Ted Grimsrud

[See notes on Revelation 17]

Revelation 18 continues the envisioning of God’s work of transformation, from Babylon to New Jerusalem.  In Revelation 17, we read of Babylon’s comeuppance. At the end of chapter 16, the seventh of the full out plagues had been visited upon the city Babylon. The greatest earthquake the world has ever known splits Babylon into three parts. A loud voice, presumably God’s, had cried out: “It is done!” (16:17). Yet, the visions John reports are far from over.

Chapter 17 focuses on what happens to Babylon—a rather gruesome picture. However, we should not think of this picture as a prediction of what will happen in the future—rather the vision is simply part of Revelation’s broader message about our purpose (or “end”). When read in context, then, chapter 17’s vision actually is part of the bigger movement the book portrays of movement toward the New Jerusalem. In a paradoxical sense, the “destruction” of Babylon might actually be its transformation—or, at least, the transformation of the human city from Babylon to New Jerusalem.

Babylon falls, crushed by the self-destructiveness of its ways. But in the destruction lies the seeds of the city’s hope. Babylon is “drunk with the blood of the saints and the blood of the witnesses of Jesus” (17:6)—”blood” that links the witnesses with Jesus. That is, the “blood” of self-giving love that leads to Babylon’s downfall, the destruction of the three great Powers of evil (dragon, beast, and false prophet), and the re-creation of Jerusalem as a city of healing. The healing, as we will see, is not only for the faithful witnesses but also for the kings of the earth and the nations.

First, though, the destruction of Babylon requires more attention. So John gives us another vision in chapter 18, also of the destruction of Babylon but from a slightly different angle.

Revelation 18:1-3

The vision features a different angel than the angel of chapter 17 who was one of the seven angels who had poured out the plague bowls in chapter 16. It begins with an assertion that indeed “Babylon the great” has met its doom. Instead of being a place of beauty and power, a true city of the gods, Babylon is actually pretty disgusting, a home for demons, foul spirits, foul birds, and foul and hateful beasts. Continue reading →