In my recent post on the Nephilim, I briefly cited the Epistle of Jude, the penultimate book of the New Testament, and one of the shortest books (only 25 verses) in the entire Bible. Jude is an interesting inclusion in the canon of the New Testament for a variety of reasons. It’s main claim to credibility is that it purports to be written by “Jude (Judas)… brother of James” (Jude 1:1) – since the James referred to was supposedly Jesus’ own brother, this would make Jude the “Judas” mentioned in Mark 6:3:

“Is he [Jesus] not the carpenter, the son of Mary, and the brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon?”

In other words, ladies and gents, what we have here is a letter written by one of Jesus’ own siblings – a man who would have grown up with the Lord and spent substantial time in His company. What better credentials could there be for inclusion in the Bible?

Note, however, that the author of Jude never claims to be related to Jesus. Why would he establish his relationship with his brother James, but not mention that he was actually related to the Son of God? If you were a blood relative of Jesus, and wanted your views attended to by your brother’s fanbase, would you not be tempted to play up your credentials as a bona-fide member of Clan Christ? Maybe Jude is the humble type, although the tone of his writing suggests otherwise… More likely, the early Christians who put the New Testament together simply got the wrong Jude – verse 17 (“remember ye the words which were spoken before of the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ”) shows that the author was writing in the post-Apostolic era, which would make it impossible for him to have been one of the Twelve Disciples (as listed in Luke 6:14-16).

Another reason for dating Jude substantially later than Jesus immediate family is verse 9. Here, Jude mentions the dispute between Archangel Michael and the devil over Moses body – in Jewish folklore, the devil tries to steal Moses body, but is prevented from doing so by the angel. Origen, Gelasius and other Church Fathers cite as the source of this verse a text called the Assumption of Moses, which, they assume, had been in circulation since ancient times. However, the partial text we have of the Assumption clearly describes events in the first century, and can be dated to around 70-75 CE at the earliest. If Origen and the other Fathers are correct, and Jude is indeed quoting from the Assumption of Moses, then his Epistle cannot have been written much earlier than the mid-70s, making him a contemporary of the Gospel-writer Mark. Given the short life-expectancy at the time, it’s pretty unlikely that one of Jesus siblings would have been around forty years after the Crucifixion – any that were would have been well into their dotage.

To further confuse the canonists, Jude quotes a couple of times from the Book of Enoch (Jude 1:6,14-15), which had already been established as non-canonical (although it was, and still is, included in the Bible of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church). It was not a habit of the early Church to allow books which were not on its approved list into Scripture, and quoting from one of these non-standard texts was a pretty surefire way to get your submission handed back with a lot of red pen marks. One of the main reasons for rejecting the Epistle of Barnabas from the New Testament was that author’s use of Enoch as a source, so it’s curious that Jude made it in uncut. Clearly the writer’s nepotistic name-dropping in verse 1 had more than a few people fooled.

Jude, then, is an odd little addition to the Christian reading list, and as a result is probably one of the least-read books of the Bible. It’s worth a quick skim, though, partly for its brevity (it’s always good to find a book of the Bible that can be read in under a minute) but mostly for its excellent language, which is entertainingly hyperbolic and contains a fluid yet hectic passion. Take a couple of minutes to soak it up – then make your own mind up as to why it got voted in.