2 But there were also false prophets among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who shall secretly bring in damnable heresies - even denying the Lord Who has bought them - and bring upon themselves swift damnation.
2 And many shall follow their destructive ways, by whom the way of truth shall be blasphemed.
3 And through covetousness they shall, with crafty words, make merchandise of you. Their ancient condemnation is not lingering. And their destruction does not slumber.
4 For if God did not spare the angels who had sinned - but cast them down into Hell and delivered them into chains of darkness (to be kept for damnation) -
5 nor spare the old world (save Noah, the eighth person, a preacher of righteousness) - but brought in the Flood upon the world of the ungodly,
6 and turned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes (condemning and overthrowing them), and made them an example to those who would live ungodly afterward,
7 and delivered Lot only, overwrought with the unclean conduct of the wicked
8 (for he - being righteous and dwelling among them - tormented his righteous soul from day to day by seeing and hearing their unlawful deeds) -
9 then the Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of trials and to reserve the unjust under punishment for the Day of Judgment;
10 and chiefly those who walk after the flesh (in the lust of uncleanness) and despise government. They are presumptuous, standing in their own conceit, and unafraid to blaspheme God’s glories.
11 Whereas, the angels (who are greater, both in power and might) do not bring slanderous judgment against them before the Lord.
12 But these, as irrational animals (born in nature for capture and corruption), blaspheme those things which they do not understand, and shall perish through their own corruption;
13 and shall receive the wages of unrighteousness as those who count it pleasure to live in debauchery every day. They are spots and blemishes, reveling in their deceptions while they feast with you;
14 having eyes full of adultery that cannot cease to sin, enticing unstable souls. They have hearts trained in covetousness - the children of the curse -
15 who, forsaking the right way, have gone astray. They follow the way of Balaam of Beor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness.
16 But he was rebuked for his iniquity. The dumb beast, speaking with man’s voice, forbade the foolishness of the Prophet.
17 These are wells without water - clouds carried about by the wind - to whom the black darkness is reserved forever.
18 For in speaking boastful words of frivolity, they allure (with lewdness and lusts of the flesh) those who had barely escaped from those walking in error;
19 promising them freedom, but themselves the servants of corruption. For by whomever one is overcome, to him also is he in bondage.
20 For if they - after they have escaped from the filthiness of the world through the acknowledging of the Lord and the Savior Jesus Christ - are once again entangled in it and overcome, the latter end is worse for them than the beginning.
21 For it had been better for them not to have acknowledged the way of righteousness than to turn from the holy commandment given to them after they have acknowledged it.
22 But it has come to them according to the true proverb, “The dog has returned to his own vomit,” and “a sow, being washed, to wallowing in the mire.”