The Judgments on Earth (2nd
series of The Revelation)
by Paige Ramsey
The Great Whore - Lesson 11
Revelation
17
The Scarlet Woman and the Scarlet Beast
Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and talked with me, saying to me,[a] “Come, I will show you the judgment of the great harlot who sits on many waters, 2 with whom the kings of the earth committed fornication, and the inhabitants of the earth were made drunk with the wine of her fornication.”
3 So he carried me away in the Spirit into the wilderness. And I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast which was full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. 4 The woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet, and adorned with gold and precious stones and pearls, having in her hand a golden cup full of abominations and the filthiness of her fornication.[b] 5 And on her forehead a name was written:
MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT,
THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS
AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.
6 I saw the woman, drunk with the blood of the saints and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus. And when I saw her, I marveled with great amazement.
The Meaning of the Woman and the Beast
7 But the angel said to me, “Why did you marvel? I will tell you the mystery of the woman and of the beast that carries her, which has the seven heads and the ten horns. 8 The beast that you saw was, and is not, and will ascend out of the bottomless pit and go to perdition. And those who dwell on the earth will marvel, whose names are not written in the Book of Life from the foundation of the world, when they see the beast that was, and is not, and yet is.[c]
9 “Here is the mind which has wisdom: The seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman sits. 10 There are also seven kings. Five have fallen, one is, and the other has not yet come. And when he comes, he must continue a short time. 11 The beast that was, and is not, is himself also the eighth, and is of the seven, and is going to perdition.
12 “The ten horns which you saw are ten kings who have received no kingdom as yet, but they receive authority for one hour as kings with the beast. 13 These are of one mind, and they will give their power and authority to the beast. 14 These will make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them, for He is Lord of lords and King of kings; and those who are with Him are called, chosen, and faithful.”
15 Then he said to me, “The waters which you saw, where the harlot sits, are peoples, multitudes, nations, and tongues. 16 And the ten horns which you saw on[d] the beast, these will hate the harlot, make her desolate and naked, eat her flesh and burn her with fire. 17 For God has put it into their hearts to fulfill His purpose, to be of one mind, and to give their kingdom to the beast, until the words of God are fulfilled. 18 And the woman whom you saw is that great city which reigns over the kings of the earth.”
Footnotes:
Some believe that Babylon in the Revelation refers to:
Matthew 13:33 – He spoke another parable to them: The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a woman took, and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened.
Of this parable, Dr. Dan W. Cozart says:
Matthew 13 is an excellent chapter on the Kingdom of Christ. Jesus teaches in the form of parables, and this parable is about a woman who hides leaven in a dough of meal.
Leaven refers to false teaching, which is mixed with unleaven, which is truth. The product is a very dangerous religious system – this is the whore of Revelation 17.
Let’s look at Rev. 17:1. The first thing we notice is that this is called a judgment. It is an event that takes place as a result of a heinous sin. Next, we see that the harlot is sitting upon many waters. Now, people do not sit on top of many waters. Floating is one of the first things you must learn if you are going to swim and move with the cooperation of water. I’ve never seen someone float by sitting on top of the water. Clearly, this vision is symbolic from the start, and cannot be taken literally. However, we do not have to guess about what the vision is talking about. Later in the chapter itself, the Lord clarifies the symbols for us. Look at verse 15 – the best commentary of the Bible is the Bible itself. Verse 15 says, “The waters which you saw, where the harlot sits, are peoples, multitudes, nations, and tongues.” Now, we know that this whore is sitting on a multitude of people – people on whom she has much influence.
Religion has influenced the people of the earth down through time. Religion is a man-made attempt to reach God. That is why I cringe inside every time I hear someone refer to their relationship to Christ as a religion. True Christianity, born out of Judaism, is the only belief system where God is reaching to men instead of men reaching to God. Judaism has the prophecy of the coming Messiah (God reaching men), but Judaism as a whole rejects Jesus Christ as that Messiah and continues to plod along under the Law which was given to them to be a schoolmaster[i] so they would learn that they cannot possibly keep the Law in their sinful condition.
This whore describes a religious system that claims to be the bride of Christ but instead, she is a prostitute. Roman Catholicism is this system. It is an idolatrous system. This system has greatly influenced many, many nations around the world. Dr. Dan Cozart makes this observation:
The harlot has but one craving: Power. How does she get this power? Idolatry. She offers them a religion that will allow them to do anything they wish and soothe their consciences like wine. Idolatry is often spoken of in the Bible as spiritual fornication. This is the Church of Rome.
John Phillips says,
To get that power, she has abandoned every principal; she will do anything for power. Do the Kings of the earth have power? She will court them, cajole them, or command them. She will give them anything they want so long as they give her power instead. She will intoxicate them with her filthy brews and drain their power from them while they are drunk.
It is Rome’s wealth that dazzles the kings of the earth and makes them dance to her tune. The total worth of the Roman Catholic Church is estimated to be in the region of 70 billion dollars. The Vatican is an international and financial power. It has extensive holdings in hotels, transportation companies, and industry. The Vatican’s liquid assets are deposited mostly in American banks and are protected by a small army of financially expert Jesuit priests. It is the controlling factor of the Mafia and the underground.
Notice in verse four of our text that this whore is extremely wealthy and holds in her hand the golden cup. This is the cup of false forgiveness, filled with her deceptive lies (proclaimed to be the blood of Jesus Christ) which she offers in communion. They call it “mass.” The word “mass” means death. Did you know that? Isn’t it strange that the time of year which the Roman Catholic Church calls Christ-mass supposedly celebrates the birth of our Lord Jesus? The Roman Catholic Church celebrates the death of Jesus. They display a dead Jesus on the cross constantly. Even at their “Easter,” the concentration is upon the crucifixion – not the resurrection.
Notice in verse 6 that this woman is drunk with the blood of the saints and the martyrs of Jesus. During the Reformation, the Roman Catholic Church murdered over 50 million Christians which they called Anabaptists. On the major road that leads to Rome, they placed fence posts every 2 feet, and upon each fence post, they placed a head of one of those Christians, and it stretched out as far as the eye could see. They have never even offered an apology for that horrendous massacre.
John Phillips continues:
Nor has Rome finished her brutal work. At present, she treads softly, but when she sits supreme, her old blood lusts will come upon her once more.
Catholicism appears to be quite different in the United States than it is in other countries, but that is only because she is in the minority here. Once she gains control, she will be just as violent in this country as well.
Notice in verses 3 & 7 that the whore lives in the wilderness. God sent Cain into the Land of Nod – the word “nod” means “vagrancy.”[ii] Vagrancy is homelessness or wanderer. The wilderness is the land of a works salvation, which is no salvation. Works creates a continual wandering of trial and defeat, but never reaching perfection, and when people put their trust in a system which is built upon works, they never receive that calm assurance that Christ gives. They never know that rest. They are continually striving to reach perfection.
As Christians, we, too, should strive for perfection. Paul said, “I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.”[iii] But, that mark is not salvation. Jesus paid for our salvation in full on the cross. When I put my trust in Christ, and believed that His death paid for my sins, God applied His blood to pay for my sins and freely gave me eternal life. When we “press toward the mark,” we are striving to be like Christ in every way, but we are not under duress to attain that kind of perfection in order to have eternal life. We desire to be Christ-like, and strive for that end because we love Him. If that is not the desire of your heart, you need to do some soul searching to see if you truly are a child of God. If becoming Christ-like is a chore – a badger, then something is wrong.
God cannot give eternal life and then take it away. That is an oxymoron. God is omniscient. He knows everything – the beginning and the end. He does not say to someone that if you believe, you will have eternal life knowing that they will one day mess up and then not have eternal life. If that were the case, God never gave it to begin with, and God is not a liar. But those who believe they must earn their salvation also believe they must keep on working to keep that salvation, only to discover over and over that they cannot accomplish it. They are vagrants, without a home, wandering in the wilderness.
This religious system rides the back of a scarlet beast. We can quickly determine who this beast is. He has seven heads and ten horns. This is the anti-christ, as revealed in chapter 13. The heads are seven mountains on which the woman sits. Ancient Rome was built on seven hills:
In verse 10, there are seven kings by which Rome is governed. There are seven different types of rulers that have reigned: 1) Kings, 2) Consuls, 3) Dictators, 4) Magistrates, 5) Tribunals, 6) Imperialists, 7) Popery.
Listen to the words of Dr. Dan Cozart as he preached about “The Great Whore” in 2010:
Now, the ten horns are ten nations, in verse number 12 … these kings are, most likely, puppet kings who will ultimately serve under the anti-christ. Here in the United States, we call it the President’s cabinet. … This probably refers to the European Common Market which began with the treaty of Rome in 1957. Made up of ten member nations. Nine of Rome’s original provinces are still with us today. Romania, the tenth, is freeing herself from communism. The confederacy that will be produced will be common money and a common passport. Just right around the corner.
If this harlot sits on these seven mountains, as in verse nine, then she sits on Rome. This false religion dominates Rome.
Now, the transfer of power takes place. Because it can no longer rest in the hands of the Pope, ladies and gentlemen, it will ultimately rest in the hands of the anti-christ. And the anti-christ and the pope will not be friends. Notice the beast carries around the harlot to gain popularity and power. And then the power of Rome leaves the Pope and is transferred to the beast.
In the book of Thessalonica, or Thessalonians, the anti-christ sets himself up in Jerusalem in the temple and the people worship him as God. That is not the Pope of Rome, that is the anti-christ and in time, it will take place when the Pope of Rome has been defeated by the anti-christ.[vi]
The Origin of the Harlot – verse 5
And on her forehead a name was written: MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.
She is the mystery of Babylon – the mother of all false religions. Catholicism did not begin in Jerusalem, nor did it begin in Rome. It began in Babylon. W. A. Criswell, who was the pastor of the First Baptist Church of Dallas, Texas for many, many years quotes a book entitled The Two Babylons in his Commentary on the Book of the Revelation. Gene has that book in his library, and I have read much of it. W. A. Criswell does a fairly good job of summarizing that very detailed and almost tedious book of historical content, so I’d like to quote his summary. He says:
It is apparent why John’s reaction should be one of amazement. The background of the development of this religious, idolatry whore is seen in the very name written on her forehead. And on her forehead a name was written: MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH. Idolatry began in the city of Babel [or Babylon]. In The Two Babylons, by the British author Alexander Hislop, he traces the development of this mystery Babylon, the idolatry Babylon through the years and centuries to this present day.
Nimrod’s wife was named Semiramis in Assyria, and in Ninevah she was called Ishtar, in the Phoenician pantheon she was called Ashtoreth or Astarte, in Egypt she was called Isis, among the Greeks she was called Aphrodite, among the Latins and Romans she was called Venus. She became the first high priestess of an idolatrous system.
In answer to the promise made to Eve, that the Seed of the woman would deliver the race, Semiramis when she gave birth to a son said he was miraculously conceived by a sunbeam, and she offered her son as the promised deliverer of the earth. His name was Tammuz. When he was grown, a wild boar slew him, but after 40 days of his mother’s weeping, he was raised from the dead. In this story of Semiramis and Tammuz, began the worship of mother and child that spread throughout the whole world. In Assyria, she is [now] called Ishtar, and her son is still Tammuz; In Phoenicia, she is called Astarte or Ashtoreth, and her son is called Baal or Tammuz; in Egypt, she is called Isis and her son is called Osiris or Horus; in Greece, she was called Aphrodite and her son was called Eros; among the Romans, she was called Venus and her son was called Cupid.
The cult of the worship of mother and child spread throughout the whole earth. She was worshipped by the offering of a wafer [a little cake] to her as the queen of heaven, and there were always forty days of lent of weeping over the destruction of Tammuz before the feast of Ishtar, at which time his resurrection was celebrated. The sign of Tammuz was an Ishtar egg, a symbol of his resurrection to life.
This false religious system is substantiated in the Bible in Jeremiah 44:16-19 and Ezekiel 8:13-14.
The Judgment of the Great Whore – verses 16–18
In verse 16, the whore [the false religious system] is destroyed. The ten horns [puppet kings] of the Beast hate her. Their plot to destroy is thorough. They isolate her, then strip her – shaming her publicly, then they devour her – chewing her up and spitting her out, to speak, and then they burn her up with fire. This is the path that Satan has for all who follow him. Satan will lead men and women into sin and glorify them for it, perhaps giving them fame and fortune. Then, he will begin to take away all friends and expose the sin to shame them before everyone. Finally, he will destroy them, knowing they will burn forever.
In verse 17, we discover that the ultimate hand behind the scene is God himself. God has not just allowed this to happen, but has put it into their hearts to do so because of the wickedness of the whore who has deceived a vast multitude of people to commit spiritual fornication with her.
Then, verse 18 tells us the whore is that great city who reigns over the kings of the earth. Rome, the capitol of the Roman Empire ruled the kings of the earth at the time John wrote down this vision. However, we should not assume the great whore is the city of Rome itself. In Rev. 21:9-10, the Bride is not the actual city of New Jerusalem – the bride lives in New Jerusalem. As so, the harlot is not the city of Rome, but she lives in that great city. The Vatican, capitol of Roman Catholicism resides in Rome.
The Great Whore is the same ugly idolatrous religion today, who makes Mary the queen of heaven, and designates the 25th of December (the birthday of Tammuz or Baal) as the birth of Jesus, and married idolatry with Christianity in order to gain power. This religious system claims to be the Bride of Christ but she is a harlot. Rome will fall. Catholicism will fall.
[i] Galatians 3:24-25
[ii] Strong’s Hebrew and Greek Dictionaries, H5113
[iii] Phillipians 3:14
[iv] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_hills_of_Rome, 11/15/2013.
[v] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_claimed_to_be_built_on_seven_hills, 11/15/2013.
[vi] Cozart, Dr. Dan W., sermon: The Great Whore, Grace Baptist Church, Tyler TX, March 7, 2010.
The Scarlet Woman and the Scarlet Beast
Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and talked with me, saying to me,[a] “Come, I will show you the judgment of the great harlot who sits on many waters, 2 with whom the kings of the earth committed fornication, and the inhabitants of the earth were made drunk with the wine of her fornication.”
3 So he carried me away in the Spirit into the wilderness. And I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast which was full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. 4 The woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet, and adorned with gold and precious stones and pearls, having in her hand a golden cup full of abominations and the filthiness of her fornication.[b] 5 And on her forehead a name was written:
MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT,
THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS
AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.
6 I saw the woman, drunk with the blood of the saints and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus. And when I saw her, I marveled with great amazement.
The Meaning of the Woman and the Beast
7 But the angel said to me, “Why did you marvel? I will tell you the mystery of the woman and of the beast that carries her, which has the seven heads and the ten horns. 8 The beast that you saw was, and is not, and will ascend out of the bottomless pit and go to perdition. And those who dwell on the earth will marvel, whose names are not written in the Book of Life from the foundation of the world, when they see the beast that was, and is not, and yet is.[c]
9 “Here is the mind which has wisdom: The seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman sits. 10 There are also seven kings. Five have fallen, one is, and the other has not yet come. And when he comes, he must continue a short time. 11 The beast that was, and is not, is himself also the eighth, and is of the seven, and is going to perdition.
12 “The ten horns which you saw are ten kings who have received no kingdom as yet, but they receive authority for one hour as kings with the beast. 13 These are of one mind, and they will give their power and authority to the beast. 14 These will make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them, for He is Lord of lords and King of kings; and those who are with Him are called, chosen, and faithful.”
15 Then he said to me, “The waters which you saw, where the harlot sits, are peoples, multitudes, nations, and tongues. 16 And the ten horns which you saw on[d] the beast, these will hate the harlot, make her desolate and naked, eat her flesh and burn her with fire. 17 For God has put it into their hearts to fulfill His purpose, to be of one mind, and to give their kingdom to the beast, until the words of God are fulfilled. 18 And the woman whom you saw is that great city which reigns over the kings of the earth.”
Footnotes:
- Revelation 17:1 NU-Text and M-Text omit to me.
- Revelation 17:4 M-Text reads the filthiness of the fornication of the earth.
- Revelation 17:8 NU-Text and M-Text read and shall be present.
- Revelation 17:16 NU-Text and M-Text read saw, and the beast.
Some believe that Babylon in the Revelation refers to:
- The city of Rome
- The city of Jerusalem
- The United States
- The city of Babylon itself
Matthew 13:33 – He spoke another parable to them: The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a woman took, and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened.
Of this parable, Dr. Dan W. Cozart says:
Matthew 13 is an excellent chapter on the Kingdom of Christ. Jesus teaches in the form of parables, and this parable is about a woman who hides leaven in a dough of meal.
Leaven refers to false teaching, which is mixed with unleaven, which is truth. The product is a very dangerous religious system – this is the whore of Revelation 17.
Let’s look at Rev. 17:1. The first thing we notice is that this is called a judgment. It is an event that takes place as a result of a heinous sin. Next, we see that the harlot is sitting upon many waters. Now, people do not sit on top of many waters. Floating is one of the first things you must learn if you are going to swim and move with the cooperation of water. I’ve never seen someone float by sitting on top of the water. Clearly, this vision is symbolic from the start, and cannot be taken literally. However, we do not have to guess about what the vision is talking about. Later in the chapter itself, the Lord clarifies the symbols for us. Look at verse 15 – the best commentary of the Bible is the Bible itself. Verse 15 says, “The waters which you saw, where the harlot sits, are peoples, multitudes, nations, and tongues.” Now, we know that this whore is sitting on a multitude of people – people on whom she has much influence.
Religion has influenced the people of the earth down through time. Religion is a man-made attempt to reach God. That is why I cringe inside every time I hear someone refer to their relationship to Christ as a religion. True Christianity, born out of Judaism, is the only belief system where God is reaching to men instead of men reaching to God. Judaism has the prophecy of the coming Messiah (God reaching men), but Judaism as a whole rejects Jesus Christ as that Messiah and continues to plod along under the Law which was given to them to be a schoolmaster[i] so they would learn that they cannot possibly keep the Law in their sinful condition.
This whore describes a religious system that claims to be the bride of Christ but instead, she is a prostitute. Roman Catholicism is this system. It is an idolatrous system. This system has greatly influenced many, many nations around the world. Dr. Dan Cozart makes this observation:
The harlot has but one craving: Power. How does she get this power? Idolatry. She offers them a religion that will allow them to do anything they wish and soothe their consciences like wine. Idolatry is often spoken of in the Bible as spiritual fornication. This is the Church of Rome.
John Phillips says,
To get that power, she has abandoned every principal; she will do anything for power. Do the Kings of the earth have power? She will court them, cajole them, or command them. She will give them anything they want so long as they give her power instead. She will intoxicate them with her filthy brews and drain their power from them while they are drunk.
It is Rome’s wealth that dazzles the kings of the earth and makes them dance to her tune. The total worth of the Roman Catholic Church is estimated to be in the region of 70 billion dollars. The Vatican is an international and financial power. It has extensive holdings in hotels, transportation companies, and industry. The Vatican’s liquid assets are deposited mostly in American banks and are protected by a small army of financially expert Jesuit priests. It is the controlling factor of the Mafia and the underground.
Notice in verse four of our text that this whore is extremely wealthy and holds in her hand the golden cup. This is the cup of false forgiveness, filled with her deceptive lies (proclaimed to be the blood of Jesus Christ) which she offers in communion. They call it “mass.” The word “mass” means death. Did you know that? Isn’t it strange that the time of year which the Roman Catholic Church calls Christ-mass supposedly celebrates the birth of our Lord Jesus? The Roman Catholic Church celebrates the death of Jesus. They display a dead Jesus on the cross constantly. Even at their “Easter,” the concentration is upon the crucifixion – not the resurrection.
Notice in verse 6 that this woman is drunk with the blood of the saints and the martyrs of Jesus. During the Reformation, the Roman Catholic Church murdered over 50 million Christians which they called Anabaptists. On the major road that leads to Rome, they placed fence posts every 2 feet, and upon each fence post, they placed a head of one of those Christians, and it stretched out as far as the eye could see. They have never even offered an apology for that horrendous massacre.
John Phillips continues:
Nor has Rome finished her brutal work. At present, she treads softly, but when she sits supreme, her old blood lusts will come upon her once more.
Catholicism appears to be quite different in the United States than it is in other countries, but that is only because she is in the minority here. Once she gains control, she will be just as violent in this country as well.
Notice in verses 3 & 7 that the whore lives in the wilderness. God sent Cain into the Land of Nod – the word “nod” means “vagrancy.”[ii] Vagrancy is homelessness or wanderer. The wilderness is the land of a works salvation, which is no salvation. Works creates a continual wandering of trial and defeat, but never reaching perfection, and when people put their trust in a system which is built upon works, they never receive that calm assurance that Christ gives. They never know that rest. They are continually striving to reach perfection.
As Christians, we, too, should strive for perfection. Paul said, “I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.”[iii] But, that mark is not salvation. Jesus paid for our salvation in full on the cross. When I put my trust in Christ, and believed that His death paid for my sins, God applied His blood to pay for my sins and freely gave me eternal life. When we “press toward the mark,” we are striving to be like Christ in every way, but we are not under duress to attain that kind of perfection in order to have eternal life. We desire to be Christ-like, and strive for that end because we love Him. If that is not the desire of your heart, you need to do some soul searching to see if you truly are a child of God. If becoming Christ-like is a chore – a badger, then something is wrong.
God cannot give eternal life and then take it away. That is an oxymoron. God is omniscient. He knows everything – the beginning and the end. He does not say to someone that if you believe, you will have eternal life knowing that they will one day mess up and then not have eternal life. If that were the case, God never gave it to begin with, and God is not a liar. But those who believe they must earn their salvation also believe they must keep on working to keep that salvation, only to discover over and over that they cannot accomplish it. They are vagrants, without a home, wandering in the wilderness.
This religious system rides the back of a scarlet beast. We can quickly determine who this beast is. He has seven heads and ten horns. This is the anti-christ, as revealed in chapter 13. The heads are seven mountains on which the woman sits. Ancient Rome was built on seven hills:
- Aventine
Hill (Latin, Aventinus; Italian, Aventino)
- Caelian
Hill (Caelius, Celio)
- Capitoline
Hill (Capitolium, Campidoglio)
- Esquiline
Hill (Esquilinus, Esquilino)
- Palatine
Hill (Palatinus, Palatino)
- Quirinal
Hill (Quirinalis, Quirinale)
- Viminal
Hill (Viminalis, Viminale)[iv]
In verse 10, there are seven kings by which Rome is governed. There are seven different types of rulers that have reigned: 1) Kings, 2) Consuls, 3) Dictators, 4) Magistrates, 5) Tribunals, 6) Imperialists, 7) Popery.
Listen to the words of Dr. Dan Cozart as he preached about “The Great Whore” in 2010:
Now, the ten horns are ten nations, in verse number 12 … these kings are, most likely, puppet kings who will ultimately serve under the anti-christ. Here in the United States, we call it the President’s cabinet. … This probably refers to the European Common Market which began with the treaty of Rome in 1957. Made up of ten member nations. Nine of Rome’s original provinces are still with us today. Romania, the tenth, is freeing herself from communism. The confederacy that will be produced will be common money and a common passport. Just right around the corner.
If this harlot sits on these seven mountains, as in verse nine, then she sits on Rome. This false religion dominates Rome.
Now, the transfer of power takes place. Because it can no longer rest in the hands of the Pope, ladies and gentlemen, it will ultimately rest in the hands of the anti-christ. And the anti-christ and the pope will not be friends. Notice the beast carries around the harlot to gain popularity and power. And then the power of Rome leaves the Pope and is transferred to the beast.
In the book of Thessalonica, or Thessalonians, the anti-christ sets himself up in Jerusalem in the temple and the people worship him as God. That is not the Pope of Rome, that is the anti-christ and in time, it will take place when the Pope of Rome has been defeated by the anti-christ.[vi]
The Origin of the Harlot – verse 5
And on her forehead a name was written: MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.
She is the mystery of Babylon – the mother of all false religions. Catholicism did not begin in Jerusalem, nor did it begin in Rome. It began in Babylon. W. A. Criswell, who was the pastor of the First Baptist Church of Dallas, Texas for many, many years quotes a book entitled The Two Babylons in his Commentary on the Book of the Revelation. Gene has that book in his library, and I have read much of it. W. A. Criswell does a fairly good job of summarizing that very detailed and almost tedious book of historical content, so I’d like to quote his summary. He says:
It is apparent why John’s reaction should be one of amazement. The background of the development of this religious, idolatry whore is seen in the very name written on her forehead. And on her forehead a name was written: MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH. Idolatry began in the city of Babel [or Babylon]. In The Two Babylons, by the British author Alexander Hislop, he traces the development of this mystery Babylon, the idolatry Babylon through the years and centuries to this present day.
Nimrod’s wife was named Semiramis in Assyria, and in Ninevah she was called Ishtar, in the Phoenician pantheon she was called Ashtoreth or Astarte, in Egypt she was called Isis, among the Greeks she was called Aphrodite, among the Latins and Romans she was called Venus. She became the first high priestess of an idolatrous system.
In answer to the promise made to Eve, that the Seed of the woman would deliver the race, Semiramis when she gave birth to a son said he was miraculously conceived by a sunbeam, and she offered her son as the promised deliverer of the earth. His name was Tammuz. When he was grown, a wild boar slew him, but after 40 days of his mother’s weeping, he was raised from the dead. In this story of Semiramis and Tammuz, began the worship of mother and child that spread throughout the whole world. In Assyria, she is [now] called Ishtar, and her son is still Tammuz; In Phoenicia, she is called Astarte or Ashtoreth, and her son is called Baal or Tammuz; in Egypt, she is called Isis and her son is called Osiris or Horus; in Greece, she was called Aphrodite and her son was called Eros; among the Romans, she was called Venus and her son was called Cupid.
The cult of the worship of mother and child spread throughout the whole earth. She was worshipped by the offering of a wafer [a little cake] to her as the queen of heaven, and there were always forty days of lent of weeping over the destruction of Tammuz before the feast of Ishtar, at which time his resurrection was celebrated. The sign of Tammuz was an Ishtar egg, a symbol of his resurrection to life.
This false religious system is substantiated in the Bible in Jeremiah 44:16-19 and Ezekiel 8:13-14.
The Judgment of the Great Whore – verses 16–18
In verse 16, the whore [the false religious system] is destroyed. The ten horns [puppet kings] of the Beast hate her. Their plot to destroy is thorough. They isolate her, then strip her – shaming her publicly, then they devour her – chewing her up and spitting her out, to speak, and then they burn her up with fire. This is the path that Satan has for all who follow him. Satan will lead men and women into sin and glorify them for it, perhaps giving them fame and fortune. Then, he will begin to take away all friends and expose the sin to shame them before everyone. Finally, he will destroy them, knowing they will burn forever.
In verse 17, we discover that the ultimate hand behind the scene is God himself. God has not just allowed this to happen, but has put it into their hearts to do so because of the wickedness of the whore who has deceived a vast multitude of people to commit spiritual fornication with her.
Then, verse 18 tells us the whore is that great city who reigns over the kings of the earth. Rome, the capitol of the Roman Empire ruled the kings of the earth at the time John wrote down this vision. However, we should not assume the great whore is the city of Rome itself. In Rev. 21:9-10, the Bride is not the actual city of New Jerusalem – the bride lives in New Jerusalem. As so, the harlot is not the city of Rome, but she lives in that great city. The Vatican, capitol of Roman Catholicism resides in Rome.
The Great Whore is the same ugly idolatrous religion today, who makes Mary the queen of heaven, and designates the 25th of December (the birthday of Tammuz or Baal) as the birth of Jesus, and married idolatry with Christianity in order to gain power. This religious system claims to be the Bride of Christ but she is a harlot. Rome will fall. Catholicism will fall.
[i] Galatians 3:24-25
[ii] Strong’s Hebrew and Greek Dictionaries, H5113
[iii] Phillipians 3:14
[iv] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_hills_of_Rome, 11/15/2013.
[v] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_claimed_to_be_built_on_seven_hills, 11/15/2013.
[vi] Cozart, Dr. Dan W., sermon: The Great Whore, Grace Baptist Church, Tyler TX, March 7, 2010.