¹ Charles Bigg discusses the text of Jude 22–23 thoroughly in The Epistles of St. Peter and St. Jude (ICC; Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1978) 340–43. Bigg writes, “This text of B cannot be correct. If we translate ‘those, whom you pity when they dispute, save and snatch from the fire, but some pity in fear,’ we must give οὓς μέν one sense and οὓς δέ another, which must be wrong. It is clear that the scribe of B has either omitted οὓς δέ before σῴζετε in which case he agrees with Sinaiticus, or wrongly inserted ἐλε ᾶτε διακρινομένους. The confusion is clearly very ancient” (p. 341).

^{2 72}, οὓς μὲν ἐκ πυρὸς ἁπράσατε, διακρινομένους δὲ ἐλεε ῖτε ἐν φόβω. K L P, οὓς μὲν ἐλεε ῖτε διακρινόμενοι, οὓς δὲ ἐν φόβῳ σῴζετε ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζοντες. Clement Alex. Strom. 6.8.65, καὶ οὓς μὲν ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζετε, διακρινομένους δὲ ἐλεε ῖτε. Idem, Adumbrationes in Epistulam Judae, “Quosdam autem saluate de igne rapientes, quibusdam uero miseremini in timore.” Jerome Commentarium in Hiezechielem 18.5–9, “et alios quidem de igne rapite, aliorum uero qui iudicantur miseremini” (οὓς μὲν ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζετε, οὓς δὲ διακρινομένους ἐλεε ῖτε).

³ Sinaiticus, οὓς μὲν ἐλε ᾶτε διακρινομένους, οὓς δὲ σῴζετε ἐκ πυρὸς ἁπράζοντες, οὓς δὲ ἐλε ᾶτε ἐν φόβῳ.

⁴ Richard Bauckham, Jude, 2 Peter (Word Biblical Commentary 50; Waco, TX: Word, 1983) 110.

⁵ Jerome H. Neyrey, 2 Peter, Jude (AB 37C; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1993) 85–86. Bigg, unacquainted with⁷², nevertheless argues (St. Peter and St. Jude, 342) for a two-clause reading. Bigg concludes, “We may thus believe that there were originally but two clauses, but the order of these two is doubtful.”

⁶ Herbert Weir Smyth, Greek Grammar (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1920) §§ 1106, 1113.

⁷ For example, Thucydides De Bello Peloponnesiaco 2.4.4, οί μέν τινες αὐτῶν ἐπὶ τὸ τε ῖχος ἀναβάντες ἔρριψαν ἐς τὸ ἔξω σ φ ᾶς αὐτοὺς καὶ διε φθάρησαν οἱ πλείους, οί δὲ κατὰ πύλας ἐρήμους γυναικὸς δούσης πέλεκυν λαθόντες καὶ διακόψαντες τὸν μοχλὸν ἐξῆλθον οὐ πολλοί (αἴσθησις γὰρ ταχε ῖα ἐπεγένετο), ἄλλῃ δὲ ἄλλῃ τῆς πόλεως σποράδες ἀπώλλυντο. τὸ δὲ πλε ῖστον καὶ ὅσον μάλιστα.

⁸ Bigg writes (St. Peter and St. Jude, 341), “Most of the textual critics and commentators, Lachmann, Tischendorf, Tregelles, Brückner, Wiesinger, Schott, Keil, Alford, Spitta, adopt the text of A. Translate ‘Some confute when they dispute, some save snatching them from fire, on some have mercy in fear.’”

⁹ The third person reflexive pronoun ἑαυτούς may be used for the second person (Smyth, Grammar, § 1230), as it is in Jude 20. The reflexive pronoun with an active verb expresses active reflexive relationship, “save yourself” (Smyth, Grammar, § 1723).

¹⁰ LSJ, s.v. σώζω, 2.6, has the example save “by flight” (σῴζεσθαι φεύγοντες).

¹¹ Bauckham writes (Jude, 2 Peter, 110), “σῴζετε is an interpretative gloss to explain the metaphor ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάσατε”; see also Carroll D. Osburn, “The Text of Jude 22–23,” ZNW 63 (1972) 141.

¹² Smyth, Grammar, § 2881.

¹³ Neyrey, 2 Peter, Jude, 84.

¹⁴ Bauckham, Jude, 2 Peter, 108.

¹⁵ Bo Reicke translates with the textus receptus which follows K, L, P; see Bo Reicke, The Epistles of James, Peter and Jude (AB 37; 2d. ed.; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1982) 215.

¹⁶ Bigg, St. Peter and St. Jude, 343.

¹⁷ The phrase “brand snatched from the fire” is an allusion to Zech 3:2 or Amos 4:11 or both. In Zech 3:3–5, Joshua's filthy attire is ceremonially exchanged for clean; the allusion may have influenced translators to take χιτών literally. Indeed, Bauckham reasons from the Zechariah allusion explicitly (see n. 18 below). In Amos 4:11, however, “brand snatched from the fire” occurs in connection with Sodom and Gomorrah, and therefore is closer to what I argue are the themes of Jude.

¹⁸ Reicke, Epistles of James, Jude, 216.

¹⁹ Bauckham, Jude, 2 Peter, 116. Regarding the allusion to Zech 3:3–4, Bauckham argues (p. 116) that Jude's ἐσπιλομένον χιτῶνα “shows no dependence on the LXX (ἱμάτια ῥυπαρά), and F. H. Chase (‘Jude, Epistle of,’ Hastings Dictionary of the Bible 2.800–801) plausibly suggests that he in fact alludes to the associations of the Hebrew word which is translated ‘filthy’ in Zech 3:3–4 (). This word is connected with the words and, which are most often used in the OT to refer to human excrement.”

²⁰ Bigg, St. Peter and St. Jude, 343.

²¹ LSJ, s.v. ἀπό, 3.2.

²² That is, χιτῶνα is a distributive singular (Smyth, Grammar, § 998).

²³ In 1 Enoch 6.1–10.15, for instance.

²⁴ ᾽Επὶ τούτων οἶμαι καὶ τῶν ὁμοίων αἱρέσεων προ φητικῶς ᾽Ιούδαν ἐν τῆ ἐπιστολῆ εἰρηκέναι. “\llenisΟμοίως μέντοι καί\hellipλαλε ῖ ὑπέρογκα” (“Concerning these and similar sects, I think Jude spoke prophetically in his letter. ‘Likewise…[Jude 8–16a]’” [Clement Alex. Strom. 3.2.11]).

²⁵ Animae videlicet tunica macula est, spiritus concupiscentiis pollutus carnalibus (“The soul's garment, of course, is a blemish, the spirit is defiled by fleshly desires” [Clement Alex. Adumbrationes in Epistulam Judae 23]).

²⁶ Ibid.

²⁷ Helmut Koester, “Gnomai Diaphoroi,” in James M. Robinson and idem, eds., Trajectories through Early Christianity (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1971) 114–57, esp. 134; see also Helmut Koester, Ancient Christian Gospels (Philadelphia: Trinity, 1990) 78–80@; and John D. Turner, “A New Link in the Syrian Judas Thomas Tradition,” in Martin Krause, ed., Essays on the Nag Hammadi Texts in Honor of Alexander Böhlig (NHS 3; Leiden: Brill, 1972) 109–19.

²⁸ Koester, “Gnomai Diaphoroi,” 134.

²⁹ See the excellent introduction by John Turner, “The Book of Thomas the Contender Writing to the Perfect,” in Bentley Layton, ed., Nag Hammadi Codex II, 2–7: Together with XIII, 2*, Brit. Lib. Or. 4926(1), and P. Oxy. 1, 654, 655 (NHS 20–21; 2 vols.; Leiden: Brill, 1989) 2. 173–78.

³⁰ Thom. Cont. 138.1–4. The translation is that of Turner, “The Book of Thomas the Contender,” 2. 205.

³¹ Thom. Cont. 145.8–13. The translation is that of Turner, “The Book of Thomas the Contender,” 2. 205.

³² Turner, “The Book of Thomas the Contender,” 173–78.

³³ Thom. Cont. 138.2, 142.7–8.

³⁴ Thom. Cont. 138.12–20 emphasizes that Thomas is “the one who knows himself” (138.15–16). Implied may be a word play on the name “Judas” and the Syriac verb yd˒ (“know”).

³⁵ Turner, who calls the revelatory dialogue “A” (138.4–142.21) and the discourse “B” (142.21–end), writes (“The Book of Thomas the Contender,” 176), “Section B is ascetic rather than Gnostic. Compared with Section A its eschatology is more futuristic.”