11 Woe to them! They have taken the way of Cain; they have rushed for profit into Balaam's error; they have been destroyed in Korah's rebellion. 12 These men are blemishes at your love feasts, eating with you without the slightest qualm—shepherds who feed only themselves. They are clouds without rain, blown along by the wind; autumn trees, without fruit and uprooted—twice dead. 13 They are wild waves of the sea, foaming up their shame; wandering stars, for whom blackest darkness has been reserved forever.
14 Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about these men: "See, the Lord is coming with thousands upon thousands of his holy ones 15 to judge everyone, and to convict all the ungodly of all the ungodly acts they have done in the ungodly way, and of all the harsh words ungodly sinners have spoken against him." 16 These men are grumblers and faultfinders; they follow their own evil desires; they boast about themselves and flatter others for their own advantage.
Dig Deeper
"I can't believe you would do that to us." There was an annual competition between classes at the school at which I taught. The goal of the competition was to collect coins and raise money for charity. Each class competed against one another and it always created a bit of fun as the classes not only competed but strategized to try to outdo the other teams. They did this to the point of engaging in a bit of espionage against one another, and would even entice students from other classes to collude with their class in order to help them win in exchange for a share in the pizza party that the winning class received at the end of the week. The students from my class had, all on their own, convinced a young man from another class to tell them his class' strategy in order to counteract it and defeat them. He had agreed it and provided valuable information. His class was bluffing, trying to convince the other classes that they had a big stash of coins that they were going to drop into their jars on the final day of competition. The reality was, they didn't have much at all. This allowed my class to not worry about that class which we otherwise would have done, and concentrate on putting pennies, which counted as negative to a team's total points, into the jars of classes that were real threats. When the winners were announced and they began to celebrate their win with the pizza party, this young spy was welcomed into the party. A young lady from his class was somewhat miffed, however. She couldn't believe that he would have done that to his own class. He said that he knew his class wasn't going to win and so he wanted some pizza. She went on to call him names, somewhat with a good-nature, but names that made her point (some were more appropriate to the particular situation than others, but she wasn't exactly a history buff). She declared that he was a "Benedict Arnold," a "Hitler," a "snake." Everyone knew what she meant by these titles, because they carry a certain meaning in our culture to the point that they can be used as adjectives and almost everyone will understand the point. Certainly Benedict Arnold, the American traitor during the War for Independence, and snake made the point that he was a traitor. Hitler wasn't really appropriate technically, but even his name has become somewhat synonymous with wronging someone, so it fit somewhat.
As Jude continues to describe the character and natures of the false teachers, he does something very similar to that young lady at my old high school. He uses cultural examples that had become so familiar to everyone in his world that they had virtually become adjectives. Their names now carried much more of the symbolic meaning that had become associated with their previous actions. Thus, just as Hitler and Benedict Arnold have come to mean things that go far beyond the men themselves, such as evil and traitorous, Jude uses three examples from his day to show just what kind of men these false teachers are.
Woe, says Jude, to the false teachers. This was a word usually reserved for the judgment announced on a rebellious people or individuals by the prophet of God. Jude thus invokes the wrath of God on those who would teach the gospel falsely. Jude uses three cultural examples (a pattern of threes which should be quite familiar to us) to demonstrate in clear terms for the people exactly what kind of men these teachers are. They are nothing to be exalted or followed. Rather, they have taken the way of Cain. Cain had become a common cultural symbol for one who murdered his brother, one who corrupted others (Jewish historian Josephus claimed that Cain "inited to luxury and pillage all whom he met, and became their instructor in wicked practices."), as well as a selfish cynic and skeptic (The ancient document, the Jewish Targum presented Cain as believing that "There is no judgment, no judge, no future life; no reward will be given to the righteous, and no judgment will be imposed on the wicked"). Jude, then, makes the point that like Cain, who murdered his brother, the false teachers are murdering the souls of the believers that follow them, as well as corrupting others in the process, and denying the judgment of God. His other two examples continue the assault. They are like Balaam, who had become a notorious example of greed and inciting Israel into pagan practices (compare Num. 25:1-2 and Num. 31:16). They are also like those that were destroyed in Korah's rebellion. Jude makes two points with linking these teachers to Korah's rebellion. Just like those involved, they are engaged in heresy and rebellion against God-appointed leadership, and, he says, they have been destroyed in that rebellion. They will suffer the same fate, but in a sense, because they have gone the way of Korah, they have already been punished with those men. In other words, they are as good as punished; it's a done deal.
Rather than being a part of the body of Christ, loving one another (John 13:34-35), and proclaiming the message of the gospel in the death of Jesus Christ (1 Cor. 11:26), these false teachers have become quite the opposite. They denigrate the very purpose of the love feast and the observance of the Lord's Supper that took place as a part of those feasts in the first century. The words that the TNIV renders "blemishes" also means "hidden reef" and is probably the better understanding. If it is "blemish" then Jude's point is that they are a stain on the fellowship rather than the spotless and blameless individuals that Christians are to be. If it is hidden reef, which seems to be more in line with Jude's context, then he is suggesting that they are like hidden reefs that rip open the bottom of a boat; they lie in wait, with designs of sinking the faithful.
Jude continues on with five more descriptions of these false teachers just so that there can be no misunderstanding what kind of people they were dealing with. They are shepherds who feed only themselves, meaning that rather than being godly leaders and caring for God's people, they were only concerned with their own interests. They are clouds without rain, promising something on things which they do not deliver (cf. Prov. 25:14). They are autumn trees, without fruit and uprooted—twice dead. They had been dead in their sins, but made alive in Christ. Sadly, by rebelling against God's truth, they have returned to their state of spiritual death (cf. Heb. 6:4-8; 2 Pet. 2:18-22). They are wild waves of the sea, foaming up their shame, by which Jude uses concepts from Isaiah 57:20, meaning that they continue to pile up their shameful ways with no end. Finally, Jude says they are wandering stars, for whom the blackest darkness has been reserved forever. Ancient people believed that anything in the sky should display order, so a wandering planet (which they had difficulty in explaining) came to be viewed as something for which there was no pattern, no accounting and was symbolically caused by evil angels (although some believed that literally). Jude may be connecting them again to evil angels, but his primary point is that they are unstable and unreliable. This instability will result in their own judgment.
Jude chooses to strengthen his overall point by turning once again to the ancient book of Enoch. The quote he takes from that writing makes sense for it backs up two things that Jude has claimed about these hucksters. They are ungodly and will suffer the condemnation of the Lord. Further stressing Enoch's righteousness and reliability as a prophet is that he was the seventh, or the complete number, from Adam (Jews often counted inclusively, meaning that Enoch is the seventh if Adam is included in the counting). Enoch clearly, according to Jude, prophesied about the certain destruction of ungodly men, and he makes the connection that these false teachers number among that group, but does not necessarily imply that they are the only ones. They are like the Israelites in the wilderness; they are grumblers and faultfinders; they follow their own evil desires; they boast about themselves and flatter others for their own advantage. They complain against God's leadership and the way that God has chosen to work, following their own fleshly lusts rather than the life of Christ. In fact, rather than following the genuine life of Christ which has everything to do with sacrificing one's own life for the benefit of others (cf. 1 Pet. 2-4), they do everything for their own desires, their own pleasure, and their own advantage. When set up against the genuine life of Christ to which believers are truly called, there simply is no comparison.
Devotional Thought
One of Jude's criticisms of the false teachers was that they made promises and claims on which they did not deliver. Christians, by virtue of our name, claim that we will be followers of Christ that love one another deeply. Do you and your Christians community truly do that in a biblical fashion, or is it closer to a rain cloud without rain?
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