THE PROPHECY of JUDE, and the BOOK of ENOCH

I would like to ask a question, pose a position. The common use of Jude 14-15, as I have heard it for many years; is an application to the fulfillment of that prophecy in the first century. As I read Jude I see that starting in verse 5 Jude sets out to show God's willingness to judge as a warning to the first century readers who would witness the judgment in 70 A.D. He shows this willingness to judge by recounting past events of God's judgment.

5. I will therefore put you in remembrance, though ye once knew this, how that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that believed not.

(PAST EVENT)

6. And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day.

(PAST EVENT)

7. Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.

(PAST EVENT)

8. Likewise also these filthy dreamers defile the flesh, despise dominion, and speak evil of dignities.

9. Yet Michael the archangel, when contending with the devil he disputed about the body of Moses, durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but said, The Lord rebuke thee.

(PAST EVENT)

10. But these speak evil of those things which they know not: but what they know naturally, as brute beasts, in those things they corrupt themselves.

11. Woe unto them! for they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying of Core.

(PAST EVENT)

12. These are spots in your feasts of charity, when they feast with you, feeding themselves without fear: clouds they are without water, carried about of winds; trees whose fruit withereth, without fruit, twice dead, plucked up by the roots;

13. Raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever.

In light of this list of past accounts of God's judgment; how is it our hermeneutic switches to a future event? What is it in the context that changed to make verses 14-15 future events when the entire context leading up to it is a listing of PAST EVENTS?

In considering this, read Deuteronomy 33:2.

"And he (Moses) said, The LORD came from Sinai, and rose up from Seir unto them; he shined forth from mount Paran, and he came with ten thousands of saints: from his right hand went a fiery law for them."

Is this quote from Deuteronomy not a fulfillment of what ENOCH prophesied? We must recognize that Jude did not make the prophesy, he merely quoted the ancient prophecy. I believe that this prophecy was well known by the patriarchs (Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and even Moses), when Moses quotes (paraphrased) Enoch's prophesy in Deuteronomy I believe he is declaring to the nation that this prophesy is about to come to pass in the conquering of the promised land at the hand of Joshua and the "Ten Thousands of (Old Covenant) Saints".

Read verses 14 and 15 of Jude again with this in mind. I believe we are looking at another in the list of recounted PAST EVENTS of God's willingness to judge the ungodly.

14. And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints,

15. To execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.

Let me know what you think.

For many folks, a conclusion is simply
the place where they got tired of thinking.