Weymouth New Testament in Modern Speech, Preface and Introductions by R F Weymouth
page 35 of 37 (94%)
page 35 of 37 (94%)
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to contradict--is that it came from the Apostle in Ephesus, about
the same time as the preceding Letter. The special mention of Diotrephes and his behaviour points indeed to a somewhat advanced development in the Church to which Galus belonged, but such characters are all too possible at any juncture to afford in this instance any guarantee of a later date. In this, as in the preceding Letters, the writer's great concern is that transcendental truth should be embodied in practical holiness. Jude's Letter Of the time and place of the composition of this Letter we know nothing beyond what may be inferred from its contents. These seem to show that it was written in Palestine, and the absence of any reference to so striking an event as the destruction of Jerusalem points to a date earlier than 70 A. D. It has, however, been thought that such a rebuke of error and licentiousness as that which this Letter contains can only apply to the forms of Gnosticism known to have existed in the first quarter of the second century. But there is no reason to doubt that the author was the man he asserts he was, the brother of James, the head of the Church in Jerusalem. He was, therefore, not an Apostle but one of the Lord's brothers. The abiding value of the Letter consists in its severe |
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