Deuteronomy 7:16

Exhortation to Destroy Canaanite Paganism

7:16 You must destroy ¹  all the people whom the Lord your God is about to deliver over to you; you must not pity them or worship ²  their gods, for that will be a snare to you.

Exodus 23:31-33

23:31 I will set ³  your boundaries from the Red Sea to the sea of the Philistines, and from the desert to the River, ⁴  for I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand, and you will drive them out before you.

23:32 “You must make no covenant with them or with their gods. 23:33 They must not live in your land, lest they make you sin against me, for if you serve their gods, it will surely be a snare ⁵  to you.”

Leviticus 18:3

18:3 You must not do as they do in the land of Egypt where you have been living, ⁶  and you must not do as they do in the land of Canaan into which I am about to bring you; ⁷  you must not ⁸  walk in their statutes.

Numbers 33:52

33:52 you must drive out all the inhabitants of the land before you. Destroy all their carved images, all their molten images, ⁹  and demolish their high places.

Jude 1:2-3

1:2 May mercy, peace, and love be lavished on you! ¹⁰ 

Condemnation of the False Teachers

1:3 Dear friends, although I have been eager to write to you ¹¹  about our common salvation, I now feel compelled ¹²  instead to write to encourage ¹³  you to contend earnestly ¹⁴  for the faith ¹⁵  that was once for all ¹⁶  entrusted to the saints. ¹⁷ 

Jude 1:2

1:2 May mercy, peace, and love be lavished on you! ¹⁸ 

Jude 1:15

1:15 to execute judgment on ¹⁹  all, and to convict every person ²⁰  of all their thoroughly ungodly deeds ²¹  that they have committed, ²²  and of all the harsh words that ungodly sinners have spoken against him.” ²³ 

Psalms 106:34-38

106:34 They did not destroy the nations, ²⁴ 

as the Lord had commanded them to do.

106:35 They mixed in with the nations

and learned their ways. ²⁵ 

106:36 They worshiped ²⁶  their idols,

which became a snare to them. ²⁷ 

106:37 They sacrificed their sons and daughters to demons. ²⁸ 

106:38 They shed innocent blood –

the blood of their sons and daughters,

whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan.

The land was polluted by bloodshed. ²⁹ 

Ezekiel 20:28

20:28 I brought them to the land which I swore ³⁰  to give them, but whenever they saw any high hill or leafy tree, they offered their sacrifices there and presented the offerings that provoke me to anger. They offered their soothing aroma there and poured out their drink offerings.

[7:16]  ¹ tn Heb “devour” (so NRSV); KJV, NAB, NASB “consume.” The verbal form (a perfect with vav consecutive) is understood here as having an imperatival or obligatory nuance (cf. the instructions and commands that follow). Another option is to take the statement as a continuation of the preceding conditional promises and translate “and you will destroy.”

[7:16]  ² tn Or “serve” (so KJV, NIV, NRSV).

[23:31]  ³ tn The form is a perfect tense with vav consecutive.

[23:31]  ⁴ tn In the Hebrew Bible “the River” usually refers to the Euphrates (cf. NASB, NCV, NRSV, TEV, CEV, NLT). There is some thought that it refers to a river Nahr el Kebir between Lebanon and Syria. See further W. C. Kaiser, Jr., “Exodus,” EBC 2:447; and G. W. Buchanan, The Consequences of the Covenant (NovTSup), 91-100.

[23:33]  ⁵ tn The idea of the “snare” is to lure them to judgment; God is apparently warning about contact with the Canaanites, either in worship or in business. They were very syncretistic, and so it would be dangerous to settle among them.

[18:3]  ⁶ tn Heb “As the work [or “deed”] of the land of Egypt, which you were dwelling in it, you must not do.”

[18:3]  ⁷ tn Heb “and as the work [or “deed”] of the land of Canaan which I am bringing you to there, you must not do.” The participle “I am bringing” is inceptive; the Lord is “about to” bring them into the land of Canaan, as opposed to their having dwelt previously in the land of Egypt (see the first part of the verse).

[18:3]  ⁸ tn Heb “and you shall not walk.”

[33:52]  ⁹ tn The Hebrew text repeats the verb “you will destroy.”

[1:2]  ¹⁰ tn Grk “may mercy and peace and love be multiplied to you.”

[1:3]  ¹¹ tn Grk “while being quite diligent to write to you,” or “while making all haste to write to you.” Two issues are at stake: (1) whether σπουδή (spoudh) here means diligence, eagerness, or haste; (2) whether ποιούμενος γράφειν (poioumeno" grafein) is to be taken conatively (“I was about to write”) or progressively (“I was writing”). Without knowing more of the background, it is difficult to tell which option is to be preferred.

[1:3]  ¹² tn Grk “I had the necessity.” The term ἀνάγκη (anankh, “necessity”) often connotes urgency or distress. In this context, Jude is indicating that the more comprehensive treatment about the faith shared between himself and his readers was not nearly as urgent as the letter he found it now necessary to write.

[1:3]  ¹³ tn Grk “encouraging.” Παρακαλῶν (parakalwn) is most likely a telic participle. In keeping with other participles of purpose, it is present tense and occurs after the main verb.

[1:3]  ¹⁴ tn the verb ἐπαγωνίζομαι (epagwnizomai) is an intensive form of ἀγωνίζομαι (agwnizomai). As such, the notion of struggling, fighting, contending, etc. is heightened.

[1:3]  ¹⁵ tn Τῇ πίστει (th pistei) here is taken as a dative of advantage (“on behalf of the faith”). Though rare (see BDAG 820 s.v. 3), it is not unexampled and must have this meaning here.

[1:3]  ¹⁶ sn The adverb once for all (ἅπαξ, Japax) seems to indicate that the doctrinal convictions of the early church had been substantially codified. That is to say, Jude could appeal to written documents of the Christian faith in his arguments with the false teachers. Most likely, these documents were the letters of Paul and perhaps one or more gospels. First and Second Peter may also have been among the documents Jude has in mind (see also the note on the phrase entrusted to the saints in this verse).

[1:3]  ¹⁷ sn I now feel compelled instead…saints. Apparently news of some crisis has reached Jude, prompting him to write a different letter than what he had originally planned. A plausible scenario (assuming authenticity of 2 Peter or at least that there are authentic Petrine snippets in it) is that after Peter’s death, Jude intended to write to the same Gentile readers that Peter had written to (essentially, Paul’s churches). Jude starts by affirming that the gospel the Gentiles had received from Paul was the same as the one the Jewish Christians had received from the other apostles (our common salvation). But in the midst of writing this letter, Jude felt that the present crisis deserved another, shorter piece. The crisis, as the letter reveals, is that the false teachers whom Peter prophesied have now infiltrated the church. The letter of Jude is thus an ad hoc letter, intended to confirm the truth of Peter’s letter and encourage the saints to ground their faith in the written documents of the nascent church, rather than listen to the twisted gospel of the false teachers. In large measure, the letter of Jude illustrates the necessity of clinging to the authority of scripture as opposed to those who claim to be prophets.

[1:2]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “may mercy and peace and love be multiplied to you.”

[1:15]  ¹⁹ tn Grk “against” (κατά [kata] + genitive). English usage is satisfied with “on” at this point, but the parallel is lost in the translation to some degree, for the end of v. 15 says that this judgment is meted out on these sinners because they spoke against him (κατά + genitive).

[1:15]  ²⁰ tn Or “soul.”

[1:15]  ²¹ tn Grk “of all their works of ungodliness.” The adverb “thoroughly” is part of the following verb “have committed.” See note on verb “committed” later in this verse.

[1:15]  ²² tn The verb in Greek does not simply mean “have committed,” but “have committed in an ungodly way.” The verb ἀσεβέω (asebew) is cognate to the noun ἀσέβεια (asebeia, “ungodliness”). There is no easy way to express this in English, since English does not have a single word that means the same thing. Nevertheless, the tenor of v. 15 is plainly seen, regardless of the translation.

[1:15]  ²³ sn An apparent quotation from 1 En. 1:9. There is some doubt as to whether Jude is actually quoting from the text of 1 Enoch; the text here in Jude differs in some respects from the extant text of this pseudepigraphic book. It is sometimes suggested that Jude may instead have been quoting from oral tradition which had roots older than the written text.

[106:34]  ²⁴ tn That is, the nations of Canaan.

[106:35]  ²⁵ tn Heb “their deeds.”

[106:36]  ²⁶ tn Or “served.”

[106:36]  ²⁷ sn Became a snare. See Exod 23:33; Judg 2:3.

[106:37]  ²⁸ tn The Hebrew term שֵׁדִים (shedim, “demons”) occurs only here and in Deut 32:17. Some type of lesser deity is probably in view.

[106:38]  ²⁹ sn Num 35:33-34 explains that bloodshed defiles a land.

[20:28]  ³⁰ tn Heb “which I lifted up my hand.”