“For if after they have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, they are again entangled therein, and overcome, the latter end is worse with them than the beginning. For it had been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than, after they have known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto them. But it is happened unto them according to the true proverb, The dog is turned to his own vomit again; and the sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire” (2 Pet 2:20-22).
2:20-22 entangled….worse: First, it is an advantage to escape the pollutions of the world, to be kept from gross and scandalous sins. Secondly, some men are, for a time, kept from the pollutions of the world by the knowledge of Christ, who are not savingly renewed in the spirit of their mind. If we receive the light of the truth and have a notional knowledge of Christ in our heads, it may be of some present service to us. But we must receive the love of the truth and hide God’s word in our heart, or it will not sanctify and save us. Thirdly, those who have, for a time, escaped the pollutions of the world are at first ensnared and entangled by false teachers, who first perplex men with some plausible and specious objections against the truths of the gospel. The more ignorant and unstable are hereby made to stagger and brought to question the truth of doctrines they have received because they cannot solve all the difficulties, nor answer all the objections that are urged by these seducers. Fourthly, when men are once entangled, they are easily overcome. Therefore should Christians keep close to the word of God and watch against those who seek to perplex and bewilder them because if men who have once escaped are again entangled, the latter end is worse with them than the beginning.
Better….to not have known: The apostle, in the last two verses of the chapter, sets himself to prove that a state of apostasy is worse than a state of ignorance, for it is a condemning way of righteousness, after they have had some knowledge of it and expressed some liking to it. It carries in it a declaring that they have found some iniquity in the way of righteousness and some falsehood in the word of truth. God is more highly provoked by those who by their conduct despise the gospel, as well as disobey the law, and who reproach and pour contempt upon God and his grace.
Dog is turned….again: The devil more narrowly watches and more closely confines those whom he has recovered after they had once gone off from him and professed to be the followers of the Lord Jesus Christ (Matt 22:45). They are kept under a stronger guard, and no wonder it should be so when they have licked up their own vomit again, returning to the same errors and impieties that they had once cast off and seemed to detest and loathe and wallowing in that filthiness from which they appeared once to be really cleansed. Well, if the scripture gives such an account of Christianity on the one hand and of sin on the other, as we have here in these two verses, we certainly ought highly to approve of the former and persevere therein because it is a way of righteousness, and a holy commandment, and to loathe and keep at the greatest distance from the latter because it is set forth as most offensive and abominable.
This article taken complete from Matthew Henry’s comments on 2 Peter 2:20-22.
Henry, M. 1997, “The Matthew Henry Study Bible: King James Version”, copyright Thomas Nelson Inc., pub Hendrickson Publishers, Peabody, MA.