SECOND PREDICTION: Scoffers shall throw doubt on Christ’s return.
(3) In the last days. — Comp. 1 Peter 1:20; Hebrews 1:2; and the parallel passage to this, Jude 1:18. “Know this first, children, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts” is quoted in a homily attributed on doubtful authority to Hippolytus. (See above on 2 Peter 2:1.)
Scoffers. — The best authorities add “in scoffing,” intensifying the meaning by repetition (as in Ephesians 1:3; Revelation 14:2; comp. Luke 22:15). There are other repetitions of this kind in the New Testament, which have been rendered by strengthening the verb in some other way (John 3:29; Acts 4:17; Acts 5:28; James 5:17).