Garry W. Trompf, «The Epistle of Jude, Irenaeus, and the Gospel of Judas», Vol. 91 (2010) 555-582
A detailed case that the New Testament Epistle of Jude was written against the socalled Cainite sectaries, who were in possession of a Gospel of Judas as Irenaeus attests is presented here. Because the names Judas and Jude were the same, the good name of Iouda, especially as being that of a relative to Jesus, needed clearing, and subversive teachings — making Cain, Judas and other Biblical figures worthy opponents of the (Old Testament) god — had to be combatted. Since a Gospel of Judas has come to light, within the newly published Tchacos Codex, one is challenged to decide whether this was the gospel appealed to by the Cainites, and, if it was, to begin to grasp how they read a text which did not readily match their interests.
JUDAS 573
THE EPISTLE JUDE, IRENAEUS, GOSPEL
OF AND THE OF
their new faith (some of the reasons being predictable, including
disappointment with over-renunciant approaches to the body and
sex, eating and possessions, and also hurts that arose from not con-
forming to majority pressures). One can easily visualize, further,
disaffected former disciples drawing on outside (“paganâ€) support
to undercut the “wholesome basis†of the new Christian way of life.
Even Jude can hardly be said to have neglected this paganic factor,
if indeed his vivid description “wild waves of the sea, casting up the
foam (epaphrizonta) of their own shame†(v. 13) touches on the
birth of Aphrodite, or the cult of love and sensuality so popular in
Asia Minor at the time 53. The overall effect would be to produce
“ anti-Biblical †energies, as De Faye once dubbed them 54, or more
accurately, as with the extollers of Cain and Judas we are dis-
cussing, the turning of the positive message of the Bible against
itself. This negativity could in fact amount to rejecting the role of
Christ altogether — “disowning (arnoumenoi) Jesus Christâ€, as Jude
says of the troubling murmurers in a technical-looking way (vv. 4b ;
cf. 2 Pet 2,1), just as Origen took the Cainites to have done (Contr.
Cels., iii,13 finis). Going this far in the “Way of Cain†made attrac-
tive sense if Judas, at least as some of the sect’s members said,
acted very well with his betrayal because “Christ was wicked†(Epi-
phanius, Panar. XXXVIII,iii,3). Satan would certainly then become
a central power to be evoked, not just as one barring Moses from
heaven (Jude 8-9) but in being the master, even “father†of Cain 55.
Before drawing any conclusions about the origins of “Satanismâ€,
however (though this is an interesting issue in its own right), it is
important to note that the strategy of subversion utilizes the Biblical
text, indeed is in that sense taking it seriously, if against itself.
So arguing J.P. OLESON, “An Echo of Hesiod’s Theogony vv. 190-192 in
53
Jude 13â€, NTS 23 (1976-1977) 334-341. For the cult of Aphrodite in the first two
centuries CE, see esp. J. REYNOLDS, Aphrodisias and Rome (JRS Monograph
1; London 1982); S. FRIESEN, Imperial Cults and the Apocalypse of John.
Reading Revelation in the Ruins (Oxford 2001) ch. 5. Jude’s images of envi-
ronment dryness before that seem to be inspired by 2 Pet 2,17, and they are
inexplicable except as vivid elaborations of a more focussed polemic.
DE FAYE, Gnostiques, ch. 3.
54
See GRANT, Gnosticism, 103-104. Cf. for background, pseudo-Jonathan,
55
Tg. Gen. 4, with comments by V APTOWITZER, Kain und Abel in der Agada
.
(Wien 1922) 117. I leave it as a possibility that Saklas was the Cainite name for
Satan.