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12 [a]They are blemishes at your love feasts, eating with you without fear. They are shepherds who feed only themselves. They are like clouds blown about by winds without giving rain, or like trees in autumn barren and uprooted and so twice dead. 13 They are like wild sea waves whose foam reflects their shameless deeds, or like wandering stars for whom the gloom of darkness is stored up forever. 14 [b]Enoch, in the seventh generation from Adam, also prophesied against them when he said, “Behold, the Lord is coming with tens of thousands of his saints,

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Footnotes

  1. Jude 1:12 Jude now characterizes the false teachers by the use of six graphic metaphors: (1) blemishes at your love feasts: see notes on 1 Cor 11:17-34; 11:27-34; and 2 Pet 2:13; (2) shepherds who feed only themselves: instead of caring for their sheep (see Ezek 34:8-10; Jn 10:12f); (3) clouds blown about by winds without giving rain: the false teachers promise much but give nothing; (4) trees in autumn barren and uprooted and so twice dead: once again, a figure of empty promises; (5) wild sea waves whose foam reflects their shameless deeds: their product is like the foam or scum at the seashore; (6) wandering stars: as these provide no guidance for navigation, neither do the false teachers give any reliable guide to the Christian life.
  2. Jude 1:14 Cited from the noncanonical Book of Enoch 1:9, probably from memory. Enoch, in the seventh generation from Adam: cited from Enoch 60:8; this refers to the Enoch in the line of Seth (Gen 5:18-24; 1 Chr 1:1-3), not the one in the line of Cain (Gen 4:17). The Book of Enoch was highly respected by many Jews and Christians of that time.