2 Peter 2

¹ But there were also false prophets among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you. They will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing swift destruction on themselves.

² Many will follow their depravities, and because of them the way of truth will be blasphemed.

³ In their greed they will exploit you with fabricated words. Their condemnation, pronounced long ago, is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep.

⁴ For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into the gloomy pits of Tartarus, holding them for judgment;

⁵ and if he did not spare the ancient world, but protected Noah, a herald of righteousness, with seven others when he brought the flood on the world of the ungodly;

⁶ and if he condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes and making them an example of what is coming on the ungodly;

⁷ and if he rescued righteous Lot, worn down by the depraved conduct of the lawless

⁸ (for as that righteous man lived among them day after day, he tormented his righteous soul over the lawless deeds he saw and heard)—

⁹ then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to hold the unrighteous for punishment on the day of judgment—

¹⁰ and especially those who follow the corrupt desire of the flesh and despise authority. Bold and arrogant, they are not afraid to slander celestial beings;

¹¹ whereas even angels, though greater in strength and power, do not bring a slanderous charge against them before the Lord.

¹² But these people blaspheme in matters they do not understand. They are like irrational animals, creatures of instinct, born to be caught and destroyed—and like animals they too will be destroyed,

¹³ suffering wrong as the wages for the wrong they have done. They count it a pleasure to revel in broad daylight. They are blots and blemishes, reveling in their deceptions while they feast with you.

¹⁴ With eyes full of adultery, they never stop sinning; they entice unsteady souls. They have hearts trained in greed—an accursed brood!

¹⁵ They have left the straight way and wandered off, following the way of Balaam son of Bosor, who loved the wages of wrongdoing—

¹⁶ but he was rebuked for his wrongdoing by a donkey, a beast without speech, which spoke with a human voice and restrained the prophet's madness.

¹⁷ These people are springs without water and mists driven by a storm. The deepest darkness has been reserved for them.

¹⁸ For they mouth empty, boastful words, and by appealing to the lustful desires of the flesh they entice people who are just escaping from those who live in error.

¹⁹ They promise them freedom, while they themselves are slaves of corruption—for a person is a slave to whatever has mastered them.

²⁰ If, after escaping the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, they are worse off at the end than they were at the beginning.

²¹ It would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness than, having known it, to turn their backs on the holy command that was passed on to them.

²² What the true proverb says has happened to them: "A dog returns to its own vomit," and, "A sow that is washed returns to wallowing in the mud."