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Rev18:4 - [In Context|Original Greek]
I heard another voice from heaven, saying, "Come out of
her, my people, so that you will
not participate in
her sins and receive of her plagues;
Come forth, my people, out of her ...
Amazing! Does God have people in the harlot church? Yes,
nor should this surprise us. There were also saints in Sardis (Revelation 3:14), and much people who
belonged to God even in pagan Nineveh (Jonah 4:11). Even of wicked Corinth, God said to Paul in the night by a vision, "I am
with thee, and no man shall set on thee to harm thee: for I have much people
in this city" (Acts 18:10).
For Full commentary open BCC -> Commentary on 18:4----------------------------------and
others--------------
‘She has fallen!
Babylon
the Great has
fallen,
Compare This Commentary
IT
IS the hour of God’s judgment! Listen, then, to the
divine message: “And
another, a second
angel, followed, saying:
‘She has fallen! Babylon the Great has fallen,
she who made
all the nations
drink
of the wine
of the anger
of her fornication!’”
(Revelation 14:8) For the first
time, but not the last, Revelation focuses attention on Babylon the Great. Later,
chapter 17 will describe her as a voluptuous harlot. Who is she? As we
shall see, she is a global empire, she is religious, and she is Satan’s
counterfeit system that he uses in fighting against the seed of God’s woman.
(Revelation 12:17) Babylon
the Great is the entire world empire of false religion. She includes all
religions that preserve the religious teachings and practices of ancient Babylon and that manifest her
spirit.
2
It was at Babylon,
more than 4,000 years ago, that Jehovah confused the tongues of the would-be
builders of the Tower
of Babel.
The different language groups were scattered to the ends of the earth, taking
with them the apostate beliefs and practices that are the basis of most
religions to this day. (Genesis 11:1-9) Babylon the Great is the
religious part of Satan’s organization. (Compare John 8:43-47.) Her most
prominent segment today is apostate Christendom, which emerged as a powerful,
lawless organization in the fourth century after Christ, with creeds and
formalisms derived, not from the Bible, but largely from Babylonish
religion.—2 Thessalonians 2:3-12.
3
You may ask, ‘Since religion still exercises great influence in the earth,
why does the angel announce that Babylon the Great has
fallen?’ Well, what resulted after 539 B.C.E. when ancient Babylon fell? Why, Israel
was freed to return to its homeland and restore true worship there! So the
restoration of spiritual Israel in 1919 to a radiant spiritual prosperity,
which continues and expands to this day, stands as evidence that Babylon the
Great fell in that year. No longer does she have power of restraint over
God’s people. Moreover, she has come into deep trouble within her own ranks.
Since 1919 her corruption, dishonesty, and immorality have been widely
exposed. In most of Europe,
few people go to church anymore, and in some socialistic countries, religion
is regarded as “the opium of the people.” Disgraced in the eyes of all lovers
of God’s Word of truth, Babylon
the Great now waits on death row, as it were, for the execution of Jehovah’s
righteous judgment on her.
Babylon’s
Disgraceful Fall
4
Let us examine in more detail the circumstances surrounding the disgraceful
fall of Babylon
the Great. The angel here tells us that “Babylon the Great . . . made all the nations drink of the
wine of the anger of her fornication.” What does this mean? It relates to
conquest. For example, Jehovah told Jeremiah: “Take this cup of the wine of rage
out of my hand, and you must make all the nations to whom I am sending you
drink it. And they must drink and shake back and forth and act like crazed
men because of the sword that I am sending among them.” (Jeremiah
25:15, 16) In the sixth and seventh centuries B.C.E., Jehovah used
ancient Babylon
to pour out a symbolic cup of tribulation for many nations to drink,
including apostate Judah, so that even his own people were taken into exile.
Then, in her turn, Babylon
fell because her king exalted himself against Jehovah, “the Lord of the
heavens.”—Daniel 5:23.
5
Babylon
the Great has also made conquests, but for the most part, these have been
more subtle. She has “made all the nations drink” by using the wiles of a prostitute,
committing religious fornication with them. She has enticed political rulers
into alliances and friendships with her. Through religious allurements, she
has schemed political, commercial, and economic oppression. She has fomented
religious persecution and religious wars and crusades, as well as national
wars, for purely political and commercial reasons. And she has sanctified
these wars by saying they are God’s will.
6
Religion’s involvement in the wars and politics of the 20th century is
common knowledge—as in Shinto Japan, Hindu India, Buddhist Vietnam,
“Christian” Northern Ireland and Latin America, as well as others—not to
overlook the army chaplains’ part on both sides of the two world wars in
urging young men to slaughter one another. A classic example of the
philandering of Babylon
the Great is the share she had in the Spanish Civil War of 1936-39, in which
at least 600,000 people were killed. This bloodspilling was provoked by
supporters of the Catholic clergy and their allies, in part because the
wealth and position of the church was threatened by Spain’s
legal government.
7
Since Babylon
the Great is the religious part of Satan’s seed, she has always made
Jehovah’s “woman,” “Jerusalem
above,” her main target. In the first century, the congregation of anointed
Christians was clearly identified as the woman’s seed. (Genesis 3:15;
Galatians 3:29;
4:26)
Babylon
the Great tried hard to conquer that chaste congregation by seducing it into
committing religious fornication. The apostles Paul and Peter warned that
many would succumb and a great apostasy would result. (Acts 20:29, 30;
2 Peter 2:1-3) Jesus’ messages to the seven congregations indicated that
toward the end of John’s life, Babylon the Great was making
some progress in her efforts to corrupt. (Revelation 2:6, 14, 15, 20-23) But
Jesus had already shown how far she would be permitted to go.
The
Wheat and the Weeds
8
In his parable of the wheat and the weeds, Jesus spoke of a man who sowed
fine seed in a field. But “while men were sleeping,” an enemy came and
oversowed weeds. Hence, the wheat came to be obscured by the weeds. Jesus
explained his parable in these words: “The sower of the fine seed is the Son
of man; the field is the world; as for the fine seed, these are the sons of
the kingdom; but the weeds are the sons of the wicked one, and the enemy that
sowed them is the Devil.” He then showed that the wheat and the weeds would
be allowed to grow together until “the conclusion of the system of things,”
when the angels would “collect out” the symbolic weeds.—Matthew 13:24-30,
36-43.
9
What Jesus and the apostles Paul and Peter warned about happened. “While men
were sleeping,” either after the apostles fell asleep in death or when
Christian overseers became drowsy in guarding the flock of God, Babylonish
apostasy sprouted right inside the congregation. (Acts 20:31)
Soon the weeds greatly outnumbered the wheat and hid it from view. For a
number of centuries, it might have appeared that the seed of the woman had
been completely engulfed by the voluminous skirts of Babylon the Great.
10
By the 1870’s anointed Christians began to make determined efforts to
disassociate themselves from the whorish ways of Babylon the Great. They
abandoned false doctrines that Christendom had brought in from paganism and
boldly used the Bible in preaching that the times of the Gentiles would end
in 1914. The chief instrument of Babylon the Great, the clergy
of Christendom, opposed these stirrings of restoration of true worship.
During the first world war, they took advantage of wartime hysteria to try to
stamp out that small group of faithful Christians. In 1918, when their
activities were almost completely suppressed, it appeared that Babylon the Great had
succeeded. She seemed to have triumphed over them.
11
As we previously noted, the proud city of Babylon experienced a
disastrous fall from power in 539 B.C.E. Then the cry was heard: “She
has fallen! Babylon
has fallen!” The great seat of the world empire had fallen to the armies of
Medo-Persia under Cyrus the Great. Although the city itself survived the
conquest, her fall from power was real, and it resulted in the release of her
Jewish captives. They returned to Jerusalem to reestablish pure
worship there.—Isaiah 21:9; 2 Chronicles 36:22, 23; Jeremiah
51:7, 8.
12
In our time the cry that Babylon
the Great has fallen has also been heard! Babylonish Christendom’s temporary
success in 1918 was sharply reversed in 1919 when the remnant of anointed
ones, the John class, was restored by a spiritual resurrection. Babylon the Great had fallen
as far as having any captive hold on God’s people was concerned. Like
locusts, Christ’s anointed brothers swarmed out of the abyss, ready for
action. (Revelation 9:1-3; 11:11, 12)
They were the modern “faithful and discreet slave,” and the Master appointed
them over all his belongings on earth. (Matthew 24:45-47) Their being used in
this way proved that Jehovah had utterly rejected Christendom despite her
claim to be his representative on earth. Pure worship was reestablished, and
the way was open to complete the work of sealing the remnant of the
144,000—the remaining ones of the seed of the woman, the age-old enemy of Babylon the Great. All of
this signaled a crushing defeat for that satanic religious organization.
Endurance
for the Holy
Ones
13
Now the third angel speaks. Listen! “And
another angel, a
third, followed them,
saying in a
loud voice: ‘If
anyone worships the
wild beast and
its image, and
receives a mark
on his forehead
or upon his
hand, he will
also drink of
the wine of
the anger of
God that is
poured out undiluted
into the cup
of his wrath.’”
(Revelation 14:9, 10a) At Revelation 13:16, 17, it was revealed that during the
Lord’s day those who do not worship the image of the wild beast would
suffer—even be killed. Now we learn that Jehovah has determined to bring to
judgment those “having the mark, the name of the wild beast or the number of
its name.” They will be forced to drink a bitter
‘cup of wrath’ of Jehovah’s anger. What will this mean for them? In
607 B.C.E., when Jehovah forced Jerusalem to drink “his cup of
rage,” the city experienced “despoiling and breakdown, and hunger and sword”
at the hands of the Babylonians. (Isaiah 51:17, 19) Similarly, when
idolizers of earth’s political powers and their image, the United Nations,
get to drink the cup of Jehovah’s wrath, the result will be a calamity for
them. (Jeremiah 25:17, 32, 33) They will be utterly destroyed.
14
Even before that happens, however, those with the mark of the beast have to
undergo the tormenting effects of Jehovah’s disapproval. Speaking of the
worshipper of the wild beast and its image, the angel informs John: “And he
shall be tormented
with fire and
sulphur in the
sight of the
holy angels and
in the sight
of the Lamb.
And the smoke
of their torment
ascends forever and
ever, and day
and night they
have no rest,
those who worship
the wild beast
and its image,
and whoever receives
the mark of
its name.”—Revelation 14:10b, 11.
15
Some have viewed the mention here of fire and sulfur (“fire and brimstone,” King
James Version) as a proof of the existence of a hellfire. But a
brief look at a similar prophecy shows the real import of these words in this
context. Back in the days of Isaiah, Jehovah warned the nation of Edom that they
would be punished because of their enmity toward Israel.
He said: “Her torrents must be changed into pitch, and her dust into sulphur;
and her land must become as burning pitch. By night or by day it will not be
extinguished; to time indefinite its smoke will keep ascending. From
generation to generation she will be parched; forever and ever no one will be
passing across her.”—Isaiah 34:9, 10.
16
Was Edom
hurled into some mythical hellfire to burn forever? Of course not. Rather,
the nation completely disappeared from the world scene as if she had been
totally consumed with fire and sulfur. The final result of the punishment was
not everlasting torment but “emptiness . . .
wasteness . . . nothing.” (Isaiah 34:11, 12) The smoke
‘ascending to time indefinite’ vividly illustrates this. When a house burns
down, smoke keeps coming from the ashes for some time after the flames have
died down, providing onlookers with evidence that there has been a destructive
conflagration. Even today God’s people remember the lesson to be learned from
the destruction of Edom. In this way
‘the smoke of her burning’ is still ascending in a symbolic way.
17
Those who have the mark of the wild beast will also
be destroyed completely, as if by fire. As the prophecy later reveals, their
dead bodies will be left unburied for animals and birds to eat. (Revelation
19:17, 18) So, clearly, they are not being literally tortured forever!
How are they “tormented with fire and sulphur”? In that the proclamation of
truth exposes them and warns them of God’s coming judgment. Therefore they
vilify God’s people and, where possible, slyly persuade the political wild
beast to persecute and even kill Jehovah’s Witnesses. As a climax, these opposers
will be destroyed as with fire and brimstone. Then “the smoke of their
torment ascends forever and ever” in that God’s judgment of them will serve
as a touchstone if ever again Jehovah’s rightful sovereignty is challenged.
That issue will have been settled for all eternity.
18
Who deliver the tormenting message today? Remember, the symbolic locusts have
authority to torment the men who do not have the seal of God on their
foreheads. (Revelation 9:5) Evidently, these ones under angelic direction are
the tormentors. Such is the persistence of the symbolic locusts that “day and
night they have no rest, those who worship the wild beast and its image, and
whoever receives the mark of its name.” And finally, after their destruction,
the monumental evidence of that vindication of Jehovah’s sovereignty, “the
smoke of their torment,” will ascend forever and ever. May the John class
endure until that vindication is complete! As the angel concludes: “Here is
where it means
endurance for the
holy ones, those
who observe the
commandments of God
and the faith
of Jesus.”—Revelation 14:12.
19
Yes, “endurance for the holy ones” means their worshipping Jehovah in
exclusive devotion through Jesus Christ. Their message is not popular. It
leads to opposition, persecution, even martyrdom. But they are strengthened
by what John next reports: “And
I heard a
voice out of
heaven say: ‘Write:
Happy are the
dead who die
in union with
the Lord from
this time onward.
Yes, says the
spirit, let them
rest from their
labors, for the
things they did
go right with
them.’”—Revelation
14:13.
20
This promise harmonizes well with Paul’s prophecy concerning Jesus’ presence:
“Those who are dead in union with Christ will rise first. Afterward we the
living who are surviving [those of the anointed ones who survive into the
Lord’s day] will, together with them, be caught away
in clouds to meet the Lord in the air.” (1 Thessalonians 4:15-17) After
Satan’s ouster from heaven, those who were dead in union with Christ rose
first. (Compare Revelation 6:9-11.) Afterward, those of the anointed ones who
die during the Lord’s day are promised a special privilege. Their
resurrection to spirit life in heaven is instantaneous, “in the twinkling of
an eye.” (1 Corinthians 15:52) How marvelous this is! And their works of
righteousness continue right on in the heavenly realm.
Harvest
of the
Earth
21
Others are also to benefit in this day of judgment, as John goes on to tell
us: “And I saw,
and, look! a white
cloud, and upon
the cloud someone
seated like a
son of man,
with a golden
crown on his
head and a
sharp sickle in
his hand. And
another angel [the fourth] emerged from
the temple sanctuary,
crying with a
loud voice to
the one seated
on the cloud:
‘Put your sickle
in and reap,
because the hour
has come to
reap, for the
harvest of the
earth is thoroughly
ripe.’ And the
one seated on
the cloud thrust
in his sickle
on the earth,
and the earth
was reaped.”—Revelation 14:14-16. |
