False Prophets and Teachers

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

2Many will follow their ⁷sensual ways, and because of ⁸them the way of the truth will be maligned.

3In their greed they will exploit you with deceptive words. Their condemnation from of old is not idle, and their destruction ⁹will not slumber.

4For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them down to Tartarus and committed them to ¹⁰chains of darkness to be kept for judgment;

5and if he did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, along with seven others, when he brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly;

6and if he condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah ¹¹to destruction by reducing them to ashes and made them an example ¹²to those who would live in an ungodly way;

7and if he rescued righteous Lot, who was distressed by the sensual conduct of the lawless

8(for as ¹³that righteous man dwelt among them, his righteous soul was tormented day after day over their lawless deeds that he saw and heard);

9then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and how to keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment,

10especially those who indulge the corrupt desires of the flesh and who despise authority. Bold and self-willed, they do not tremble when they blaspheme glorious beings,

11whereas angels, who are greater in strength and power, do not bring a blasphemous judgment against them ¹⁴before the Lord.

12But these men blaspheme in matters they do not understand. They are like irrational beasts, creatures of instinct born for capture and destruction, and in the destruction of those beasts ¹⁵they will be destroyed,

13¹⁶receiving the wages of unrighteousness. Counting indulgence in the daytime as pleasure, they are stains and blemishes, openly indulging in their deceptions as they feast with you.

14They have eyes full of adultery, insatiable for sin. They entice unstable souls. They are accursed children with hearts trained in ¹⁷greed.

15They have abandoned the straight path and gone astray, following the way of Balaam, the son of ¹⁸Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness.

16But he received a rebuke for his own transgression; a speechless donkey spoke with a human voice and prevented the prophet's madness.

17These men are springs without ¹⁹water, clouds driven by a storm, for whom the thick gloom of darkness has been reserved forever.

18For they speak bombastic words of nonsense, and with sensual desires of the flesh they entice people who ²⁰have ²¹truly escaped from others who live in error.

19They promise them freedom while they themselves are slaves of corruption. For a man is a slave to whatever masters him.

20For if after they have escaped from the defilements of the world through the knowledge of ²²the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in these defilements and overcome, the last state is worse for them than the first.

21It would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness than, after knowing it, to turn back from the holy commandment that was passed on to them.

22What the true proverb says has happened to them: “A dog returns to its own vomit,” and, “A sow, after washing herself, returns to wallowing in the mire.”