Jude 1:14 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

And Enoch—the seventh from Adam, &c.— Enoch is called the seventh from Adam, to distinguish him from another of the same name, who was the son of Cain, Genesis 4:17. A remarkable fragment of antediluvian history is here preserved to us. Our translation has it, Enoch—prophesied of these. In the old English version it is, Enoch—prophesied before of such. Blackwell takes notice that the words may be translated, He prophesied against them; but the word προφετευω, with a dative case after it, signifies to prophesy to: so that the Syriac and others have well translated the words, but Enoch prophesied also unto these men. He prophesied immediately unto the men of his own age, who were abandoned to violence and lust; and foretold, that if they did not repent, God would bring on the flood, and overtake them with his righteous judgments, both temporal and eternal. But there was no occasion for confining the benefit of his prophesy to his own age. The και, even or also, here, is emphatical; he prophesied ALSO unto these Christians, so called, or said what they might improve to their own advantage, if they pleased. See Romans 15:4. Here we may see in what sense they were said to have been described beforehand, Jude 1:4 as persons who would fall under condemnation; for in the punishment of sinners of former times, they might have read their own doom.