Simeon Peter, a slave and apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have obtained a faith equal in value to ours by the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ.

Therefore I intend to remind you continually concerning these [things], although [you] know [them] and are established in the truth that you have.

[By] leaving the straight path, they have gone astray, [because they] followed the way of Balaam the [son of] Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness,

For if, [after they] have escaped from the defilements of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and they are again entangled in these [things] [and] succumb to [them], the last [state] has become worse for them than the first.

For it would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness than having known [it], to turn back from the holy commandment that had been delivered to them.

and saying, "Where is the promise of his coming? For {ever since} the fathers fell asleep, all [things] have continued just as they have been from the beginning of creation."

Therefore, dear friends, [because you] know [this] beforehand, guard yourselves so that you do not lose your own safe position [because you] have been led away by the error of lawless persons.