2 Peter 2:18

18 Mouthing grandiosities of nothingness, they play on the desires of the old nature, in order to seduce with debaucheries people who have just begun to escape from those whose way of life is wrong.

2 Peter 2:18 Meaning and Commentary

2 Peter 2:18

For when they speak great swelling [words] of vanity
Marvellous things against the God of gods, great things and blasphemies against God, his name, his tabernacle, and his saints; see ( Daniel 11:36 ) ( Revelation 13:5 Revelation 13:6 ) ; or against men, dominions, and dignities, ( 2 Peter 2:10 ) ; or it may design their self-applauses and vain glorying in themselves, and their empty boast of knowledge and learning; and also express the windiness of their doctrines, and the bombast style, and high flown strains of rhetoric in which they were delivered; as likewise the flattering titles they bestowed on men for the sake of their own worldly interest and advantage; see ( Jude 1:16 ) and hereby

they allure, through the lusts of the flesh, [through much]
wantonness, those that were clean escaped from them who live in error:
that is, from those who lived in the error of Heathenism or Judaism, from whom, and which, they were clean escaped; or truly, really, and entirely delivered, being fully convinced of the falsity thereof, and of the truth of the Christian religion; though some copies, as the Alexandrian, and two of Beza's, and two of Stephens's, read, not (ontwv) , "truly", but (oligwv) , "a little"; and the Vulgate Latin version renders it, "a very little"; to which agrees the Complutensian edition; and the Syriac version renders it "in a few words", or "almost"; and according to the Ethiopic version, "a few persons" are designed; but be they more or less, and truly, or but a little, and for a little while, or almost, escaped from their former errors, in which they were brought up, and lived; yet by the carnal lusts and liberties, lasciviousness and wantonness, which these false teachers indulged, they were allured, ensnared, and drawn by them into their wicked principles and practices.

2 Peter 2:18 In-Context

16 but was rebuked for his sin - a dumb beast of burden spoke out with a human voice and restrained the prophet's insanity!

17 Waterless springs they are, mists driven by a gust of wind; for them has been reserved the blackest darkness.

18 Mouthing grandiosities of nothingness, they play on the desires of the old nature, in order to seduce with debaucheries people who have just begun to escape from those whose way of life is wrong.

19 They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption; for a person is slave to whatever has defeated him.

20 Indeed, if they have once escaped the pollutions of the world through knowing our Lord and Deliverer, Yeshua the Messiah, and then have again become entangled and defeated by them, their latter condition has become worse than their former.