Is Babylon the Great of Revelation 18 symbolic for New York City?
The Revelation 17 and 18 Mystery
BABYLON THE GREAT: SITS ON SEVEN HILLS, INFLUENCE OF IMMORALITY WORLD-WIDE, CONTROL OVER MANY NATIONS, RICH LUXURY, GREAT WORLD TRADE CENTER AND SEAPORT, QUEENLIKE, ENTERTAINMENT CENTER, GREAT BUSINESS AND INDUSTRY, CITY OF LIGHTS, THE WORLD WILL MOURN HER LOSS
I could tell you my opinion up front, but the description alone should be enough for anyone to infer Babylon’s true identity. Unfortunately, at lot of prejudice against a certain branch of Christianity has clouded the interpretation of many. I take Revelation as literal events that are laid out in semi-symbolic format. The clues are real clues pointing to a real city. It obviously is a city that represents the degradation of the world. It also has to have great influence in the world, enough to make the antichrist jealous of her influence. Here are the clues as I see them. Again, this is my opinion, but it takes all the facts into consideration in literal fashion.
Revelation 17and 18 give a lot of identifying characteristics of Babylon the Great. She corrupts the world with her immorality. Hmm? Where did the evolution of burlesque into the smutty shows of the 1920s that eventually became XXX movies begin? It became a model for other nations and has corrupted the world? Entertainment, music is found in her. Think The Apollo, Radio City Music Hall, Carnegie Hall, The Met, Beacon Theater, Madison Square Garden, etc. etc. She is a great trader nation with New York Harbor at her disposal. Which nation has grown rich off the rest of the world? Ships offshore will one day watch in horror at the smoke of her burning. Her description seems to indicate she is separated from Europe/Rome by a sea. She exerts undue influence over the world. World government meets within her shores. Which nation has military bases all over the world? This is why she is pictured as riding the back of the beast just as she sat on the seven hills (kings). The beast, in the resurrected Roman Empire, loses patience with her exerting her influence. He hates her riding his back like she is in control and the back of the other kings he is allied with. He is jealous and will destroy her with fire. God tells His people to come out of her. What city has a million Jews living it? The original Babylon was also once the home of a great portion of the Jewish population which was exiled there. What great city and country about half the Jewish population of the world? There is only one nation and particularly one great city within it that fits anything like excesses of the luxury and debauchery this description makes. She even has a great pagan statue out in front of her. Guess which one?
New York City is the location of the United Nations (oops, I said it!). This body is the closest thing to a world government. The antichrist will not tolerate the overriding influence the United States has as had as its host. The description of riding the back of Europe as well as other nations has been well established.
The statue of Liberty in New York Harbor is based on the Roman goddess, Libertas. This has manifested in our times as freedom from Biblical morality. The real connection of New York to Babylon is the moral corruption of Broadway and its offspring Hollywood. Not that all theater, film, and television is corrupt, but rather there is an overall moral decline as film ratings had to a accommodate more immorality, violence, and, anti-Christian values. These values have corrupted the entire world.
Revelation 17:15 And he said to me, “The waters which you saw where the harlot sits, are peoples and multitudes and nations and tongues. 16 And the ten horns which you saw, and the beast, these will hate the harlot and will make her desolate and naked, and will eat her flesh and will burn her up with fire.
God will use the beast as his agent to judge the sins of Babylon. But first, He will first call out the remnant of His people, Judah from the fallen Babylon. Over a million Jews currently live in New York City. What about Christians? They were called up earlier in Revelation 6:12-17 followed by Revelation 7:9-14
Her Judgement
Revelation 18:4 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; 5 for her sins have piled up as high as heaven, and God has remembered her iniquities. 6 Pay her back even as she has paid and give back to her double according to her deeds; in the cup which she has mixed, mix twice as much for her. 7 To the degree that she glorified herself and lived sensuously, to the same degree give her torment and mourning; for she says in her heart, ‘I sit as a queen and I am not a widow, and will never see mourning.’ 8 For this reason in one day her plagues will come, pestilence and mourning and famine, and she will be burned up with fire; for the Lord God who judges her is strong.