In Jude 1:7 the author of the Epistle of Jude points to the Lord’s judgment upon Sodom and Gomorrah, as an example of how God would judge the behavior of the false teachers who had crept into the church during the first century AD (cp. Jude 1:4). Much has been said in the modern church era about the sins of Sodom and Gomorrah. In fact, the term, sodomite, stands as an offensive word, meant to describe a person who commits a sexual sin, usually with the same sex. While it is not my intention to excuse or legitimize behavior that the Bible says is wrong, I have to say that to literalize what Jude says (i.e. interpreting what he says to be a literal, physical sin) would be to miss the point of his bringing up the Lord’s judgment upon the ancient cities during the time of Abraham.
If it was immoral behavior that the Lord judged, how would this speak to believers in the first century AD about the false teachers, who had crept into the church in an effort to turn the disciples away from Christ? Jude wasn’t simply making a list sins and claiming that God judged sin in a general sense. Not only wasn’t Jude saying that, but such an idea is simply not found in the Bible. The Lord set into force the law that what one sows, he reaps in kind and in abundance. If I plant an apple seed, not only will I get an apple tree, but I will reap an abundance of fruit—apples, not oranges, not grapes, not peaches, but apples. The fruit I reap will arise from the seed I plant. Good seed yields good fruit, but evil seed reaps evil fruit, and the kind of fruit one reaps is indicative of the seed one plants. So, if Jude wasn’t speaking of immorality (sodomy) by bringing up Sodom and Gomorrah, what did he intend for his readers to consider?
The King’s Highway was an important ancient trade route connecting Egypt with Mesopotamia. In between these two great trade markets was the land of Canaan and the Jordan Valley. The highway ran through Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities of the Plain. The King’s Highway is alluded to in the book of Genesis when, during the time of Abraham, the five kings of the Plain made war with the four kings of Mesopotamia (Genesis 14:1-2). The point is that many folks traveled back and forth between Egypt and Mesopotamia by going through the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah and the other cities of the Plain. Genesis 19 describes what the typical welcome those cities provided for the travelers. They were raped. Rape is not only immoral, but it has at its foundation an act and attitude of violence. It is practiced in prisons not simply for sexual gratification but as a means for the strong to dominate the weak. It has at its core total loss of freedom for the weak. Not only doesn’t the weaker individual have no say in what goes on around him, but he doesn’t even have power over his own body. He is totally dominated by the stronger of the two. He is completely humiliated and demoralized, and stands at the utter mercy of the stronger of the two. This is what the Lord judged during Abraham’s day, not sodomy (specifically), but the violence alluded to in the act, and the complete loss of freedom of the weak.
This is also what Jude had in mind, when he brought up the sin of Sodom and Gomorrah and their judgment. Believers were being mistreated by the false teachers (cp. 3John 1:9-10) and those believers had begun to forget their main objective of being an image of God (Genesis 1:27).[1] Embracing the new Judaism, they began to prey upon their faithful brethren in an effort to dominate them by forcing them to reject Christ and accept the new Judaism, which they had embraced as a means of salvation in Christ’s stead. While it is wrong to reject Christ, it is even a more terrible act to cause others to do the same by ruling their faith (viz. cult leaders of modern times) and taking away the free moral agency of their brethren (cp. Matthew 20:25-28).
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[1] See my earlier studies concerning the “angels” who sinned: Who Are Jude’s Angels; They Kept Not Their First Estate; and Everlasting Chains of Darkness.
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