The Great Prostitute and the Beast, 1-18
17:1 Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and spoke to me. “Come,” he said, “I will show you the condemnation and punishment of the great prostitute who sits on many waters, 17:2 with whom the kings of the earth committed sexual immorality and the earth’s inhabitants got drunk with the wine of her immorality.”
We have already been introduced to three of the leaders of the forces of evil – Satan the dragon, the beast from the sea, and the false prophet. Now is added third.
The great prostitute – She is represented in two ways – as an immoral woman, and as a wicked city. Her pride, her flashy appearance, her opposition to the saints, her alliance with the beast, and her destined fate all tend to distinguish her as the embodiment of worldliness. See 1 Jn 2:16.
17:3 So he carried me away in the Spirit to a wilderness, and there I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast that was full of blasphemous names and had seven heads and ten horns. 17:4 Now the woman was dressed in purple and scarlet clothing, and adorned with gold, precious stones, and pearls. She held in her hand a golden cup filled with detestable things and unclean things from her sexual immorality.
As Koester (End) remarks:
‘John pens a merciless parody of the city’s wealth and power when he depicts a woman who, from a distance, might appear to be an elegant lady, for she is dressed in a purple and scarlet gown, and adorned with gold, jewels, and pearls. Yet with scathing satire, he points out that she sips sewage from the golden cup in her hand and clings to her grotesque mount in a drunken stupor.’
17:5 On her forehead was written a name, a mystery: “Babylon the Great, the Mother of prostitutes and of the detestable things of the earth.” 17:6 I saw that the woman was drunk with the blood of the saints and the blood of those who testified to Jesus. I was greatly astounded when I saw her. 17:7 But the angel said to me, “Why are you astounded? I will interpret for you the mystery of the woman and of the beast with the seven heads and ten horns that carries her. 17:8 The beast you saw was, and is not, but is about to come up from the abyss and then go to destruction. The inhabitants of the earth—all those whose names have not been written in the book of life since the foundation of the world—will be astounded when they see that the beast was, and is not, but is to come. 17:9 (This requires a mind that has wisdom.) The seven heads are seven mountains the woman sits on. They are also seven kings: 17:10 five have fallen; one is, and the other has not yet come, but whenever he does come, he must remain for only a brief time. 17:11 The beast that was, and is not, is himself an eighth king and yet is one of the seven, and is going to destruction. 17:12 The ten horns that you saw are ten kings who have not yet received a kingdom, but will receive ruling authority as kings with the beast for one hour. 17:13 These kings have a single intent, and they will give their power and authority to the beast. 17:14 They will make war with the Lamb, but the Lamb will conquer them, because he is Lord of lords and King of kings, and those accompanying the Lamb are the called, chosen, and faithful.”
“Babylon the Great” – Often identified as Rome. But:
‘it is not sufficient simply to identify Babylon with Rome. For that matter, Babylon cannot be confined to any one historical manifestation, past or future; it has multiple equivalents (cf. 11:8). Babylon is found wherever there is satanic deception. Babylon is better understood here as the archetypal head of all entrenched worldly resistance to God. Babylon is a transhistorical reality that includes idolatrous kingdoms as diverse as Sodom, Egypt, Babylon, Tyre, Nineveh, and Rome. Babylon is an eschatological symbol of satanic deception and power; it is a divine mystery that can never be wholly reducible to empirical earthly institutions. Babylon represents the total culture of the world apart from God, while the divine system is depicted by the New Jerusalem. Rome is simply one manifestation of the total system.’ (Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible, art. ‘Revelation’)
A scarlet beast – the colour of luxury and of sin (Isa 1:18).
v4 She offers so much from her golden cup – popularity, wealth, ease, and power – but there is no lasting satisfaction to be had from her.
‘We may react to the glamour of 17:4 with a shudder—‘How cheap, how tawdry!’—because that is what we think is expected of us. But in practice, in daily life, the pearls and the purple and the golden cup have an awful fascination. The world is powerful, its message is attractive, and we know what it is to be like the bird held by the glittering eye of the snake.’ (Wilcock)
Babylon – The city of Babylon was founded by Nimrod (Gen 10:8-11). The building of its famous tower (Gen 11:1-9) was ‘an idolatrous attempt to defy God’ (Wiersbe), and led to the scattering of the nations and the multiplication of their languages. Later, Babylon became a great empire, before finally falling to the Medo-Persians. So prevalent is the influence of Babylon in the OT that in the NT (and here in Rev 17-18 especially) it stands for godless worldy power: she is not only a prostitute, but the mother of prostitutes.
‘Already in the OT (cf. Is 13:1–22, esp. the ultimacy of the language in Is 13:9–13; 14:3–23) and certainly in the NT (e.g., 1 Pet 5:13; cf. 1:1; 2:11), Babylon stands not for a specific power but more generally for world power in opposition to God-the empire where God’s people live in exile. This is particularly clear in Revelation, which draws heavily on OT imagery in portraying the end times. Here stands Babylon the great, the mother of prostitutes. She is the harlot, drunk on the blood of the martyrs, making others drunk with the wine of fornication (Rev 17:1–6), forced by God to drink a double draught of judgment in her own cup (Rev 18:3–6). She is the arrogant and secure queen of the whole earth, now smitten suddenly and decisively with pestilence, mourning and famine (Rev 17:15–18, 18:7–8); desolate, naked and destroyed (Rev 17:16); deprived of all her previous luxuries (Rev 18:11–19). She is the ruin inhabited by demons and birds (Rev 18:2). The force of the imagery is the more strongly felt in Revelation because of the deliberate contrast drawn toward the end of the book between Babylon and the new Jerusalem, which is presented as the Bride of Christ (Rev 19:6–9; 21:1–27).’ (DBI)
Verse 10 may contain an indication of an early date of Revelation. If these kings are Roman Emperors, then the fifth is Nero, and so the book was written shortly after his death. See Rev 13:18.
Verse 11 appears to refer to a ‘Nero redivivus’ myth – the idea that Nero, although dead, would appear again on this earth.
“Called, chosen and faithful” – The hymn ‘Who is on the Lord’s Side’ (Frances Ridley Havergal) alludes to this description, but with a slightly different word order: ‘Chosen, called and faithful’.
“Called, chosen” – ‘The general call of the gospel is like the sheet lightning we sometimes see on a summer evening – beautiful, grand – but who ever heard of anything being struck by it? But the special call is the forked flash from heaven; it strikes somewhere.’ (Spurgeon)
17:15 Then the angel said to me, “The waters you saw (where the prostitute is seated) are peoples, multitudes, nations, and languages. 17:16 The ten horns that you saw, and the beast—these will hate the prostitute and make her desolate and naked. They will consume her flesh and burn her up with fire. 17:17 For God has put into their minds to carry out his purpose by making a decision to give their royal power to the beast until the words of God are fulfilled. 17:18 As for the woman you saw, she is the great city that has sovereignty over the kings of the earth.”
They will consume her flesh and burn her up with fire – Note the fragility of the prostitute-city. Rebellion against God is, ultimately, self-destructive.
Tina Pippin’s application of this graphic text seems singularly misguided:
‘Sex workers in the United States identify with the Whore of Babylon. In their reading, she is a prostitute like them and a victim of male violence. Groups of women victim-survivors often use these “texts of terror” in the Bible to name their own experiences with male violence. The violence done to the Whore is extreme; why does the demise of empire have to be symbolized by a sexually abused and devoured woman?’ (Women’s Bible Commentary, 3rd ed.)
Gorman writes that although this chapter contains rather explicit allusions to Rome and Roman emperors, it is eminently applicable to ’empires’ more generally, in the following ways:
1. Empire is a system of domination that both seduces the powerful, partly with the promise of more power, and intoxicates common people with its alluring wine, perhaps the false promise of security that supposedly comes from increasing prosperity and power (17:2, “kings of the earth . . . inhabitants of the earth”).
2. Empire is by definition both territorially grand and ideologically expansive, creating a kind of pseudo-ecumenism of politics and religion, and blasphemously self-promoting its own (alleged) grandeur, making claims about itself that are rightly made only about God (17:3–5).
3. Empire self-presents as aesthetically pleasing and full of benefactions to its subjects, both great and small, but in fact this appearance masks many “abominations,” which constitute the essence of the imperial character (17:4). Among these abominations are practices that use, abuse, and oppress defenseless human beings, treating them like commodities. Contemporary examples include human trafficking, sweat shops, abortion without restraint—and many more abuses of power.
4. Despite its claims to divine status—sanction, mission, protection, etc.—empire is always ultimately opposed to the true God and those who represent the true power of God that is manifested in the life and death of Jesus. Empire will eventually resort to anything necessary, including lethal violence, to silence the powerful pro-God, counter-imperial witness of the faithful (17:5, 14).
5. Empires grow, in part, because the conquered acquiesce (17:13).
6. Empires often eventually die of a self-inflicted wound; their subjects revolt and destroy the very thing that has empowered them, and this reversal may be seen in a real sense as the judgment of God (17:16–17).
7. Empires (plural), that is, the particular historical realities, are in fact simply short-term manifestations, or incarnations, of something much more powerful and permanent that we may call Empire.