Doubt or dispute (Jude 9 and 22-23) 205 special NT meaning claim is built upon the assumptions 1) Matthew, Mark, Luke, Paul, James, and Jude write independently, virtually detached from the larger Greek linguistic environment, ad hoc transforming the meaning of a common word (16); and 2) the special meaning of diakrivnomai is distributed across a variety of NT texts, rising above biographies, time, genre, and geography. To what causes can one attribute the sudden semantic birth and death of this new meaning, the co-existence of parallel meanings (special NT and classical/Hellenistic) of diakrivnomai (17), and the biblical author’s subsequent rejection of common Greek words for “doubt” (e.g., distavzw or ejndoiavzw) in certain passages but not in others (cf. Mt 14,13; 28,17)? It would seem it is the scholars themselves, with their own interpretations, who have initiated a shift of meaning for which conclusive semantic and literary evidence is absent. Perhaps the most dramatic aspect of adherence to the concept of a special NT meaning in specific passages, is the shift in meaning from diakrivnomai as marker of an inter-personal, social conflict, to diakrivnomai as reflexive indicator of an individual’s intra-personal conflict (previsously stated as lexically unsupportable). 2. Jude 9 Diakrinomai occurs first in v. 9 within a section (vv. 4-15) that is, v I propose, chiastically organized [A – B – C – D – C1 – B1 – A1] (18). Jude’s reference to the proscribed judgment (krivma) of certain persons (tine" a[nqrwpoi) who deny the Lord (kuvrio") in [A] (19), and (16) With reference to the difference between the development of special NT vocabulary and the classification, NT meaning, for Greek vocabulary, cf. S.E. PORTER, “Problems in the Language of the Bible: Misunderstandings that Continue to Plague Biblical Interpretation”, The Nature of Religious Language. A Colloquium (ed. S.E. PORTER) (Sheffield 1996) 23-29, 40-46. (17) Matthew uses diakrivnomai (21,21) and distavzw (14,13; 28,17), and, according to most contemporary exegetes, Luke (Acts 10,20; 11,2), James (1,6; 2,4), and Jude (Jude 9, 22) apparently alternate between classical/Hellenistic and special NT meaning. (18) Others propose different structural organizations of this section in Jude’s letter; cf., for instance, E.R. WENDLAND’s survey (“A Comparative Study of ‘Rhetorical Criticism’, Ancient and Modern - With Special Reference to the Larger Structure and Function of the Epistle of Jude”, Neot 28/1 [1994] 193-228) of structural outlines that are informed by rhetorical criticism. (19) I understand Jude’s clause oiJ pavlai progegrammevnoi eij" tou'to to; krivma