Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Jude 1:13
Raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever.
13. raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame ] Image follows on image to paint the shameless enormities of the false teachers. In this we trace an echo of the thought, though not of the words, of Isa 57:20. The same image meets us, though in a milder form, and to express a different type of spiritual evil, in Jas 1:6. The Greek word for “shame” is in the plural, as indicating the manifold forms of the impurity of the false teachers.
wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever ] The latter words are parallel to 2Pe 2:17. The word for “wandering stars” is that which in the terminology of astronomy distinguishes the “planets” from the fixed stars. Here, however, the ordered regularity of planetary motion supplies no fit point of comparison, and we may probably see in the words a reference either to comets or shooting stars, whose irregular appearance, startling and terrifying men, and then vanishing into darkness, would present an analogue to the short-lived fame and baleful influence of the false teachers whom St Jude has in view. They too were drifting away into the eternal darkness.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Raging waves of the sea – Compare 2Pe 2:18. They are like the wild and restless waves of the ocean. The image here seems to be, that they were noisy and bold in their professions, and were as wild and ungovernable in their passions as the billows of the sea.
Foaming out their own shame – The waves are lashed into foam, and break and dash on the shore. They seem to produce nothing but foam, and to proclaim their own shame, that after all their wild roaring and agitation they should effect no more. So with these noisy and vaunting teachers. What they impart is as unsubstantial and valueless as the foam of the ocean waves, and the result is in fact a proclamation of their own shame. Men with so loud professions should produce much more.
Wandering stars – The word rendered wandering ( planetai) is that from which we have derived the word planet. It properly means one who wanders about; a wanderer; and was given by the ancients to planets because they seemed to wander about the heavens, now forward and now backward among the ether stars, without any fixed law. – Pliny, Nat. Hist. ii. 6. Cicero, however, who saw that they were governed by certain established laws, says that the name seemed to be given to them without reason. – De Nat. Deo. ii. 20. So far as the words used are concerned, the reference may be either to the planets, properly so called, or to comets, or to ignes fatui, or meteors. The proper idea is that of stars that have no regular motions, or that do not move in fixed and regular orbits. The laws of the planetary motions were not then understood, and their movements seemed to be irregular and capricious; and hence, if the reference is to them, they might be regarded as not an unapt illustration of these teachers. The sense seems to be, that the aid which we derive from the stars, as in navigation, is in the fact that they are regular in their places and movements, and thus the mariner can determine his position. If they had no regular places and movements, they would be useless to the seaman. So with false religious teachers. No dependence can be placed on them. It is not uncommon to compare a religious teacher to a star, Rev 1:16; Rev 2:1. Compare Rev 22:16.
To whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever – Not to the stars, but to the teachers. The language here is the same as in 2Pe 2:17. See the notes at that verse.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Jud 1:13
Raging waves of the sea.
The character and doom of the wicked
The scope of the apostle in all these similitudes is to show that these seducers were nothing less than what they pretended to be: clouds, but dry, barren clouds; trees, but such as bore either none or rotten fruit; waves, that seemed to mount up unto heaven, and to promise great matters, as if they would swallow up the whole earth, but being dashed against a rock, all this raging and swelling turneth into a little foam and froth.
1. From the scope observe that spiritual boasters will certainly come short of their great promises. All is but noise, such as is made by empty vessels.
2. But let us a little examine the force of the words. The whole similitude alludeth to what is said of wicked men in general (Isa 57:20). Observe that they are waves, which noteth their inconstancy (Gen 49:4). Water, you know, is movable, soon furled, and driven to and fro by the winds; so were these (Eph 4:14). Note thence that seducers are unsettled and uncertain in their opinions (2Pe 3:16). Why? Because they are not rooted and grounded in their profession, but led by sudden affection and interests rather than judgment; they are unstable because unlearned; such as do not proceed upon clear and certain grounds. Well, then, discover them by their levity; you will never have comfort and certainty in following them who, like weathercocks, turn with every wind. Waves of the sea. There you have their restless activity, they are always tossed to and fro (Jer 49:23). They are acted by Satan, who is a restless spirit. Raging waves of the sea. There you have their turbulency; they fill all places with troubles and strifes. Why? Because they are urged by their own pride and vanity, and have lost all restraints of modesty, and are usually, as to their constitution, of violent and eager spirits. Well, then, be not borne down with impudence and rage; there may be daring attempts and much resolution in an ill cause. The next expression is foaming out their own shame, as a raging sea casteth up mire and dirt; or it alluded to that scum and froth which the waves leave upon the rocks, and so it noteth the abominableness of their opinions and practices. So errors come in like a raging wave, as if they would bear all before them, but they go out like foam and froth, in scorn and infamy. Well, then, observe the fruitless-ness of all Satans attempts. We come now to the next similitude, wandering stars. It may be taken two ways–properly or improperly.
(1) Properly, for the stars which we call planets, or wandering, though indeed no stars wander less than they do; they have their name from the opinion and common judgment of sense, because they are not carried about the whole circuit of the heavens, but in a shorter orb and course.
(2) Improperly; there are a second sort of wandering stars, which Aristotle calleth running and gliding stars; not stars indeed, but only dry exhalations inflamed, which glare much and deceive the eye with an appearance of light, but soon vanish and are quenched. Now these glancing, shooting stars do excellently express the quality of these seducers, who pretended great knowledge, being therefore called Gnostics, and gave out themselves for illuminate and profound doctors, but were various and uncertain in their motions, and soon extinguished and obscured. The guides of the Lords people should be stars, but not wandering, gliding stars. These seducers pretended to be stars, and great lights of the Church, but were indeed wandering stars, and such as did seduce and cause to err.
1. Stars they should be–
(1) In regard of the light of doctrine (Mat 5:14).
(2) In regard of the lustre of their conversations.
It is said of all Christians (Php 2:15) that they should shine as lights in this world; they are the bright part of the world, as the stars are the shining part of heaven; as the star directed the wise men to Christ, so they must shine to light others by their example to Him. Alas! we are but dim lights; we have our spots and eclipses, but this sets the world a-talking.
2. They must not be gliding, falling stars; that is charged upon these seducers. A false teacher and a falling star symboliseth in three respects–
(1) It is but a counterfeit star; so is he an angel of light only in appearance (2Co 11:14). A true Christian should covet more to be than to seem to be; to be light in the Lord before he is a light in the world.
(2) In respect of the uncertainty of its motion. Falling stars are not moved with the heavens, but with the motion of the air, hither and thither, and so are no sure direction. So are they inconstant in the doctrines which they teach, running from opinion to opinion; vagabond lights, that seduce, not direct, as meteors mislead travellers out of the way.
(3) In regard of the fatal issue. A wandering star falleth to the ground, and becometh a dark slime and jelly; so their pretences vanish at length, and they are found to be those that were never enlightened and fixed in the firmament of God; counterfeits cannot last long; we see stars shoot in the turn of an eye, and Satans instruments fall from heaven like lightning. Well, then, for a guide to heaven, choose a star, but not a wandering star. New light is admired, but it should be suspected rather. True stars have influences; they do not only enlighten and fill you with notions, but enflame and stir you to practice. The last clause of the text is, to whom is reserved blackness of darkness for ever.
In this threatening three things are notable–
(1) The dreadfulness of the punishment;
(2) the sureness;
(3) the suitableness of it.
1. The dreadfulness, in two circumstances–
(1) The nature of it;
(2) the duration of it.
(a) The nature of it, the blackness of darkness. It is a Hebraism for exceeding great darkness, called in the gospel outer darkness, as being furthest from God, the fountain of life and glory, and so expressing that extreme misery, horror, and torment which is in hell. Well, then, let us not begin our hell ourselves, by shunning Gods presence, by preferring carnal pleasures before the light of His countenance, by remaining in the night or darkness of ignorance or error, by darkening the glory of our holy profession through scandalous living, by sinning against conscience, and so providing food for the gnawing worm, or matter of despair to ourselves to all eternity.
(b) The next thing is the duration, the blackness of darkness for ever. The torment prepared for the wicked is everlasting (Mar 9:44). This is the hell of hell, that, as the torments there are without measure, so without end. Here they might have life and would not, and now would have death, and cannot (Rev 20:10).
2. So much for the terribleness of the judgment; now, secondly, let us consider the sureness of it: it is reserved. Hell torment is sure, prepared, kept for the wicked (Mat 25:1-46). Carnal men may lord it abroad for a while, and ruffle and shine in worldly pomp, but the blackness of darkness is kept for them.
3. Observe the suitableness of the judgment to the sin; he saith darkness, not fire. Clouds that darken the truth are justly punished with the mists of darkness for ever (2Pe 2:17). They that would quench the true light are cast into eternal darkness. (T. Manton.)
Wandering stars.
Wandering stars
Dean Alford, with many other commentators, says, These words, wandering stars, mean comets, which astonish the world for a while and then pass away into darkness. The Bible takes up this thought about comets, or wandering stars, and applies it to certain kinds of people. Let us trace some of the features of similarity.
I. In the first place, some folk are very much like comets in that there is not much substance in them.
II. Notice, that some people are like comets in that they are easily swayed out of their orbits. The metaphor applies to unstable men, driven hither and thither by temptations, whose life presents the strongest kind of contrast to the safe, well-ordered life of Christians, more fixed, like the orbit of a planet.
(a) Young friends, keep to your orbit of purpose. Have an aim and stick to it. Many a life goes to waste and ruin simply because, like an abandoned and drifting vessel, or a wandering star, no guiding purpose directs its course.
(b) More important, young friends, keep to your orbit of right. Let no Jupiter attraction sway you out of it.
III. Notice, again, that comets grow brighter as they get near the sun and darker as they go away from it. So do we all grow more bright and beautiful as we get near to Christ, and darker as we go from Him.
IV. Notice, lastly, that some comets are truly wandering stars. As unstable, disrupted ruins, they are hastening forward to a final darkness. Surely this is very suggestive of the sad ending of sin. To die in ones sins is the darkest of deaths. (G. B. F. Hallock.)
The blackness of darkness for ever.–
Outer darkness
You have been out in a very dark night, when you could not see an inch before you, and the whole world seemed blotted out of existence. I dare say you thought that there could be no darkness deeper than that. And yet the darkest night that any one has ever seen is not the blackness of darkness to which the apostle alludes; for there is some light mixed with it–light which other creatures can see, such as cats and owls, though you cannot. The stars are shining all the time, and their rays are piercing through the universal gloom and lighting it up, so that it is not so dense as it would otherwise be. We know nothing of the blackness of darkness–darkness without light; darkness in blank, empty space. There is one spot in the visible universe that can in some measure enable us to realise the awful conception of Jude. When Sir William Herschel examined the southern part of the starry heavens on one occasion with his huge telescope, he noticed in the constellation of the Scorpion–the eighth sign of the Zodiac, into which the sun enters about the 23rd of October–a particular dark spot; and he was very much startled and said, There is certainly a hole in the heavens there. There was in that spot a total absence of any star, or gleam of light such as elsewhere, in countless myriads, overspread the entire firmament. His son Sir John was some time afterwards at the Cape of Good Hope as Astronomer Royal, and with the same telescope, in the clear atmosphere of South Africa, he looked up at the same spot in the starry sky, and saw that his father was correct. He was, indeed, looking at a hole in the heavens, where no mortal eye with any instrument that the highest skill could devise could detect one solitary glimmer of far-off light. It is into outer darkness like that that lost souls are cast which have separated themselves from God and refused to obey His law of love and light. Human beings cannot bear darkness. There are some creatures that love it–that hide themselves under stones and in dark corners of the earth. But man was made for the light, and therefore dreads darkness more than anything else. God has given to us this instinctive fear of darkness because it is injurious to us, except during the short time that it is necessary to aid and deepen our sleep at night, which may be said to be a kind of death. He meant us to dread it and avoid it, and to live in the light. I said that in this world it is impossible to get out of the reach of light. In the natural world God has placed the orbit of our earth amid regions that are continually lit up with the light of suns and stars everywhere. And so too in the spiritual world God has placed your sphere and orbit in a region of light. The Sun of Righteousness shines upon you always. You cannot get beyond the reach of Gods light. Behind the gloom in which you bury yourself by conscious and wilful sin, He works to bring you out of the darkness into His own marvellous light. God wishes you in His own light to see light upon all the great things that concern your immortal welfare. He wishes you to walk in the light, for He knows that darkness is your greatest enemy; for darkness means the loss of power to use the organs of life, the loss of enjoyment in the bright and beautiful world which He has made for your happiness, and, if carried to an extreme, the loss of life itself. Have you ever seen a root, say a potato, or a dahlia root, sprouting in a dark cellar? What a brittle, feeble, monstrous growth does it produce; the semblance of a plant, without sap, or strength, or beauty–a white, death-like ghost! But even that feeble abortive effort to grow is caused by the small quantity of light that finds its way into the darkest cellar, and cannot be shut out. But supposing that you could exclude the light altogether, and make the place absolutely dark, then not only would the root of the plant make no effort to grow, but it would wither and die away altogether; it would lose the life that it had. Complete darkness is fatal to all life. And so, hiding yourself from the light of God that shines all around you, loving darkness rather than light, because your deeds are evil, you become like blind fishes–you lose some faculty or power of your soul. You make yourself blind to the things that belong to your peace. You deprive yourself of much that is fitted to bless and ennoble your life. But separating yourself from God altogether, you would lose the life itself of your soul. Your living soul would become a dead, inanimate thing, without a pulse of love or a glow of hope. It would be all darkness–not the darkness cast by the shadow of Gods presence, but the utter, deathly darkness of the absence of God. You would wander out of the region of Gods light, out of the Milky Way of Gods gracious influences, into outer darkness, where Dantes terrible words would be realised to the full, All hope abandon, ye who enter here. Does not the thought of that awful blackness of darkness for ever urge you to cry for the light, to come to the light, to ask God to lighten your eyes lest you sleep the sleep of death–to walk in the light while you have the light? (H. Macmillan, D. D.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 13. Raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame] The same metaphor as in Isa 57:20: The wicked are like the troubled sea, when it cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt. These are like the sea in a storm, where the swells are like mountains; the breakers lash the shore, and sound like thunder; and the great deep, stirred up from its very bottom, rolls its muddy, putrid sediment, and deposits it upon the beach. Such were those proud and arrogant boasters, those headstrong, unruly, and ferocious men, who swept into their own vortex the souls of the simple, and left nothing behind them that was not indicative of their folly, their turbulence, and their impurity.
Wandering stars] . Not what we call planets; for although these differ from what are called the fixed stars, which never change their place, while the planets have their revolution round the sun; yet, properly speaking, there is no irregularity in their motions: for their appearance of advancing, stationary, and retrograde, are only in reference to an observer on the earth, viewing them in different parts of their orbits; for as to themselves, they ever continue a steady course through all their revolutions. But these are uncertain, anomalous meteors, ignes fatui, wills-o’-the-wisp; dancing about in the darkness which themselves have formed, and leading simple souls astray, who have ceased to walk in the light, and have no other guides but those oscillating and devious meteors which, if you run after them, will flee before you, and if you run from them will follow you.
The blackness of darkness] They are such as are going headlong into that outer darkness where there is wailing, and weeping, and gnashing of teeth. The whole of this description appears to have been borrowed from 2Pet. 2, where the reader is requested to see the notes.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Raging waves of the sea; not only inconstant as water, but unquiet, turbulent, restless, that cannot cease from sin.
Foaming out their own shame; that wickedness whereof they should be ashamed; like the troubled sea, when it cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt, Isa 57:20.
Wandering stars; either planets properly called, or rather meteors called running stars, inconstant in their motion, uncertain in their shining, making a little show, but presently vanishing; such was the doctrine of these, which had a show of light, but a deceitful and inconstant one.
To whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever; the thickest darkness, viz. that of hell; they would be counted lights, but are themselves cast into utter darkness, 2Pe 2:17. As blackness of darkness shows the horror of their punishment, so its being reserved for them shows the certainty of it.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
Raging wild. Jude has in mind Isa57:20.
shame plural in Greek,shames (compare Phi3:19).
wanderingstars instead of moving on in a regular orbit, as lights to the world,bursting forth on the world like erratic comets, or rather, meteorsof fire, with a strange glare, and then doomed to fall back againinto the blackness of gloom.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Raging waves of the sea,…. False teachers are so called, for their, swelling pride and vanity; which, as it is what prevails in human nature, is a governing vice in such persons, for knowledge without grace puffs up; and this shows that they had not received the doctrine of grace in truth, for that humbles; as also for their arrogance, boasting, and ostentation; and for their noisiness, their restless, uneasy, and turbulent spirits, for their furious and wrathful dispositions; as well as for their levity and inconstancy, and for their turpitude and filthiness:
foaming out their own shame: wrathful words, frothy and obscene language, and filthy doctrines; and which expresses the issue of their noisy and blustering ministry, which ends in uncleanness, shame, emptiness, and ruin.
Wandering stars; they are called “stars”, because they have the appearance of such, and blaze for a while, in seeming light, zeal, and warmth, and in fame and reputation; and “wandering” ones, not comparable to the planets, which go their regular course, but to fiery exhalations, gliding and running stars; because they wander about from house to house, as well as from one nation to another, and being never settled in their principles, nor at a point in religion; and wander also after their own carnal lusts, and cause others to wander likewise, and at last become falling stars; not from real grace and sanctified knowledge, which they never had; but from truth to error, and from a seemingly holy life and conversation, to a vicious one; and from a profession of religion, to open profaneness; and whose fall is irrecoverable, as that of stars:
to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever; or the blackest darkness, even utter darkness; which phrase not only expresses the dreadful nature of their punishment, their most miserable and uncomfortable condition; but also the certainty of it, it is “reserved” for them among the treasures of divine wrath and vengeance, by the righteous appointment of God, according to the just demerit of their sins; and likewise the duration of it, it will be for ever; there will never be any light or comfort, but a continual everlasting black despair, a worm that dieth not, a fire that will not be quenched, the smoke and blackness of which will ascend for ever and ever; hell is meant by it, which the Jews represent as a place of darkness: the Egyptian darkness, they say, came from the darkness of hell, and in hell the wicked will be covered with darkness; the darkness which was upon the face of the deep, at the creation, they interpret of hell e.
e Shemot Rabba, sect. 14. fol. 99. 3.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
Wild waves ( ). Waves (Mt 8:24, from , to swell) wild (from , field, wild honey Mt 3:4) like untamed animals of the forest or the sea.
Foaming out (). Late and rare present active participle of , used in Moschus for the foaming waves as here. Cf. Isa 57:20.
Shame (). Plural “shames” (disgraces). Cf. Php 3:19.
Wandering stars ( ). “Stars wanderers.” , old word (from ), here alone in N.T. Some refer this to comets or shooting stars. See Isa 14:12 for an allusion to Babylon as the day-star who fell through pride.
For ever ( ). The rest of the relative clause exactly as in 2Pe 2:17.
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
Raging [] . Rev., wild, which is better, as implying quality rather than act. Waves, by nature untamed. The act or expression of the nature is given by the next word.
Foaming out [] . Only here in New Testament. Compare Isa 57:20.
Shame [] . Lit., shames or disgraces.
Wandering stars. Compare 2Pe 2:17. Possibly referring to comets, which shine a while and then pass into darkness. “They belong, not to the system : they stray at random and without law, and must at last be severed from the lights which rule while they are ruled” (Lumby).
Blackness [] . See on 2Pe 2:4.
Of darkness [ ] . Lit., “the darkness,” the article pointing back to the darkness already mentioned, ver. 6.
Fuente: Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament
1) “Raging waves of the sea” (Greek kumata agria thalasses) waves wild of the sea – high, furious, uncontrolled, bouncing, dashing, rolling, tumbling.
2) “Foaming out their own shame” These religious saboteurs could not control their tongues, temperaments, passions, and spirits because they were slaves of demon spirits. Like white caps of waves in a storm, like a glassy-eyed mad-dog with foaming phobia snapping at everything that moved before them, these pious do-gooders, once in the flock of God, showed their colors by their evil and vicious words. They were like the raving lunatic of the insane asylum, the demented, the deranged. Paul wrote “The spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets”. 1Co 14:32. It is only prophets of the devil, demon possessed prophets, who cannot control themselves -foaming out their own shame. This is why John wrote, “Try the spirits . . . because many false prophets are gone out into the world.” 1Jn 4:1.
3) “Wandering stars” (Greek planetai) meaning stars “unstable”, that move about, guide no mariner, or help no traveler, unstable, undependable, that can’t be trusted, either for light or guide. They soon burn out, fade away, leaving the world little better than before.
4) “To whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever” These unstable stars are demon spirits personified in the living flesh of the apostate men who crept in among the sanctified to whom Jude wrote. These unstable stars seem to be demons embodied in false prophets, whose destinies are already sealed, Mat 25:41. They dart from one human to another, seeking a dwelling place; they have a (Greek tereov) – guarded or reserved doom of eternal darkness to which they are chained or fixed, (Rev 20:10). Until that hour of final concealment in hell, however, it is a sobering and fearful truth that Christians must encounter these wandering, unstable stars, demons, and resist them in wicked religious and irreligious men (Rev 12:4; Rev 12:7-9; 1Ti 4:1-2).
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
13. Raging waves of the sea. Why this was added, we may learn more fully from the words of Peter: [2Pe 2:17 ] it was to shew, that being inflated with pride, they breathed out, or rather cast out the scum of high-flown stuff of words in grandiloquent style. At the same time they brought forth nothing spiritual, their object being on the contrary to make men as stupid as brute animals. Such, as it has been before stated, are the fanatics of our day, who call themselves Libertines. You may justly say that they make only rumbling sounds; for, despising common language, they form for themselves an exotic idiom, I know not what. They seem at one time to carry their disciples above heaven, then they suddenly fall down to beastly errors, for they imagine a state of innocency in which there is no difference between baseness and honesty; they imagine a spiritual life, when fear is extinguished, and when every one heedlessly indulges himself; they imagine that we become gods, because God absorbs the spirits when they quit their bodies. With the more care and reverence ought the simplicity of Scripture to be studied, lest, by reasoning more refinedly than is right, we should not draw men to heaven, but on the contrary be involved in manifold labyrinths. He therefore calls them wandering stars, because they dazzled the eyes by a sort of evanescent light.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
13. Raging waves Savage, as if alive, full of furious purpose and power.
Their own shame The plural shames. The image, like that of Isaiah, “casting up mire and dirt;” the shames being their own brutal dogmas and feelings flung forth in shameless words.
Wandering stars Unknown to modern astronomy, but too well known in both ancient and modern moral experience. They are neither comets nor shooting stars; but ocularly meteors, conceptually, stars swinging from their positions, drifting from their orbits, and lawlessly wandering in space. These errorists, probably, once had position and orbits, but are veering farther and farther from the light.
Blackness of darkness An intenser expression in the English than the original. Substitute in place of blackness, murkiness, gloom. But Gardiner remarks, that the former of these two terms “is a Homeric word for the darkness of the infernal regions, and is even put for the world itself of future woe.” As the meteoric star conceptually loses itself in distant and hopeless darkness, so these living wanderers will drift into a returnless destiny of ruin.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Jud 1:13 “wandering stars” Comments – In ancient astronomy, these wandering stars were the planets that continually moved through the constellations. They had no place in the sky that was reserved for them. No constellation called them their own. They wandered in the dark skies continually.
As these planets wandered from one gathering of stars to another, so do these ungodly men wander from one group of believers to another. They belong to no particular congregation. They look like believers, just as the planets at first appear to be stars. However, with careful observation, one can see that they do not belong.
We read in 1Ti 4:1 about “deceiving spirits with doctrines of devils” The Greek word “deceiving” used in this verse is ““planos” ( ), from which we get the English word “planet.” By its very position in the sky, a planet is deceptive. Imagine ancient sailors fixing their sights upon a “wandering star” by mistake instead of a fixed star. This would cause them to gradually drift off course without suspecting a problem and eventually become shipwrecked.
Jud 1:14 And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints,
Jud 1:14
I Enoch 60:7-9, “And on that day were two monsters parted, a female monster named Leviathan, to dwell in the abysses of the ocean over the fountains of the waters. But the male is named Behemoth, who occupied with his breast a waste wilderness named Duidain, on the east of the garden where the elect and righteous dwell, where my grandfather was taken up, the seventh from Adam , the first man whom the Lord of Spirits created.”
I Enoch 93:3, “And Enoch began to recount from the books and said: ‘ I was born the seventh in the first week , While judgment and righteousness still endured.’”
Jud 1:14 “prophesied of these, saying” – Comments – This could be the dative case in the Greek and read, “prophesied to these.” Thus, Enoch preached in his day to his contemporaries about the coming of God’s judgment. So this prophecy was both to Enoch’s generation, as well as to us today in the Church age. Enoch was looking both to the flood and beyond to the great Judgment Day of the Lord.
YLT, “And prophesy also to these did the seventh from Adam–Enoch–saying, `Lo, the Lord did come in His saintly myriads,”
Jud 1:14 “Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints” Word Study on “ten thousand” Strong says the Greek word “ten thousand” ( ) (G3461) means, “a ten-thousand, by extension, a myriad or indefinite number.”
Comments The Lord will come with a countless host of saints. Other New Testament verses state that the saints will appear with Jesus Christ at His Second Coming (Col 3:4, 1Th 3:13).
Col 3:4, “When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory .”
1Th 3:13, “To the end he may stablish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints .”
Many scholars believe that these verses support the teaching that the rapture of the Church will take place before the Tribulation period since the saints will need to be in Heaven when Jesus appears at the end of this seven year tribulation period.
Jud 1:15 Comments – In this passage, judgment is based upon two things: a man’s words and a man’s deeds. Note:
Mat 12:34, “O generation of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things ? for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.”
Jud 1:14-15 Comments Enoch – Enoch was considered the holiest man of the pre-flood era of the Holy Bible. Jud 1:14-15 is a quote from a combination of passages from the book of 1 Enoch, particularly 1 Enoch (Jud 1:9).
I Enoch Jud 1:9, “And behold! He cometh with ten thousands of His holy ones To execute judgment upon all, And to destroy all the ungodly: And to convict all flesh Of all the works of their ungodliness which they have ungodly committed, And of all the hard things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him.”
It is an apocalyptic work long lost, but recovered in modern times in Abyssinia. The book of 1 Enoch is also referred to in the ancient Jewish writing called The Book of Jubilees, which was written a few centuries before Christ Jesus was born. This writing says that Enoch wrote a book after God revealed to him the future in a vision of his sleep.
“And in the eleventh jubilee [512-18 A.M.] Jared took to himself a wife, and her name was Baraka, the daughter of Rasujal, a daughter of his father’s brother, in the fourth week of this jubilee, [522 A.M.] and she bare him a son in the fifth week, in the fourth year of the jubilee, and he called his name Enoch. And he was the first among men that are born on earth who learnt writing and knowledge and wisdom and who wrote down the signs of heaven according to the order of their months in a book, that men might know the seasons of the years according to the order of their separate months. And he was the first to write a testimony and he testified to the sons of men among the generations of the earth, and recounted the weeks of the jubilees, and made known to them the days of the years, and set in order the months and recounted the Sabbaths of the years as we made (them), known to him. And what was and what will be he saw in a vision of his sleep, as it will happen to the children of men throughout their generations until the day of judgment; he saw and understood everything, and wrote his testimony, and placed the testimony on earth for all the children of men and for their generations.” ( The Book of Jubilees 4.16-20) [38]
[38] The Book of Jubilees, translated by R. H. Charles, in The Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament in English With Introductions and Critical and Explanatory Notes to the Several Books, vol 2, ed. R. H. Charles, 1-82 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1913), 19.
Although the authorship and date of 1 Enoch is unknown, it may have been written by the Essenes about a century before Christ. Thus, Jude was obviously familiar with this some of this Jewish apocalyptic literature, and held in high enough regard as to quote it in his writings.
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
Jud 1:13. Raging waves of the sea, The word , raging or wild, is applied to such herbs or trees as grow up of themselves in the desarts or mountains, by way of opposition to those which are in gardens, or cultivated by the care and industry of man. So several animals are called , wild, to distinguish them from those which are tame, or manageable by man: and because wild fruits are more bitter and less mild; and wild animals commonly less gentle than others, hence the word, by a metaphor, is used for any thing that is intractable, fierce or raging; accordingly here, and Wis 14:1 the word is used for the intractable and enraged waves of a stormy sea; and the corrupt Christians are compared to those troubled unmanageable waves, to intimate their restless, turbulent temper and behaviour among their brethren. See Eph 4:14.foaming out their own shame, that is, “as the raging waves of a tempestuous sea cast out foam, and mire, and dirt; so they, out of their wicked hearts, cast forth wicked words and actions, proclaiming aloud their vices, and glorying in those filthy deeds of darkness, of which they ought to have been ashamed.” The apostle seems to have had his eye upon the words of Isa 57:20. See also Rom 6:21. Php 3:19. He adds, Stars that are planets, or that wander. The Jews used to call those who took upon them to be teachers, by the name of stars; and the same word is applied to teachers in the Christian church, Rev 1:20. But those false teachers were only planets or wandering stars. There are several interpretations of this phrase: some, by wandering stars, understand those vapours which run along the surface of the earth, called ignes fatui, or false and delusive lights: this would have well suited the delusive light of those false teachers, as it is described by Milton, in his Paradise Lost, b. 9: 50: 634, &c. But the grand objection to this interpretation is, that those delusive vapours are never called stars. Some understand by wandering stars, the comets; which may be so called, though that is not the most usual sense of the phrase; for by , stars that are planets, the Greeks most commonly meant those five wandering stars which we call planets, (they knew of no more,) all which are dark bodies in themselves, and are perpetually in motion from place to place; in both which things they probably differ from the fixed stars: and the false teachers might be compared to them as they were dark in themselves, and as unsteady and wandering from truth and holiness. “As the planets (says Doddridge,) seem to have a very irregular motion, being sometimes stationary, and sometimes retrograde, they are proper emblems of persons so unsettled in their principles, and so irregular in their behaviour as these men were.” See Cic. De Nat. Deor. lib. 2: 100: 20 and Parkhurst on the word .
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Jud 1:13 . Continuation of the figurative description of those false teachers. The two images here employed characterize them in their erring and disordered nature.
. . .] Already Carpzov has correctly referred for the explanation of these words to Isa 57:20 ; the first words correspond to the Hebrew ; the following words: , to the Hebrew , only Jude uses the literal word where Isaiah has the figurative expression.
] properly: to foam oJude Jud 1:1 :Luther well translates it: which foam out their own shame.
, not properly vices (de Wette); the plural does not necessitate this explanation, but their disgraceful nature, namely, the shameful which they manifest in their wild lawless life; not “their self-devised wisdom” (Schott).
From the fact that the Hebrews sometimes compared their teachers to the sea (see Moses, theol. Samar., ed. Gesenius, p. 26), it is not to be inferred, with Schneckenburger and Jachmann, that there is here a reference to the office of teachers; this is the more unsuitable as the opponents of Jude hardly possessed that office.
] These two words are to be taken together, wandering stars; that is, stars which have no fixed position, but roam about. The analogy with the preceding metaphors requires us to think on actual stars, with which Jude compares his opponents; thus on comets (Bretschneider, Arnaud, Stier, de Wette, Hofmann) or on planets (so most of the early commentators, also Wiesinger). The latter opinion is less probable, because the of the planets is less striking to the eye than that of the comets. It is incorrect “in the explanation entirely to disregard the fact whether there are such in heaven or not” (so earlier in this commentary, after the example of Schott), and to assume that Jude, on account of their ostentation (Wiesinger, Schott), designates these men as stars, and by indicates their unsteady nature. De Wette incorrectly assumes this in essentials as equivalent with , 2Ti 3:13 . Bengel thinks that we are in this figure chiefly to think on the opaqueness of the planets; but such an astronomical reference is far-fetched. Jachmann arbitrarily explains = , Phi 2:15 , as a designation of Christians. Several expositors also refer this figure to the teaching of those men, appealing to Phi 2:15 and Dan 12:3 ; so already Oecumenius: (Hornejus, and others); but the context gives no warrant for this.
] This addition may grammatically be referred either to what immediately precedes, thus to the , or to the men who have been described by the figures used by Jude. It is in favour of the first reference (Hofmann: “Jude names them stars passing into eternal darkness, comets destined only to vanish”) that a more precise statement is also added to the preceding figure; thus the addition to . . . But it is against it that the expression chosen by Jude is evidently too strong to designate only the disappearance of comets, therefore the second reference is to be preferred (Wiesinger; comp. Jud 1:6 ), which also the parallel passage in 2Pe 2:17 favours. The addition of the genitive to serves to strengthen this idea.
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
13 .] wild waves of the sea, foaming up their own shames (cf. Isa 57:20 , in Heb. and E. V.: “The wicked are like the troubled sea, whose waters cast up mire and dirt,” which beyond doubt has been in the Writer’s mind. , plur., either, each his own , or all their own , disgraces, instances of disgraceful conduct), wandering stars, for whom the blackness of darkness is reserved for ever (cf. 2Pe 2:17 , where nearly the same words occur. would seem most probably to indicate comets , which (as in Oct. 1858) astonish the world for a time, and then pass away into darkness. The similitude would not find any propriety as applied to the planets , properly so called: for there can be no allusion to the astronomical fact of their being naturally opaque bodies, as Bengel imagines. Many Commentators have supposed that the similitude is to be understood of teachers, who would enlighten others, and yet are doomed to darkness themselves: so c., comparing the transformation into an angel of light, 2Co 11:14 . But the context does not justify this. Rather should we say, these professing Christians, by their profession lights in the world, instead of letting that light shine on more and more into the perfect day, are drifting about in strange errors of doctrine and practice till it will be utterly extinguished in eternal darkness).
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
Jud 1:13 . . Cf. Cic. Ad Hercnn. iv. 55, spumans ex ore scelus . The two former illustrations, the reefs and the clouds, refer to the specious professions of the libertines and the mischief they caused; the third, the dead trees, brings out also their own miserable condition; the fourth and fifth give a very fine description of their lawlessness and shamelessness, and their eventual fate. The phrase is found in Wis 14:1 . The rare word is used of the sea in Moschus Jud 1:5 . It refers to the seaweed and other refuse borne on the crest of the waves and thrown up on the beach, to which are compared the overflowings of ungodliness (Psa 17:4 ), the condemned by Jas 1:21 , where see my note. The libertines foam out their own shames by their swelling words (Jud 1:16 ), while they turn the grace of God into a cloak for their licentiousness (Jud 1:4 ). We may compare Phi 3:19 , .
. This is borrowed from Enoch (chapters xliii., xliv.) where it is said that some of the stars become lightnings and cannot part with their new form, ib. lxxx, “In the days of the sinners, many chiefs of the stars will err, and will alter their orbits and tasks, ib. lxxxvi, where the fall of the angels is described as the falling of stars, ib. lxxxviii, “he seized the first star which had fallen from heaven and bound it in an abyss; now that abyss was narrow and deep and horrible and dark and they took all the great stars and bound them hand and foot, and laid them in an abyss,” ib. xc. 24, “and judgment was held first upon the stars, and they were judged and found guilty and were cast into an abyss of fire”; also xviii. 14 f.
It would seem from these passages, which Jude certainly had before him, that cannot here have its usual application, the propriety of which was repudiated by all the ancient astronomers from Plato downwards. Cf. Cic. N. D. ii. 51, “maxime sunt admirabiles motus earum quinque stellarum quae falso vo cantur errantes. Nihil enim errat quod in omni aeternitate conservat motus constantes et ratos,” with the passages quoted in my notes on that book.
Some commentators take it as applying to comets; perhaps the quotations from Enoch xliv and lxxx fit better with shooting-stars, (Arist. Meteor. i. 4, 7) which seem to rush from their sphere into darkness; compare Hermes Trismegistus ap. Stob. Ecl. 1. 478, , , . For the close relationship supposed by the Jews to exist between the stars and the angels, see my note on Jas 1:17 , . In this passage, however, the subject of the comparison is men, who profess to give light and guidance, as the pole-star does to mariners ( , Phi 2:15 ), but who are only blind leaders of the blind, centres and propagators of (Jud 1:11 ), destined to be swallowed up in everlasting darkness. Cf. Rev 6:13 ; Rev 8:10 ; Rev 8:12 ; Rev 9:1 ; Rev 12:4 .
. See the parallel in 2Pe 2:17 , and above Jud 1:6 .
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
Raging = Wild. Greek. agrios. Occurs: Mat 3:4. Mar 1:6.
foaming out. Greek. epaphrizo. Only here.
wandering. Greek. planetes. Only here.
is = hath been.
blackness. Same as “darkness”, Jud 1:6.
for ever. App-151. a.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
13.] wild waves of the sea, foaming up their own shames (cf. Isa 57:20, in Heb. and E. V.: The wicked are like the troubled sea, whose waters cast up mire and dirt, which beyond doubt has been in the Writers mind. , plur., either, each his own , or all their own , disgraces, instances of disgraceful conduct), wandering stars, for whom the blackness of darkness is reserved for ever (cf. 2Pe 2:17, where nearly the same words occur. would seem most probably to indicate comets, which (as in Oct. 1858) astonish the world for a time, and then pass away into darkness. The similitude would not find any propriety as applied to the planets, properly so called: for there can be no allusion to the astronomical fact of their being naturally opaque bodies, as Bengel imagines. Many Commentators have supposed that the similitude is to be understood of teachers, who would enlighten others, and yet are doomed to darkness themselves: so c., comparing the transformation into an angel of light, 2Co 11:14. But the context does not justify this. Rather should we say, these professing Christians, by their profession lights in the world, instead of letting that light shine on more and more into the perfect day, are drifting about in strange errors of doctrine and practice till it will be utterly extinguished in eternal darkness).
Fuente: The Greek Testament
Jud 1:13. , foaming out) swollen through plenty: Isa 57:20.- , wandering stars) It has been ascertained in a more recent age, that planets are of themselves dark (opaque) bodies, shining with borrowed light. St Jude, even at that time, from his divine light, conveyed this meaning. For it is plain, from the subsequent mention of darkness, that the allusion is not merely to the etymological derivation of wandering stars [, Th. , I wander] (although this is also suitable). Comp. 2Pe 2:17. And the same reason shows that it is not to be understood of the ignis fatuus. Aristotle plainly distinguishes between , the stars which appear to dart through the heavens, shooting stars, and , the planets. Book i. Meteor, ch. 4 and 6.-, to whom) As before, in the case of the clouds, trees, and waves, so now to the wandering stars, an appropriate description is added, with reference to the Apodosis.
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
Reciprocal: Exo 10:21 – darkness Num 25:6 – in the sight of Moses 1Sa 2:9 – be silent Job 15:30 – depart Job 18:18 – He shall be driven Job 20:26 – darkness Job 21:30 – the wicked Psa 49:19 – never Psa 88:6 – darkness Psa 88:12 – dark Pro 20:20 – his Pro 23:33 – and Pro 24:20 – candle Pro 25:14 – boasteth Pro 27:8 – man Ecc 7:6 – as Isa 8:22 – look Isa 45:7 – create darkness Isa 47:5 – silent Jer 23:12 – in the Jer 44:25 – Ye and Lam 3:2 – brought Hos 10:7 – the water Joe 2:2 – A day of darkness Amo 5:20 – darkness Mat 8:12 – be cast Mat 22:13 – outer Mat 25:30 – outer Mar 3:29 – but is Mar 9:18 – he foameth Luk 11:26 – and the Luk 12:45 – to eat Joh 8:12 – shall not Joh 15:6 – he Rom 11:10 – their eyes Eph 4:29 – no Eph 5:4 – filthiness Phi 3:18 – many Phi 3:19 – end Col 3:8 – filthy 2Th 1:9 – be Heb 10:39 – we are Jam 1:6 – he 2Pe 2:4 – to be 2Pe 2:17 – are wells 2Pe 2:18 – they speak Rev 8:10 – a great
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Jud 1:13. Raging waves is used because such things make great disturbances but accomplish nothing but threatening appearances. Wandering stars refers to the planets that seem to have no fixed position and these men are like that. Blackness of darkness refers to the “outer darkness” awaiting the wicked.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Jud 1:13. They are at once rocks and waves, wild waves of the sea, which cannot rest, and throw up only mire and dirt (Isa 57:20).
foaming out their own shametheir lusts disgraceful.
wandering stars (comets or meteors, not planets), which neither light the world nor guide the mariner, but after blazing awhile drift into the blackness and darkness which is kept (in reserve) for them, and into which they sink and sink for ever. All that is mischievous, useless, disastrous in sea or land or sky becomes in turn the symbol of the character and the destiny of these bad men. . . . The feasts of charity or of love (Agapae) spoken of in these verses are not strictly the Lords Supper, though it is probable that the observance of the Lords Supper was sometimes connected with them. The historical facts, the use of the pronoun your feasts of love (Jud 1:12), and the customs spoken of in 1 Corinthians 11, all point to a wider meaning. They seem to have been social gatherings of Christians for promoting kindly feeling and helping the poor. Dr. Lightfoot notes (on 1Co 10:16) that the Jews had meetings of this kind at the close of their Sabbath, and found a sanction for them in Deu 12:5; Deu 12:7; Deu 12:12; Deu 14:23-29. Pliny and Tertullian both speak of them, and distinguish them from the simple Eucharist, Pliny apparently (x. 97, 98), and Tertullian certainly. In the fourth century the Council of Carthage forbade the holding of them in the churches; and the transference of the Lords Supper from the evening to the morning originated in part in the abuses to which the blending of the two led.
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
Jdg 1:13. Raging waves of the sea Unstable in their doctrine, and turbulent and furious in their tempers and manners, having no command of their irascible passions. Foaming out their own shame By their wicked and outrageous behaviour, even among their disciples, showing their own filthiness to their great disgrace. The apostle seems here to have alluded to Isa 57:20, The wicked are like the troubled sea when it cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt. Wandering stars , literally, planets, which shine for a time, but have no light in themselves. The Jews called their teachers stars, and Christian teachers are represented under the emblem of stars, Rev 1:20; Rev 2:1. And as the planets seem to have a very irregular motion, being sometimes stationary and sometimes retrograde, they are very proper emblems of persons unsettled in their principles, and irregular in their behaviour, such as these men were. To whom is reserved the blackness of darkness, &c. Who will soon be driven to an eternal distance from the great original of light and happiness, to which they shall never return. Thus the apostle illustrates their desperate wickedness, by comparisons drawn from the air, earth, sea and heavens.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
13. Wild waves of the sea pouring out their own disgrace. Oh, how beautiful the snowy white waves of the ocean. Yet their beautiful white crest is the dark winding sheet of the sailor. These are the popular preachers magnetizing the carnal people by their eloquent speeches, cultured manners, handsome physique, tidy apparel and inimitable urbanity. At the same time they blind their spiritual eyes and lead them to hell. Wandering stars for whom has been reserved the blackness of darkness forever. What an awful metaphor! When a planet deflects from its orbit, it can never get back, but is destined to aberrate further away till it collides with another, and is utterly demolished. You see plainly and unmistakably that the deepest, darkest, blackest and hottest abyss of the pandemonium is reserved for the counterfeit preacher. I have been a preacher forty-three years. I would rather endure any other hell than the preachers. Jude is not indulging in chimerical visions, but awful realities, revealed to him by the infallible Holy Spirit. If it was so in Judes day, when the Church was but a handful, what is it now, when she belts the globe? Doubtless Judas, who sold Jesus for money, has a tremendous following among the clergy of the present day.
Fuente: William Godbey’s Commentary on the New Testament
1:13 Raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering stars, to whom is reserved the {n} blackness of darkness for ever.
(n) Most gross darkness.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
Waves cast up bits of filth and debris on the shore with their foam and flotsam (wreckage, refuse). Similarly the false teachers spread evidence of their uncontrolled immorality and impurity wherever they went (cf. Isa 57:20). This comparison emphasizes ". . . the restless and unrestrained nature of these men." [Note: Hiebert, "An Exposition . . . 12-16," p. 243.]
Some "stars" move about in the sky differently from the other stars. We now recognize these as planets and distinguish them from stars. Similarly the false teachers behaved out of harmony with the other luminaries. The Greek word planetes, which transliterated means "planet," really means wanderer. Long ago stargazers observed that these wanderers across the sky were different from the fixed stars. Likewise the false teachers had gone off course and had led people astray.
Another possible though less likely interpretation is that the reference is to meteors or "shooting stars" that flash across the sky but quickly disappear in darkness. [Note: See Kelly, p. 274, for a refutation of this view.] The "black darkness," away from the Source of light, indicates the eternal punishment of those among them who were not Christians.