What Does Jude 1:18 Mean?

How that they told you there should be mockers in the last time, who should walk after their own ungodly lusts. Jude specifies the apostolic teaching they should remember: prophecies about false teachers. "They told you" (Greek elegon hymin, ἔλεγον ὑμῖν) indicates repeated apostolic warnings—this wasn't isolated comment but consistent message. "There should be mockers" (Greek esontai empaiktai, ἔσονται ἐμπαῖκται) predicts people who scoff, ridicule, and deride sacred things. "Mockers" denotes those who treat serious matters with contempt, making light of divine truth, mocking godliness as foolishness.

"In the last time" (Greek ep' eschatou chronou, ἐπ' ἐσχάτου χρόνου) refers to the entire period between Christ's first and second coming—the "last days" begun at Pentecost (Acts 2:17, Hebrews 1:2) and continuing until Christ's return. The New Testament consistently teaches that the church age is eschatological period characterized by both gospel advance and increasing apostasy. False teachers aren't surprising anomalies but predicted features of this age.

"Who should walk after their own ungodly lusts" (Greek kata tas heautōn epithymias poreuomenoi tōn asebeiōn, κατὰ τὰς ἑαυτῶν ἐπιθυμίας πορευόμενοι τῶν ἀσεβειῶν) repeats v. 16's description—lifestyle governed by sinful desires, not divine revelation. Their mockery flows from ungodliness; they reject truth not from intellectual conviction but moral rebellion. People suppress truth to justify preferred behaviors (Romans 1:18-25). Doctrine and ethics connect inseparably—bad theology enables bad living; bad living requires bad theology.