] NOTES 23
8. A parenthesis, telling why Lot needed deliverance.
δίκαιος is preceded by the article ὁ in all MSS, except B. Westcott
and Hort follow B. Some difference in rendering is entailed;
omitting 6 we translate “righteous in respect of looking and
listening,” like the man in Isa, xxxiii. 15 “ that stoppeth his ears
from hearing of blood, and shutteth his eyes from seeing evil.” The
Latin Vulgate takes this view, ‘‘aspectu enim et auditu iustus erat.”
Inserting ὁ, we must connect the datives βλέμματι καὶ ἀκοῇ with éBacd-
vgev as A.V., ‘‘in seeing and hearing, vexed his righteous soul,” ete.
ἡμέραν ἐξ ἡμέρας Ξε καθ᾽ ἡμέραν. It occurs in Ps. xcvi. 2 (UXX) ‘‘Be
telling of His salvation from day to day.”
Ψψυχὲν.. ἐβασάνιζεν. Compare Apocalypse of Peter, § 1, And then
shall God come to my faithful ones that hunger and thirst and are
afflicted, καὶ ἐν τούτῳ τῷ βίῳ Tas ψυχὰς ἑαυτῶν δοκιμάξοντας. But
though the idea of testing may underlie ἐβασάνιζεν here, it is not safe
to discard the ordinary N.T. meaning of ‘‘ tormented.”
The Latin Vulgate must have had a different text, which is not
found in any Greek MS. Τὺ reads, ‘‘habitans apud eos qui de die in
diem animam iustam iniquis operibus cruciabant,” i.e. ἐν αὐτοῖς ol...
ἐβασάνιζον.
9. The apodosis: see on v. 4.
κολαζόμενοι : present participle. In Enoch x. the sinful angels are
bound in torment from the moment of their capture till the great day
of judgment.
10. With this verse the writer returns to the denunciation of the
false teachers. Like the angels, the men before the Flood, the men
of Sodom, they had sinned through lust.
ὀπίσω σαρκός in Jude 7,
ἐπιθυμίᾳ μιασμοῦ. Adjectival as αἱρέσεις ἀπωλείας, ii. 1.
κυριότητος καταφρονοῦντας. This is the main theme of the next
verse and of Jude 8, 9, δόξας οὐ τρέμουσιν βλασφημοῦντες κιτιλ. The
primary application of both κυριότης and δόξα may well be to orders of
angels. The men of Sodom, in particular, had not recognised the
angels. But the words seem to have another meaning when applied
to the false teachers, and to indicate the authorities of the Church
against whom they were in revolt. They are spoken of repeatedly as
anarchists, and compared to Korah, who withstood Moses. We are
reminded of the angels of the seven churches in Rev. i.—iii., by whom
the bishops of the churches are often thought to be meant.
κυριότης is used by St Paul of a definite order of angels, Eph. i. 21
(singular), Col. i. 16 (plural) ; ‘‘ dominions” (A.V.): in the medieval
‘hierarchy of angels, Dominationes.
24 II PETER (2 11—
11. A veiled description of the incident of Michael and Satan
which is openly told in Jude 9. See Introd. p. xiv.
12. Contrast this with Jude 10. Jude says: These men speak
evil of what they do not know: what they do know by natural
instinct, like irrational beasts, they turn to a bad use.
2 Peter: These men, like irrational beasts, whose natural end is to
be snared and killed, speaking evil of what they do not know (a vague
phrase), will certainly perish.
It affords a good example of the elaboration of Jude by our writer
and of the consequent loss of clearness. Jude has a clear antithesis,
which is set aside in 2 Peter ; yet the language of the altered half of
the antithesis (ἀλόγα ζῴα, φυσικά) is retained and used to a different end.
Such is the impression I gather: Dr Bigg, on the other hand,
says: ‘‘ Jude has rewritten this rugged sentence and made it much
more correct and much less forcible.”
γεγεννημένα.. «εἰς... φθοράν. Wetstein gives a good illustration from
a rabbinic source: ‘‘a calf led to the slaughter ran to Rabbi Judah,
put its head into his bosom and wept: but the Rabbi said, ‘Go: thou
wert created for this end.’”
ἐν τῇ φθορᾷ κιτ.λ. Cf. ἐν ἐμπαιγμονῇ ἐμπαῖκται iii. 3. Best taken
as an emphatic prediction of destruction.
13. ἀδικούμενοι μισθὸν ἀδικίας. This is the reading of δὲ (first
hand) BP, one Syriac version and the Armenian; whereas a corrector
of δὲ, ACKL, the Latin, Egyptian, and another Syriac version give the
undoubtedly easier κομιούμενοι ‘destined to receive.” It has rather a
close parallel in Col. iii. 25, ὁ yap ἀδικῶν κομίσεται ὃ ἠδίκησεν. But
the future (κομιούμενοι) is against the reading: all the other participles
near by (and there are many) are in the present.
ἀδικούμενοι is quite hard to translate. I prefer the rendering of
Tischendorf, “ being defrauded in respect of the wages of iniquity.”
μισθὸς ἀδικίας is used just below of Balaam: and like Balaam the false
teachers will not receive the gain they hoped for, but destruction.
If it were permissible to take ἀδικεῖν in the sense which it often has
in Rev. (e.g. vii. 2, 3, etc.) of ‘* hurting,” we might render “ being
hurt as the reward for harming.” But this is not in the manner of
our author, and besides would seem to require ἀδικήσεως, not ἀδικίας.
ἡδονὴν ἡγούμενοι τὴν ἐν ἡμέρᾳ τρυφήν. This hard clause finds an
explanation in the Psalms of Solomon (1st century 8.6.) xiv. 4. ‘Not
so are the sinners and transgressors of ἠγάπησαν ἡμέραν ἐν μετοχῇ
ἁμαρτίας αὐτῶν, ἐν μικρότητι camplas ἡ ἐπιθυμία (or ἐν ἐπιθυμίᾳ) αὐτῶν.
They were contented with a day while they were partners together
in sin: their desire was in (was satisfied with) a-short space of
2 14] NOTES 25
corruption.” So these false teachers reckoned the shortlived enjoy-
ment of a day to be true pleasure.
Another good interpretation depends on a passage in the Asswmp-
tion of Moses (iv. 4). Those who are denounced are described as
“omni hora diei amantes conuiuia.” This is in favour of the R.V.
rendering, “‘men that count it pleasure to revel in the day-time.”
Compare Rom. xiii. 13 “let us walk honestly as in the day: not in
revellings and drunkenness ”’ etc.
σπίλοι Kal μῶμοι, ἐντρυφῶντες ἐν ταῖς ἀπάταις αὐτῶν συνενωχού-
μενοι ὑμῖν. Jude 12 οὗτοί εἰσιν οἱ ἐν ταῖς ἀγάπαις ὑμῶν σπιλάδες
συνευωχούμενοι.
ἀπάταις is read by &, the first hand of A and 0, KLP and others; for it
B, the second hand of A and C, and the Latin have ἀγάπαις (agreeing
with Jude). The addition of αὐτῶν here is ‘‘in favour of ἀπάταις."
So Mayor, who also points out that ἀπάταις and σπίλοι are character-
istic modifications of the similar ἀγάπαις and σπιλάδες in Jude.
σπίλος occurs in Eph. v. 27 μὴ ἔχουσαν σπίλον : and ἄσπιλος in our
Epistle (iii, 14): the verb σπιλόω in Jude 23 and also in James iii. 6.
μῶμος, which in classical Greek means reproach or disgrace, is used
to mean blemish (as it does here) in the LXX. of Leviticus. duwpos
is in Jude 24. See also 1 Pet. i. 19.
If we adopt the strongly supported reading ἀπάταις it is not easy
to get a clear notion of the meaning of the clause. Two ways of
taking it are suggested: (a) revelling when they join in your feasts,
to which by their deceitful conduct they have gained admission ;
(b) revelling in their deceitfulness, when they feast with you. In any
case the writer has in his mind the love-feast of the Christians which
these men perverted and profaned.
14. ὀφθαλμοὺς ἔχοντες μεστοὺς μοιχαλίδος. Dr Bigg unhesitatingly
rejects μοιχαλίδος as @ blunder for μοιχείας : the only various reading
in the MSS. is μοιχαλίας (NA and three cursives) which is not a possible
word. μοιχαλίδος does not seem to yield a tolerable sense, though it is
accepted by commentators as meaning ‘‘ eyes which see an adulteress
in every woman.” The general sense ‘‘eyes full of lust” is undoubted.
ἀκαταπάστους ἁμαρτίας. SoAB. The other authorities give ἀκατα-
παύστους (compare for the idea 1 Pet. iv. 1 πέπαυται duaprias). Hort,
preferring ἀκαταπάστους, says that it might be explained as a derivative
of παύω on the strength of such forms as ἀναπαήσεται: but prefers to
take it as meaning insatiable, and derives it from πάσασθαι {πατέομαι)
which according to Athenaeus was used in his time ἰο-- πληρωθῆναι:
so that ἀκατάπαστος-- ἄπαστος etc. But Mayor points out that ἄπαστος
etc. wherever found means “ fasting.”
26 II PETER [2 14—
γεγυμνασμένην, exercised in, familiar with: used with θαλάττης,
πολέμων, σοφίας by Philostratus,
κατάρας τέκνα means no more than “accursed.” We hear of
‘children of obedience” (1 Pet.), ‘‘son of perdition” (Joh.), ‘‘ sons of
disobedience” (Eph.).
15. ἐξακολουθήσαντες, for the third time in this Epistle (i. 16, ii. 2).
The sentence about Balaam is loosely constructed. There are some
various readings. For Βεὼρ (B and two versions) Βόσορ is read by the
other uncials except δὲ which has Bewopoop, showing a consciousness
of both forms. Bédcop cannot be satisfactorily explained.
Next, for ὃς μισθ. ἀδικ. ἠγάπησεν, B and one version read μισθ. ἀδικ.
ἠγάπησαν. But this cannot be right, for ἔσχεν in the next clause must
refer to Balaam, and the change of subject is intolerably awkward.
16. ἰδίας seems unnecessarily emphatic: it may not have been so
intended by the writer. In later (and in modern) Greek the word
tends to lose its force and become little more than a possessive.
προφήτου is put in to mark the contrast with the ὑποζύγιον ἄφωνον.
παραφρονία is not found elsewhere: but forms in -οσύνη (we should
expect παραφροσύνη) and in -ovla do exist side by side, as ἀπημονία
ἀπημοσύνη.
These two verses 15, 16 are based on a single verse in Jude (11) oval
αὐτοῖς (hence κατάρας τέκνα) ὅτι τῇ ὁδῷ τοῦ Καὶν ἐπορεύθησαν (καταλεί-
ποντες εὐθεῖαν ὁδὸν ἐπλανήθησαν 2P.) καὶ τῇ πλάνῃ τοῦ Βαλαὰμ μισθοῦ
ἐξεχύθησαν. Jude adds καὶ τῇ ἀντιλογίᾳ τοῦ Κορὲ ἀπώλοντο : but our
writer as before (4---10) deserts his original in order to amplify one of
the examples used.
11. ‘*Waterless springs and mists driven by a gale: for whom
darkness is reserved.” In Jude the list of comparisons is longer;
Waterless clouds, barren trees, wild waves, wandering stars, for
whom darkness is reserved. It is conceivable that some words have
dropped out of the text of our Epistle.
πηγαί, One who sets up to be a teacher ought to be a fountain of
wisdom. These men yield none.
ὁμίχλαι κιτιλ. ‘* Mists” which veil the light, not clouds which
promise fertilising rain. And the mists are to be swept away by a
tempest into darkness. Compare Wisdom y. 14 ‘the life of the
ungodly is ws φερόμενος χνοῦς ἀπὸ ἀνέμου καὶ ws πάχνη ὑπὸ λαίλαπος
διωχθεῖσα λεπτή."
οἷς ὁ ζόφος x.7.A. This cannot be pressed into connexion with the
metaphor of springs: to the mists it is not inapplicable. In its
original place in Jude it applies, with complete suitability, to stars.
The masculine ofs here must, as the text stands, be referred to the
2 19] NOTES 27
men who are described under these various images: but a lacuna
seems not improbable.
18. ὑπέρογκα κιτ.λ. ἐν iniBvntane σαρκός. This is the last case of
borrowing from Jude for some time. It answers to Jude 16 κατὰ τὰς
ἐπιθυμίας αὐτῶν πορευόμενοι καὶ τὸ στόμα αὐτῶν λαλεῖ ὑπέρογκα.
ἐν ἐπιθυμίαις σαρκὸς ἀσελγείαις. σαρκός is best taken with ἐπι-
᾿ θυμίαις. The whole phrase is rather pleonastic to our ideas. ἀσελγείαις
serves perhaps to define ἐπιθ. capx. The general meaning is that the
false teachers proclaimed to their followers the lawfulness of indulgence
in passions, under the name of Christian liberty, and so converts who
had been nearly drawn away, and with great difficulty, from the
licence which prevailed in heathen society were now slipping back.
Their first teachers had preached to them the importance of purity:
these new ones told them that it was of no consequence. The havoc
which such teaching must have wrought upon the morals and upon
the very being of young Christian communities amply justifies the
tremendous denunciation which we find here.
τοὺς ὀλίγως ἀποφεύγοντας x.7.A. For ὀλίγως (AB, a corrector of ἐξ,
and Syriac, Latin and Egyptian) a group including NCKLP reads
ὄντως. For ἀποφεύγοντας (SABC) the aorist participle ἀποφυγόντας is
read by KLP.
ὀλίγως is rendered in the Vulgate by paululum, for a little time: it
is an uncommon word, but is found meaning ‘in a slight degree” and
(inapplicable here) ‘‘ quickly.” The escape is recent or incomplete.
τοὺς ἐν πλάνῃ ἀναστρεφομένους : almost certainly the heathen.
19. ἐλευθερίαν «.7.A. This degeneracy of liberty into licence was a
constant danger. πάντα ἔξεστιν" ἀλλ᾽ οὐ πάντα συμφέρει (1 Cor. x. 23).
Gal. v. 13 μόνον μὴ τὴν ἐλευθερίαν els ἀφορμὴν τῇ σαρκί. 1 Pet. ii. 16
μὴ ws ἐπικάλυμμα ἔχοντες τῆς κακίας τὴν ἐλευθερίαν. Men have been
found in all ages to say either openly or in effect: ‘‘ Rules made for
weaker brethren do not apply to me: I have penetrated into the
mysteries of divine things, and know that what my body does
cannot affect my soul.” But this, as our writer points out, is just
where they are mistaken; they become slaves of the most abject
kind to their habits and passions. Yet, slaves as they are, they dare
to promise freedom to others !
ᾧ γάρ τις ἥττηται, τούτῳ δεδούλωται : so Sophocles in old age spoke
of passion as a λυττῶν καὶ ἄγριος δεσπότης from whom he had
escaped. Whoever committeth sin is the slave of sin, Jo. viii. 34:
cf. Ro. vi. 16. .
. Another kindred thought is that in Wisdom xi. 16 δι᾽ ὧν τις ἁμαρ-
τάνει, διὰ τούτων κολάζεται : @ ruling idea in the Apocalypse of Peter,
28 II PETER ὩΣ 20—
20. ἀποφυγόντες τὰ μιάσματα τοῦ κόσμου. We revert to the
language of chapter i. (i. 4 ἀποφυγόντες τῆς ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ ἐν ἐπιθυμίᾳ
POopas). ἐν ἐπυγνώσει κ-.τ.λ. i. 2.
In the words δελεάζειν, ἀποφεύγειν, ἡττᾶσθαι we have fresh
instances of our author’s tendency to use words over again at short
intervals.
τὰ ἔσχατα χείρονα τῶν πρώτων, one of the few citations of our
Lord’s words in the Epistle (see Introd. p. xxiv). These occur in
Matt. xii. 45.
21. τὴν ὁδὸν τῆς δικαιοσύνης occurs in the Apocalypse of Peter,
§§ 7, 13. It is not a common phrase.
22. τὸ τῆς ἀληθοῦς παροιμίας : a usual phrase for introducing a
proverb, as Lucian, Dialogues of the Dead, viii. 1, τοῦτ᾽ ἐκεῖνο τὸ τῆς
παροιμίας.
Κύων etc. The equivalent isin Prov. xxvi. 11, the LXX. has ἔμετον
for ἐξέραμα which is a very unusual word.
Ὗς Aoveapévy ‘after a wash.” In the ancient History of Ahikar
(ed. Rendel Harris 1898) which the writer may well have known,
there is a proverb of the pig that went to the bath, and on coming
out saw some mud and rolled in it.
There may be a second thought in the writer’s mind of the latter
end of these men in the βόρβορος of Hell: which figures in the Apoca-
lypse of Peter, as it did also in the Orphic mysteries.
III. 1. It is natural to most of us on a first reading to assume
that the first Epistle here alluded to must be what we know as
1 Peter; but this has been denied by critics of eminence, who hold
that 1 Peter does not answer to the description before us: and further
that 2 P. speaks of personal intercourse between writer and readers
(i. 16 ἐγνωρίσαμεν ὑμῖν) which is not the case in 1 Peter. One point
which is urged is undeniably true, namely, that many apostolic letters
must have perished, and there is no necessity to regard 1 Peter as
being meant: but the objections to doing so are not conclusive,
διεγείρω ἐν ὑπομνήσει occurred above, i. 13.
εἰλικρινῆ, pure, genuine, unmixed: then pure, morally. εἰλικρινεῖς
kal ἀπρόσκοποι in Phil. i. 10 is the only other occurrence of the
adjective in N.T. The substantive εἰλικρίνεια is coupled with ἀλήθεια
in 1 Cor. v. 8.
2. μνησθῦναικ.τιλ. He is specially anxious to hold his readers fast
to their first beliefs in view of the new false teaching.
ἁγίων προφητῶν as in the Benedictus, Luke i. 70.
καὶ τῆς τῶν ἀποστόλων ὑμῶν ἐντολῆς τ. κυρ. K. σωτῆρος. The
array of genitives has its awkwardness, but is not obscure.
8 4] NOTES 29
τῶν ἀποστόλων ὑμῶν : ἡμῶν (a very natural alteration) is read by
some cursives, but no uncials. ‘The preachers who evangelized you,”
not necessarily the Twelve, may be meant; but this is one of the
phrases which suggest that the Epistle belongs to the sub-apostolic
age.
8. With this verse we return to the borrowing from Jude (17) ὑμεῖς
δέ, ἀγαπητοί, μνήσθητε τῶν ῥημάτων τῶν προειρημένων ὑπὸ τῶν ἀποστόλων
τ. κυρ. ἡμ. I. Χ.
τοῦτο πρῶτον γινώσκοντες, above, i. 20. The grammar is loose.
ὅτι ἐλεύσονται κ.τ.λ., the last considerable borrowing, from Jude 18
ἐπ᾽ ἐσχάτου χρόνου ἔσονται ἐμπαῖκται κατὰ τὰς ἑαυτῶν ἐπιθυμίας πορευό-
μενοι τῶν ἀσεβειών.
The possibility that both writers are independently quoting the
same prophecy has been mentioned and dismissed in the Intro-
duction.
A passage from an apocryphal book (unknown, but not improbably
the prophecy of Eldad and Medad) which is quoted both in the
genuine Epistle of Clement of Rome (cir. 90 a.p.) and in the ancient
sermon known as his Second Epistle deserves to be given here.
‘* Miserable ‘are the waverers, that waver in their soul and say,
‘These things we heard long ago even in our fathers’ days, but we,
expecting them day after day, have seen nothing of them.’ (Variant:
‘And, lo, we have grown old, and none of these things has befallen
us.’) O fools, compare yourselves to a tree. Take the vine. First it
sheds its leaves, then comes a shoot, then a leaf, then a flower, then
a young grape, and then the cluster is ready. Even so also my people
hath suffered disturbance and affliction and thereafter shall be re-
compensed with good.”
Similarly an ancient Jewish comment on Ps, Ixxxix. 50 ‘‘slandered
the footsteps of thine anointed ” is ‘‘they have scoffed at the slowness
of Messiah’s coming”; and again “He delays so long, that they say,
He will never come.”
It is possible that our writer is referring to the Jewish book quoted
by Clement, or to a similar source. At least we see that the mur-
muring was current outside Christian circles.
ἐμπαιγμονῇ, this form occurs here only. ἐμπαιγμός, -μα are the
forms used in Biblical Greek.
4. Ποῦ ἐστὶν κατ.λ. They ask the question, not as those who long for
the fulfilment of the promise, but as disbelieving that it will ever be
fulfilled : and therefore they are at liberty to indulge their passions
(πορευόμενοι, etc.).
᾿ «παρουσίας, above i. 16.
30 II PETER [3 4—
οἱ πατέρες. Of. ἐπὶ τῶν πατέρων in the prophecy quoted above from
Clement. The phrase inevitably suggests that the first generation of
Christians had passed away.
οὕτως, in statu quo. Compare the reading of some Latin authorities
in Joh. xxi, 22, Sic or Si sic eum uolo manere.
The unbelievers say: Where is the promise of His coming? the
first disciples to whom it was promised are dead, and there is no sign :
the world goes on in its course as it has since the creation. That is
where you are wrong, replies our writer. It has not gone on without
one great convulsion. There was the Deluge; and there will be the
final fire.
δ. ὅτι οὐρανοὶ ἦσαν κιτλ. There were of old heavens and an earth,
(the latter) having its being out of water (it rose out of the water over
which the Spirit brooded) and δι᾽ ὕδατος. This difficult expression Iam
inclined to interpret as ‘‘between the waters,” supported on water,
according to Jewish belief, and with an over-arching firmament above
which were waters. Compare the use of διά to express intervals:
διὰ χρόνου, διὰ πέντε σταδίων ete.
ἔκπαλαι, above, ii. 3.
τῷ τοῦ θεοῦ λόγῳ -- ῥήματι θεοῦ Heb. xi. 3.
6. δι ὦν. I am inclined (in spite of the fact that the word is
rather remote in position) to think that οὐρανοί is the antecedent of ὧν.
‘‘There were heavens...by means of which the old world was deluged.”
The other alternative, that the two “ waters” are the antecedent, also
yields a fairly good sense. Mayor with one good cursive MS. reads
δι᾿ ὃν and refers it to λόγος. De Zwaan (1909) agrees.
ὃ τότε κόσμος, cf. ἀρχαιὸς κόσμος ii. 5. The human beings who
perished at the Flood are primarily meant.
7. οἱ δὲ νῦν οὐρανοί. He seems to speak of the Flood as if it
had destroyed heaven and earth (in the Book of Enoch hyperbolical
language of that kind is used of the Flood lxxxiii. 3, in a vision ‘‘the
heaven collapsed and was borne off and fell to the earth’): and it
may have been his view that the upper firmament did fall in and
overwhelm the earth. But the general run of thought seems to be
this. Of old the heavens were the means of destruction: in the
future the heavens themselves will be destroyed (by fire).
τεθησαυρισμένοι πυρί, stored up—reserved—for fire; not stored
with fire, which would mean that there was fire latent in them which
would some day burst forth and consume them. That was the belief
of Valentinus, a great heretical teacher of cent. ii.
τηρούμενοι κιτ.λ. Cf. ii. 4, 9.
8. ὑμᾶς, emphatic, opposed to αὐτούς in v. 5.
8 10] NOTES 31
Not only are the mockers mistaken as to the immutability of the
world: they forget also (but you must not) that time is nothing in
God’s sight. He delays His vengeance in mercy, but it will come.
pla ἡμέρα x.7.A. The words go back to Ps. xe. 4 χίλια ἔτη ἐν ὀφθαλ-
pots σου ws ἡ ἡμέρα ἡ ἐχθὲς ἥτις διῆλθεν, Kal φυλακὴ ἐν νυκτί.
The writer does not apply the words in a sense which very usually
attached to them among Jews and Christians, The belief arose (we
cannot exactly trace by what steps), that since the world had been
created in six days, and since a day and a thousand years are in God’s
sight the same, so it would last six thousand years; and, as at
creation the seventh day of rest followed, so the six thousand years
would be succeeded by a seventh thousand of Sabbatical rest, the
Millennium, as it is commonly called. We cannot dwell upon the
importance of the belief in a Millennium: but the text before us was
constantly invoked in support of that belief.
_ 9. βραδύνει with a genitive only here: it is compared with the use
of ἁμαρτάνω, ὑστερεῖν, λείπεσθαι.
μακροθυμεῖ, Cf. 1 Pet. ili. 20 ἀπειθήσασιν ὅτε ἀπεξεδέχετο ἡ τοῦ
θεοῦ μακροθυμία ἐν ἡμέραις Νῶε. ὶ
εἰς ὑμᾶς. Evidence is divided here both as to the preposition and
the pronoun.
els BCKLP Armenian, one Egyptian version.
δι’ NSA 3 good cursives, Latin, one Egyptian version (the older),
Syriac, Aethiopic.
ὑμᾶς SABCP, most versions,
ἡμᾶς KL, later Egyptian version.
μὴ βουλόμενός τινας ἀπολέσθαι ἀλλὰ πάντας κιτιλ. The first clause
is emphasized greatly in Ezek, xviii. With the second we may
compare 1 Tim. ii. 4 τοῦ σωτῆρος ἡμῶν θεοῦ ὃς πάντας ἀνθρώπους θέλει
σωθῆναι καὶ εἰς ἐπίγνωσιν ἀληθείας ἐλθεῖν.
10. Ἥξει δὲ ἡμέρα Κυρίου ὡς κλέπτης. This must have been a
commonplace of Apocalyptic prophecy. We have the image in the
eschatological discourse of our Lord, Matt. xxiv. 43 ‘If the goodman
of the house had known in what watch (of the night) the thief would
come” and again in Luke xii. 39. In 1 Thess. v. 2, Ye know clearly
ὅτι ἡμέρα Κυρίου ws κλέπτης ἐν νυκτὶ οὕτως ἔρχεται (whence the MSS.
CKL add ἐν νυκτί here). Rev. iii. 8 ἥξω ὡς κλέπτης, xvi. 15 ἰδοὺ
ἔρχομαι ὡς κλέπτης.
οἱ οὐρανοὶ... παρελεύσονται. Mc. xiii. 81 ὁ οὐρανὸς καὶ ἡ γῇ παρε-
λεύσονται. The destruction of the heavens, which were thought of as
a solid firmament arched over the earth, is spoken of in Isa. xxxiy. 4
καὶ ἑλιγήσεται ὁ οὐρανὸς ws βιβλίον, This whole verse of Isaiah seems
32 II PETER [3 10—
to have been introduced into the Apocalypse of Peter. It is quoted in
Rev. vi. 13, 14 καὶ ὁ οὐρανὸς ἀπεχωρίσθη ws βιβλίον ἑλισσόμενον and in
the Sibylline oracles m1. 81 ὁπόταν θεὸς αἰθέρι ναίων | οὐρανὸν εἱλίξῃ
καθ᾽ ἅπερ βιβλίον εἱλεῖται.
ῥοιζηδόν, with a rushing or whizzing round: κλαγγηδόν, κοναβη-
δόν are words of similar formation also descriptive of sound.
στοιχεῖα. The heavenly bodies are very probably intended.
στοιχεῖα was used in the sense of ‘‘luminaries”: in a letter of
Polycrates the bishop of Ephesus (about 190 a.p.) he says ‘‘ among us
also (in Asia, that is, as well as in Rome) μέγαλα στοιχεῖα κεκοίμηνται
great luminaries rest”: and he goes on to specify John the Evangelist
and others.
St Paul’s use of στοιχεῖα Gal. iv. 3, Col. ii. 8, 20 is interpreted as
meaning the spiritual beings who have charge of the stars and of
other provinces of creation.
kavootpeva, must be from καυσόομαι, a medical word applied to fever-
heats.
εὑρεθήσεται. See Introd. p. xlix.
A passage in the Sibylline oracles 11. 252 sqq. shows what is meant
by ἔργα and favours the reading οὐχ εὑρεθήσεται.
κοὐκέτι πωτήσονται ἐν ἠέρι ἄπλετοι ὄρνεις,
οὐ ζῷα νηκτὰ θάλασσαν ὅλως ἔτι νηχήσονται,
οὐ ναῦς ἔμφορτος ἐπὶ κύμασι ποντοπορήσει,
οὐ βόες ἰθυντῆρες ἀροτρεύσουσιν ἄρουραν,
οὐκ ἦχος δένδρων ἀνέμων ὕπο: ἀλλ᾽ ἅμα πάντα
εἰς ἕν χωνεύσει καὶ εἰς καθαρὸν διαλέξει.
11. λυομένων possibly implies that creation is even now declining
to its fall: but compare the present tenses of τήκεται, κατοικεῖ
below.
ποταπούς, a late form and use: ποδαπός “‘of what nation” is the
classical word. Our word occurs elsewhere in N.T. and in the
Apocalypse of Peter.
ὑπάρχειν, how ought you to be equipped—ready for the catastrophe
when it comes.
ἀναστροφαῖς, εὐσεβείαις, plural as ἀσελγείαις several times above.
12. σπεύδοντας. The thought is well compared with Peter’s words
in Acts iii. 19. Repent...drws ἂν ἔλθωσιν καιροὶ ἀναψύξεως. As sins
(cf. v. 9) delay the coming, so righteousness will accelerate it.
θεοῦ ἡμέρας, usually ἡμ. Κυρίου. In Rev. xvi. 14 we have ‘‘the great
day of God Almighty.”
δι᾿ ἣν. ἐν 7 above inv. 10. We might render “on the occasion of
which”: the destruction takes place because the Day has come,
3 16] NOTES 33
Notice the repetition of words, λυθήσονται, στοιχεῖα, καυσούμενα.
We have already encountered many such in our text.
τήκεται is the reading of SABKL. Chas τακήσεται, P τακήσονται.
Hort conjectures τήξεται, which is found with a passive sense in
Hippocrates.
13. καινοὺς δὲ οὐρανούς x.7.’. The new heaven and earth are
prophesied in the concluding chapters of Isaiah: lxv. 17 ἔσται yap ὁ
οὐρανὸς καινὸς καὶ ἡ γῆ καινή, xvi. 22 ὃν τρόπον γὰρ ὁ οὐρανὸς καινὸς καὶ
ἡ γῆ καινὴ ἃ ἐγὼ ποιῶ, cf. li. 6 Lift up your eyes to the heavens, ete.
The prediction is quoted in Rev. xxi. 1. Kat εἶδον οὐρανὸν καινὸν
kal γῆν καινήν" 6 yap πρῶτος οὐρ. k. ἡ πρώτη γῆ ἀπῆλθαν.
ἐν οἷς δικαιοσύνη κατοικεῖ. Cf. Isa. i. 21 of Jerusalem, ἐν ἣ
δικαιοσύνη ἐκοιμήθη ἐν αὐτῇ and xxxii. 16 δικαιοσύνη ἐν τῷ Καρμήλῳ
κατοικήσει, together with what follows.
14. Cf. Jude 24 στῆσαι κατενώπιον τῆς δόξης αὐτοῦ ἀμώμους. The use
of εὑρεθῆναι is rather like that in Phil. iii. 9 ‘‘ that I may be found in
Him, not having my own righteousness,” etc.
15. καθὼς kal ὁ ἀγαπητὸς ἡμῶν ἀδελφὸς Παῦλος. It has been
usual to take καθὼς as referring to the topic of the end of the world,
and to suppose that the Epistles to the Thessalonians are specially
indicated. But others (incl. Mayor) would refer καθώς to the sen-
tence immediately preceding about μακροθυμία, and point to certain
passages in Romans, especially ii. 4 καὶ τῆς μακοθυμίας καταφρονεῖς
ἀγνοῶν ὅτι τὸ χρηστὸν τοῦ θεοῦ εἰς μετάνοιάν σε ἄγει; also 111, 25, 26,
ix. 22, 23, xi. 22, 23. ὑμῖν would then naturally mean that this
Epistle is itself addressed to the Romans.
κατὰ τῆν δοθεῖσαν αὐτῷ σοφίαν. Cf. 1 Cor. iii. 10 κατὰ τὴν χάριν
τοῦ θεοῦ τὴν δοθεῖσάν μοι.
16. ἐν πάσαις ἐπιστολαῖς. πάσαις ταῖς is read by NKLP: ABC
omit the article, and are followed by Westcott and Hort. The phrase
reads very awkwardly without it. There is no great difference in
sense, whether we read ‘in all letters” or “‘in all his letters.”
ἐν als ἐστὶν δυσνόητά τινα «.7.A. Not specially referring to the
subject of μακροθυμία, nor to the end of the world, but, generally, to
those parts of Pauline teaching which had been exaggerated or mis-
represented, e.g. about things offered to idols (1 Cor. viii. etc.) :
utterances about the Law which might form an excuse for men to say
that they were not bound by the Decalogue (Rom. iii. 20, vii. 7—11
etc.) : of becoming all things to all men: and so on.
ὡς καὶ τὰς λοιπὰς γραφάς. If the phrase occurred in a later docu-
ment, we should not hesitate to render it ‘‘ the rest of the Scriptures”
and to take it as including both O.T. and N.T. Scriptures. But the
2 Peter C
34 II PETER [3 16—18
fact that we have here a writing under the name of an Apostle, and of
early date, causes a difficulty. We shall be overstating the case if we
say that the writer here places Paul’s Epistles exactly on a level with
the O.T. and implies the existence of a body of Christian Scriptures
that were so regarded: but it is fair to say that he knows of the
Pauline Epistles as writings read to Christian congregations and
on the way to be put upon the level of Canonical Scripture. Cf.
p. xxviii.
17. ἀθέσμων, πλάνῃ, ii. 7, 18.
συναπαχθέντες as Gal. ii. 13, BapydBas συναπήχθη αὐτῶν τῇ
ὑποκρίσει.
18. αὐξάνετε ἐν χάριτι, οἵ. i. 8 πλεονάζοντα. αὐξάνω is oftener than
not intransitive in N.T. but in classical Greek transitive, and so in
1 Cor. iii. 6 (ὁ θεὸς ηὔξανεν).
els ἡμέραν αἰῶνος. An uncommon phrase: Keclus. xviii. 10 is
quoted: as a drop of water out of the sea, or a grain of sand, οὕτως
ὀλίγα ἔτη ἐν ἡμέρᾳ αἰῶνος. It is strange to find this expression in a
doxology, where els τοὺς αἰῶνας (τῶν αἰώνων) is almost invariable.
Norse oN THE DESTRUCTION OF THE WoRLD BY Fire.
The passage iii. 5—13 is the only one in the New Testament which
speaks of the destruction of the world by fire. The coming of Christ,
the Resurrection, and the Final Judgment are dwelt upon by other
writers, but of a general conflagration nothing is said bythem. This is
a noteworthy fact; so widely spread is the notion of a final fire, that
it comes as a surprise to most people when they realize how very
slender is the Biblical foundation for that belief.
Whence did our author derive it? We know that the Stoics held
that there would be an ἐκπύρωσις of the world: but their view was
that it was an event which would recur at the end of vast periods of
time, and that each burning would be succeeded by a παλιγγενεσία, a
- re-constitution of the world. This differs from the Christian idea,
which was that there would be one final burning, and that human
history would not repeat itself.
Among the Jews the belief was entertained by some: but it has not
left any considerable trace in the apocalyptic literature. Philo argues
strongly against the Stoic belief in his tract on the Incorruptibility of
the World.
In certain early Christian books pretending to high antiquity the
final fire is dwelt upon. The fourth book of the Sibylline oracles,
NOTES 35
which is assigned to the reign of Titus or Domitian (and is appealed
to upon this point by Justin Martyr.in his Apology) says (172—177) :
εἰ δ᾽ οὔ μοι πείθοισθε κακόφρονες...
πῦρ ἔσται κατὰ κόσμον ὅλον...
φλέξει δὲ χθόνα πᾶσαν, ἅπαν δ᾽ ὀλέσει γένος ἀνδρῶν
καὶ πάσας πόλεας ποταμούς θ᾽ ἅμα ἠδὲ θάλασσαν,
ἐκκαύσει δέ τε πάντα, κόνις δ᾽ ἔσετ᾽ αἰθαλόεσσα.
There is a longer description in the later second book of the oracles
(196—213). It is pretty clear that this book derives its matter very
largely from the Apocalypse of Peter, in which we now know that
the burning of the world was described at some length. See the
Additional Note, p. lvii.
Justin Martyr also appeals to a book called Hystaspes as agreeing
with the Sibyl. This we no longer possess, but we can tell from
scattered quotations that it was a prophecy revealed to an ancient
king of the Medes; it seems to have been Christian, and quite early
in date.
Another early book which speaks of this, in words which recall
2 Peter, is the so-called Second Epistle of Clement (really a sermon of
the second century): cap. xvi. γινώσκετε δὲ ὅτι ἔρχεται ἤδη ἡ ἡμέρα τῆς
κρίσεως ὡς κλίβανος καιόμενος (Malachi iv. 1 ἰδοὺ ἡμέρα ἔρχεται καιομένη
ὡς κλίβανος) καὶ τακήσονταί τινες (corrupt: perhaps αἱ δυνάμεις) τῶν
οὐρανῶν (Isa. xxxiv. 4 and Apocalypse of Peter, quoted above), καὶ
πᾶσα ἡ γῆ ws μόλιβος ἐπὶ πυρὶ τηκόμενος, Kal τότε φανήσεται τὰ κρύφια
καὶ φανερὰ ἔργα τῶν ἀνθρώπων. Can this last clause (καὶ τότε φανήσεται
κιτ.λ.) be taken as showing that the writer actually had 2 Peter before
him, and that his copy of it read εὑρεθήσεται ὃ One is tempted to
guess that this was the case, and that he interpreted τὰ ἐν αὐτοῖς ἔργα
εὑρεθήσεται as meaning “the works that are therein shall be mani-
fested.”’
It is not practicable to trace the gradual growth of the belief: but
it did grow, and in later times at least, when the Sibylline oracles
and other such books were forgotten, the passage in 2 Peter became
the authoritative one on the subject.
C2
NOTES ON THE EPISTLE OF
SAINT JUDE.
1. Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ δοῦλος. So in James i. 1 (where θεοῦ καί is
prefixed): the word is also in 2 P. i, 1 δ. καὶ ἀπόστολος Ἶ. X.
ἀδελφὸς δὲ ᾿Ιακώβου. Jude was a ““ brother of the Lord” but does
not say so, perhaps from motives of humility. The person he mentions
is, there can be little doubt, James the first bishop of Jerusalem.
Three persons of this name are mentioned in N.T., (1) James the son
of Zebedee, ‘‘ James the great” martyred by Herod (Acts xii.), (2) James
the son of Alphaeus Matt. x. 3, Mark iii. 18, in the list of the Twelve,
coupled with Thaddaeus: Luke vi. 15, between Thomas and Simon
Zelotes, Acts i. 18 between Matthew and Simon, (3) James the
brother of the Lord, Matt. xiii. 55, Mark vi. 3. This last was the
first bishop of Jerusalem, and presided at the council of Acts xv.
It has been usual in the Western Church to identify nos. 2 and 3 of
the above list. The Hastern Church, however, has always com-
memorated three Jameses, and there can be little doubt that this is
the right view. Of James the son of Alphaeus we really know nothing
beyond his name.
τοῖς ἐν θεῷ πατρί κιτ.λ. A difficult sentence. The late uncial
MSS. KLP give ἡγιασμένοις for ἠγαπημένοις (NBA) which is a very
much easier reading, but on that account suspicious. Westcott and
Hort suggest that ἐν is out of place and that we ought to read τοῖς
θεῷ πατρὶ ἠγαπημ. καὶ ἐν "I. X. τετηρημ. The possibility has been
suggested (by Bishop Chase) that after ἐν a place-name was meant to
be inserted (as in Eph. i. 1): the letter being a circular letter, and
the name varied according to the place where it was read. The
sentence would run ‘‘to those at ——- who are beloved of God the
Father” etc. As they stand the words are not free from confusion,
and I believe that their order must be incorrect. It would be better
if ἠγαπημένοις followed κλητοῖς. The three substantives in the next
4] NOTES 37
verse may each refer to one of these three descriptive words, thus:
ἔλεος to κλητοῖς, for the calling of God shows His mercy: εἰρήνη to
τετηρημένοις, for peace is the condition of those who are kept safe:
ἀγάπη to ἠγαπημένοις. I do not think it altogether safe to build
much upon words which are in the nature of a formula: yet this
particular salutation is not identical with any other in N.T. The
substantives in Rom., 1, 2 Cor., Gal., Eph., Phil., Col., 1, 2 Thess.,
Tit., Philemon, are χάρις (ὑμῖν) καὶ εἰρήνη : so too in Rev. (i. 4), 1,
2 Pet. In 1, 2 Tim. χάρις, ἔλεος καὶ εἰρήνη : also 2 Jo. 3. So Jude
does use a form which is varied, doubtless intentionally. The verb
πληθυνθείη is common to him and 1, 2 Pet.
8. ᾿Αγαπητοί recurs in 17, 20 and often in 2 Peter. It is also
frequent in 1 John, but there a great many other forms of address
are used as well.
πᾶσαν σπουδὴν ποιούμενος ypddev...avayKny ἔσχον γράψαι. Dis-
tinguish between the use of the present tense in the first clause and
that of the aorist in the second: we may infer that Jude was contem-
plating the writing of a treatise (or more probably an Epistle) on more
general lines περὶ τῆς κοινῆς σωτηρίας, when he was suddenly compelled
to write at short notice and warn his readers against a special danger.
We are reminded of the intention expressed in 2 Peter i. 12—15.
ἐπαγωνίζεσθαι : not common in the sense of defending, which is its
meaning here. Plutarch (quoted by Mayor) speaks of the philosopher
Cleanthes ἐπαγωνιζόμενος τῇ ἐκπυρώσει, i.e. defending the Stoic doctrine
of the destruction of the world by fire.
τῇ ἅπαξ παραδοθείσῃ τοῖς ἁγίοις πίστει. ἅπαξ ‘once for all,” cf. v. 5
and Heb. vi. 4. παραδοθείσῃ, compare the Pauline use in 1 Cor. xi. 2,
2 Thess. ii. 15, and the παραθήκη of 1 Tim. vi. 20. ἁγίοις. Bodies of
Christians are called ἅγιοι in Acts ix, 32, 41 (at Lydda and Joppa),
1 Cor. xvi. 1 ete.
πίστει. Here not the act of believing but the truths believed.
Paul preached the faith, τὴν πίστιν, which once he used to destroy
(Gal. i. 23). The phrase belongs to a time when a creed (of however
simple a kind) was delivered to converts by their teachers: a con-
fession of faith which they were required to repeat in public at the
time of their baptism.
4. παρεισεδύησαν κιτιλ. It is here that the parallelism with
2 Peter begins most obviously. To comment upon the matter common
to the two Epistles would be to repeat the notes on 2 Peter. I shall
therefore only call attention to selected points.
προγεγραμμένοι. Not “ predestinated’’ but predicted by Enoch
(v. 14) and others.
38 ST JUDE [4—
χάριτα μετατιθέντες els ἀσέλγειαν. By making Christian liberty an
excuse for licence. Cf. Rom. vi. 1, 1 Peter ii. 16.
ἀρνούμενοι. Perhaps by teaching, as many Gnostics did, that Jesus
was a mere man upon whom a heavenly spirit, Christ, descended
at His baptism, leaving Him before or at the Passion. (In the
apocryphal Gospel of Peter the cry of our Lord on the Cross is
given in this form, ‘‘My Power, My Power, why hast thou forsaken
me?”) Or else by the doctrine that the God of creation (ὁ μόνος
δεσπότης) was not the supreme God.
5. Jude’s first example of sin and punishment is not used in
2 Peter, probably because it seemed too vague and obscure. It is
indeed somewhat difficult. The general sense is like that of the
passage 1 Cor. x. 1—11. In that we are reminded how Israel was
delivered, and nourished in the wilderness (1—4) ; and how for all
that they sinned and were punished (5—11). The same theme recurs
over and over again in Ps. Ixxviii. The special sin which Jude has in
mind seems to be Israel’s want of faith when the spies brought back
reports of the Promised Land (τοὺς μὴ misredcavras). But no good
explanation of the words τὸ δεύτερον has been suggested. They are
less emphatic, and therefore less awkward, if we are allowed to read
(with δὲ 68 and several versions) κύριος ἅπαξ λαὸν σώσας. With the
text before us I see no other reasonable rendering but to take τὸ
δεύτερον as simply equivalent to ὕστερον, ‘‘afterwards”: but no
authority has been cited for such a use. There are other points of
uncertainty about the text of this verse which it is worth while to
note: for εἰδότας ἅπαξ πάντα NKL and others read εἰδ. ὑμᾶς (which
Mayor adopts), B has eid. ὑμᾶς ἅπαξ and for κύριος (read by NCKL etc.)
AB 13 and four versions read ’Incods (see further Introd.). This was
interpreted by some Fathers, e.g. Jerome, as signifying Joshua (who,
of course, in Greek and Latin is called Jesus). But the subject of
both this and the next verse is the same, and Joshua cannot be the
subject of v. 6. If Jude did write ᾿Ιησοῦς, it was not without a
recollection of Joshua. The identity of name appealed to many
early Christian writers.
6. On the source see Introd. p. xlvii.
7. ὅμοιον τούτοις, 1.6. the false teachers.
8. μέντοι, however, “in spite of these warnings” (Mayor).
ἐνυπνιαζόμενοι. This probably refers to the pretended revelations
of the false teachers, who laid claim to a special inspiration. Cf.
Deut. xiii. 1. In what follows, Jude sums up their conduct: they
are of loose life, and rebellious against constituted authority. See on
2 Peter ii. 10.
12] NOTES 39
9. For the matter see Introd. p. xli.
κρίσιν βλασφημίας -- βλάσφημον κρίσιν 2 Pet, ii. 11 (cf. James i. 25
ἀκροατὴς ἐπιλησμονῆς) not ‘‘an accusation of blasphemy,” but cf.
Field ad loc.
10. Corresponds to 2 Peter ii. 12 but in that place is differently
turned, Here φυσικῶς means by instinct: and it is said of the false
teachers that they come to ruin (φθείρονται) by means of the
knowledge—and that a contemptible sort of knowledge—which they
possess, while they speak evil of what they do not understand—
perhaps primarily of the spiritual world—édéas βλασφημοῦσιν v. 8,
11. Of the three examples of sin punished which Jude uses 2 Peter
only adopts one, Balaam. Cain is perhaps chosen as an instance of
one who defied the simplest and most obvious laws of God by murder,
or else as having consulted only his own natural instincts in choosing
an offering for God. Balaam is chosen as having prostituted the
prophetic gift for gain (and the false teachers made money one of
their objects). Korah rebelled against divinely appointed authority.
The phrase used of Balaam is not lucid. πλάνῃ is susceptible of
two meanings, active, in the sense of deceiving others, and passive,
in the sense of being deceived. ἐξεχύθησαν is used of indulging un-
restrainedly in pleasure: Ecclus. xxxvii. 29 μὴ ἐκχυθῇς ἐπ᾽ ἐδεσμάτων.
The whole sentence may be paraphrased: they have let themselves go
in the deceiving course of Balaam, for gain. We learn what is meant
by the deceit of Balaam from Rev. ii. 14 ‘‘thou hast there some that
hold the doctrine of Balaam, who taught Balak to put a stumbling
block before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols
and to commit fornication.” The laxity of the false teachers is here
again in Jude’s mind.
12. οὗτοί εἰσιν recurs again in vv. 16, 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.
(i. 10 etc.), Rev. vii. 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 v. 16, and as I think
also in v.19. In these two places he quotes the Assumption of Moses ;
perhaps he is doing so in τ, 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 iii, 46 κλῶντές τε κατ᾽ οἶκον
40 ST JUDE be
dprov, and of the abuses and confusion which sometimes occurred in
connexion with it, in 1 Cor. xi. 18sqq. 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, @ 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 (1. 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. Ezek. xxxix. 8 (Westcott and Hort) ἐβόσκη-
σαν οἱ ποιμένες ἑαυτούς.
The similes employed by Jude in νυ. 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 x.7.A. 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 ἀποθανόντα : 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.
18. κύματα «.7.A. Of. Isa. lvii. 20. ““ΤῊΘ wicked are like the
troubled sea when it cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt ”
(Mayor).
ἐπαφρίζοντα, casting up their own shame, exposing it, as the sea
22] NOTES 41
casts up refuse on the beach. Moschus Idyll. v. 5 (ἁ δὲ θάλασσα
κυρτὸν ἐπαφρίζῃ) is the only author quoted for the rare verb.
ἀστέρες πλανῆται, on this see Introd. p. xlvii.
ols ὁ ζόφος κιτιλ. Notice that these words are applied in 2 Peter
with far less appropriateness to the waterless springs and driven
clouds.
14,15. On the quotation from Enoch see Introd. p. xlvi.
16. Largely from the Assumption of Moses : see Introd. pp. xliv, xlv.
17. We find several examples in N.T. (e.g. Acts xx. 29, 1 Tim. iv.,
2 Tim. iii. etc.) of predictions of false teaching and wickedness in the
Christian body, but not of mockers, as here. Jude need not be re-
ferring to a written document, but to a spoken warning often uttered
(ἔλεγον) by the Apostles. But see above on 2 Peter iii. 3. The
mockers, teaching as they did the lawfulness of many lax practices,
would deride those who held the stricter view.
19. ἀποδιορίζοντες, making distinction, saying “stand aside, touch
me not: I am holier than thou.” In the Introd. p. xlv I suggest
that this again is an allusion to the Asswmption of Moses. The false
teachers would claim possession of special knowledge in divine things.
Ψυχικοί, sensual. 1 Cor. ii. 14 a ψυχικὸς ἄνθρωπος does not receive
the things of the Spirit of God, xv. 44 σπείρεται σῶμα ψυχικόν, ἐγείρεται
σῶμα πνευματικόν. James iii, 15 speaks of a wisdom which is ἐπίγειος,
ψυχική, δαιμονιώδης. There it is definitely the opposite of mvev-
ματικός.
πνεῦμα μὴ ἔχοντες, though doubtless they claimed to possess it in a
special degree.
20. ἐποικοδομοῦντες... πίστει. Polycarp’s letter to the Philippians
(iii. 2) seems to contain a reminiscence of this (Bigg and Mayor).
“If you study the epistles of the blessed Apostle Paul, δυνηθήσεσθε
οἰκοδομεῖσθαι εἰς τὴν δοθεῖσαν ὑμῖν πίστιν." St Paul often uses the
metaphor of building, notably in Eph. ii. 20 sqq. The solidarity of
the brotherhood is contrasted with the divisions introduced by the
ἀποδιορίζοντες.
πίστει, used very much as in v. 8.
ἐν πνεύματι ἁγίῳ προσευχόμενοι, cf. Eph. vi. 18 προσευχόμενοι ἐν
παντὶ καιρῷ ἐν πνεύματι. :
21. προσϑεχόμενοι τὸ ἔλεος as Symeon in Luke ii. 25. Cf. Titus
li. 18 προσδεχόμενοι THY μακαρίαν ἐλπίδα κ.τ.λ.
22, 28. He abruptly returns to the thought of the false teachers
suggested perhaps by the words ἑαυτοὺς τηρήσατε, ‘keep yourselves,”
‘And what about your relation to others? what is your duty to
‘them?”
42 ST JUDE [22—
I have discussed the reading in Introd. pp. lvi, lvii, and prefer that
which gives three clauses.
22. ods μὲν ἐλέγχετε διακρινομένους. A.V. reads διακρινόμενοι and
translates ‘‘making a difference” which is only correct as a rendering
of διακρίνοντες. διακρινόμενος in James i. 6 means ‘‘ wavering,
doubting,” and this gives a good sense here. ‘‘Some you must
convince when they are wavering.” The alternative rendering is ‘‘ when
they dispute with you,” and this has support from v. 9 of this
Epistle.
ods δὲ σώζετε ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζοντες. The idea is that of a brand
plucked out of the burning, which occurs in Amos iv. 11 (coupled
with a reference to Sodom and Gomorrah: ef. Jude 7) and also in
Zech. iii. 2 of the High Priest Joshua (cf. Jude 9, where the words
ἐπιτιμήσαι σοι Κύριος are taken by Westcott and Hort as referring to
the same verse in Zech.).
23. οὖς δὲ ἐλεᾶτε ἐν φόβῳ, μισοῦντες κιτ.λ. In the reference to the
garment there may be again a recollection of Zech. iii., where the
High Priest is clad in filthy garments.
The threefold division marks a growth of danger. The first class
of those who have come under the influence of the false teachers are
waverers. These the faithful are to dispute with, and convince. The
next are in the fire and must be snatched out. The third cannot be
touched without danger: perhaps all that can be done is to pity
them.
24,25. The beautiful ending of the Epistle grows naturally out of
the preceding words. The thought of the fate that attends those
who have gone astray leads to a prayer that the faithful may be
preserved in their faith. Compare the opening words with Rom.
xvi. 25.
ἀπταίστους only here in N.T., but the verb rralw occurs in 2 Peter
i. 10 οὐ μὴ πταίσητέ ποτε in a very similar connexion: also in James
ii. 10, iii. 2.
στῆσαι κατενώπιον x.7.A. The thought of Col. i, 22 is very like
this: παραστῆσαι ὑμᾶς ἁγίους καὶ ἀμώμους Kal ἀνεγκλήτους κατενώπιον
αὐτοῦ, εἴ γε ἐπιμένετε τῇ πίστει. Compare also Eph. i. 4 εἶναι ἡμᾶς
ἁγίους καὶ ἀμώμους κατενώπιον αὐτοῦ ἐν ἀγάπῃ. These two passages—
certainly the last—refer to the present life. Jude is speaking of the
future.
ἐν ἀγαλλιάσει. The substantive occurs in the Greek fragment of
Enoch, v. 2 ‘‘ the years of their joy πληθυνθήσεται ἐν ἀγαλλιάσει."
25. μόνῳ θεῷ σωτῆρι ἡμῶν, cf. τὸν μόνον δεσπότην v.4, Rom. xvi. 27.
Θεὸς σωτήρ occurs in the Magnificat Luke i. 47 and in 1 Tim. i. 1,
25] NOTES 43
ii. 3, iv. 10. μόνῳ perhaps emphasized because false teachers held
that the God of the Jews, the Creator, was distinct from the true God.
διὰ Ἴ. X. (cf. Rom. i. 8) is best taken with what follows, ‘glory
to God through Jesus Christ,” not ‘‘ God, our Saviour through Jesus
Christ.” In 1 Pet. iv. 11 it is said ‘‘that God may in all things be
glorified through Jesus Christ.”
μεγαλωσύνη occurs several times in the Greek fragment of Enoch
but in N.T. only in Heb. i. 3 “sat down on the right hand of the
majesty on high.”
ἐξουσία, cf. Rev. xii. 10 ἄρτι ἐγένετο ἡ σωτηρία καὶ ἡ δύναμις καὶ ἡ
βασιλεία τοῦ θεοῦ ἡμῶν καὶ ἡ ἐξουσία τοῦ χριστοῦ αὐτοῦ, which however
is a statement of what has happened, not an ascription of praise.
It does not occur elsewhere in doxologies (Mayor), though δύναμις
and ἰσχύς do,
πρὸ παντὸς τοῦ αἰῶνος stands by itself: we have πρὸ τῶν αἰώνων in
1 Cor. ii. 7, and in Prov. viii. 23 Wisdom says ‘‘ God founded me πρὸ
τοῦ αἰῶνος."
εἰς πάντας τοὺς αἰῶνας again is a unique variant of the ordinary εἰς
τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων.
GENERAL INDEX
TO THE INTRODUCTION AND NOTES
Agape 39
Ahikar, story of 28
Angels, erring xlvii
Apocalypse, see Baruch, Peter
Apocalyptic literature xxxii
Apocryphal Books xiv sqq., xxvi,
xxxii, xl sqq.
Aristides, Apology xvili
Athenagoras xxxix
Baruch, Apocalypse of lviii
Bigg, Dr C. vi and notes passim
Bradshaw, H. lv
Brotherhood 12
Caleb xliii sqq.
Carpocratians li n.
Cassiodorus xviii
Ceriani xlii
Cerinthus xlix
Charles, R. H. xlii, xlv
Chase, Dr xx, xxxviii, 36, 39
Cleanthes 37
Clement of Rome 16, 29
**2nd Epistle”? 29, 35
Clement of Alexandria xviii,
XXxix
Deissmann, Dr xxv n.
Demas -and Hermogenes lii
De Zwaan lili, ly, lvi, 30
Didache xxxviii
Domitian xxxvii
Egyptian versions liv, 10
Eldad and Medad, Book of 29
-Enoch, Book of xiv, xlv sqq.
Epistles, study of ix, x
Esdras, 4th Book 17
Kusebius xviii, xix, xxxix
False teachers in 2 P. and Jude
xlvili sqq.
Field, Dr 14
Fire, Destruction of the world
by 30, 34
Firmilian xix
Gnostics 1
Grotius xxi
Hegesippus xxxvii
Heresy and Heretics xlviii sqq.,
19
Hermas, Shepherd of 18
Hippolytus xviii
Hort, Dr lv sqq.
Hymenaeus and Philetus lii
Hystaspes, Book of 35
Ignatius 10
Irenaeus xxi
James, in N.T. 36
Jerome xix
John, Acts of 1
Josephus
relation to 2 P. xxv
quoted 9, 17
Joshua xliii, 12, 38
Jude, Ep. of
connexion with 2 P. x
explanation of xii
author xxxvii
descendants of xxxvii
date xxxvii
external evidence xxxix
contents xxxix
false teachers in xlviii
use of apocryphal writings
xl sqq.
INDEX 45
Jude, Ep. of—continued
MSS. and Versions liii
corruptions in text liv sqq.
Text 6
Notes 36
Latin Versions xx
Levi, Testament of 16
Lyons and Vienne, Letter of
Churches xviii
Maccabees, 3rd Book of 22
Manuscripts liii
Vatican (B) xx
Mark, origin of Gospel 15
Mayor, J. B. vi, xxii sqq., Xxx,
notes passim
Methodius xix
Michael xliii sq.
Millennium 31
Moschus 40
Moses, Assumption of xiv, xv,
xli sqq., 24, 41
Muratorian Canon xxi, xxxviii
Nicolaitanes 1, li
Origen xix, xxxix
Orpheus Lithica 40
Orphic mysteries xxvii, 28
Pastoral Epistles li
Paul, Acts of lii
allusion to Paul in 2 P. xxviii,
33
Perpetua, Passion of xxi
Peter
Acts of xxxi, 17
Apocalypse of xviii, xxvi sqq.,
17, 23, 31
Gospel of xxx, 38
Legend of Domine quo vadis 15
Preaching of xxx, 16
lst Epistle, relation to 2 P.
Xxi sqq.
2nd Epistle
connexion with Jude x, xii
external evidence xix
segs 2nd Epistle—continued
relation to 1 Ῥ, xxii
to other writings, Josephus,
etc. XXV
vocabulary xxii
date xxvii
is it a forgery? xxxii
contents xxxiv
corruptions in text
false teachers in xlviii
Text 1
Notes 9
Philo xxv, 34
Philoxenian Syriac xx
Plato 11
Polycarp, Ep. and Martyrdom
xxxvli, 41
Polycrates 32
Prophecy, 17, 18
Rabbinic citations 24, 29
Sahidie version liv, 10
Samael xliii sq.
Sibylline oracles 22, 32, 34, 35
Simon 9
Simon Magus xlix
Solomon, Psalms of 24
Wisdom of xxvii
Stars, erring xlvii
Stoic view of the end of the
world, 34
Stratonicea, inscription at xxv n.
Symeon 9
Syriac versions xx, liii
Tertullian xxi, xxxix
Theophilus of Antioch xviii,
Xxxix
Versions xx, xxxix, liii
Vienne and Lyons, Letters of
Churches xviii
Zechariah 42
Zoker and James, descendants of
Jude xxxvii
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