Koine Foundations

Translation by Matthew Jones
koinefoundations@gmail.com
Completed October 2026

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Translation

^1:1 Simeon Peter, a slave and an apostle of Jesus Christ.

To the ones who were divinely allotted a faith that is equally honorable as ours by the righteous action of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ.

² May grace and peace be multiplied to you through full knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, ³ because Jesus’ divine power has given us everything for godly living, through the full knowledge of Him who called us by His own splendor and moral excellence. ⁴ Through these, Jesus our Lord has given us precious and magnificent promises, so that through these promises you may share in the divine nature, having fled from the corruption in the world caused by desire.

⁵ In light of all this, exerting additional effort with all diligence, in your faith generously supply moral excellence; in your moral excellence, knowledge; ⁶ in your knowledge, self-control; in your self-control, patient endurance; in your patience endurance, piety; ⁷ in your piety, mutual affection; in your mutual affection, love. ⁸ For if these virtues are present and increasing in you, they will make your full knowledge of our Lord, Jesus Christ, neither useless nor fruitless. ⁹ For the one in whom these virtues are not present is so near-sighted that he is blind, since he has forgotten the cleansing of his past sins. ¹⁰ Therefore, fellow believers, give all the more effort to making your elective call firm. For if you are exercising these virtues you will certainly never stumble. ¹¹ For in this way, the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, will be richly supplied for you.

¹² Therefore, I will always remind you about these things, even though you are knowledgeable and established in the truth that is present. ¹³ And I consider it right, so long as I am in this bodily tent, to stir up your memory ¹⁴ because I know that my bodily tent will soon be discarded, just as our Lord, Jesus Christ, has also disclosed to me. ¹⁵ So I will be diligent also to make sure that you are always able to remember these things after my departure.

¹⁶ For we made known to you the powerful future coming of our Lord, Jesus Christ, not by following cleverly contrived stories but by becoming eyewitnesses of His majesty. ¹⁷ For when He received honor and glory from Father God by a voice borne to Him by the Majestic Glory saying, “This is My beloved Son, with whom I was well pleased,” ¹⁸ we ourselves also heard this voice as it was borne from heaven when we were with Him on the holy mountain. ¹⁹ And so, we have reliable confirmation of the prophetic word, to which you do well to pay attention as you would to a lamp shining in a dark place, doing so until the day shines forth and the Morning Star rises in your hearts. ²⁰ Above all, know that absolutely no prophecy of Scripture comes about from one’s own interpretation. ²¹ For prophecy was never borne by human will, but people spoke from God as they were borne along by the Holy Spirit.

^2.1 But there were also false prophets among the people of Israel, just as there will also be false teachers among you. They will introduce destructive schisms, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing sudden destruction upon themselves, ² and many will follow their lack of moral restraint. Because of them the way of truth will be maligned, ³ and motivated by greed they will exploit you with fabricated teachings.

Against these the judgment decreed long ago is not idle and their destruction does not drowse. ⁴ For if God did not spare angels who sinned, but confining them to Tartarus in pits of gloomy darkness, He handed them over to be kept for judgment; ⁵ and if He did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a herald of righteousness, and seven others, when He brought a deluge upon the world of impious people; ⁶ and if He condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction by reducing them to ashes, presenting them as an example of what would happen to impious people, ⁷ and rescued Lot, a righteous man who was distressed by the indecent lifestyle of the wicked inhabitants ⁸ (for this righteous man was tormenting his righteous soul over their wicked deeds, which he saw and heard as he lived among them day after day); ⁹ then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trial, but to keep the unrighteous, who are being punished, for the day when judgment takes place, ¹⁰ and especially those who pursue the flesh with polluting passion and despise Christ’s lordship.

Boldly arrogant, they show no fear as they malign glorious beings. ¹¹ Whereas angels, although stronger and more powerful, do not bring a maligning judgment against them from the presence of the Lord. ¹² But these false teachers who malign things they do not understand, like unreasoning animals that are by nature born for capture and destruction, will themselves also be utterly destroyed, ¹³ suffering injury as the wage of causing injury.

Their idea of self-indulgence is to party in broad daylight. They are stains and blemishes who party in their deceptions as they feast together with you. ¹⁴ They have eyes consumed with adulterous desires that are insatiable for sin. They entice souls who are not established in the truth. They have a heart trained for greed.

Accursed children!

¹⁵ Having thoroughly abandoned the straight path, they veered off, following the path of Balaam of Bosor who loved the reward paid for unrighteousness. ¹⁶ But he was rebuked for his evil conduct when a mute donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained the prophet’s madness.

¹⁷ These false teachers are waterless springs and mists driven by a storm, for whom the blackest gloomy darkness is kept. ¹⁸ For by uttering bombastic nonsense, with an appeal to sensual passions of the flesh, they entice those who are just escaping from those who are wandering about in error. ¹⁹ They promise them freedom, even though they themselves are slaves of corruption – for a person is enslaved by whatever masters him. ²⁰ For if those who escaped the world’s defilements through the full knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, are mastered by them, having become entangled again, then their last state has become worse than the first. ²¹ 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 which had been delivered to them.

²² They show the truth of this proverb: A dog returns to its own vomit, and a washed sow to rolling in the mud.

^3.1 Beloved, now I am writing this second letter to you. Through both of them I am stirring up your wholesome way of thinking by refreshing your memory, ² so that you will remember the words spoken in the past by the holy prophets and the commandment given by the Lord and Savior through your apostles.

³ Above all, know that in the last days scoffers will come with mockery, while pursuing their own desires, ⁴ and saying, “Where is the promise of His coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, everything continues as it has from the beginning of creation.” ⁵ For in taking this view it escapes their notice that by God’s word the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of water and by water. ⁶ Through these the world at that time was destroyed, being deluged by water. ⁷ And the heavens and earth that now exist are reserved for fire by the same word, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of impious people. ⁸ But do not let this one thing escape your notice, beloved: From the Lord’s viewpoint, one day is as a thousand years and a thousand years as one day. ⁹ The Lord of the promise is not being slow, as some think of slowness, but He is being patient toward you, not desiring anyone to perish, but all to move forward to repentance.

¹⁰ But the Day of the Lord will come like a thief. On that day the heavens will pass away with a whoosh and the elements will be destroyed from the heat, and the earth and the works done on it will be discovered. ¹¹ Because all these things will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people should you be in holy conduct and godly acts ¹² as you wait expectantly for the day of God and speed up its arrival? Because of that day the heavens will be destroyed by fire, and the elements will melt from the heat, ¹³ but consistent with His promise we are waiting expectantly for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness makes its home.

¹⁴ Therefore, beloved, as you wait expectantly for these things, make a strong effort to be discovered by Him without stains and moral blemishes, in peace. ¹⁵ And think of our Lord’s patience as granting time for salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given to him, ¹⁶ as he also does in all his letters, speaking in them of these things. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which those who are not instructed and not established in the truth distort to their own destruction, as they also do to the rest of the Scriptures.

¹⁷ You, therefore, beloved, since you already know these things, be on your guard so that you do not fall away from your own secure position by being carried away by the error of unprincipled people.

¹⁸ But grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

To Him belongs glory, both now and to the Day of Eternity. Amen.

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