By Angus Harley

One of the many hot potatoes of the Arminian vs Calvinism debate is 2 Peter 2:1. Arminianism in particular lofts it up as a prooftext for its belief in universal redemption. Are the Arminians correct? What about the Calvinists? Let’s do some investigating and find out.

Universal atonement?

To all those who love the concept of universal atonement, I’m afraid you’re going to have to look elsewhere. The text does not come even remotely close to the idea of a universal atonement. Peter is addressing the assembly only, and talking about it alone:

“But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Sovereign Lord who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves.” (2:1)

The false teachers were “bought”. Even if one wishes to argue that the whole assembly was bought, we must of first importance deal with what the text explicitly states: it was the false teachers who were bought. Secondly, this is in the context of the assembly, so the ‘extent’ issue can, at most, be extended to the assembly. There is, in other words, no contextual warrant for the idea that Jesus’ death atoned for every single person’s sins.

Indeed, the context is so tightly tied to the assembly that we cannot force the text or context to refer to a universal dimension of atonement. For example, the standard reading is to interpret en as “among”. “[A]mong” would be okay if we had a qualifying phrase such as we find in Acts 20:30, “and from among your own selves men will arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after them.” I prefer the stronger idea of ‘in’ for en, because “among” by itself might suggest that the false teachers have come from outside assembly into the assembly to be among them. I will argue later that the false teachers grew up inside the assembly.

The translations’ preference that the compound verb pareisagō be translated “secretly introduce” adds to the notion that the false teachers came from outside the assembly. The verb is used only once in the NT. Some look to a similar compound in Jude 1:4. However, in 2 Peter 2:1, there is nothing in the use of this compound to suggest the idea of secrecy: it is a simple compound of para (‘beside’, ‘from’) and eisagō (‘bring’).[1] The compound verb pareisduō in Jude 4 is likewise a compound of ‘from/beside’ (para) and ‘enter’ (eisduō).

We must distinguish, then, between the false teachers who arose from within the assembly, and the false teachings they brought into the assembly. For it is their false teachings or heresies, not the men themselves, that are “brought in”. Nor do I think that they brought these doctrines in secretly. A cursory look at the MO of the false teachers is that they are brazen and very, very public. They are anything but sneaky! These false teachers are clearly identifiable in both doctrine and practice.

Other renditions

Jews only? Wayne Grudem maintains that in context, Jesus is not the Master (despotēs)for the Father is (cf., Jude 1:4). Peter is referring to God the Father’s act of ‘buying’ Israel out of Egypt (Exo.15:6; Deut.32:6), and that historically, even up unto Peter’s day, the Jews had rejected the Father and his act of redemption from Egypt.[2]

            Grudem’s reading is onto something, inasmuch as we will see later that the OT model of redemption is alluded to by Peter.           

Nonetheless, his overall claim flies in the face of 2 Peter, and 1 Peter, for that matter, as the epistles are concerned with the New Covenant assembly of God and its redemption in Christ Jesus (2 Pet.1:1-11; 1 Pet.1:1-10). Peter is addressing both Jew and Gentile believers (see 1 Pet.1:1). Undoubtedly Jews were present in the assembly that Peter was writing to, but it is contextually gratuitous to make the Jews as Old-Covenant Jews the focus. Peter is addressing the same assembly and the same problem in 2:20, and it is apparent that these false teachers were rejecting the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, which they once accepted, and now were returning to their old body of knowledge and old godless lifestyle. The preceding context is also about the holy prophetic witness made to the Lord Jesus Christ and God’s pleasure with it (1:16-21).

            Although Peter is comparing the OT false prophets with the NT false teachers, he does not conflate them or their intended ‘victims’. That Balaam and others attacked the nation of Israel is regarded by Peter as illustrative of the more urgent message that in the New Covenant assembly false teachers will attack the flock of God.

            The context of 2:1 could go either way as to the identity of the Master: it could be the Father or the Lord Jesus Christ. However, I prefer the latter, for as Grudem noted, Jesus is explicitly called the Master (despotēs) in Jude 1:4. Many have noted that Jude and 2 Peter 2 bear resemblances, a subject I will briefly come back to.

False claim? To Matthew McMahon, the false teachers claimed to be bought but were not so. [3] This view has going in its favor that it takes at face value that the false teachers were “bought”. But, as with Grudem’s rendition, McMahon reads into the text his theological assumptions, forcing him to deny the very wording of the text itself, wherein Peter the apostle- not the false teachers- writes that the false teachers were bought by the Master.

Not bought, but acquired? Robert L. Reymond argues that the false teachers were not “bought” but were acquired. The Greek term hagaradzō, when referring to the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, explicitly ties this act to a price “or its equivalent” (1 Cor.6:20; 7:23; Rev.5:9; 14:3, 4). Following Deuteronomy 32:6, LXX, Christ the Sovereign Lord has obtained, or acquired, the false teachers, making “them part of the covenant nation of God in the flesh…for the purpose of bringing glory to himself through their foreordain-ment unto condemnation (see II Pet. 2:12; Jude 4).” ”[4]

            Where I do agree with McMahon is that, the verb hagaradzō is to be taken as ‘to buy’.[5] This is its exclusive meaning in the NT (Matt.13:44, 45; 14:15; 21:12; 25:9, 10; 27:7; Mark 6:36, 37; 11:15; 15:46; 16:1; Luke 9:13; 14:18, 19; 17:28; 22:36; John 4:8; 6:5; 13:29; 1 Cor.6:20; 7:23, 30; Rev.3:18; 5:9; 13:17; 14:3, 4; 18:11). There is no contextual warrant in 2 Peter 2 to think otherwise.

            Yet, I do accept the point that when the redemption, or buying, that is in Jesus Christ is referred to in 1 Corinthians 6:20; 7:23; Revelation 5:9; 14:3, 4 that a price or its equivalent is explicitly stated. It does not follow, however, that these specific Christological uses of hagaradzō control how Peter uses the same term. Indeed, I will argue that Peter has something different in mind.

Buying through knowledge and power

The view I hold is that Peter is teaching that the false teachers, as part of the assembly, arising from within it, were “bought”, in the sense that they were delivered by divine power from the world by the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. I will now unfold this basic assertion.

            From within. As said before, the false teachers of 2 Peter 2 are identical in origin to the Ephesian false teachers: they arise from within the assembly. It is preferrable, therefore, to swap “in” for “among” and “bring from” for “secretly introduce” in v1. Verses 20-22 confirm this reading:

13…reveling in their deceptions, as they carouse with you….20 For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and are overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. 21 For it would be better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than having known it, to turn away from the holy commandment handed on to them. 22 It has happened to them according to the true proverb, “A dog returns to its own vomit,” and, “A sow, after washing, returns to wallowing in the mire.”

Language of redemption. As argued before, these false teachers were “bought”, not acquired or obtained, by the Master. This was a ‘redemptive’ act, for two common themes of redemption are escaping from evil and enslavement.  V18 refers to Christians who “barely escape” from those who live in error. This is spoken of new converts, most likely, and not the false teachers. Even so, it shows a form of deliverance-redemption is in mind. Peter uses the same verb (apopheugō) in 1:4, “having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust.” It is then taken up again in 2:20, but this time it refers to the false teachers, “For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ”. We read in Exodus 14:5 that the Israelites “fled” (Heb., barach) Egypt.

The theme of enslavement is prominent, too. The false teachers were “slaves” (doulos) of corruption, “enslaved” (douloō) to it, having been “overcome” (hēttaomai) by it (v19; v20, too). It is possible an element of being made inferior is in mind by the use of hēttaomai. This is its meaning in 2 Corinthians 12:13- the only other place it is used in the NT. In other words, arguably these false teachers were enslaved and made inferior through corruption. It would seem that “corruption” itself was acting like a slave-master, or itself had enslaving power. Thus, Christian converts “escaped the corruption (hēttaomai) that was in the world” (1:4), as if they were the Jews escaping Pharaoh’s rule in the land of Egypt. Peter self-identifies as Jesus Christ’s slave (1:1), and identifies all Christians as “slaves” of God (1 Pet.2:16). Thus, the false teachers hold out “freedom” (eleutheria) to the new Christian converts, when in actual fact, the false teachers are the ones in bondage to corruption. Christ’s people were his slaves, but, paradoxically, had freedom (eleutheria), too, as free men (eleutheros) (1 Pet.2:16).

The false teachers had escaped the world and its corruption at one time, for they had known the redemptive-deliverance of the Master (despotēs). This title is typically tied to the themes of enslavement and ownership (Luke 2:29; Acts 4:24, 29; 1 Tim.6:1, 2 Tim.2:21; Tit.2:9; 1 Pet.2:18). Revelation 6:10 reminds us of the OT “blood-redeemer” (Heb., goēl haddam) avenging the murder of a family member (Num.35:19-27; see Lev.25:25-28, 47-55). Jude 1:4 demonstrates that despotēs cannot mean ‘lord’, “denying the Master (despotēs) and Lord (kurios)”. Even though both titles are similar, the former connotes deliverance, ownership, redemption, and so forth. As to the identity of the despotēs in 2 Peter 2:1, given the parallels with Jude 1:4, it is most likely Jesus Christ himself:

Jude 1:4, “and deny (arneomai) our only Master (despotēs) and Lord, Jesus Christ”;

2 Peter 2:1, “denying (arneomai) the Master (despotēs) who bought them”.

Note how Jude self-identifies, like Peter, as the Master’s slave (doulos) (Jude 1:1).

‘Bought’. This brings us to the nub of the issue. How could these false teachers have been “bought”? They were bought because they were ‘owned’ by the Master, the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. He delivered them from the present corrupt world. From their point of view, they escaped this corruption, fled from it, under his Mastery.

            Arminians say that when coupled with 1 Peter 1:18-19, this entails that the redeemed were “bought” by Jesus’ blood. But this is not what Peter has in mind in 2 Peter 2. As stated before, in the context of 2 Peter 2, the blood of Christ is not mentioned as a price. Peter tells us very explicitly that the false teachers escaped the corruption of the world “by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ”. It was the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ that was the means of deliverance and of escape for the false teachers, not the blood of Christ. Such “knowledge” (epignosis) is a prominent theme in 2 Peter 1:

“Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord” (v2);

“seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence” (1:3);

“For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ” (v8).

Added to this, gnosis (“knowledge”) is another feature in 2 Peter 1:

“5 Now for this very reason also, applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge, 6 and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance, and in your perseverance, godliness”.

Thus, Peter points out the precise problem the false teachers now ran into:

“For it would be better for them not to have known (epiginoskō) the way of righteousness, than having known it (epiginoskō), to turn away from the holy commandment handed on to them.”

The false teachers, through knowledge of Jesus Christ the Lord and Savior, were originally delivered from the corruption of the world, only to cast off this knowledge, deliberately and willfully pursuing and teaching a false Gospel, and thereby returning to their former unclean, vomit-infused, lifestyle. 

Temporary, external blessings. We tend to forget that the NT tells us many times about a temporary and superficial form of blessing attached to the preaching of the Gospel and its reception by some. Jesus had many disciples who followed him, only to quickly get shot of him when they did not like some of the things he said (John 6:60-67). He himself was aware of these superficial ‘believers’, but he did not commit to them (John 2:23-25). The prime example of an externally blessed wicked person is Judas. He was appointed as an apostle, no less! He ‘knew’ Jesus and his Gospel. He quite literally was brought out of the Jewish world of unbelief to follow the true Master. He was Jesus’ disciple. Peter was very familiar with Judas, of course. The writer of Hebrews, too, warns that some receive blessings from the Gospel of the crucified Son, only then to reject this Gospel and the Son (Heb.6:4-8).  Thus, the same writer states, “For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins”. There is the parable where Jesus describes how the seed of the Gospel is sown in the lives of hearers, but there are different reactions to this seed. Some receive the kingdom-seed with joy, but it lasts but a moment, for after persecution they fall away from the truth. Others receive the kingdom-seed, only to allow the world and its way to choke to death the life of the seed (Matt.13:1-23).

Calvin. Calvinists will not be happy with the above reading. However, I have found over the decades that most Calvinists have not properly read Calvin. They dip into his works. Calvin in his commentary on 2 Peter 2:1-2 writes:

“Even denying the Lord that bought them. Though Christ may be denied in various ways, yet Peter, as I think, refers here to what is expressed by Jude, that is, when the grace of God is turned into lasciviousness; for Christ redeemed us, that he might have a people separated from all the pollutions of the world, and devoted to holiness and innocency. They, then, who throw off the bridle, and give themselves up to all kinds of licentiousness, are not unjustly said to deny Christ by whom they have been redeemed. Hence, that the doctrine of the gospel may remain whole and complete among us, let this be fixed in our minds, that we have been redeemed by Christ, that he may be the Lord of our life and of our death, and that our main object ought to be, to live to him and to die to him. He then says, that their swift destruction was at hand, lest others should be ensnared by them. 164

2. And many shall follow. It is, indeed, no slight offense to the weak, when they see that false doctrines are received by the common consent of the world, that a large number of men are led astray, so that few continue in true obedience to Christ.”[6] [Italics his; bold text mine]

Writing on Jude 1:4, Calvin states:

“And, indeed, in the Second Epistle of Peter, Christ alone is mentioned, and there he is called Lord.  But He means that Christ is denied, when they who had been redeemed by his blood, become again the vassals of the Devil, and thus render void as far as they can that incomparable price.”[7] [bold text mine]

I am not in complete agreement with Calvin, however, for as stated before, the blood is not mentioned in regard to the deliverance of these false teachers, but if a price is to be spoken of it is not the blood of Christ (see ahead). That being said, Neo-Calvinists who read these texts to say that Calvin believed that the false teachers were truly saved, or truly had their sins atoned for, misunderstand his theology. Calvin promoted the division of the ‘invisible and visible church’. As to the external, visible assembly, of those who, to our appearance, belong to Christ, many are called but few truly persevere to follow. This is because only a minority from the outset are truly saved or regenerated; only a few truly have their sins atoned for. The others eventually show their true colors, and cast off the Gospel to pursue their old life, and even a false Gospel. These ones, like Judas, receive many external, temporary blessings that come from the hand of God, through Christ and his Gospel, by his Spirit. Even though I personally do not accept the Reformed model of an invisible-visible assembly, I do agree with Calvin’s general belief that many in the assembly only superficially experience the Gospel’s blessings.

The price. The language of buying indicates a price. Arminians, as said before, latch on to 1 Peter 1:2, 19. Even with these texts, no proof of universal atonement is afforded, as the blood is applied only to believers. And that is the point. Peter specifically ties the blood to believers. He never applies it to the false teachers, to those who abandon Christ. More to the point, when he does refer to the false teachers and what initially drove them from the world, it is the knowledge of the Gospel of the Master that is the focus.

            Is knowledge therefore the ‘price’? We can say that Paul or John’s language of redemption and buying are not to drive Peter’s very specific model of buying. Judas ‘escaped’ the world through the knowledge of Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior in the Gospel. Yet, Judas was never ‘redeemed by the blood’; it never cleansed his soul. The Gospel did, however, proclaim that blood, that Savior and Lord. And to accept it, at least ostensibly, was to bow to its content and claims. Put another way, the Gospel-knowledge is the conduit for grace and mercy (2 Pet.1:2), however temporary and external they may be.

Again, is knowledge therefore the ‘price’? Perhaps. If we are to insist on a literal price- and not settle for metaphorical language- I think it more likely that it is the basic concept of “power”. 2 Peter 1:2 refers to the “divine power” that “has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence.” It was God’s power that delivered those who turned out to be false teachers. We must not forget that the OT model of the redemption of Israel was tied God’s divine power, by which he delivered the wicked and the faithful in Israel:

Say, therefore, to the sons of Israel, ‘I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and I will deliver you from their bondage. I will also redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great judgments. (Exo.6:6);

Moses said to the people, “Remember this day in which you went out from Egypt, from the house of slavery; for by a powerful hand the Lord brought you out from this place. (Exo.13:3; see 13:9, 14, 16; 32:11);

“ “Your right hand, O Lord, is majestic in power, Your right hand, O Lord, shatters the enemy.”” (Exo.15:6)

As the Gospels abundantly testify, many, many Jews experienced the power of Jesus Christ in both word and deed, especially in healings. Yet, how many of them truly believed? Just as the sun shines on the wicked and the righteous, so, in the presence of the true assembly, the Gospel-power irradiates even the non-elect and depraved, bringing external and temporary benefits to them.

[1] For a similar view, see Peter H. Davids, The Letters of 2 Peter and Jude, The Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006), Kindle 2 Peter 2:1.

[2] Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Academic, 2020), 742.

[3] Matthew McMahon, “Exegesis of 2 Peter 2:1 – To Buy or Not to Buy,” https://www.apuritansmind.com/arminianism/exegesis-of-2-peter-21-dr-matthew-mcmahon/, accessed July 17, 2023.

[4] R. L. Reymond, A New Systematic Theology of the Christian Faith, 2nd ed. (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, Inc., 2010): Kindle, 2 Peter 2:1.

[5] McMahon, “Exegesis”.

[6] John Calvin, Commentary on 2 Peter 2:1, Christian Classics Ethereal Library, https://ccel.org/ccel/calvin/calcom45/calcom45.vii.iii.i.html, accessed July 18, 2023.

[7] John Calvin, Commentary on Jude 1:4, Christian Classics Ethereal Library, https://ccel.org/ccel/calvin/calcom45/calcom45.viii.ii.ii.html, accessed July 18, 2023.

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