Who is judes brother in the short book of Jude?

Answer 1

The General Epistle of Jude does not say directly whether the author was the apostle Jude or Jude, the brother of Jesus, but does say in verse 1 that his brother was named James. Verse 1 also says that the author, Jude, the 'slave' of Jesus, when a brother would naturally mention his relationship to Jesus, so this surely rules him out as the brother (or half-brother) of Jesus. Verse 17 speaks of the apostles as if the author was not one of them, so this also rules out Jude as the apostle Jude.


Verse 17 also tells us that the apostles had spoken of these things beforehand, verse 18-19 speak of things that were once told about the mockers of Jude's time, while verse 3 tells us that the Christian faith was once (long ago) passed on to the saints, all of which confirm that this epistle was written during the second century, long after the apostles and the brothers of Jesus were dead.

The Epistle of Jude was written pseudepigraphically, but the author carelessly failed to make clear which Jude we wanted to represent himself as, and therefore we do not know which James was supposedly his brother.

Answer 2

Another answer from our community:

Jude is the brother of James, who was one of Jesus' apostles. Jude and James are also believed to be Jesus' half brother.