When Ignorance Is a Sin

The word amathes means unlearned, and it is used once in the New Testament. Peter is talking about how the apostle Paul is sometimes difficult to understand. This means that there are things in his letters which unstable and unlearned people twist to their own destruction (2 Pet. 3:16). Here the problem is obviously not with being ignorant or unlearned in itself — a toddler is unlearned, but a toddler is not supposed to be learned. Those who are ignorant, but have had no opportunity for learning are not to be condemned. But those who are unlearned and yet gather to themselves the prerogatives of learning — which would include the authority to interpret the letters of Paul — are demonstrating that they are unlearned for a reason. They are unstable souls, and their ignorance is sinful.