²³ He will die for lack of instruction. In the greatness of his folly, he will go astray.

²¹ Isn't their tent-cord plucked up within them? They die, and that without wisdom.'

¹² But if they don't listen, they shall perish by the sword; They shall die without knowledge.

²¹ The lips of the righteous feed many, But the foolish die for lack of understanding.

¹² So I let them go after the stubbornness of their hearts, That they might walk in their own counsels.

¹⁴ The unfaithful will be repaid for his own ways; Likewise a good man will be rewarded for his ways.

³² The wicked is brought down in his calamity, But in death, the righteous has a refuge.

¹⁵ forsaking the right way, they went astray, having followed the way of Balaam the son of Beor, who loved the wages of wrong-doing;

¹⁶ but he was rebuked for his own disobedience. A mute donkey spoke with man's voice and stopped the madness of the prophet.

¹⁷ These are wells without water, clouds driven by a storm; for whom the blackness of darkness has been reserved forever.

¹⁸ For, uttering great swelling words of emptiness, they entice in the lusts of the flesh, by licentiousness, those who are indeed escaping from those who live in error;

¹⁹ promising them liberty, while they themselves are bondservants of corruption; for by whom a man is overcome, by the same is he also brought into bondage.

²⁰ For if, after they have escaped the defilement of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled therein and overcome, the last state has become worse with them than the first.

²¹ For it would be better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than, after knowing it, to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them.

²² But it has happened to them according to the true proverb, "The dog turns to his own vomit again," and "the sow that had washed to wallowing in the mire."