To understand Jude it is necessary that it be compared with other Scriptures which tell us of the times and things which Jude is writing about. He is writing to beloved brethren and exhorting them to “earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints” (Jude 3). He is warning them because there were ungodly men among them, men like those we read about in Revelation 2:2 where the faithful brethren had “tried them which say they are apostles, and are not, and has found them liars.” In verses 14 and 15 we are told that there were those in Pergamos who taught the doctrine of Balaam and of the Nicolaitans.
Jude is saying the same thing as Peter said in 2nd Peter 2:1: “There were false prophets among the people (of Israel) even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies . . .” Peter and Jude are using the exodus of Israel as an object lesson to the faithful brethren, whom they were exhorting to earnestly contend for the faith. Jude in verse 5 is writing about the Israelites who were saved out of Egypt, while the Egyptians were destroyed. In the 6th verse Jude is continuing his object lesson about Israel and the punishments that were meted out to the men who rebelled against Moses and Aaron as a warning to the false leaders of that time. (The word “angel” here and in 2nd Peter 2:4 is “messenger” or “agent.”)
Going back to the record as given in Numbers 16:1, 2, we find that Korah, Datham, Abiram and two hundred and fifty princes that were “princes of the assembly, famous in the congregation, men of renown” are the ones that Jude is writing about in Jude 6. They were not satisfied with their high position of principality (see margin), but rebelled against Moses and Aaron. In Numbers 16: 5-7, Moses told these rebels that God would show “whom the Lord doth choose” to come near unto Him. He then instructed them to offer incense the next day. (This was what the rebels wanted to do.) They should have remembered what had happened to Nadab and Abihu which is recorded in Leviticus 10:1. They offered strange fire before the Lord and fire went out from the Lord and devoured them. Moses said to Aaron in Leviticus 10:3: “This is it that the Lord spake, saying, I will be sanctified in them that come nigh me, and before all the people I will be glorified . . .” Evidently Korah, Datham and Abiram had forgotten about this, or at least it made no impression upon them, for they went ahead with their rebellion as they had planned. In Numbers 16: 23-33 we are told how Moses under the direction of God handled this matter: the earth opened up and swallowed them and all that appertained to them. And in verse 35 we are told how the vengeance of eternal fire consumes the 250 men who offered incense. This explains how some are held in darkness and others suffered the vengeance of eternal fire, the fire lasting until they were consumed The record is kept for all time
In Jude 11 he mentions that some perished in the gainsaying of Core (Core in Greek for Korah ) This shows that he is referring to Korah and his company in the first part of his epistle In Numbers 16 37, 38 we are told that the censers were made into broad plates for a covering of the altar—to be a sign unto the children of Israel
The Origin of the Organic World – Part One