Bible Strands
2 Peter 2:19
They promise them freedom, while they themselves are slaves to depravity. For a man is a slave to whatever has mastered him.
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — Peter addresses believers regarding false teachers who use empty rhetoric to entice those recently escaping false doctrine. He writes to warn them that these instructors offer liberation while remaining bound themselves.
The words — δοῦλοι (douloi) = slaves and φθορᾶς (phthoras) = corruption. These terms establish the contrast between the promised release and the actual master controlling the teachers.
The thread — This theme of involuntary bondage to sin appears in John 8:34, Romans 6:16, and Galatians 5:1. Each passage reinforces that obedience to sin or error creates a master-servant dynamic that overrides claimed autonomy.
Why it lands — The text demands recognition that self-proclaimed liberty is meaningless when a person is mastered by a corrupting force. Readers must evaluate spiritual claims by the actual authority that governs the claimant's life.
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
While they promise them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption: for of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he brought in bondage.
Cross-references
- John 8:34 Jesus replied, “Truly, truly, I tell you, everyone who sins is a slave to sin.
- Romans 6:16 Do you not know that when you offer yourselves as obedient slaves, you are slaves to the one you obey, whether you are slaves to sin leading to death, or to obedience leading to righteousness?
- Galatians 5:1 It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not be encumbered once more by a yoke of slavery.
- Galatians 5:13 For you, brothers, were called to freedom; but do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh. Rather, serve one another in love.
- 1 Peter 2:16 Live in freedom, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as servants of God.
- Titus 3:3 For at one time we too were foolish, disobedient, misled, and enslaved to all sorts of desires and pleasures—living in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another.
- Romans 6:12 Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its desires.
- Jeremiah 23:9 As for the prophets: My heart is broken within me, and all my bones tremble. I have become like a drunkard, like a man overcome by wine, because of the LORD, because of His holy words.
- 2 Timothy 2:26 Then they will come to their senses and escape the snare of the devil, who has taken them captive to his will.
- 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.