The Text of the Second Epistle of St. Peter online

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The Online Text of

The Second Epistle of

ST. PETER

Chapter 1

¹Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have obtained along with us equally precious faith by means of the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ, ²grace and peace be multiplied to you, through the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, ³as his divine power has given to us all things pertaining to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and virtue, ⁴through which he has given to us precious and very great promises, in order that through these you might become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world from lust.

⁵But especially for that very reason, bringing to bear all diligence, add to your faith virtue, and to virtue knowledge, ⁶and to knowledge self-control, and to self-control endurance, and to endurance godliness, ⁷and to godliness brotherly friendship, and to brotherly friendship add love. ⁸For these things abounding in you make you not barren or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. ⁹Whereas someone in whom these things are not present is blind, being short-sighted, forgetful of receiving the cleansing of his sins in the past. ¹⁰Therefore instead, brethren, be diligent to make your calling and election sure, for by doing these things you will never fail. ¹¹For so will be richly supplied to you entry into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and savior Jesus Christ.

¹²Wherefore I intend to remind you always about these things, even though you know them and are confirmed in the truth that has come. ¹³And I deem it right, as long as I am in this tent, to rouse you by a reminder, ¹⁴knowing that soon is the putting off of my tent, as indeed our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me, ¹⁵but I will strive to have you also after my departure always make mention of these reminders.

¹⁶For it is not after the fashion of skillfully fabricated stories we have made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eye-witnesses of that majesty. ¹⁷For after receiving honor and glory from God the Father, what a voice was brought for him by that majestic glory: “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” ¹⁸And we heard this voice, produced from heaven, when we were with him on the holy mountain. ¹⁹And we have a very sure word of prophecy, to which you would do well to take heed, as to a lamp shining in a dismal place, until the daylight shines through, and the Light Bearer dawns in your hearts, ²⁰knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of scripture arises from personal illumination, ²¹for no prophecy was ever brought by the will of a human being, but rather men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

Chapter 2

¹But false prophets have also arisen among the people, as there will be false teachers among you as well. Such people will introduce destructive personal opinions, and contradicting the master who purchased them, bring upon themselves swift damnation. ²And many will follow their loose ways, because of whom, the way of truth will be disparaged. ³And in covetousness they will defraud you with baseless teachings. Whose sentence from of old was never idle, nor is their damnation sleeping.

⁴For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but transferred them down to Tartarus, being kept in chains of deep darkness for judgment day, ⁵and the ancient world he did not spare, when he brought a flood upon a world full of wicked people, except for Noah, one of eight he protected, heralder of righteousness, ⁶and the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah he condemned to ruin, reducing them to ashes, setting them as an example to those about to be ungodly, ⁷and rescued righteous Lot, who was overwhelmed by the behavior of them unrestrained in sensuality, ⁸(for that righteous man, though he lived among them, seeing and hearing day after day their lawless acts grated on his righteous soul) ⁹the Lord certainly knows how to deliver the godly out of trial, but store up the unrighteous ones for punishment on the day of judgment, ¹⁰and especially those running after the flesh in defiling lust, and who despise authority. Bold, over-bearing, they do not tremble as they insult higher powers, ¹¹whereas angels who are much more able and powerful do not bring against them an accusation that is insulting.

¹²But these, like unreasoning beasts of instinct, are born for capture and death: hurling invective about things in which they are not knowledgeable. In the manner of their demise, these also will be destroyed, ¹³suffering injury as the wages of doing injury. When they eat a communal meal with you, they are blights and sores, in their delusion, reveling, thinking it is partying in the daytime for pleasure; ¹⁴having eyes full of adultery, and who cannot cease from sin, enticing unsure souls, having a heart trained on material gain, inheritors of doom. ¹⁵Leaving the right path, they have gone astray, following in the path of Balaam son of Bosor, who loved the payment from unrighteousness, ¹⁶but received a rebuke for his transgression. A donkey, that has not speech, reigned in the madness of the prophet, by speaking up with a human voice.

¹⁷These are springs without water and clouds driven away by a storm, for whom the absolute blackness of darkness is reserved. ¹⁸For by uttering high sounding but worthless words they entice through the untempered desires of the flesh those just escaping the ones who live in error, ¹⁹promising them freedom, themselves being slaves of seduction. For by whatever someone has been defeated, to that he has become a slave.

²⁰For if after having escaped the moral corruptions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ they are but again entangled, defeated by them, their latter state has become worse for them than their former. ²¹For it would have been better for them not to have known the path of righteousness, than though knowing it, to turn back from the holy commandment that was delivered to them. ²²The definition of that true proverb is met in them: “A dog returns to its vomit, and a sow after washing herself to rolling in her dung.”

Chapter 3

¹This now, beloved, is the second epistle I write to you in which I rouse your sincere minds by a reminder, ²to recall the statements spoken in the past by the holy prophets, and the order from the Lord and Savior through your apostles, ³knowing this first of all, that there will come in the last days mockers, conducting themselves according to their own desires, ⁴and saying with scorn, “Where is the promise of his coming? Because from the time our fathers passed away, everything continues like it was from the beginning of creation.”

⁵For this escapes them on purpose, that the heavens existed long ago, and the earth from water and through water was put together by the word of God, ⁶by which also the then world perished when it was flooded with water; ⁷and the present heavens and earth by the same word are reserved for fire, kept until the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly people.

⁸But this one thing must not escape you, beloved, that with the Lord, one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like one day. ⁹The Lord of that promise is not loitering, as some consider loitering. Instead, he is being very patient toward us, not wanting anyone to perish, but rather all to come to repentance. ¹⁰But the day of the Lord will come, like a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the elements be dissolved by burning up, and the earth and the works in it will be found no more.

¹¹Since all these things are being dissolved, what kind of people is it requisite to be, in holy ways of life, and godliness, ¹²looking forward to and cheering on the coming of the day of God, by which it is all melted, the heavens to be dissolved by fire and the elements by burning up? ¹³And we are looking forward, according to his promise, to a new heaven and a new earth, in which righteousness is at home.

¹⁴Wherefore, beloved, looking forward to these things, be diligent to be found by him at peace, from being pure and blameless. ¹⁵And consider the patience of our Lord to be salvation, just as also our beloved brother Paul has written to you according to the wisdom given to him, ¹⁶as also in all his epistles, talking in them about these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which untaught and unstable persons distort, as they do also the rest of the scriptures, to their own destruction.

¹⁷You therefore, beloved, knowing this ahead of time, guard yourselves so that you not be led away by the error of unprincipled persons and fall from your own firm conviction, ¹⁸but grow in grace and in the knowledge of our lord and savior Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and for ever.

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