Jude

"= Judas. Among the apostles there were two who bore this name," "(1) Judas (Jude 1:1; Matt. 13:55; John 14:22; Acts 1:13), called" also Lebbaeus or Thaddaeus (Matt. 10:3; Mark 3:18); and (2) "Judas Iscariot (Matt. 10:4; Mark 3:19). He who is called "the" "brother of James" (Luke 6:16), may be the same with the Judas" surnamed Lebbaeus. The only thing recorded regarding him is in John 14:22.

"The author was "Judas, the brother of James" the Less (Jude" "1:1), called also Lebbaeus (Matt. 10:3) and Thaddaeus (Mark" "3:18). The genuineness of this epistle was early questioned, and" doubts regarding it were revived at the time of the Reformation; but the evidences in support of its claims are complete. It has all the marks of having proceeded from the writer whose name it bears. "There is nothing very definite to determine the time and place at which it was written. It was apparently written in the later "period of the apostolic age, for when it was written there were" persons still alive who had heard the apostles preach (ver. 17). "It may thus have been written about A.D. 66 or 70, and" apparently in Palestine. "The epistle is addressed to Christians in general (ver. 1), and its design is to put them on their guard against the misleading efforts of a certain class of errorists to which they were "exposed. The style of the epistle is that of an "impassioned" "invective, in the impetuous whirlwind of which the writer is" "hurried along, collecting example after example of divine" "vengeance on the ungodly; heaping epithet upon epithet, and" "piling image upon image, and, as it were, labouring for words" and images strong enough to depict the polluted character of the licentious apostates against whom he is warning the Church; "returning again and again to the subject, as though all language" "was insufficient to give an adequate idea of their profligacy," and to express his burning hatred of their perversion of the "doctrines of the gospel." "The striking resemblance this epistle bears to 2 Peter suggests the idea that the author of the one had seen the epistle of the other. "The doxology with which the epistle concludes is regarded as the finest in the New Testament.

After the Captivity this name was applied to the whole of the "country west of the Jordan (Hag. 1:1, 14; 2:2). But under the" "Romans, in the time of Christ, it denoted the southernmost of" "the three divisions of Palestine (Matt. 2:1, 5; 3:1; 4:25)," although it was also sometimes used for Palestine generally (Acts 28:21). "The province of Judea, as distinguished from Galilee and "Samaria, included the territories of the tribes of Judah," "Benjamin, Dan, Simeon, and part of Ephraim. Under the Romans it" "was a part of the province of Syria, and was governed by a" procurator.

Related Bible Dictionary Terms:
Jude Epistle of