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δένδρα Φθινοπωρινὰ ἄκαρπα Sis ἀποθανόντα ἐκριζωθέντα, 13. κύμ- ατα ἄγρια θαλάσσης ἐπαφρίζοντα τὰς ἑαυτῶν αἰσχύνας, ἀστέρες
the zodiac, the reappearance of the birds, etc. A more strictly accurate division was made by the astronomers, who dis- tinguished between the various kinds of rising and setting of the stars, and divided the year into four equal parts by the solstices and equinoxes. In the year 46 Ε.ο, Julius Caesar introduced his re- vised calendar, which assigned definite dates to the different seasons. Thus spring begins a.d. vii. id. Feb. (Feb. 7), summer a.d. vti. id. Mai. (May ο), autumn a.d. tit. id. Sext. (Aug. 11), winter a.d, iv. id. Nov. (Nov. 10).
To turn now to the commentators, I may take Trench as representing their view in his Authorised Version, p. 186, ed. 2, where he says, ‘“‘ The φθινόπωρον is the late autumn . . . which succeeds the ὀπώρα (or the autumn contemplated as the time of the ripened fruits of the earth) and which has its name παρὰ τὸ φθίνεσθαι τὴν ὀπώραν, from the waning away of the autumn and the autumn fruits. .. . The deceivers of whom St. Jude speaks are likened to treés as they show in late autumn, when foliage and fruit alike are gone.” :
I have stated above what I hold to be the origin of the word φθινόπωρον. Trench’s explanation is ambiguous and unsuited to the facts of the case, as will be seen from the criticisms in Lightfoot’s Fresh Revision, p. 135: ‘*In the phrase ‘autumn-trees without fruit’ there ap- pears to be a reference to the parable of the fig-tree. . . . At all events the men- tion of the season when fruit might be expected is significant.” He adds in a note, ‘‘ Strange to say, the earliest ver- sions α]]τεπάετεάφθινοπωρινά correctly.* Tyndale’s instinct led him to give what I cannot but think the right turn to the expression, ‘ Trees with out frute at gadringe (gathering) time,’ z.e. at the season when fruit was looked for. I cannot agree with Archbishop Trench, who maintains that ‘ Tyndale was feel- ing after, though he has not grasped, the right translation,’ and himself explains Φθινοπωρινὰ ἄκαρπα as ‘ mutually com- pleting one another, without leaves, with- out fruit’. Tyndale was followed by Coverdale and the Great Bible. Simi- larly Wycliffe has ‘hervest trees with-
* This agreement is probably owing to auctumnales infructuosae’”’.
out fruyt,’ and the Rheims version ‘trees of autumne unfruiteful’. The earliest offender is the Geneva Testa- ment, which gives ‘corrupt trees and without frute’. . . . The Bishops’ Bible strangely combines both renderings, ‘trees withered (@{vev) at fruite gathering (ὀπώρα) and without fruite,’ which is explained in the margin, ‘ Trees withered in autumne when the fruite har- vest is, and so the Greke woord im- porteth ’.”
The correctness of the interpretation, given by Lightfoot alone among modern commentators, is confirmed by a con- sideration of the context. The writer has just been comparing the innovators, who have crept into other Churches, to water- less clouds driven past by the wind. Just as these disappoint the hope of the hus- bandman, so do fruitless trees in the proper season of fruit. If Φθινοπωρινά were equivalent to χειμερινά, denoting the season when the trees are necessarily bare both of leaves and fruit, how could a tree be blamed for being @kaprov? It is because it might have been, and ought to have been a fruit-bearing tree, that it is rooted up.
Sis ἀποθανόντα ἐκριζωθεντα. Schneck- enburger explains, ‘‘ He who is not born again is dead in his sins (Col. ii. 13), he who has apostatised is twice dead,” cf. Apoc. xxi. 8, Heb. vi. 4-8, 2 Peter ii. 20- 22. So the trees may be called doubly dead, when they are not only sapless, but are torn up by the root, which would have caused the death even of a living tree.
Ver. 13. κύματα ἄγρια θαλάσσης ἐπαφρίζοντα τὰς ἑαυτῶν αἰσχύνας. ϐ/. Cic. Ad Herenn. iv. 55, spumans ex ore scelus. The two former illustrations, the reefs and the clouds, refer to the specious professions of the libertines and the mischief they caused ; the third, the dead trees, brings out also their own miser- able condition ; the fourth and fifth give a very fine description of their lawlessness and shamelessness, and their eventual fate. The phrase ἄγρια κύματα is found in Wisdom xiv. 1. The rare word ἐπα- φρίζω is used of the sea in Moschus ν. 5. It refers to the seaweed and other refuse borne on the crest of the waves and thrown up on the beach, to which are