²⁶ Dear friends, if we deliberately continue sinning after we have received knowledge of the truth, there is no longer any sacrifice that will cover these sins.

²⁰ And when people escape from the wickedness of the world by knowing our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and then get tangled up and enslaved by sin again, they are worse off than before. ²¹ It would be better if they had never known the way to righteousness than to know it and then reject the command they were given to live a holy life. ²² They prove the truth of this proverb: “A dog returns to its vomit.”^[a] And another says, “A washed pig returns to the mud.”

⁴ For it is impossible to bring back to repentance those who were once enlightened—those who have experienced the good things of heaven and shared in the Holy Spirit, ⁵ who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the power of the age to come— ⁶ and who then turn away from God. It is impossible to bring such people back to repentance; by rejecting the Son of God, they themselves are nailing him to the cross once again and holding him up to public shame.

⁴¹ “If you were blind, you wouldn’t be guilty,” Jesus replied. “But you remain guilty because you claim you can see.

⁴⁷ “And a servant who knows what the master wants, but isn’t prepared and doesn’t carry out those instructions, will be severely punished.

¹⁷ Remember, it is sin to know what you ought to do and then not do it.

⁴³ “When an evil^[a] spirit leaves a person, it goes into the desert, seeking rest but finding none. ⁴⁴ Then it says, ‘I will return to the person I came from.’ So it returns and finds its former home empty, swept, and in order. ⁴⁵ Then the spirit finds seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they all enter the person and live there. And so that person is worse off than before. That will be the experience of this evil generation.”

³¹ “So I tell you, every sin and blasphemy can be forgiven—except blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, which will never be forgiven. ³² Anyone who speaks against the Son of Man can be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven, either in this world or in the world to come.

¹⁶ If you see a fellow believer^[a] sinning in a way that does not lead to death, you should pray, and God will give that person life. But there is a sin that leads to death, and I am not saying you should pray for those who commit it.

²⁸ The priest will sacrifice it to purify^[a] the guilty person before the Lord, and that person will be forgiven. ²⁹ These same instructions apply both to native-born Israelites and to the foreigners living among you.

³⁰ “But those who brazenly violate the Lord’s will, whether native-born Israelites or foreigners, have blasphemed the Lord, and they must be cut off from the community. ³¹ Since they have treated the Lord’s word with contempt and deliberately disobeyed his command, they must be completely cut off and suffer the punishment for their guilt.”