Book of Jude: 'Destroying them that do not believe...'

[Baroness]

Hi everyone! I was just reading through the book of Jude in the New Testament and was quite struck to the heart by some passages. Like verse 5 says " ...the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that believed not."

Reading this made me realise just how important it is to try and strive to live a Christian life. I mean if God firstly saved His called - the Israelites - and then because of their disbelief destroyed them ... wow ... that's something for us to be wary of - if God did that to His people, imagine what He could / would do to us!

Does anyone else have thoughts on the book of Jude?
Or any quotes / links from the Holy Fathers?
Perhaps an Orthodox commentary on this?

Joy in Christ,
Baroness

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

Reading this made me realise just how important it is to try and strive to live a Christian life. I mean if God firstly saved His called - the Israelites - and then because of their disbelief destroyed them ... wow ... that's something for us to be wary of - if God did that to His people, imagine what He could / would do to us!

Does God indeed destroy what is sinful? The above example of the Israelites refers to being continually rebellious against the will of God. And this signifies a conscious & continuous rejection of God's will. In other words what was involved here was not a sin due to ignorance or just fear but rather open rebelliousness.

This in fact is the state continually described in the Old Testament and which the Israelites' path signifies. They find the Promised land and remain in it as long as they at least struggle to remain in God's path. But if they reject this after the continual warnings of the prophets then they find themselves chastised with the exile of being removed from the Promised land.

This also is a sign of the Church. God gives us a way of life which also allows for struggle- for falling and getting back up again; for doubt & faith; for the cross & resurrection. But what is most terrible which Jude the Apostle refers to above is the rebelliousness of the human spirit which after all of God's promises and exhortations still consciously rejects this. As is implied in the rest of Jude's epistle to turn away also often ends up leading others astray. As we can see in contemporary church life this type of sin usually is corporate and ends up creating factions which rise up against the rest of the Church.

Does God chastise such people or do they in effect chastise themselves? God continually allows for certain circumstances that would lead us to humble ourselves & if we reject this we risk falling further into destructive self-will. Through this He hopes that of our own accord we will humble ourselves to follow His way.

It can happen though that evil self-will grows to such an extent that this becomes the dominating part of our personality. Then since we based so much of our ourselves on this self-willed sin Gods' chastisement of it or putting a halt to it indeed seems like a destruction of our whole selves.

The point then is what are we making ourselves into? If we struggle towards God in humble obedience then in time we shall perceive how His chastisement purifies us only of what is sinful. It occurs to us what a loving thing He is doing for us. If we cling only to our own sin however then this massive treasure will be stored up only for destruction and we will see it all go up in smoke one day.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

[Richard David Hawthorn]

Commentary on Jude-

The best I have as far as commentaries on Jude are the volume which includes this epistle from the Ancient Christian Commentary Series by Intervarsity Press and the notes in the Orthodox New Testament by Dormition Skete.

The first is really good but the series does include a few early figures who were not Orthodox but as long as you know "Who's who" it works out. The second (the New Testament" is REALLY good on the notes as virtually every note is a quote from an Orthodox Father but the translation itself is a little choppy and hard for me to get into. I prefer the good old King James version for my NT readings- hey if it was good enough for St. Gregory Palamas it's good enough for me!

In Christ,
Rd. David