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Jud_1:12. A further description of these false teachers; comp. 2Pe_2:13; 2Pe_2:17.
οὗτοί εἰσιν [ οἱ ] ἐν ταῖς ἀγάπαις ὑμῶν σπιλάδες ] In the reading οἱ , ὄντες is either, with de Wette, to be supplied; thus: “these are they who are σπιλάδες in your ἀγάπαις ;” or οἱ is to be joined to συνευωχούμενοι (comp. Jud_1:16; Jud_1:19; so Hofmann). That by ἀγάπαις the love-feasts are to be understood, is not to be doubted. Erasmus incorrectly takes it as = charitas, and Luther as a designation of alms.
The word σπιλάδες is usually explained = cliffs (so also formerly in this commentary). If this is correct, the opponents of Jude are so called, inasmuch as the love-feasts were wrecked on them (de Wette-Brückner, Wiesinger), i.e. by their conduct these feasts ceased to be what they ought to be; or inasmuch as they prepared destruction for others, who partook of the love-feasts (Schott and this commentary). It is, however, against this interpretation that σπιλάς does not specially indicate cliffs, but has the more general meaning rocks (Hofmann: “projecting interruptions of the plain”), and the reference to being wrecked is not in the slightest degree indicated.[35]
Stier and Fronmüller take ΣΠΙΛΆΔΕς as = ΣΠῖΛΟΙ , 2Pe_2:13; this is not unwarranted, as ΣΠΙΛΆς , which is properly an adjective (comp. ΣΠΟΡΆς , ΦΥΓΆς , ΛΟΓΆς ), may be derived as well from ΣΠῖΛΟς = filth (comp. Γῆ ΣΠΙΛΆς = clayey soil; so Sophocles, Trach. 672, without γῆ ), as from ΣΠΊΛΟς = a rock (comp. ΠΟΛΥΣΠΙΛΆς ). In this case ΣΠΙΛΆΔΕς may either be taken as a substantive = what is filthy, spots (these are spots in your agapé; so Stier and Fronmüller), or as an adjective, which, used adverbially (see Winer, p. 433), denotes the mode and manner of συνευωχεῖσθαι (so Hofmann). The former construction merits the preference as the simpler.
Apart from other considerations, ΣΠῖΛΟΙ ΚΑῚ ΜῶΜΟΙ in 2 Peter are in favour of taking ΣΠΙΛΆΔΕς here in the sense of ΣΠῖΛΟΙ .
ΣΥΝΕΥΩΧΟΎΜΕΝΟΙ ] The verb ΕὐΩΧΕῖΣΘΑΙ [36] has not indeed by itself a bad meaning, signifying to eat well, to feast well, but it obtains such a meaning here by the reference to the agapé. The συν placed before it may either refer to those addressed, with you, see 2Pe_2:13, where ὑμῖν is added to the verb (Wiesinger, Schott, Fronmüller, Hofmann); or to those here described by Jude, feasting together, i.e. with one another. Against the first explanation is the objection, that according to it the εὐωχεῖσθαι in their agapé would render those addressed also guilty (so formerly in this commentary); but against the second is the fact that the Libertines held no special love-feasts with one another, but participated in those of the church. The passage, 2Pe_2:13, is decisive in favour of the first explanation.
The connection of ἀφόβως is doubtful; de Wette-Brückner, Arnaud, Schott, Fronmüller unite it with συνευωχούμενοι ; Erasmus, Beza, Wiesinger, Hofmann, with ἑαυτοὺς ποιμαίνοντες . In this commentary the first connection was preferred, “because the idea συνευωχ . would otherwise be too bare.” This, however, is not the case, because if the verse is construed, as it is by Hofmann, it has its statement in what goes before; but if σπιλάδες is taken as a substantive, as it is by Stier and Fronmüller, then συνευωχ . is more precisely determined by the following ἀφόβως … ποιμαίνοντες , whilst it is said that they so participate in the agapé that their feasting was a ἀφόβως ποιμαίνειν ἑαυτούς . Erasmus takes the latter words in a too general sense: suo ductu et arbitrio viventes; Grotius, Bengel, and others give a false reference to them after Eze_34:2, understanding “that these feed themselves and not the church” (comp. 1Pe_5:2), and accordingly Schneckenburger thinks specially on the instructions which they engage to give; but this reference is entirely foreign to the context. According to de Wette, it is a contrast to “whilst they suffer the poor to want” (1Co_11:21); yet there is also here no indication of this reference.
νεφέλαι ἄνυδροι ] is to be understood no more of the agapé (de Wette, Schott), but generally. νεφ . ἄνυδρ . are light clouds without water, which therefore, as the addition ὑπὸ ἀνέμων παραφερόμεναι makes prominent, are driven past by the wind without giving out rain; comp. Pro_25:14. This figure describes the internal emptiness of these men, who for this reason can effect nothing that is good; but it seems also to intimate their deceptive ostentation[37]; the addition serves for the colouring of the figure, not for adducing a special characteristic of false teachers; Nicolas de Lyra incorrectly: quae a ventis circumferuntur i. e. superbiae motibus et vanitatibus.
In the parallel passage, 2Pe_2:17, two images are united: πηγαὶ ἄνυδροι καὶ ὁμίχλαι ὑπὸ λαίλαπος ἐλαυνόμεναι .
According to the reading περιφερόμεναι , the translation would be: “driven hither and thither;” παραφερόμεναι denotes, on the other hand, driven past. A second figure is added to this first, by which the unfruitfulness (in good works) and the complete deadness of these men are described; in the adjectives the gradation is obvious.
δένδρα φθινοπωρινά ] are not a particular kind of trees, such as only bare fruit in autumn, but trees as they are in autumn, namely, destitute of fruit (de Wette-Brückner, Wiesinger, Schott, etc.). It is arbitrary to desert the proper meaning of the word, and to explain φθινοπωρινά according to the etymology of φθίνειν by arbores quarum fructus perit illico = frugiperdae (Grotius; so also Erasmus, Beza, Carpzov, Stier. “which have cast off their fruit in an unripe state”).
ἄκαρπα ] not: “whose fruit has been taken off” (de Wette), but “which are without fruit” (Brückner). Whether they have had fruit at an earlier period, and are now destitute of it, is not said. “The impassioned discourse proceeds from marks of unfruitfulness to that of absolute nothingness” (de Wette). δὶς ἀποθανόντα ] Beza, Rosenmüller, and others arbitrarily explain δίς by plane, prorsus. Most expositors retain the usual meaning; yet they explain the idea twice in different ways; either that those trees are not only destitute of fruit, but also of leaves (so Oecumenius, Hornejus, and others); or that they bear no fruit, and are accordingly rooted out; or still better, δίς is to be referred to the fact that they are not only fruitless, but actually dead and dried up.[38] That Jude has this in his view, the following ἐκριζωθέντα shows. Several expositors have incorrectly deserted the figure here, and explained this word either of twofold spiritual death (Beza, Estius, Bengel, Schneckenburger, Jachmann, Wiesinger, Schott), or of death here and hereafter (so Grotius: neque hic bonum habebunt exitum, neque in seculo altero), or of one’s own want of spiritual life and the destruction of life in others. All these explanations are without justification. ἐκριζωθέντα is in close connection with δὶς ἀποθανόντα ; thus, trees which, because they are dead, are dug up and rooted out;[39] thus incapable of recovery and of producing new fruit (Erasmus: quibus jam nulla spes est revirescendi). This figure, taken from trees, denotes that those described are not only at present destitute of good works, but are incapable of producing them in the future, and are “on this account rooted out of the soil of grace” (Hofmann). It is incorrect when Hofmann[40] in the application refers δὶς ἀποθανόντα to the fact that those men were not only in their early heathenism, but also in their Christianity, without spiritual life. There is no indication in the context of the distinction between heathenism and Christianity. Arnaud observes not incorrectly, but too generally: tous ces mots sont des métaphores énergiques pour montrer le néant de ces impies, la légèreté de leur conduite, la stérilité de leur foi et l’absence de leurs bonnes oeuvres.
[35] The explanation of Arnaud: les rochers continuellement battus par les flots de la mer et souillés par son écume (after Steph.: σπιλάς ), is unsuitable; since, when the Libertines are called cliffs, this happens not because they are bespattered and defiled by others, but because others are wrecked on them.
[36] An explanation of this word is found in Xenophon, Memorabilia, lib. iii.: ἔλεγε (namely, Socrates) δὲ καὶ ὡς τὸ εὐωχεῖσθαι ἐν τῇ Ἀθηναίων γλώττῃ ἐσθίειν κάλοιτο . Τὸ δὲ εὐ προσκεῖθαι , ἔφη ἐπὶ τῷ ταῦτα ἐσθίειν , ἅτινα μήτε τὴν ψυχὴν , μήτε τὸ σῶμα λυποίη , μήτε δυσεύρετα εἴη ; ὥστε καὶ τὸ εὐωχεῖσθαι τοῖς κοσμίως διαιτμωένοις ἀνετίθει . However, εὐωχεῖσθαι sometimes occurs in classical Greek in a bad sense.
[37] Calvin: vanam ostentationem taxat, quia nebulones isti, quum multa promittunt, intus tamen aridi sunt. Bullingcr: habent enim speciem doctorum veritatis, pollicentur daturos se doctrinam salvificam, sed veritate destituuntur et quovis circumaguntur doctrinae vento.
[38] Fromnüller, incorrectly: “trees which have at different times suffered fatal injury by frosts or from insects.”
[39] Fronmüller, linguistically incorrect: “trees which still remain in the earth, but which are shaken loose by their roots.”
[40] “If, when they became Christians, a fresh sap from the roots, by which they were rooted in the soil of divine grace, appeared to establish them in a new life out of their heathen death in sin, yet this new life was to them only a transition into a second and now hopeless death.”