and among the lampstands a being like a man, wearing a long robe, with a gold belt around his breast.

"To the angel of the church in Ephesus write: " 'He who holds the seven stars in his right hand and goes about among the seven gold lampstands speaks thus:

I know where you live; where Satan has his throne! Yet you cling to my name and did not renounce your faith in me even in the days when my faithful Antipas, my witness, was put to death among you??here Satan lives.

Yet I hold it somewhat against you that you have among you some adherents of the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to entrap the children of Israel into eating meat that had been sacrificed to idols, and into immoral practices.

So you also have among you some who hold the teaching of the Nicolaitans.

The kings of the earth, the nobles, the officers, the rich, the strong??verybody, slave and free??id themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains.

They are the men who have not been defiled by relations with women; they are celibates. It is they who follow the Lamb wherever he goes. They have been ransomed from among men as the first-fruits for God and the Lamb,