A cryptic designation in Revelation ( Rev. 14:8 ; 16:19 ; 17:5 ; 18:2 , 10 , 21 ) for apostate religious organizations in opposition to Christ and His people on earth, especially during the closing phase of the agelong conflict between good and evil. Babylon is variously identified as “that great city, which reigneth over the kings of the earth,” as “the great whore” and a “mother of harlots” ( Rev. 16 ; 17:1 , 5 , 18 ). Adultery is a common OT metaphor for apostate religion (for example, Eze. 16:15 ff. ; 23:2 , 3 ff. ; Hosea 4:15 ). The revelator declares that Babylon has “fallen” ( Rev. 14:8 ; 18:2 ), has seduced “the kings of the earth” to commit fornication with her ( Rev. 17:2 ), has enticed “the inhabitants of the earth” to become “drunk with the wine of her fornication” ( Rev. 17:2 ; 19:2 ), and has deceived the nations with her “sorceries” ( Rev. 18:23 ). He represents her as “drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus” ( Rev. 17:5 , 6 ; 18:24 ; 19:2 ). He sees her “sins” as consisting of pride and arrogance ( Rev. 17:4 ; 18:7 , 16 ), defiance of God, and the persecution of His people on earth ( cf. Rev. 16:19 ; 17:6 ; 18:24 ), and an illicit alliance with the political powers of earth ( Rev. 17:2 , 3 ; 18:9 ). He notes that “her sins” eventually reach “unto heaven,” and the time comes for God to judge her ( Rev. 16:19 ; 18:5 , 6 ; 19:2 ). God therefore summons His people to leave Babylon, in order to avoid complicity in her “sins” and the “plagues” He is about to visit upon her ( Rev 18:4 ). Disillusioned, the kings of the earth turn on Babylon and destroy her ( Rev. 17:14 , 16 , 17 ; cf. Rev. 18:19 , 21 ; 19:3 ). In this way God avenges His people on Babylon ( Rev. 18:20 ; 19:2 ).
Babylon is “a name of mystery” ( Rev. 17:5 , RSV ), that is, a figurative or cryptic title; hence the often-used designation, “mystical Babylon.” This symbolic name connotes the historical fact that in OT times literal Babylon was the archfoe of God’s covenant people. Mystical Babylon is to be understood in terms of the role played by its historical counterpart in OT times ( see SDACom 7:866, 869). The Babylonian name Bâb-ilu (Babel or Babylon) meant “gate of god.” In ancient times the city gate was the place where official visitors conducted public business. The name Bâb-ilu reflected the belief that Babylon was the place selected by the gods to meet with human beings, and the claim of Babylonian kings that the gods had commissioned them to rule the world. In Hebrew Bâb-ilu was disparagingly associated with the term balal , “to confuse”—a reminder that God had confused the speech of the Babel builders ( Gen. 11:9 ).
From the time of its founding by Nimrod ( Gen. 10:9 , 10 ; 11:1–9 ), Babylon was characterized by disbelief in the true God and defiance of His will. Its tower was a monument to apostasy, and a citadel of rebellion against Him. Isaiah identifies Lucifer as king of Babylon ( Isa. 14:4 , 12–14 ), and implies that Satan made Babylon the center and agent of his master plan to secure control of the human race, even as God purposed to work through Jerusalem to accomplish His plan for this world. Throughout OT times the two cities typified the forces of evil and good at work in the world. In Revelation mystical Babylon stands in contrast with the New Jerusalem, Christ’s “bride,” who is dressed in “fine linen, clean and white: . . . the righteousness of the saints,” in contrast with Babylon’s gaudy, voluptuous attire ( Rev. 19:8 ; cf. Rev. 17:4 ; 18:7 , 16 ).
Nebuchadnezzar II made Babylon one of the wonders of the ancient world, intending his kingdom to be universal and eternal ( Dan. 3:1 , 4–30 ). Over the centuries following its destruction by Xerxes, the city gradually lost its glitter and importance, and by the time John wrote Revelation it was virtually a desolate ruin, and thus a graphic illustration of the impending fate of mystical Babylon.
As early as the first century A.D., Christians were referring to Rome by the cryptic title Babylon (see 1 Peter 5:13 ). The Jews were suffering under Rome as they had previously suffered under Babylon, and Christians were also experiencing sporadic persecution. To avoid reprisal, both Jews and Christians began to use “Babylon” as a secret name for imperial Rome ( see the Sibylline Oracles 5:155–161; 2 Baruch 11:1; the Jewish Midrash Rabbah on Canticles 1:6 [“They called the place Rome Babylon”] [Soncino ed. ], p. 60).
The Church Fathers of the early centuries, as for example Tertullian ( Against Marcion 3. 13) and Irenaeus ( Against Heresies 5. 26. 1), applied “Babylon” in the Apocalypse to the city of Rome or to the empire. Joachim of Floris ( d. 1202) was among the first to include the Roman Church under “Babylon” (L. E. Froom, Prophetic Faith , vol. 1, p. 708). Others of the late Middle Ages who did so were Pierre Jean d’Olivi, a French Spiritual ( d. 1298) ( ibid. , pp. 764, 765); Michael of Cesena ( ibid. , vol. 2, p. 20); the Lollards ( ibid. , pp. 78, 79); John Huss ( ibid. , p. 116); and Savonarola ( ibid. , p. 152). This identification came to be widespread among Protestants.
William Miller identified mystical Babylon with “Rome under papal rule” (Joshua V. Himes, [William Miller’s] Views of the Prophecies and Prophetic Chronology [1842], p. 200). Sylvester Bliss, a Millerite editor, held that Babylon is “everything in this world opposed to or varying from the spirit of Christ,” or “Satan’s Kingdom,” and that upon the division of the Roman Empire “the Papal horn succeeded to the supremacy, as the head of Satan’s power, and became the Babylon of the world” ( The Advent Shield and Review [1844], pp. 112, 113, 115, 116). When the Protestant churches rejected the message of Christ’s soon coming, Adventists began to include them under “Babylon,” along with papal Rome, and interpreted the fall of Babylon to be these churches’ rejection of that message. For example, Joseph Bates assigned the fall of Babylon to 1843–1844 and attributed it to the churches’ utter rejection of the doctrine of the coming Lord.
“When this subject first began to be introduced in 1843, the most of the professed nominal churches had closed their doors against the Second Advent doctrine, and began to treat the message with scorn and contempt. . . .
“Mystery Babylon . . . represents the organized churches of all descriptions, divided into three parts, Rev. 16 , 19 , viz, Roman, Greek, and Protestant. . . .
“Our business then is with the Protestant Church, for it will be admitted by all that the Roman and Greek churches are corrupt and anti-Christian” (Joseph Bates, in Advent Review 1:66, 67, November 1850).
In 1851 James White wrote: “The woman, which is the great city, called Babylon, symbolizes the fallen apostate churches” ( Review and Herald 2:3, Aug. 5, 1851). J. N. Andrews similarly defined Babylon as being “all the corrupt religious bodies which ever have existed, or which exist at the present time, united to the world, and sustained by the civil power,” including “the corrupt Jewish church,” “the corrupt Papal and Greek churches,” and “the great body of the Protestant churches” that “imitate the Romish church” ( ibid. 5:5, Feb. 21, 1854).
Uriah Smith, classic SDA commentator on Daniel and the Revelation, understood “that by this symbol [Babylon] is meant the great mass of confused and corrupt Christianity,” and added that “her fall was a moral fall, caused by rejecting the vivifying truths of the first message, or great Advent proclamation. By the wine of the wrath of her fornication we understand her false doctrines and pernicious errors. These she has caused all nations to drink” ( Thoughts on the Revelation [1865 ( i.e. , 1867) ed. ], p. 233).
He identified the component parts of modern Babylon as “paganism, Catholicism, and Protestantism,” and the whore of chapter 17 as the Roman Church. “Other independent religious organizations,” are her daughters, and all “belong to the same great family.” The Roman segment of Babylon, he wrote, comes to an end in chapter 17, and the Protestant daughters in chapter 18. He quoted contemporary Protestant commentators to the effect that the popular Protestant churches had become Babylon ( ibid. . [1867 ed. ], pp. 233–275, passim ) .
Seventh-day Adventist interpretation today is essentially that of Uriah Smith and other early SDA commentators. Modern Babylon is understood to stand for all Christian churches that have departed from the “everlasting gospel” as set forth in the Scriptures, including both the great Roman apostasy of the early Christian centuries and the more recent departure of mainstream Protestantism from God’s Word, beginning in particular with its rejection of the 1844 message. The fall is understood to be progressive; it is not yet complete, but it will be so when the major Protestant churches collaborate with the Church of Rome in an attempt to coerce the conscience ( Rev. 13 ). The second angel’s message of Rev. 14:8 is a warning that Babylon has fallen, and Rev. 18:1–4 is a call to God’s people to come out of Babylon, in order to avoid complicity in her crimes and a share in her “plagues.”