Peter's Second Letter, Chapter 2
{2:1} But false prophets also arose among the people, as false
teachers will also be among you, who will secretly bring in
destructive heresies, denying even the Master who bought them,
bringing on themselves swift destruction. {2:2} Many will follow their
[1>]immoral[<1] ways, and as a result, the way of the truth will be
maligned. {2:3} In covetousness they will exploit you with deceptive
words: whose sentence now from of old doesn't linger, and their
destruction will not slumber. {2:4} For if God didn't spare angels
when they sinned, but cast them down to [2>]Tartarus[<2], and
committed them to pits of darkness, to be reserved for judgment; {2:5}
and didn't spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah with seven
others, a preacher of righteousness, when he brought a flood on the
world of the ungodly; {2:6} and turning the cities of Sodom and
Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them to destruction, having made them
an example to those who would live ungodly; {2:7} and delivered
righteous Lot, who was very distressed by the lustful life of the
wicked {2:8} (for that righteous man dwelling among them, was
tormented in his righteous soul from day to day with seeing and
hearing lawless deeds): {2:9} the Lord knows how to deliver the godly
out of temptation and to keep the unrighteous under punishment for the
day of judgment; {2:10} but chiefly those who walk after the flesh in
the lust of defilement, and despise authority. Daring, self-willed,
they are not afraid to speak evil of dignitaries; {2:11} whereas
angels, though greater in might and power, don't bring a railing
judgment against them before the Lord. {2:12} But these, as
unreasoning creatures, born natural animals to be taken and destroyed,
speaking evil in matters about which they are ignorant, will in their
destroying surely be destroyed, {2:13} receiving the wages of
unrighteousness; people who count it pleasure to revel in the daytime,
spots and blemishes, reveling in their deceit while they feast with
you; {2:14} having eyes full of adultery, and who can't cease from
sin; enticing unsettled souls; having a heart trained in greed;
children of cursing; {2:15} forsaking the right way, they went astray,
having followed the way of Balaam the son of Beor, who loved the wages
of wrongdoing; {2:16} but he was rebuked for his own disobedience. A
mute donkey spoke with a man's voice and stopped the madness of the
prophet. {2:17} These are wells without water, clouds driven by a
storm; for whom the blackness of darkness has been reserved forever.
{2:18} For, uttering great swelling words of emptiness, they entice in
the lusts of the flesh, by licentiousness, those who are indeed
escaping from those who live in error; {2:19} promising them liberty,
while they themselves are bondservants of corruption; for a man is
brought into bondage by whoever overcomes him.
{2:20} For if, after they have escaped the defilement of the world
through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are
again entangled in it and overcome, the last state has become worse
for them than the first. {2:21} For it would be better for them not to
have known the way of righteousness, than, after knowing it, to turn
back from the holy commandment delivered to them. {2:22} But it has
happened to them according to the true proverb, "The dog turns to his
own vomit again,"[3] and "the sow that has washed to wallowing in the
mire."
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Footnotes:
[1] {2:2} TR reads "destructive" instead of "immoral"
[2] {2:4} Tartarus is another name for Hell
[3] {2:22} Proverbs 26:11
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