2 Peter 3:3 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

Knowing this first— That is, either what was to happen first in order of time, or as a premise, from whence they might conclude, that they ought to remember the predictions of the prophets, and the commandments of the apostles. The last days particularlyand more immediately refer to the lastdays of Jerusalem, or of the Jewish state. See Jude 1:18-19. Archbishop Tillotson thinks, that by these scoffers are meant the Carpocratians; a large sect of the Gnostics, who denied the resurrection of the dead and future judgment, and who appeared quickly after the writing of this epistle. The root of infidelity, and the grand reason of men's scoffing at religion, is given in the last words of this verse; they walk after their own lusts. They may pretend to reason, but they are governed by sense and appetite; and they take refuge in infidelity, and scoff at religion, to make themselves easy in their vices: they are against religion, because religion is against them: they account it their interest that the gospel should not be true; for if it be true, their case is desperate: but it is the interest of every good man that it should be true; and the more any one searches with a well disposed mind, the more will its truth and evidence appear.