Judas

Judas, the son of Alphaeus and the “4th half-brother of the L-rd and in the 4th century theologians debated whether the letter of Jude should be included in the New Testament. Many Bible readers today would be surprised to learn that we have within the New Testament letters from Y’Shua’s brothers.
Jude Thaddeus, whose real name is Judas, but is called Thaddeus, which means courageous one in Hebrew to distinguish him from the traitor. He was in his nineties when chosen to succeed Simeon because of the great honor and respect these early Believers had for the royal family.
Martin Luther, a great champion of Paul, moved the letters of James and Jude to the very end of his 1522 edition asserting that “they were of lesser quality than the true and certain books of the New Testament.”
Jude’s letter dates to the last decades of the 1st century A.D. He warned his readers of certain ‘intruders’ who had stolen in among the movement and he urges them to ‘struggle earnestly for the faith that was once for all passed on’ to the original Believers (3), formal passing on of an authorized tradition. The phrase ‘once for all’ implies that no subsequent tradition is to replace the original one. He does not identify by name those he has in mind but he does say that such teachers had turned the notion of ‘grace’ into a license for lawless behavior.
Both James and Jude share the apocalyptic outlook that Y’Shua and John the Baptizer had proclaimed. Jude quoted the Book of Enoch which survives in Ethiopic, and also in Aramaic fragments among the Dead Sea Scrolls. Enoch was the seventh generation from Adam and according to this apocryphal work he had prophesied, “The L-rd comes with 10.000 of His holy ones, to execute judgment on all, and to convict everyone of all the deeds of ungodliness that they have committed.” The reference to the ‘coming of the
L-rd’ was to ‘the only G-d our Savior,’ as Jude puts it, not to the Second Coming of Y’Shua (25). What these early Christians expected was drawn from the Hebrew Prophets who predicted the coming of the L-rd G-d that is Yahweh, not a Second Coming of the Messiah. L-rd meaning G-d in Zech. 14:5; Isa. 40:10; Isa. 66:15.
James and Jude refer to their brother Y’Shua as the “L-rd” but they don’t use the term to refer to the “L-rd G-d” to Y’Shua as their respected “Master” who had given His life for the cause of the Kingdom of G-d. The Greek word for “L-rd” is a term of respect, something akin to ‘Sir’ or Mister.’ One of the pivotal moves that Paul had made was to equate Y’Shua as “L-rd” with passages in the Hebrew Bible that referred exclusively to the “L-rd G-d” of Israel – thus effectively making Y’Shua equal Yahweh. (Isa. 45:22-23).
Paul quotes this very verse but shifts its reference to the “L-rd” Y’Shua as the Messiah in Phil. 2:10-11. This is an enormous change that eventually became commonplace among Christians. Y’Shua as ‘G-d in the flesh’ and His mother became the ‘holy mother of
G-d.” Since Christians maintained that they were nonetheless monotheistic, that is, they adhered to the Shema – the great confession of Judaism, “Hear O Israel, the L-rd our G-d, the L-rd is One” – the conclusion became inescapable. If Y’Shua were truly “G-d”, and there is one G-d not two, then He is nothing less than an incarnation of the L-rd G-d of Israel. To put things bluntly, G-d became man.
Paul started the expression “Jesus Christ”, as if the term “Christ”, which was a Greek term for the Messiah, used as a proper name rather than a designated title.
Y’Shua Himself confessed the Shema and highlighted it as the “Great Commandment” in Mark 12:29. Notice Mark 10:18.
The Didache is the handbook for Christian converts and reminds one strongly of the faith and goodness we find in the letter of James, it was a witness to a form of the Christian faith that traces directly back to Y’Shua and was carried on and perpetuated by James, Jude, and the rest of the Twelve Apostles. In Paul’s gospel there is nothing in the Didache that corresponds to his, - no divinity of Y’Shua, no atoning through His body and blood, and no mentioned of Y’Shua’s resurrection from the dead. In the Didache Y’Shua is the one who has brought the knowledge of life and faith, but there is no emphasis whatsoever upon the figure of Y’Shua apart from His message. Sacrifice and forgiveness of sins in the Didache come through good deeds and a consecrated life.
Jude is given the L-rd’s burial cloth. You see, Y’Shua likes to keep things “all in the family.” Jude Thaddeus, is the Apostle who takes the cloth out of Jerusalem during the time that their brother James the Less is bishop of the city.
He will first evangelize Northern Africa (Mauritania) with the Shroud, to take the cloth to fulfill Y’Shua’ earthly vow, as recorded by the first Church historian, Bishop Eusebius, to heal the king of Edessa, Turkey, known as Agbar the Black. Jude will, again, under Divine Inspiration entrust the cloth to this king, Agbar V. Why? Because the L-rd knew that soon Apostle Jude, with the Apostle Simon the Zealot were to become martyrs for the faith in Persia.
As apparent from today’s headlines, the “prince of Persia” does not like those who preach Truth, whether Old or New Covenant, and stirs up the people of the area to kill those who are the true messengers of G-d.
We have no record of Jude’s manner of death, but we do know that during the early decades of the 2nd century A.D., in Palestine identification with the Davidic family and its messianic expectations could have serious consequences. Any hope of the Kingdom of G-d being realized on earth had begun to fade and Jewish Messianic passion grew cold. Paul is sharply censored as one who put his own testimony based on visions over the certainty of the teachings that the original apostles had from Y’Shua directly.
What Jews had rejected is not so much Y’Shua as the systems of Christian theology that equated Him to G-d, that nullified the Torah, and that displaced Jewish people and their covenant.