Jude’s initial intent in writing his
letter was to convey a positive message about “our common salvation” (v. 3a).
But his focus abruptly switches to the urgency of his readers to “contend earnestly for
the faith” in view of the intrusion of ungodly men who had secretly “crept in”
among them (vv. 3b-4).1 In v. 8 he describes these intruders as
“dreamers” [void of spiritual substance] who “defile the flesh, reject authority, and speak evil of
dignitaries.” To reinforce and illustrate the indictment, he writes in v. 9, “Yet
Michael the archangel, in contending with the devil, when he disputed about the
body of Moses, dared not bring against him a reviling accusation, but said, ‘The
Lord rebuke you!’” The point Jude makes is that evil men ignorantly reject and ridicule
authority, while in so doing reveal their own corruption (v. 10).
The question is, what’s this about the dispute between Michael the
archangel and the devil over the body of Moses? This is the only biblical
passage that speaks of this incident. It is commonly alleged that Jude’s
account is based on a pseudepigraphical work, namely the Assumption of Moses
(a.k.a. the Testament of Moses). However, Jude does not attribute
his information to any particular source. The Assumption of Moses is of
uncertain date and authorship, and the only extant portion of it is a sixth-century
AD fragmentary Latin manuscript. Since no surviving portion of this work
contains the passage in question, and since similar words are found in
Zechariah 3:1-2, the element of divine revelation notwithstanding, it is just
as likely that the material came from a common source or tradition rather than
having been the result of literary dependency.2
Seeing that Jude provides no further
details, no definitive conclusions can be reached, although various suggestions
have been made. Nothing is said about the timing of the event. One proposal is
that the contention concerned baby Moses (Ex. 1:16) and maybe the devil wanted
to destroy or corrupt this future leader of God’s people. Another possibility
is that “the body of Moses” is to be understood in a corporate sense as the OT parallel of “the body
of Christ”; i.e., the collectivity [body] of people following
Moses whom the devil was against (see Zech. 3:2; cp. Acts
15:21; 1 Cor. 3:15).
The most popular suggestion is that Moses’
corpse was the center of the dispute (Deut. 34:6). Perhaps the devil questioned
his right to a proper burial, or wanted to desecrate the body or reveal the
burial site to tempt people to idolize the tomb or the remains and draw honor
away from God.
The bottom line is, we don’t know. And
seeing that no further details are revealed in scripture, this is apparently
something we don’t need to know. The point Jude makes is clear enough without having
to satisfy our curiosity.
--Kevin L. Moore
Endnotes:
1 Scripture
quotations are from the NKJV.
2 See K. L.
Moore, “Jude’s Alleged Use of Pseudonymous Sources,” <Link>.
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