111 Reconsidering the Text of Jude 5, 13, 15 and 18 angels either, unless this is the only such reference (v. 6). This makes the reading ᾽Ιησοῦς suspect as an alteration. If so, the “original” reading was κύριος. This hypothesis, however, has a problem. The variant reading ᾽Ιησοῦς has no parallel anywhere in similar contexts, not even in Jude. A scribe would unlikely create such a reading, which was not only out of harmony with the style of the author but would also create an unnecessary lectio difficilior. Thus, the probability goes the other way around. It is easier for a scribe to change ᾽Ιησοῦς to κύριος, if he wanted to harmonise the text to its immediate context rather than vice versa. P. Bartolomä has suggested that a scribe could have made such a change because a human name Jesus might appear too bold and/or improper for a pre-existent Christ59. Secondly, Jude stands rather apart from most of the first century Christian literature in that there appears to be a high respect for Jewish apocalyptic texts, namely, 1 Enoch and T. Mos. Jude apparently belongs to that section of early Christianity in which Jewish apocalyptic outlook was reinterpreted to apply to Jesus. In such circles apocalypticism was the dominant vehicle through which the faith of Jesus found its expression. This apocalypticism died out later in the second century60, which ap- pears to be the general timeframe when the textual corruption took place. There was also a distancing of Christianity from Judaism in the early second century61. To read from the epistle of Jude that Jesus is Yahweh of the Hebrew Scriptures could have been too much for some scribes in their second century social setting, because the Roman society had become anti-Judaic because of the Jewish rebellion. Christian communities were seen as Jewish sects by the society at large. Hence, apologetical reasons could have compelled a scribe to tune down the Jewish aspects of the New Testament writings62. This offers an alternative explanation for the often Bartolomä, “Did Jesus Save the People out of Egypt?”, 150. 59 Bauckham, Jude, 2 Peter, 10. 60 See, e.g., J.D.G. Dunn (ed.), Jews and Christians. The Parting of the Ways, A.D. 70 61 to 135. The Second Durham-Tubingen Research Symposium on Earliest Christianity and Judaism (WUNT 66; Durham 1989). Codex Bezae has long been held to contain some anti-Judaic features in its text, both 62 additions and omissions. D.C. Parker has argued that this Greek-Latin bilingual majuscule was in fact prepared in Berytus (Beirut), which was an important centre of Latin studies in the Eastern Roman Empire. If so, it would testify of some kind of rewriting of the New Testament texts in the eastern part of the Roman Empire at the time when Christi- anity and Judaism were clashing theologically. See E.J. Epp, The Theological Tendency of Codex Bezae Cantabrigiensis (Cambridge 1966); D.C. Parker, The Living Text of the Gospels (Cambridge 1997) 32; G.E. Rice, “The Anti-Judaic Bias of the Western Text in the Gospels of Luke”, AUSS (1980) 51-57, idem., “Some Further Examples of Anti-Judaic Bias