Originally describing water flowing past or objects slipping off, this verb developed the metaphorical sense of drifting from teaching or neglecting warnings. The nautical imagery of a ship carried past its mooring by currents fits the metaphor. Hebrews 2:1 warns believers not to drift away from what they have heard. The passive construction suggests gradual, perhaps unconscious movement away from truth—not dramatic apostasy but slow slippage that ends in catastrophic distance.