The quickest way to show that the whore of Revelation 17 and 18 is the city of Jerusalem is to go line by line and prove it by the clear Biblical evidence.
Chapter 17
Verse 1 shows a present condemnation. That is, present in 68 AD when the book is written. A present condemnation against a present harlot who presently sits on many waters. Waters representing peoples. Everything here is spoken in present and past tense.
Verse 2. Again, the harlotry is shown as something that has already happened, as of 68 AD. There are scores of Biblical scriptures referring to Jerusalem as a whore. This woman is not a worldly power. She is not the Kings of the earth, she played the whore with the Kings of the earth. Rome is now excluded as the identity of the Woman. The harlotry refers to spiritual harlotry. In 68 AD, it is absurd to even suggest any other entity but Jerusalem. She played the whore...the world was drunk. John is clearly showing a present condemnation for past actions.
Verse 3. The beast is who the woman sat on. An overtly sexual connotation, strongly reinforcing the whore metaphor. The seven heads and ten horns and scarlet color directly tie this beast to the dragon identified as Satan in Revelation Chapter 12. The allusion is clear- this woman played footsie with no less than Satan Himself. The blasphemous names on the beast represent actual persons who are the personification of that evil. In 68 AD, the reader could not possibly have interpreted this as any other than the emperors of Rome.
Verse 4. All of the descriptors in verse 4 explicitly are shown in the Jewish priesthood and are, in total present in no other entity in human history. We see the Purple and Scarlet yarn, precious stones and pearls in Exodus 28, the golden cup in Exodus 25:29. True, we see a Chalice- a golden cup, if you will, in the Catholic Mass but never do we see precious stones or pearls. Ever. There are many colors in Catholic vestments and, yes, Reds and Purples and even Gold are occasionally among them but it is inescapable to see that these were the feature colors of the Jewish Priesthood. To make verse 4 fit any other entity but the Jewish Priesthood is simply untenable.
Verse 5. Babylon. A name recorded in Scripture many times as referring explicitly to Jerusalem. Isaiah 47:1 is just one example.
Verse 6. The woman is drunk with the blood of the saints and martyrs of Jesus. Later, it says Saints and prophets. There is no other entity on earth, in history, that can be accused of killing prophets, saints and martyrs than the city of Jerusalem, hysteria about the Inquisition notwithstanding.
Matthew 23:37 O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, that killeth the prophets, and stoneth them that are sent unto her! how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!
Verse 7 In verse 7, the Angel tells John that he will identify both the beast and the harlot. That means they existed in 68 AD and John would recognize them.
Verse 8. The first reference to the beast who was, is not, and is to come. Just as the whore cannot be the Catholic Church because it was a reigning religious power in 68 AD, this Beast cannot be the Catholic church because it existed before 68 AD, did not exist in 68 AD and would exist again after 68.
This will become clearer as we go. Think of it as a tightening lens. In Revelation 12, there is a 7 headed, 10 horned beast that is called Satan. In Revelation 14:3-4, the seven headed, ten horned beast is shown as a world power that personified Satan's power, and now, the lens tightens even further and some of the seven heads are actually described as beast entities on their own.
Verse 9 Seven mountains and Seven Kings. Not Seven hills and Seven Kingdoms. John uses the word Horos for Mountain, not Boonos for hill. A critical distinction. Although the woman rides the beast, she, herself, is not the Beast. She, herself is a city that sits on seven mountains. Mountains, not hills. In John's time, there was only one city in the world that qualified- The city that sat on Mt. Goath, Mt. Gareb, Mt. Acra, Mt. Bezetha, Mt. Zion, Mt. Ophel, and Mt. Moriah. That city is Jerusalem.
Verse 10. The Seven Kings are persons. Kings, not Kingdoms. They are the specific beasts that are the heads of the Roman beast. John tells us that 5 have fallen and one is. That places the writing of this book squarely in the reign of the Emperor Galba with Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius and Nero as the 5 who have fallen. This, and other factors, show conclusively that John wrote this book in 68 AD with an imminent event in mind.
John says a seventh King would come and reign only a short time. He was right. Otho reigned only 3 months.
Verse 11. These 7 kings set the stage for one who is to come- an 8th king who will be a reincarnation of one of the seven who was, is not but will come again. Is John talking literal reincarnation? No. However, the savagery of this dead king would be fresh in their mind. He is the specific beast of the Roman beast of the Satanic beast. He is called a beast in Revelation 13 and identified with the number 666 for his name. This is not the anti-Christ who comes later.
The beast who was, identified by the number 666 and his unimaginable cruelty, is none other than Caesar Nero. Verse 11 is actually a prophecy of a future emperor so cruel that it would be as if Nero cane back out of hell.
That prophecy would be fulfilled by Vespasian who, with his son Titus, sacked Jerusalem and slaughtered a million people.
Verses 12, 13 and 14 show the same doom that is about to befall the whore, will one day befall the beast and it's allies.
Verse 15 affirms what I said early, that the waters represent the many peoples influenced by the harlot.
Verse 16 shows the Roman beast turning on her and burning her with fire, just as what happened in 70 AD with Jerusalem. Verse 17 hearkens back to Matthew 23 and 24 and tells us that this is God's judgement on Jerusalem.
Verse 18 removes all doubt. The Woman is called the great city that rules over the Kings of the earth. The Religious city that played the harlot with the Worldly city. This city is called the Great city in Revelation half a dozen times and in Revelation 11:8, we are told that the Great City is the city where our Lord was crucified- Jerusalem.
Chapter 18
If chapter 17 focuses on the reasons for the judgement of the whore, chapter 18 emphasizes both it's ferocity and it's imminence.
Verses 1, 2 and 3 show it as an event that has already begun.
Verse 4 is often used to abuse Catholics, by implication that it is a cry for believers to come out of the Catholic church. What it actually is is the urgent alarm that the time of Jesus' prophecy is at hand.
Luke 21:20 And when you shall see Jerusalem compassed about with an army; then know that the desolation thereof is at hand.
22 For these are the days of vengeance, that all things may be fulfilled, that are written.
23 But woe to them that are with child, and give suck in those days; for there shall be great distress in the land, and wrath upon this people.
24 And they shall fall by the edge of the sword; and shall be led away captives into all nations; and Jerusalem shall be trodden down by the Gentiles; till the times of the nations be fulfilled.
| "Come out of her my people" was an urgent plea from God to get out of Jerusalem. It was a plea that was heeded. Of the 1 million killed there, included were the entire Jewish Priesthood...but not one Christian. They all got away. |
Over and over, Jesus promised that Jerusalem would be destroyed within the current generation. It was- in 70 AD. Jerusalem would pay for the blood of the prophets and all those slain on earth.
Matthew 23:
33 You serpents, generation of vipers, how will you flee from the judgment of hell?
34 Therefore
behold I send to you prophets, and wise men, and scribes: and some of
them you will put to death and crucify, and some you will scourge in
your synagogues, and persecute from city to city:
35 That
upon you may come all the just blood that hath been shed upon the
earth, from the blood of Abel the just, even unto the blood of Zacharias
the son of Barachias, whom you killed between the temple and the altar.
36 Amen I say to you, all these things shall come upon this generation.
37 Jerusalem,
Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them that are
sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered together thy children,
as the hen doth gather her chickens under her wings, and thou wouldest
not?
38 Behold, you house shall be left to you, desolate.
The case for Jerusalem as the whore of Babylon is simply airtight.
QUESTIONS
1) The first seven verses of the Book of Revelation say that the time is at hand, Jesus is coming soon and every eye will see him even those that pierced him. How could this be if this book is referring to events beyond 2013?
2) There are half a dozen references to the harlot being a Great City that sat on Seven mountains for example. Vatican City is too small to host an embassy, sits on a single hill and has a population of less than 900 people. It would fit inside Fairfax County, VA about 2,400 times and has about the population of one of it's larger high schools. Yes, the Catholic church has over a Billion people but Rev 17 is very clear that the harlot is a great city. Can you explain this?
3) Revelation 11:8 not only tells us that the Great City was where Our Lord was crucified but that it is a spiritual Sodom or Egypt. As you recall, Sodom was destroyed by fire and Egypt had God's people driven out of it. Why would John go to such great pains to identify Jerusalem in such a derogatory way, if it was not the focus of Revelation 17 and 18?
4) Isn't it the case that if the proclamation "Come out of her, my people" is not about the Catholic church, then there can be no scriptural support given for the Protestant reformation? If so, isn't it fair to say that protestants need this polemic to prop up their empty doctrines, rather than actually believing it is true?
Conclusion
The first of the surest signs that the fall of Babylon refers to the fall of Jerusalem is the plain allusions to the city that sat on seven mountains, played the whore with Rome and killed Prophets, Martyrs, Saints and Our Lord. The second is that Jesus said not one little stone (the Greek word Lithos) would be left on another and it happened within one generation just as He said. The third is that John was ringing the alarm in 68 AD and Jerusalem's fall came within two years. The fourth is that the Temple in Jerusalem remains in ruins more than 1940 years later and all attempts to rebuild it have been thwarted. Even, in the case of Julian the Apostate, by miraculous means. Finally, the 5th is that Catholicism has stood for 2,000 years and despite protestant croaking for 500+ of those years, we are still going strong.
The Catholic church has clearly seen some dark days. If God were going to destroy her, He surely would have done it then. Now, as Catholicism feeds more hungry people and takes the message of Jesus to more people than any institution the world has ever seen, those who rail against it and predict it's demise are running a fool's errand.
The case for the Catholic church being the harlot has been utterly destroyed tonight. It should make you wonder, how many other lies have you been listening to?
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