<p>2:1- see on Gal. 5:1.</p><p><em>But there arose false prophets also among the people, as among you also there shall be false teachers, who shall secretly bring in destructive heresies- </em>The failures of natural Israel are traceable to false teaching from the priesthood / leadership, rather than purely personal apostasy. All the examples of rejected false teachers mentioned in 2 Pet. 2 were responsible, and in the ecclesia of their times. These false teachers had once known the Truth :12 and would therefore be reserved to judgment :9; they attended the memorial meeting :13, they had or claimed to have the gift of prophecy as Balaam did :15 cp. Heb.6:4-6, and had once left the world, although now they were returning to it :20-22. In other words, they had all the external trappings of good Christians. We must expect something similar in the latter day ecclesia.</p><p>The appropriacy of the allusion to Israel's history was in the fact that Peter is writing his letters to his own converts, who were largely comprised of the Jews he had baptized in Jerusalem at Pentecost.&nbsp;</p><p><em>Denying even the master that bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction</em>- He warns that they even deny the Lord who bought them (AV). They <em>even</em> do this- as if denying the Lord was the worst possible, imaginable sin. And it was the very thing which he had so publicly done, three times, and had effectively done again when bowing to Judaist false teaching. They deny &ldquo;the Lord&rdquo;- and that had been Peter&rsquo;s favourite title for Jesus during the ministry. As he warned of the evil of the apostate brethren, his own sense of personal failure and frailty was so evidently shown. And yet it was no reason for him to simply say &lsquo;So, I can&rsquo;t judge, I can&rsquo;t criticize another after what I did&rsquo;. What he had learnt from the whole experience of forgiveness and grace was that the wondrous grace and atonement of Christ <em>must at all costs be preached and preserved</em>.</p><p>The tragedy is that Israel's rejection of Moses is typical of the rejection of Christ by those in the new Israel who turn away. The same word used about Israel <em>refusing</em> Moses as their deliverer (Acts 7:35) is used about those who <em>deny</em> (same word) the Lord (Jesus) that bought them. This is prefaced by the information that as there were those who lost their faith in the ecclesia in the wilderness, so there will be among the new Israel. Therefore &quot;the Lord that bought them&quot; is an allusion back to Moses as a type of Christ. The illogicality of Israel's rejection of Moses when he first appeared to them is so apparent. They were slaves in Egypt, and then one of the most senior of Pharaoh's officials reveals that he is their brother, and has been sent by God to deliver them. Yet they preferred the life of slavery in Egypt. This same illogicality is seen in us if we refuse baptism, preferring to stay in the world of slavery, or later when we chose the world as opposed to Christ. We deny, we refuse, we reject, the Lord who bought us by going back to the world from which he redeemed us. The illogicality of going back to the world is brought out by the illogicality of Israel's rejection of Moses. Israel rejected Moses because it was easier to stay where they were. Such is the strength of conservatism in human nature; such is our innate weakness of will and resolve. They rejected the idea of leaving Egypt because they thought it was better than it was, they failed to face up to how much they were suffering (Num. 11:5). And our apathy in responding to Christ's redemptive plan for us is rooted in the same problem; we fail to appreciate the seriousness of sin, the extent to which we are in slavery to sin- even though the evidence for this is all around us. &nbsp;</p>