Bible Strands
2 Peter 2:18
With lofty but empty words, they appeal to the sensual passions of the flesh and entice those who are just escaping from others who live in error.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — Peter addresses a church confronting false teachers who have entered the community and are actively targeting converts who have recently turned from pagan error.
The words — The text specifies huperogka (arrogant) and deleazousin (they entice), describing how these individuals use haughty, vain speech to lure listeners.
The thread — The motif of empty, enticing speech and fleshly appeal recurs in Jude 1:15 regarding the harsh words of the ungodly, while the contrast between promised freedom and actual slavery appears in 2 Peter 2:19.
Why it lands — The passage requires readers to evaluate teachers by their rhetorical substance and moral outcome, rejecting those whose words merely stimulate fleshly desire rather than genuine repentance.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Greek words
King James Version
For when they speak great swelling words of vanity, they allure through the lusts of the flesh, through much wantonness, those that were clean escaped from them who live in error.
Cross-references
- 2 Peter 2:20 If indeed they have escaped the corruption of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, only to be entangled and overcome by it again, their final condition is worse than it was at first.
- Jude 1:15 to execute judgment on everyone, and to convict all the ungodly of every ungodly act of wickedness and every harsh word spoken against Him by ungodly sinners.”
- Romans 13:13 Let us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and jealousy.
- James 5:5 You have lived on earth in luxury and self-indulgence. You have fattened your hearts in the day of slaughter.
- 2 Thessalonians 2:4 He will oppose and exalt himself above every so-called god or object of worship. So he will seat himself in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God.
- 2 Peter 1:4 Through these He has given us His precious and magnificent promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, now that you have escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.
- Revelation 13:5 The beast was given a mouth to speak arrogant and blasphemous words, and authority to act for 42 months.
- Psalms 73:8 They mock and speak with malice; with arrogance they threaten oppression.
- Daniel 4:30 the king exclaimed, “Is this not Babylon the Great, which I myself have built as a royal residence by the might of my power and for the glory of my majesty?”
- Daniel 11:36 Then the king will do as he pleases and will exalt and magnify himself above every god, and he will speak monstrous things against the God of gods. He will be successful until the time of wrath is completed, for what has been decreed must be accomplished.