Thematic Bible


Thematic Bible




They zealously seek you, not commendably, but they want to exclude you, in order that you may seek them [zealously]. Verse ConceptsExcommunicationmotives

For from these are those who slip into houses and captivate foolish women loaded down with sins, led by various kinds of desires, Verse ConceptsLicentiousnessCharacter Of WickedCaptivesHeavy BurdensWeak WomenProblem Peoplevulnerabilityimpulsivenessworms


{For by speaking high-sounding but empty words}, they entice with desires of the flesh [and] with licentiousness those who are scarcely escaping from those who live in error, Verse ConceptsFutilityFaultsemptinessEloquenceCharmdesiresTemptation, Sources OfEnticersBoastersAllurements Of SinWantonnessLiving For The MaterialEnticingUseless WordsEscaping From PeopleEvil DesiresError

But I have a few [things] against you: that you have there those who hold fast to the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to put a stumbling block before the sons of Israel, to eat food sacrificed to idols and to commit sexual immorality. Verse ConceptsBalaams DonkeyFreedom, Abuse Of ChristianFoodAdultery, SpiritualChastityToleranceAbuse, Of Christian FreedomFalse Teachers, Examples OfStumbling BlocksMisteachingFood For Other godsFood Offered To IdolsThey Committed ImmoralitysexSexual Immorality

But I have against you that you tolerate the woman Jezebel, the one who calls herself a prophetess, and teaches and deceives my slaves to commit sexual immorality and to eat food sacrificed to idols. Verse ConceptsFalse TeachingsOpposition, To Sin And EvilPeople Of God, In NtFalse Prophets, Examples OfSexual Sin, Nature OfProphetessSeducersBeing MisleadMisteachingFood For Other godsFood Offered To IdolsThey Committed Immoralityjezebel

But there were also false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you also, who will bring in {destructive heresies}, even denying the Master who bought them, [thus] bringing on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their licentious ways, because of whom the way of truth will be reviled. And in greediness they will exploit you with false words, whose condemnation [from] long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. read more.
For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but held [them] captive in Tartarus with chains of darkness [and] handed [them] over to be kept for judgment, and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a proclaimer of righteousness, {and seven others} [when he] brought a flood on the world of the ungodly, and condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes, having appointed [them] [as] an example for those who are going to be ungodly, and rescued righteous Lot, worn down by the way of life of lawless persons in licentiousness (for that righteous man, [as he] lived among them day after day, was tormenting [his] righteous soul by the lawless deeds [he was] seeing and hearing), [then] the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to reserve the unrighteous to be punished at the day of judgment, and especially those who go after the flesh in defiling lust and who despise authority. Bold [and] arrogant, they do not tremble in awe [as they] blaspheme majestic beings, whereas angels, who are greater in strength and power, do not bring against them a demeaning judgment. But these persons, like irrational animals born [only with] natural [instincts] for capture and killing, blaspheming {about things} they do not understand, in their destruction will also be destroyed, being harmed [as the] wages of unrighteousness. Considering reveling in the daytime a pleasure, [they are] stains and blemishes, carousing in their deceitful pleasures [when they] feast together with you, having eyes full of [desire for] an adulteress and unceasing from sin, enticing unstable persons, [and] having hearts trained for greediness. Accursed children! [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, but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}. These [people] are waterless springs and mists driven by a hurricane, for whom the gloom of darkness has been reserved. {For by speaking high-sounding but empty words}, they entice with desires of the flesh [and] with licentiousness those who are scarcely escaping from those who live in error, promising them freedom [although they] themselves are slaves of depravity. For to whatever someone succumbs, by this he is also enslaved.


But there were also false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you also, who will bring in {destructive heresies}, even denying the Master who bought them, [thus] bringing on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their licentious ways, because of whom the way of truth will be reviled. And in greediness they will exploit you with false words, whose condemnation [from] long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep.



Therefore [it will be as] night to you, without vision, and darkness to you, without divination. And the sun will set on the prophets, and the day will grow dark over them. Then the seers will be disgraced, and those practicing divination will be put to shame. All of them will cover their lips, for there is no reply from God.


whom it is necessary to silence, whoever are ruining whole families [by] teaching [things] which must not be [taught] for the sake of dishonest gain. Verse ConceptsProfitsSelf IndulgenceSacrilegeMisteachingRelatives Also InvolvedDishonestyFamiliesvulnerability


as Sodom and Gomorrah and the towns around them indulged in sexual immorality and {pursued unnatural desire} [in] the same way as these, are exhibited as an example [by] undergoing the punishment of eternal fire. Verse ConceptsDeath, Of UnbelieversBestialityCivilizationHomosexualityEternal JudgementTwo CitiesSexual Immorality Brings PunishmentgayssexSexual ImmoralityBeing Gay

For I do not want you to be ignorant, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud and all went through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, read more.
and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual rock that followed [them], and the rock was Christ. But God was not pleased with the majority of them, for they were struck down in the desert. Now these [things] happened [as] examples for us, so that we should not be desirers of evil [things], just as those also desired [them], and not become idolaters, as some of them [did], just as it is written, "The people sat down to eat and drink, and stood up to play," nor commit sexual immorality, as some of them committed sexual immorality, and twenty-three thousand fell in one day, nor put Christ to the test, as some of them tested [him], and were destroyed by snakes, nor grumble, just as some of them grumbled, and were destroyed by the destroyer. Now these [things] happened to those [people] as an example, but are written for our instruction, on whom the ends of the ages have come. Therefore, the one who thinks that he stands must watch out lest he fall.

But there were also false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you also, who will bring in {destructive heresies}, even denying the Master who bought them, [thus] bringing on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their licentious ways, because of whom the way of truth will be reviled. And in greediness they will exploit you with false words, whose condemnation [from] long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. read more.
For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but held [them] captive in Tartarus with chains of darkness [and] handed [them] over to be kept for judgment, and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a proclaimer of righteousness, {and seven others} [when he] brought a flood on the world of the ungodly, and condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes, having appointed [them] [as] an example for those who are going to be ungodly,

Like a dog returning to his vomit [is] a fool reverting to his folly. Verse ConceptsFolly, Effects OfdogsVomittingSin, Love OfWicked Described AsSinning RepeatedlyFoolspoop

But there were also false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you also, who will bring in {destructive heresies}, even denying the Master who bought them, [thus] bringing on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their licentious ways, because of whom the way of truth will be reviled. And in greediness they will exploit you with false words, whose condemnation [from] long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. read more.
For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but held [them] captive in Tartarus with chains of darkness [and] handed [them] over to be kept for judgment, and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a proclaimer of righteousness, {and seven others} [when he] brought a flood on the world of the ungodly, and condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes, having appointed [them] [as] an example for those who are going to be ungodly, and rescued righteous Lot, worn down by the way of life of lawless persons in licentiousness (for that righteous man, [as he] lived among them day after day, was tormenting [his] righteous soul by the lawless deeds [he was] seeing and hearing), [then] the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to reserve the unrighteous to be punished at the day of judgment, and especially those who go after the flesh in defiling lust and who despise authority. Bold [and] arrogant, they do not tremble in awe [as they] blaspheme majestic beings, whereas angels, who are greater in strength and power, do not bring against them a demeaning judgment. But these persons, like irrational animals born [only with] natural [instincts] for capture and killing, blaspheming {about things} they do not understand, in their destruction will also be destroyed, being harmed [as the] wages of unrighteousness. Considering reveling in the daytime a pleasure, [they are] stains and blemishes, carousing in their deceitful pleasures [when they] feast together with you, having eyes full of [desire for] an adulteress and unceasing from sin, enticing unstable persons, [and] having hearts trained for greediness. Accursed children! [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, but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}. These [people] are waterless springs and mists driven by a hurricane, for whom the gloom of darkness has been reserved. {For by speaking high-sounding but empty words}, they entice with desires of the flesh [and] with licentiousness those who are scarcely escaping from those who live in error, promising them freedom [although they] themselves are slaves of depravity. For to whatever someone succumbs, by this he is also enslaved. 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. The [statement] of the true proverb has happened to them, "A dog returns to its own vomit," and "A sow, [after] washing herself, [returns] to wallowing in the mud."

But there were also false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you also, who will bring in {destructive heresies}, even denying the Master who bought them, [thus] bringing on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their licentious ways, because of whom the way of truth will be reviled. And in greediness they will exploit you with false words, whose condemnation [from] long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. read more.
For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but held [them] captive in Tartarus with chains of darkness [and] handed [them] over to be kept for judgment, and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a proclaimer of righteousness, {and seven others} [when he] brought a flood on the world of the ungodly, and condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes, having appointed [them] [as] an example for those who are going to be ungodly, and rescued righteous Lot, worn down by the way of life of lawless persons in licentiousness (for that righteous man, [as he] lived among them day after day, was tormenting [his] righteous soul by the lawless deeds [he was] seeing and hearing), [then] the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to reserve the unrighteous to be punished at the day of judgment, and especially those who go after the flesh in defiling lust and who despise authority. Bold [and] arrogant, they do not tremble in awe [as they] blaspheme majestic beings, whereas angels, who are greater in strength and power, do not bring against them a demeaning judgment. But these persons, like irrational animals born [only with] natural [instincts] for capture and killing, blaspheming {about things} they do not understand, in their destruction will also be destroyed, being harmed [as the] wages of unrighteousness. Considering reveling in the daytime a pleasure, [they are] stains and blemishes, carousing in their deceitful pleasures [when they] feast together with you, having eyes full of [desire for] an adulteress and unceasing from sin, enticing unstable persons, [and] having hearts trained for greediness. Accursed children! [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,





But there were also false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you also, who will bring in {destructive heresies}, even denying the Master who bought them, [thus] bringing on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their licentious ways, because of whom the way of truth will be reviled. And in greediness they will exploit you with false words, whose condemnation [from] long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. read more.
For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but held [them] captive in Tartarus with chains of darkness [and] handed [them] over to be kept for judgment, and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a proclaimer of righteousness, {and seven others} [when he] brought a flood on the world of the ungodly, and condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes, having appointed [them] [as] an example for those who are going to be ungodly, and rescued righteous Lot, worn down by the way of life of lawless persons in licentiousness (for that righteous man, [as he] lived among them day after day, was tormenting [his] righteous soul by the lawless deeds [he was] seeing and hearing), [then] the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to reserve the unrighteous to be punished at the day of judgment, and especially those who go after the flesh in defiling lust and who despise authority. Bold [and] arrogant, they do not tremble in awe [as they] blaspheme majestic beings, whereas angels, who are greater in strength and power, do not bring against them a demeaning judgment. But these persons, like irrational animals born [only with] natural [instincts] for capture and killing, blaspheming {about things} they do not understand, in their destruction will also be destroyed, being harmed [as the] wages of unrighteousness. Considering reveling in the daytime a pleasure, [they are] stains and blemishes, carousing in their deceitful pleasures [when they] feast together with you, having eyes full of [desire for] an adulteress and unceasing from sin, enticing unstable persons, [and] having hearts trained for greediness. Accursed children! [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, but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}. These [people] are waterless springs and mists driven by a hurricane, for whom the gloom of darkness has been reserved. {For by speaking high-sounding but empty words}, they entice with desires of the flesh [and] with licentiousness those who are scarcely escaping from those who live in error, promising them freedom [although they] themselves are slaves of depravity. For to whatever someone succumbs, by this he is also enslaved.

Stretch out your hands from on high; Rescue me and deliver me from many waters, from [the] hand of foreigners, whose mouth speaks falsely, and their right hand [is] a false right hand. O God, I will sing a new song to you. With a lyre of ten [strings] I will sing praise to you, read more.
who gives victory to kings, who rescues David his servant from [the] evil sword. Rescue me and deliver me from [the] hand of foreigners, whose mouth speaks falsely, and whose right hand [is] a false right hand,

Because the household gods speak deceit, and those who practice divination see a lie, and the dreamers of vanity speak in vain. Therefore [the people] wander like sheep; they are afflicted because there is no shepherd. Verse ConceptsAstrologyFutilityencouragement, examples ofdiscouragementGuidance, Need For God'sHousehold GodsPeace, Human Destruction OfRestlessnessSheepSorcery And MagicVisionsDivinationWanderersMisleading DreamsProphesying LiesNo ComfortDreams And False Prophets

Thus says the Lord Yahweh: 'Alas, for the foolish prophets who [are] going after their [own] spirit, {and they did not see anything}! Your prophets have been like foxes among ruins. You did not go up into the breaches and repair a wall for the house of Israel to stand [firm] in the battle on the day of Yahweh. read more.
They saw falseness and {a lying divination}, the ones saying, 'Declaration of Yahweh!' and Yahweh did not send them, and they wait {for the confirmation of their word}. Have you not seen {a false vision} and spoken {lying divination}, and [you] said, 'Declaration of Yahweh!' but {I myself did not speak}. Therefore thus says the Lord Yahweh: 'Because of your speaking falseness and [because] you envisioned a lie, therefore, look! I [am] against you!" {declares} the Lord Yahweh. "And it will be my hand against the prophets who [are] seeing falseness and who [are] practicing lying divination. They will not be in the council of my people, and they will not be written [down] in the record [book] of the house of Israel, and into the land of Israel they will not come, and [then] you will know that I [am] the Lord Yahweh. Because, yes, because they led my people astray, {saying} 'Peace!' And [there is] not peace. And [when] anyone builds a flimsy wall, look, they coat it [with] whitewash.

But there were also false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you also, who will bring in {destructive heresies}, even denying the Master who bought them, [thus] bringing on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their licentious ways, because of whom the way of truth will be reviled. And in greediness they will exploit you with false words, whose condemnation [from] long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. read more.
For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but held [them] captive in Tartarus with chains of darkness [and] handed [them] over to be kept for judgment, and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a proclaimer of righteousness, {and seven others} [when he] brought a flood on the world of the ungodly, and condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes, having appointed [them] [as] an example for those who are going to be ungodly, and rescued righteous Lot, worn down by the way of life of lawless persons in licentiousness (for that righteous man, [as he] lived among them day after day, was tormenting [his] righteous soul by the lawless deeds [he was] seeing and hearing), [then] the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to reserve the unrighteous to be punished at the day of judgment, and especially those who go after the flesh in defiling lust and who despise authority. Bold [and] arrogant, they do not tremble in awe [as they] blaspheme majestic beings, whereas angels, who are greater in strength and power, do not bring against them a demeaning judgment. But these persons, like irrational animals born [only with] natural [instincts] for capture and killing, blaspheming {about things} they do not understand, in their destruction will also be destroyed, being harmed [as the] wages of unrighteousness. Considering reveling in the daytime a pleasure, [they are] stains and blemishes, carousing in their deceitful pleasures [when they] feast together with you, having eyes full of [desire for] an adulteress and unceasing from sin, enticing unstable persons, [and] having hearts trained for greediness. Accursed children! [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, but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}. These [people] are waterless springs and mists driven by a hurricane, for whom the gloom of darkness has been reserved. {For by speaking high-sounding but empty words}, they entice with desires of the flesh [and] with licentiousness those who are scarcely escaping from those who live in error,

as Sodom and Gomorrah and the towns around them indulged in sexual immorality and {pursued unnatural desire} [in] the same way as these, are exhibited as an example [by] undergoing the punishment of eternal fire. Despite that, in the same way also these [men], [because of their] dreams, defile the flesh and reject authority and blaspheme majestic beings. But Michael the archangel, when he argued with the devil, disputing concerning the body of Moses, did not dare to pronounce a blasphemous judgment, but said, "The Lord rebuke you!" read more.
But these persons blaspheme all that they do not understand, and all that they understand by instinct like the irrational animals, by these [things] they are being destroyed.

A heart of righteousness will ponder the answer, but a mouth of wickedness will pour out deceit. Verse ConceptsMind, The HumanRighteous, TheSpeech, Positive Aspects OfThoughts Of The RighteousThinkingAnsweringToo Many Words

But to the wicked God says, "What [right] have you to recite my statutes and {mention my covenant with your mouth}, while you yourself hate discipline, and cast my words behind you? When you see a thief, then you are pleased with him, and your association [is] with adulterers. read more.
You give your mouth free rein for evil, and you harness your tongue to deceit. You sit and speak against your brother; you slander your mother's son.

But there were also false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you also, who will bring in {destructive heresies}, even denying the Master who bought them, [thus] bringing on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their licentious ways, because of whom the way of truth will be reviled. And in greediness they will exploit you with false words, whose condemnation [from] long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. read more.
For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but held [them] captive in Tartarus with chains of darkness [and] handed [them] over to be kept for judgment, and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a proclaimer of righteousness, {and seven others} [when he] brought a flood on the world of the ungodly, and condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes, having appointed [them] [as] an example for those who are going to be ungodly, and rescued righteous Lot, worn down by the way of life of lawless persons in licentiousness (for that righteous man, [as he] lived among them day after day, was tormenting [his] righteous soul by the lawless deeds [he was] seeing and hearing), [then] the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to reserve the unrighteous to be punished at the day of judgment, and especially those who go after the flesh in defiling lust and who despise authority. Bold [and] arrogant, they do not tremble in awe [as they] blaspheme majestic beings, whereas angels, who are greater in strength and power, do not bring against them a demeaning judgment. But these persons, like irrational animals born [only with] natural [instincts] for capture and killing, blaspheming {about things} they do not understand, in their destruction will also be destroyed,

But there were also false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you also, who will bring in {destructive heresies}, even denying the Master who bought them, [thus] bringing on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their licentious ways, because of whom the way of truth will be reviled. And in greediness they will exploit you with false words, whose condemnation [from] long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. read more.
For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but held [them] captive in Tartarus with chains of darkness [and] handed [them] over to be kept for judgment, and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a proclaimer of righteousness, {and seven others} [when he] brought a flood on the world of the ungodly, and condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes, having appointed [them] [as] an example for those who are going to be ungodly, and rescued righteous Lot, worn down by the way of life of lawless persons in licentiousness (for that righteous man, [as he] lived among them day after day, was tormenting [his] righteous soul by the lawless deeds [he was] seeing and hearing), [then] the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to reserve the unrighteous to be punished at the day of judgment, and especially those who go after the flesh in defiling lust and who despise authority. Bold [and] arrogant, they do not tremble in awe [as they] blaspheme majestic beings, whereas angels, who are greater in strength and power, do not bring against them a demeaning judgment. But these persons, like irrational animals born [only with] natural [instincts] for capture and killing, blaspheming {about things} they do not understand, in their destruction will also be destroyed, being harmed [as the] wages of unrighteousness. Considering reveling in the daytime a pleasure, [they are] stains and blemishes, carousing in their deceitful pleasures [when they] feast together with you, having eyes full of [desire for] an adulteress and unceasing from sin, enticing unstable persons, [and] having hearts trained for greediness. Accursed children! [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, but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}. These [people] are waterless springs and mists driven by a hurricane, for whom the gloom of darkness has been reserved. {For by speaking high-sounding but empty words}, they entice with desires of the flesh [and] with licentiousness those who are scarcely escaping from those who live in error, promising them freedom [although they] themselves are slaves of depravity. For to whatever someone succumbs, by this he is also enslaved.

"Those are among [the ones] rebelling [against the] light; they do not recognize his ways, and they do not stay in his paths. {At dusk} the murderer rises; he kills [the] needy and [the] poor, and in the night he is like a thief. And [the] eye of [the] adulterer waits for dusk, saying, {'No eye will see me,'} and he places a covering [on his] face. read more.
He digs through houses in the darkness; by day they shut themselves in-- they do not know [the] light because morning likewise is to them deep darkness; indeed, they know about [the] terrors of deep darkness. "He himself [is] swift on [the] water's surface; their portion is cursed in the land. {No one turns toward the path of their vineyards}.

Discretion will watch over you; understanding will protect you, [in order] to deliver you from the way of evil, from a man who speaks devious things-- those who forsake the paths of uprightness to walk in ways of darkness, read more.
those who are happy to do evil, [for] they delight in [the] deviousness of evil, {who are crooked in their ways}, and devious in their paths; [in order] to deliver you from a strange woman, from a foreign woman [who] flatters [with] her sayings, she who forsakes the partner of her youth and has forgotten the covenant of her God, for her house sinks to death, and to the dead are her paths. [Of] all who go to her, none shall return, nor do they reach paths of life.

For before the eyes of Yahweh [are] {human ways}, and all his paths he examines. His iniquities shall ensnare him, the evildoer, and in the vanity of his sin he shall be caught. He shall die {for lack of} discipline, and in the greatness of his folly he shall be lost.

But there were also false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you also, who will bring in {destructive heresies}, even denying the Master who bought them, [thus] bringing on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their licentious ways, because of whom the way of truth will be reviled. And in greediness they will exploit you with false words, whose condemnation [from] long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. read more.
For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but held [them] captive in Tartarus with chains of darkness [and] handed [them] over to be kept for judgment, and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a proclaimer of righteousness, {and seven others} [when he] brought a flood on the world of the ungodly, and condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes, having appointed [them] [as] an example for those who are going to be ungodly, and rescued righteous Lot, worn down by the way of life of lawless persons in licentiousness (for that righteous man, [as he] lived among them day after day, was tormenting [his] righteous soul by the lawless deeds [he was] seeing and hearing), [then] the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to reserve the unrighteous to be punished at the day of judgment, and especially those who go after the flesh in defiling lust and who despise authority. Bold [and] arrogant, they do not tremble in awe [as they] blaspheme majestic beings, whereas angels, who are greater in strength and power, do not bring against them a demeaning judgment. But these persons, like irrational animals born [only with] natural [instincts] for capture and killing, blaspheming {about things} they do not understand, in their destruction will also be destroyed, being harmed [as the] wages of unrighteousness. Considering reveling in the daytime a pleasure, [they are] stains and blemishes, carousing in their deceitful pleasures [when they] feast together with you, having eyes full of [desire for] an adulteress and unceasing from sin, enticing unstable persons, [and] having hearts trained for greediness. Accursed children! [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, but received a rebuke for his own lawlessness: a speechless donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained {the prophet's madness}. These [people] are waterless springs and mists driven by a hurricane, for whom the gloom of darkness has been reserved. {For by speaking high-sounding but empty words}, they entice with desires of the flesh [and] with licentiousness those who are scarcely escaping from those who live in error, promising them freedom [although they] themselves are slaves of depravity. For to whatever someone succumbs, by this he is also enslaved. 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. The [statement] of the true proverb has happened to them, "A dog returns to its own vomit," and "A sow, [after] washing herself, [returns] to wallowing in the mud."