The armiments therefore for assigning the Ep. to the 2na cent, break down on examination.
Other critics place the Ep. in the latter half of the 1st cent. 'To this cla.s3 belong most English scholars (Plumptre, Lumby, Salmon, Plumnier), and among recent German writers Spitta (who
g laces Jude shortly after St. Peter's death), von oden (who, holding that there is nothing to show that the Ep. was not written by a younger brother of the Lord, gives 80-90 as an approximate date), Kiihl (who places it 65-80).
We are Drought therefore to the problem of authorship. The Ep. begins with the words 'Ioi)5as 'l7;<roC XpioToO SouKos, a5eX06t 5^ 'loKii/Sou. Those who place the Ep. in the 2nd cent, either suppose that it is pseudepigraphic (so Pfleiderer, who suggests that some local traditions influenced the writer to take the name of ' Jude the brother of James '), or hold that it was written by someone bearing the name Jude,* and that (to quote Harnack's view) possibly the words 'ItjitoC Xp. JoDXos, and certainly the words a5eX06s Si 'laKiipov, were added at a later time (i.e. 150-180) to enhance its value as a weapon against Gnosticism. If it is objected that such an interpolator would have madejude to be the apostle, Jiilicher suggests that a5e\<pbi 'laxu^ov is a ' synonym for the title of bishop.' Those who find in the Ep. itself no evidence to show that it could not have been written in the apostolic age need not criticise these speculations. The simplest Interpretation of the salutation, which identifies the writer — not with the apostle (cf. Wordsworth), nor with Judas Barsabbas (cf. J. Lightfoot, Plumptre), but— >vith the brother of the Lord (Mt 13», Mk 6'), is the best.t It appears that the Lord's kindred had a posi- tion of authovitjjr accorded them, especially among Palestinian Christians (Eus. HE iii. 11. 20, 33. 6, Iv. 22. 4). At a much earlier date St. Paul, writing to a Gentile Church, appeals to the case of
* Grotius, Annotalimus (,00 Judel), gives it as his opinion that i P was the work of SjTneon the successor of James, and that our Epistle was written bv Jude, the last Jewish Bp. of Jeru- salem in the reign of Hadrian (Eus. BE iv. 6. 8 : Epiph. H(er. U. 68. 20).
t This conclusion is confirmed by the fact that Jude uses the Jitumplim 0/ Moses. We know that his brother James the Just had much in common with what was highest in the teaching and practice of the Pharisees. To such men the Aiisumplum, the work probably of a Pharisaic Quietist (Charles. yn (rod. § 10), would naturally appeal.
'the brethren of the Lord' as having a decisive bearing on the question of his own rights (1 Co 9') The naiiie of James was infiuentim in distant Churihes (Gal 2", Ja 1'). There is then every rcasi n to believe that the words aSeX^As 'laKw^ov would win a hearing for the writer, whether St. James were living or dead, especially in churches which were in constant communication «ith the church at Jerusalem. That Palestinian Jews, especially those who, like St. James and St. Jude, had been brought into constant communication with Jews of the Dispersion, would be likely to have a command of Greek has been shown by Mayor, St. James, p. xlif., Zahn, Einleitung »n das NT, § 2 (see especially p. 31 f.).
The limits of date are now greatly narrowed. The superior limit is the death of St. Jude. The language of Hegesippus (ap. Eus. HE iii. 20) shows that the interview of Domitian with St. Jude's grandsons can hardly be placed late in that Emperor's reign (/x^pL TpaiavoO Trepi/xelfai aiToi'j Tif piif), and that St. Jude had been dead some time before it took place (tn 0^ irepi^croi/). Hence we cannot place the letter later than 80. As to the inferior limit, we must allow time (n) for the apostolic college to have been broken up by the separation of its members, and probably by the death of some ; (6) for such Pauline phraseology as we find in 1 Co, Ro, Col, Eph to have become known to a Hebrew Christian probably of .lerusa- lem, partly perhaps through personal intercourse (Ac 15. 18^- 21""'-), certainly (as the kind of evidence shows)through astudy of those Epi.stles. We cannot then place the Ep. earlier than the composition of Col and Eph. The general tone of the Ep. harmon- izes best with a date somewhat late in the apostolic age. We shall not be far wrong if we suppose that it was written \vithin a year or two of the Pastoral Epistles (assuming their genuineness), the Apoca- lypse (assuming the earlier date), the First Epistle of St. Peter, and the Ep. to the Hebrews.
6. Place of Writing, Destination, Circum- stances OF Composition. — Many critics, who regard the Ep. as directed against a developed Gnosticism, hold it probable that it was written in E^pt {fi.g. Jiilicher), or even more definitely in Alexandria (MayerholFs conjecture, adopted by, e.g., Schenkel, Holtzmann, Pfleiderer). We have already considered the ground for this conjecture. The ' brethren of the Lord ' would naturally have a prominent place among ' the elders ' closely con- nected with St. James at Jerusalem. There is no reason to doubt that the Ep. was composed either there or at least in Palestine.