2 Peter 2:19–21

2:19 Although these false teachers promise71 such people72 freedom, they themselves are enslaved to73 immorality.74 For whatever a person succumbs to, to that he is enslaved.75 2:20 For if after they have escaped the filthy things76 of the world through the rich knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ,77 they78 again get entangled in them and succumb to them,79 their last state has become worse for them than their first. 2:21 For it would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than, having known it, to turn back from the holy commandment that had been delivered to them.

71	tn Verse 19 is a subordinate clause in Greek. The masculine nominative participle “promising” (ἐπαγγελλόμενοι, epangellomenoi) refers back to the subject of vv. 17–18. At the same time, it functions subordinately to the following participle, ὑπάρχοντες (huparchontes, “while being”).
72	tn Grk “them.”
73	tn Grk “slaves of.” See the note on the word “slave” in 1:1.
74	tn Or “corruption,” “depravity.” Verse 19 constitutes a subordinate clause to v. 18 in Greek. The main verbal components of these two verses are: “uttering … they entice … promising … being (enslaved).” The main verb is (they) entice. The three participles are adverbial and seem to indicate an instrumental relation (by uttering), a concessive relation (although promising), and a temporal relation (while being [enslaved]). For the sake of English usage, in the translation of the text this is broken down into two sentences.
75	tn Grk “for by what someone is overcome, to this he is enslaved.”
76	tn Grk “defilements”; “contaminations”; “pollutions.”
77	sn Through the rich knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The implication is not that these people necessarily knew the Lord (in the sense of being saved), but that they were in the circle of those who had embraced Christ as Lord and Savior.
78	tn Grk “(and/but) they.”
79	tn Grk “they again, after becoming entangled in them, are overcome by them.”