1 But false prophets arose also among the people, as among you also shall be false teachers, who shall privily bring in destructive heresies, denying even the Master that bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction. 2 And many shall follow their lasciviousnesses; by reason of whom the way of the truth shall be evil spoken of. 3 And in covetousness shall they with feigned words make merchandise of you: whose :sentence now from of old lingereth not, and their :destruction slumbereth not. 4 For if :God spared not angels that sinned, but †tartarizing them committed them to pits of darkness, to be kept unto judgment; 5 and spared not the ancient world, but preserved one of eight, Noah, a preacher of righteousness, when he brought a flood upon a world of the ungodly; 6 and turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes condemned them, having made them an example of things coming upon the ungodly; 7 and delivered righteous Lot, sore distressed by the lascivious conduct of the wicked 8 (for that righteous man dwelling among them, in seeing and hearing, tormented his righteous soul from day to day with their lawless deeds): 9 the Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptation, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment unto a day of judgment; 10 but chiefly them that go after flesh in lust of defilement, and despise lordship. Darers, self-willed, they tremble not at †dignities, railing; 11 whereas angels, being greater in might and power, bring not railing judgment against them before the Lord. 12 But these, as creatures without reason, born mere †animals for capture and corruption, railing in matters whereof they are ignorant, shall in their corruption also be corrupted, 13 suffering wrong as the wage of wrongdoing; men that count revel by day a pleasure, spots and blemishes, reveling in their :deceivings while they feast with you; 14 having eyes full of adultery, and that cannot cease from sin; enticing unsteadfast souls; having a heart practiced in covetousness; children of a curse: 15 forsaking the straight way, they went astray, having followed the way of :Balaam the son of :Beōr, who loved the wage of unrighteousness: 16 but was rebuked for his own transgression: a dumb ass spake with man’s voice and stayed the madness of the prophet. 17 These are waterless springs, and mists driven by a storm; for whom the blackness of the darkness hath been reserved. 18 For, uttering great swellings of vanity, they entice in lusts of the flesh by lasciviousness those who are just escaping from them that live in error; 19 promising them liberty, while themselves are bondmen of :corruption; for of †whom a man is worsted of the same is he also enslaved. 20 For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled therein and are worsted, their last are become worse with them than the first. 21 Better were it for them not to have known the way of :righteousness, than, after knowing it, to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them. 22 It has happened to them :after the true proverb, A dog turning to his :own vomit again, and, A washed sow to wallowing in mire.
