The author had intended to write them a pastoral letter, but circumstances have made it necessary for him to write in a different strain and to exhort them to contend earnestly for the faith. These circumstances were the presence in their midst of false brethren whose doom was appointed long ago men denying Jesus Christ, their Master and Lord, by their vicious lives.
Jude 1:3. the faith. unto the saints: this reference to the faith as a fixed and final deposit is said to prove the late date of the epistle: but the same conception of the faith is found in the Pastoral Epistles; cf. also Galatians 1:23; Romans 10:8; Ephesians 4:5. the saints, i.e. Christians; the phrase does not suggest that the writer regards those to whom the faith was delivered as belonging to an earlier generation than those to whom he writes.
Jude 1:4. of old set. condemnation: render, who were long ago set forth in writing to this doom. There is no reason to suppose that the writing is some early Christian document (possibly 2 P.) and to see here proof of the late date of Jude (or of the priority of 2 P.). The writing is the OT with its denunciation of evil-livers. Jude has not yet said what the doom is; it is described in the next section.