¹But there were false prophets also among the people, as there shall be also among you false teachers, who shall bring in by the bye destructive heresies, and deny the master that bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction; ²and many shall follow their dissolute ways, through whom the way of the truth shall be blasphemed.

³And through covetousness, with well-turned words, will they make merchandise of you: for whom judgment of old is not idle, and their destruction slumbers not. ⁴For if God spared not the angels who had sinned, but having cast them down to the deepest pit of gloom has delivered them to chains of darkness to be kept for judgment; ⁵and spared not the old world, but preserved Noe, the eighth, a preacher of righteousness, having brought in the flood upon the world of the ungodly; ⁶and having reduced the cities of Sodom and Gomorrha to ashes, condemned them with an overthrow, setting them as an example to those that should afterwards live an ungodly life;

⁷and saved righteous Lot, distressed with the abandoned conversation of the godless, ⁸(for the righteous man through seeing and hearing, dwelling among them, tormented his righteous soul day after day with their lawless works,) ⁹the Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of trial, and to keep the unjust to the day of judgment to be punished;

¹⁰and specially those who walk after the flesh in the lust of uncleanness, and despise lordship. Bold are they, self-willed; they do not fear speaking injuriously of dignities: ¹¹when angels, who are greater in might and power, do not bring against them, before the Lord, an injurious charge. ¹²But these, as natural animals without reason, made to be caught and destroyed, speaking injuriously in things they are ignorant of, shall also perish in their own corruption, ¹³receiving the reward of unrighteousness; accounting ephemeral indulgence pleasure; spots and blemishes, rioting in their own deceits, feasting with you; ¹⁴having eyes full of adultery, and that cease not from sin, alluring unestablished souls; having a heart practised in covetousness, children of curse; ¹⁵having left the straight way they have gone astray, having followed in the path of Balaam the son of Bosor, who loved the reward of unrighteousness; ¹⁶but had reproof of his own wickedness—the dumb ass speaking with man’s voice forbad the folly of the prophet. ¹⁷These are springs without water, and mists driven by storm, to whom the gloom of darkness is reserved for ever. ¹⁸For while speaking great highflown words of vanity, they allure with the lusts of the flesh, by dissoluteness, those who have just fled those who walk in error, ¹⁹promising them liberty, while they themselves are slaves of corruption; for by whom a man is subdued, by him is he also brought into slavery. ²⁰For if after having escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, again entangled, they are subdued by these, their last state is worse than the first. ²¹For it were better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than having known it to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them. ²²But that word of the true proverb has happened to them: The dog has turned back to his own vomit; and, The washed sow to her rolling in mud.

Chapter 3

¹This, a second letter, beloved, I already write to you, in both which I stir up, in the way of putting you in remembrance, your pure mind, ²to be mindful of the words spoken before by the holy prophets, and of the commandment of the Lord and Saviour by your apostles;

³knowing this first, that there shall come at the close of the days mockers with mocking, walking according to their own lusts, ⁴and saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for from the time the fathers fell asleep all things remain thus from the beginning of the creation. ⁵For this is hidden from them through their own wilfulness, that heavens were of old, and an earth, having its subsistence out of water and in water, by the word of God, ⁶through which waters the then world, deluged with water, perished. ⁷But the present heavens and the earth by his word are laid up in store, kept for fire unto a day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.

⁸But let not this one thing be hidden from you, beloved, that one day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.

⁹The Lord does not delay his promise, as some account of delay, but is longsuffering towards you, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. ¹⁰But the day of the Lord will come as a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a rushing noise, and the elements, burning with heat, shall be dissolved, and the earth and the works in it shall be burnt up.

¹¹All these things then being to be dissolved, what ought ye to be in holy conversation and godliness, ¹²waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, by reason of which the heavens, being on fire, shall be dissolved, and the elements, burning with heat, shall melt? ¹³But, according to his promise, we wait for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwells righteousness. ¹⁴Wherefore, beloved, as ye wait for these things, be diligent to be found of him in peace, without spot and blameless; ¹⁵and account the longsuffering of our Lord to be salvation; according as our beloved brother Paul also has written to you according to the wisdom given to him, ¹⁶as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; among which some things are hard to be understood, which the untaught and ill-established wrest, as also the other scriptures, to their own destruction. ¹⁷Ye therefore, beloved, knowing these things before, take care lest, being led away along with the error of the wicked, ye should fall from your own stedfastness: ¹⁸but grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.

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