Texts in Conversation
Jude’s description of wandering stars follows 1 Enoch’s story of heavenly beings who abandoned their proper place. Both use the image of stars that no longer follow their paths to show disorder and wrongdoing, reflecting ancient astronomy and cosmology to explain why comets or planets move unpredictably through the sky.
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1 Enoch 19:2
Pseudepigrapha
1 And Uriel said to me: 'Here shall stand the angels who have united with women, and their spirits, taking many different forms, are corrupting mankind and leading them astray to worship demons as gods. Here they shall remain until the day of the great judgment when they will be judged and brought to an end. 2 And the women of the angels who went astray will become sirens.' 3 And I, Enoch, alone saw the vision, the ends of all things: and no man shall see as I have seen.
Date: 200-50 B.C.E. (based on scholarly estimates)
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Jude 1:13
New Testament
12 These men are dangerous reefs at your love feasts, feasting without reverence, feeding only themselves. They are waterless clouds, carried along by the winds; autumn trees without fruit—twice dead, uprooted; 13 wild sea waves, spewing out the foam of their shame; wayward stars for whom the utter depths of eternal darkness have been reserved. 14 Now Enoch, the seventh in descent beginning with Adam, even prophesied of them, saying, “Look! The Lord is coming with thousands and thousands of his holy ones,
Date: 90-100 C.E. (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... A similar type of transgression is mentioned in 1 Enoch 80:6 - there an eschatological phenomenon. It is uncertain, however, precisely what celestial phenomenon is being alluded to in either or both cases. Jude 13 seems to interpret the passage with reference to comets. Perhaps the author thinks of the orbits of the planets and some comets, the regularity of which would not be known to primitive astronomy ..."
Nickelsburg, George W. E.
A Commentary on the Book of 1 Enoch Chapters 1-36, 81-108
(p. 289) Fortress Press, 2001
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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