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There is no need for argument here. These false prophets must belong to the Adamic
creation, and consequently there is added reason to believe that Peter's second use of the
term will be but an expansion of the first, and that II Pet. 3: 6 refers back as far as
Gen. 1: 3 but no farther.
Palai simply means `old', palaios, palaiotes and palaioo also occur and should be
examined. We give just two examples:
"But he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and hath forgotten
that he was purged from his old sins" (II Pet. 1: 9).
"God Who at sundry times and in diverse manners, spake in time past" (Heb. 1: 1).
The expression "the heavens were of old" therefore refers quite legitimately to
Gen. 1: 6. This `firmament' was temporary and is to pass away, as many passages of
Scripture testify. There is no passage, however, that teaches that heaven itself, the
dwelling place of the Most High, will ever pass away, and this is an added reason for
limiting Peter's words to the present creation.
The earth `standing' out of the water, appears to refer to the way in which the present
system was brought into being. Sunistemi is translated `consist' in Col. 1: 17, and while
it would take a scientist to explain the meaning of II Pet. 3: 5, the reference is so
evidently back to Gen. 1: 3 onwards that scientific proof is not necessary to our
argument.
The association of the `water' and creation, with the `water' that caused the `overflow'
of II Pet. 3: 6, is emphasized when one observes that after the many references to water
in Gen. 1:, no further mention is made until the ominous words of Gen. 6: 17 are
reached "I do bring a flood of waters upon the earth". These things the scoffers `wilfully
ignored'.
The future dissolution will involve the heavens as well as the earth (II Pet. 3: 10),
whereas it was `the world' not the heaven and the earth that `perished' in the days of
Noah. The heavens and the earth remained, and so could be called by Peter `The heavens
and the earth which are now'.
In the second chapter of the epistle Peter refers to the Flood and speaks of `the old
world' and `the world of the ungodly' (II Pet. 2: 5), similarly in both II Pet. 2: 4 & 3: 7
he uses the word `reserved' in reference to judgment.
Again in II Pet. 3: 6 the Greek word katakluzomai is used where the translation
reads "being overflowed with water". In II Pet. 2: 5 he uses the word kataklusmos
(which becomes in English `cataclysm') "bringing in the flood upon the world of the
ungodly" which makes the parallel between these two chapters even more obvious.