And one of the seven angels, which had the seven bowls, came and spoke with me, saying, Come here, I will shew thee the sentence of the great harlot who sits upon the many waters;
One of the angels who poured out the last bowls of God's wrath now stops to explain who the woman is. Chapter 17 does not bring a new event. It brings an invitation to understand why God judges this figure at all.
The chapter steps out of the running order of the book:
It is necessary to bear in mind, if we have not observed it before, that Revelation 17 does not pursue the chronological course of the prophecy. It is an episode about objects already dealt with, not one of the visions that carry us onward in historic sequence. It looks back at Babylon in her relation to the Beast and the kings, whom we saw last under the Bowls of God's wrath.
Twice the book has announced her fall. It has not yet said who she is:
The fourteenth chapter already announces Babylon as fallen, and the seventh bowl shows God judging her. But we have not yet seen what Babylon is, and we are not to be left in any uncertainty. She has played too large a part in human history, and teaches too important a lesson, to be passed over so briefly.
The guide fits the message, and the word "prostitute" has a history in Scripture:
The seven angels had the last plagues, one of which was in part directed against Babylon. It is by one of these angels therefore that John is taken to witness her judgment. He calls her "the great prostitute who is seated on many waters." Scripture often uses the first part of this figure for those who forsake God for idolatry. It is applied again and again in this sense to Jerusalem and the Jews. So "the great prostitute who is seated on many waters" means a system of idolatry that has spread over vast regions and many nations. Unlike the idolatry of the antichrist, it is not one nation's turning away from God; its area is far wider.
The exact word depends on the relationship behind it:
In the Old Testament, Scripture treats Israel, when she turned away from God, as an adulterous wife. The LORD had brought her as a nation into an established relationship with Himself. The Church is engaged to Christ "as a pure virgin" (2 Cor. 11:2), and the wedding day is still in the future. So Scripture accurately calls the false church, wholly allied with the world, not an adulteress but a prostitute.
Later in the chapter the vision explains its own symbol:
The explanation of the vision (vv. 7-18) tells us what these waters mean: "The waters that you saw, where the prostitute is seated, are peoples and multitudes and nations and languages." Adding "multitudes" to the usual formula for universality marks the mixed character of those under her power. She rules and dominates the nations in religion, as the Beast does in government. Her following is an almost universal one. She herself is a vast religious system. The woman stands for the religious system; the Beast stands for the civil power.
The hardest thing about this figure is recognising her at all:
For she is a mystery. The Babylon of old was the plain and straightforward enemy of the people of God; she is not. She is a riddle, so hard to read that many of God's people in every age have taken her, prostitute as she is, for the pure bride of the Lamb. Yet here, for all ages, the riddle is solved for those who are close enough to God to understand it. And the figure is gaudy enough to attract all eyes to her — and she even seeks to do so.
The same kind of angel later shows John another woman:
From every point of view these two women are set in sharp contrast. The prostitute is subject to Satan. The bride is subject to Christ. It is one of the bowl angels who shows both to the wondering seer. A wilderness (Rev. 17:3) and a great, high mountain (Rev. 21:10) are the respective viewing points... Satan decks the one (Rev. 17:4); God adorns the other (Rev. 19:8). Eternal ruin is the portion of the prostitute; eternal glory the happy lot of the bride.
She is bigger than any one institution:
The principles of Babylon have been at work from earliest times. Its highest development is still future. She is not the papal system alone, but the fusion of parties bearing the Christian name into one vast system of evil... "The great prostitute" is Satan's counterfeit of the true Church. She is also the concentrated expression of every antichristian movement and sect then in existence, held together and controlled by Satan.
- Shown — The chapter breaks the sequence to answer a question the bowls raised. God explains who He is judging before we watch her fall.
- Named — She is a prostitute, not an adulteress, because she was never a wife. She counterfeits a church that is still waiting for its wedding day.
- Seated — The many waters are peoples, multitudes, nations and languages. She rules them in religion; the Beast rules them in government.
- Seductive — She is a mystery, and the mystery has worked. In every age believers have mistaken her for the bride of the Lamb.
- Sentenced — The same kind of angel shows her, and later shows the bride. Satan dresses one, and she ends in ruin; God adorns the other, and she ends in glory.
with whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication; and they that dwell on the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication.
Two women appear in the closing chapters of Revelation, and the same angel introduces both. That parallel is the key to reading this verse.
Say the holy city, the new Jerusalem of the later chapter, is the bride, the Lamb's wife — the glorified church. Then the great city of the earlier chapter is naturally the anti-church. It is that corrupt evil body which claims to be the church, puts herself forward with supreme claims, and takes the highest ground in the Lord's name. But there is this fatal brand on her: Babylon seeks the earth; her communion is not with Christ. She courts and lavishes her guilty favours on the kings of the earth.
Where the ESV says "sexual immorality," older translations read "fornication" — the word these writers use. It is a picture, and the shock lies in who is doing it.
Scripture often uses "fornication" as a symbol. The following are a few instances among many: 2 Chronicles 21:11; Isaiah 23:17; Ezekiel 16:29. It means evil intercourse with the world. Sadly, this has been true of some bearing the name of Christ! The Church is the deeply loved spouse of the absent Christ. She belongs to heaven, not to this dark and corrupt scene at all. Her path should always have been that of a stranger, simply passing through on her way to meet the Bridegroom in glory.
So what is she after — and who drinks with her?
But the woman here is a harlot, in guilty relation with the kings of the earth. Her lure is clearly ambition, the desire of power on earth, the refusal of the cross of Christ — the place of rejection. The wine, the intoxication, of her fornication makes the "dwellers on earth" drunk. These are people who profess much but have their hearts on earthly things. They naturally drink in the poison of her doctrine.
The verse names the rulers first, then everyone else. The order matters.
The harlot first forms a guilty alliance with the kings of the earth — the great political leaders of Christendom. Then she makes "the dwellers on earth" drunk with the wine of her fornication. These are the mass who once claimed the Christian faith and have now abandoned it. Their wickedness is then filled up. Christ, the heavenly calling, and Christianity abandoned, they give themselves up to the short-lived joys of the harlot's cup of wine.
So does everyone caught up with her carry the same blame?
There are different degrees of guilt, but all of it came from being connected with Babylon, closely or loosely.
What does her wine actually do to people?
The word "fornication," as used here, means, we have no doubt, the seducing power of the Roman system in drawing the affections away from Christ, who is the only true object of faith for the heart. The priest comes in between the heart and the blessed Lord. The Bible is hidden. No one knows the mind of God. The people are drunk on her exciting falsehoods, and they worship what they do not know.
So is this past or future? The answer is both — and the final form is bigger than any single church.
The principles of Babylon have been at work from earliest times, but Babylon's highest development is still to come. It is not the papal system alone, but the fusion of parties bearing the Christian name into one vast system of evil.
This is not only a forecast. It is a test.
But should we not ask our own consciences this? Is Roman Catholicism the only form of Christianity that approves union with the world and tries to make it holy? The first Christians were linked with a Christ whom men rejected. Is it so with us? "You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God" (James 4:4). This spiritual harlotry is the great outstanding feature of what is described here: an alliance with the world, its kings and its people, made by something that bears the name of Christ and claims to be His spouse.
- Counterfeit. Revelation sets a bride and a harlot side by side. She claims Christ's name, but her communion is with the earth, not with Him.
- Cause. Her sin is ambition — the desire for power now and the refusal of the cross, the place of rejection.
- Contact. Her "fornication" is evil dealing with the world. She should have passed through it as a stranger.
- Contagion. She allies with the rulers first. Then her wine drugs the crowds: the priest stands between the heart and the Lord, and the Bible stays hidden.
- Conscience. The pattern is not confined to one system. Friendship with the world is the test, and every believer must put the question to themselves.
And he carried me away in spirit to a desert; and I saw a woman sitting upon a scarlet beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns.
An angel carries John away to show him the judgment of a great harlot. He sees her seated, riding a beast — so who is she, and what is the beast that carries her?
Where John stands to see this matters as much as what he sees. In another vision an angel shows John the bride of the Lamb. For that sight he takes him somewhere very different.
This point of view is very striking. When the angel showed John the bride of the Lamb, he carried him away "to a great, high mountain" (Rev. 21:10). To get into God's thoughts about the true Church, we must be lifted higher. We must be taken above the mists and clouds of this world into the clear air of His own blessed presence. But the seer was carried "into a wilderness" to see the great prostitute! So the Spirit of God reminds us that everything around her is barren, however great her wealth and splendour. Her grand and showy ceremonies may capture and overawe the senses, but they leave the soul unsatisfied and unfed. Ritual is not Christ, and He alone can satisfy the hunger and thirst of the soul.
The wilderness also explains how John could take in what he saw.
You can only understand it in the wilderness (v. 3), where you see there is not one green blade for the soul... The Spirit led John into the wilderness, and so he could understand it. Only revelation and the power of God can make a "MYSTERY" clear.
The posture carries the meaning. The beast is imperial power, and the woman is riding it.
The beast serves the harlot, and John shows it when he says, "I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast." The action shows the full and complete subjection of the civil power. It is a remarkable sight: the woman rules over this vast imperial and apostate power. She sits on, or beside, the nations and peoples inside the prophetic area (v. 1). She also rules the beast, the leading civil and political power on earth in that day.
Rider and beast are not one thing. They travel together, yet Scripture keeps them apart.
The strange woman is a distinct system from the beast that carries her, Rev. 17. She stands for the religious system, the beast for the political system. They may go hand in hand, yet they are distinct... The world and the professing church have much in common, but Scripture treats them as distinct systems, and God will deal with each of them separately in judgment.
Two details describe the beast itself: its colour, and the writing all over it.
The scarlet colour stands for earthly glory, and only that: the beast's reign has no link with heaven. It is full of names of blasphemy, not merely words. That means it takes titles that belong to God, and taking them is blasphemy. Of these seven heads, only one exists at a time, as we see by the angel's words. The seven are seen together for identification, not because they exist at the same time.
Commentators agree the woman stands for a religious system. They differ on how far it reaches. Some name her directly:
The beast is the revived political system of Rome. The woman is Rome's religious system, plus whatever else she may have gathered into herself before this vision comes true. She has daughters — other bodies that claim to be Christian, and hardly less evil than their mother.
Others point to the arrangement the picture shows:
If the beast means the secular and political power, how do we explain the woman seated on it? What great system do we see seated on the secular power of Europe, and held up by it? Is it not plainly the church power? Is it not the church in alliance with the state, and supported by the state?
The vision is not only prophecy about the future. The principle it names reaches Christians today.
It is important to avoid these principles and forms that lead to ruin... A heathen is not in Babylon. He cannot be there. A Christian may be found there. Whatever connects the world with religion is the principle of Babylon. The spirit of Babylon, the spirit of worldliness, is very slippery ground. That is why God warns us. May God keep us!
- Wilderness — the angel must carry John into a desert to see her. For all her splendour, nothing there feeds the soul.
- Riding — the woman on the beast pictures a religious system steering the political power that carries it.
- Distinct — woman and beast go hand in hand, yet they stay two systems. God judges each one separately.
- Scarlet — the colour marks earthly glory alone. The names of blasphemy mark divine titles the beast takes for itself.
- Warning — anything that joins the world to religion is the principle of Babylon. The call is to avoid it, not just study it.
And the woman was clothed in purple and scarlet, and had ornaments of gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and the unclean things of her fornication;
John is carried into the wilderness, where a woman sits on a scarlet beast, and now we see what she wears — her colours, her jewels, and the cup she holds out to the world. Every item is splendid, and every item is a warning: the outside is glorious, and what is inside is vile.
The two colours are not chosen for beauty alone. One writer reads them as a claim to rank, and sets this woman's dress against the bride's.
This is not the bride dressed in fine linen, white and clean. It is the showy splendour of the world, meant to attract the flesh. The colours are clearly royal — yes, imperial — so that her claims as a church rest first of all on a claim to supreme rank... But this woman, who wrongly takes that name, seeks nothing but pleasure for the flesh and worldly importance, all that people naturally want and prize on the earth.
Another writer ties the two colours to a double claim.
She is dressed in purple and scarlet, because she claims spiritual as well as earthly authority.
The jewels themselves stand for good things. That is what makes her use of them so serious: she turns them into decoration, and into bait.
She is also decorated with gold, precious stones and pearls. These stand for truths that are truly divine and spiritual. But she uses them only to adorn her outside, and to make the cup of her intoxication more tempting.
The whole picture works by surfaces. The gold goes no deeper than the skin, and one writer says the Pharisee's sin worked the same way.
Elsewhere gold, precious stones and pearls stand for all that is beautiful and of God. Here she is only "decked," or gilded, with them. It is all surface. These things are excellent in themselves, but she twists them to low uses. Her cup is golden too, as anyone can see from the outside, but inside it is full of filth. The Pharisee's sin was like this, as we see in Luke 11:39, but here it reaches its highest pitch of evil.
Two words name what is in the cup, and each has a settled sense in Scripture. One means false worship, the other a rotten life — and the shock is where both are found.
These two evils, idolatry and corruption, mark the last phase of the professing Church on earth. "Abominations" refers to idolatry (2 Kings 23:13; Isa. 44:19; Ezek. 16:36), and "fornication" to gross corruption (Rev. 2:21; Rev. 9:21). Idolatry and the worst forms of wickedness are what this woman is known for. Her cup is full of horrible evils. This is the climax. You might expect such things among pagan nations. But Christendom is now the scene of light, grace and truth, and for it to become the very hotbed and cesspool of all that is filthy and vile in religion is truly astonishing.
She holds the cup herself. One writer weighs what that means, and where it ends.
The golden cup was in the prostitute's hand; she was not herself a golden cup in the Lord's hand. She governed and rode the beast with ten horns. That was her general character for a long time, but not her final one. She became the prey and spoil of the kings who held their power along with the beast.
Set this woman next to the Lamb's wife and the two outfits explain each other. One dress wins the world's applause; God grants the other.
What a contrast! The prostitute dazzled the eyes of the world with scarlet and purple, with gold and precious stones and pearls. The wife is granted a white robe, the mark of God's approval, to wear when Jesus Christ is revealed. The splendour of the prostitute may be "exalted among men," but it is "an abomination in the sight of God." On the other hand, God owns the very deeds that brought down the scorn, the hatred and the persecution of the world, and gives them to adorn the Lamb's wife for ever.
- Gilded claim — Purple and scarlet are royal, even imperial colours: a bid for supreme rank, and a claim to spiritual as well as earthly power.
- Gilded gifts — Gold, jewels and pearls stand for divine and spiritual truths. She only wears them, and good things are put to low uses.
- Gilded cup — Gold on the outside, filthiness inside: the Pharisee's sin at its highest pitch.
- Gilded poison — "Abominations" means idolatry; "fornication" means corruption. The marvel is that this fills Christendom, where you would expect it among pagan nations.
- Gilded and doomed — She holds the cup herself; she is not a cup in the Lord's hand. She ends as the spoil of the kings who shared the beast's power, while the bride's white robe is granted by God.
and upon her forehead a name written, Mystery, great Babylon, the mother of the harlots, and of the abominations of the earth.
John sees a name on the woman's forehead, and the name tells us what she is. Commentators read it as the exposure of a religious system that wears Christ's name yet is false to Him.
The first word of the title has a precise sense in Scripture.
In Scripture the word "Mystery" does not mean something mysterious. As has been said, it "points to something the natural mind of man cannot discover, a secret that needs the distinct and fresh light of God to unravel." Without this revelation, John would never have imagined that a great system would grow up in the Christian world that professes the name of Christ, claims to be the church, and yet becomes completely corrupt.
God had already revealed one mystery: Christ and the church. This woman is the counterfeit of it.
There was a great claim to truth — the enemy's masterpiece of counterfeiting the revealed ways of God. God had revealed the mystery of Christ and the church. Now there is the mystery of this anti-church. It is not the mystery of faith and godliness, but of lawlessness — Babylon the great seated on the beast, the terrible opposite of the church, which is subject to Christ. Here she rules the beast.
The name looks back to the Babylon that once enslaved God's people.
The old Babylon was great and evil. It enslaved God's people long ago, and its doom can never be reversed. Yet its spiritual counterpart, the great Babylon of Revelation, goes far beyond it. In Babylon the Great we see one vast system gathering up all the evils that have wrecked the church in past times. This is the peak. Every evil that has ever troubled the Christian world comes to a focus here. The last days of the church on earth are her worst.
The charge goes past her own unfaithfulness: she has children, and resemblance is the test of kinship.
Every system that copies the ways of the woman and imitates her actions, takes in her doctrines, adopts her forms of worship, and generally borrows from or conforms to the Church of Rome, now or then, counts as her offspring. She is the mother, or source, of every evil religious system.
Commentators name Rome here, but the likeness reaches wider. It shows in what a system does to the heart. Any system "that tends in any measure to lead souls away from Christ, to engage their affections with objects that come between the heart and the Man in the glory, is related to this great parent of spiritual iniquity" (Church History).
The last word of the title is a specific charge, and Scripture fixes its meaning.
She also produces "abominations." Now, "abominations" is a well-known scriptural word for "idols," so Rome is a parent of idolatry. Who does not know it? And yet people are willing to be blinded, to listen to her claims of innocence, and to accept her embrace.
A name on the forehead marks who someone belongs to. Revelation uses the same picture for God's own people.
The terrible name written on the woman's forehead for all to see stands in contrast to the 144,000 in Revelation 14:1, who have the Father's name on their foreheads, and to the saints of the heavenly city in Revelation 22:4, who have the Lamb's name on their foreheads. Great Babylon advertises herself, not the Lord. "Mystery" tells us how she hides her real character: she keeps her victims ignorant of the Word of God and in bondage to mysterious rituals and man-made teachings.
If the name is that public, missing it says something about the reader.
Her name was written on her forehead. A drunken world does not see it, but a believer should not mistake it. We should judge it from outside it. If we are in our right place, in the Spirit, in the wilderness, we will not mistake it. But if we tamper with it, we have lost the sense of it: if we do not see it for what it is, we have drunk some of her wine.
Given such a name, the response Scripture calls for is not repair work.
Babylon means "confusion," and no word could better describe the result. Something that professes the name of Christ has taken up friendship with the world, and the world is at enmity with God. It ends with the outward form of religion used as a cloak to cover "the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life." We are not called to reform it or to overthrow it, but to come out of it, so that we do not share in its sins.
- Mystery — the name begins with a secret only God could reveal: a system that claims to be the church and is corrupt to the core.
- Counterfeit — against the true mystery of Christ and the church stands this anti-church: not subject to Christ, but riding the beast.
- Babylon — the name means confusion. It gathers into one system every evil that ever wrecked the church, and the last days are the worst.
- Mother — her guilt spreads through her children: every system that copies her ways, and idolatry too, since "abominations" means idols.
- Forehead — she advertises her own name where God's people bear the Lamb's. A drunken world misses it, and a believer who cannot read it has already drunk her wine. The call is to come out, not to reform.
And I saw the woman drunk with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the witnesses of Jesus. And I wondered, seeing her, with great wonder.
John has just seen a woman dressed in purple and scarlet, holding a golden cup; now he sees what she has been drinking. A figure who claims to represent Christ is soaked in the blood of His people. The sight leaves John astonished.
This is not a system with a troubled conscience. It has lost all sense of what it is doing. One writer explains what the picture of drunkenness says about her:
"Drunk with the blood of the saints, the blood of the martyrs of Jesus" (v. 6) is a graphic picture of how little she feels. She has no sense of the enormous guilt of her persecution of the true saints of God. Like a wild beast that has tasted blood, she has become the more callous and unrelenting. John, in seeing her, wonders with great wonder. Probably it was hard for him to imagine a woman being so exalted and yet so callous. Who could have imagined beforehand that the professing "church" would take on such a grotesque character?
One writer traces this bloodshed back to the character of Satan himself. He also weighs the names given to her victims:
Then the next thing is murder. Satan is a liar, the "father of lies." He is also a "murderer from the beginning." So in the working of Satan we find first idolatry, and then it leads to murder... This is the time of prosperity to her. She is drunk. There are two marks given of those whose blood she is drunk with... The terms saints and martyrs of Jesus, witnesses for Him, describe them. They are not described as people settling down here on earth.
The word behind "martyrs" carries that same idea of testimony, and it points back to One who bore it perfectly:
The Greek word is μάρτυς, and is very often translated 'witness'. A martyr is one who dies because of the witness he bears... Christ Himself was the faithful and true witness. So the Lord Jesus was the true Martyr, though His death included much more than dying as a martyr — it was atonement.
Why is blood on a religious system more shocking than blood on a pagan one? One writer answers from what religion was given for:
He could well understand a religious system becoming corrupt... But that the woman should be drunk with the blood of the saints was what filled even John's mind with great astonishment. Bad as passion is, it is not the worst thing that the heart of man is capable of. In the deceiving power of false religion, Satan displays his direct power. God gave that very thing for light and blessing, to win the heart and to bring people into fellowship with Himself. The enemy twists it to make a man worse than ever.
Another writer turns the same point against reading the woman as pagan Rome only:
John was banished on Patmos. Why would he wonder that the heathen world persecuted the saints? But that this same Rome, now professing Christianity, should do it — that would be a marvel indeed... Here, just before her judgment, the apostle pronounces her condemnation. She has never repented of murdering God's saints.
So whose hand sheds the blood? One writer separates the hand from the will behind it:
Papal Rome far exceeded pagan Rome in cruelty and bloodshed. She is also far more guilty, because she knew better. She claimed to be the spouse of Christ, and yet murdered at will those redeemed by the blood of the Lamb... What amazed John was not the Beast's persecution (Rev. 13:7), but the woman's — the professed spouse of Christ. Yet it is the Beast, not she, who puts the saints to death. The woman is the power behind.
Suffering that looks forgotten is not forgotten. God keeps the record:
What a day of reckoning is at hand! The sighs and tears of the helpless and the suffering have gone up to God. He records it all in His book, and the tears are in His bottle. Righteous retribution will yet fall. Babylon will be overthrown and judged, to recover herself no more forever.
- Cup — Idolatry comes first, murder follows; the golden cup and the blood belong to the same story.
- Blood — "Drunk" pictures a conscience past feeling: the more she has shed, the less she is troubled by it.
- Witnesses — Her victims are called saints and martyrs of Jesus. A martyr is someone whose testimony costs him his life.
- Wonder — Persecution by pagans would not have amazed John. Persecution by what claims the name of Christ did. What God gave for light, the enemy turns into harm.
- Reckoning — The beast holds the sword, but the woman is the power behind it. God has recorded every tear, and He is about to answer that blood in judgment.
And the angel said to me, Why hast thou wondered? *I* will tell thee the mystery of the woman, and of the beast which carries her, which has the seven heads and the ten horns.
John has just seen a woman drunk with the blood of the saints, and the sight stuns him. The angel does not leave him there. He asks why John wonders, and promises to explain. Two questions follow. What astonished John so deeply? And why are the woman and the beast spoken of as one joined mystery?
The angel does not simply decode the picture. Commentators note that divine explanations always enlarge the subject rather than merely restate it.
Then comes the angel's explanation, and we shall find that it gives fresh information of the most important kind. It is always like this in the interpretations of Scripture. Man's explanations rest only on the thing to be explained. God, out of His fullness, loves to give us more, and of even deeper importance.
The shock was not that evil exists. It was the disguise this evil wore, and where it aimed its violence.
But it was no such evil that astounded the prophet. What filled him with astonishment was this. A mysterious form of evil, the enemy's counter-testimony — not antichrist, but antichurch — should appear to be, and be widely accepted as, the holy catholic (that is, universal) church of God. And Christendom, if not Christianity, should at the same time become the bitterest of persecutors. It was more savagely enraged against the witnesses of Jesus and the saints of God than paganism had ever been in any country or in any age.
The angel's "why do you marvel?" is not only a preface to teaching. One writer hears in it a principle about corruption that should have removed John's surprise.
The angel questions John as to why he marvels (v. 7). Is it so hard to understand that when the best thing on earth (the true Church of God) is corrupted, it becomes the worst corruption?
The angel names two things to explain, not one. One writer sets the pair against the mystery of Christ and the church in Ephesians.
Then the second part of the chapter explains the "mystery of the woman and of the Beast which carries her." It is a double mystery — the woman and the Beast. It is a mockery of the New Testament mystery "concerning Christ and the Church." In the mystery of our chapter the woman is named first. In the mystery of Ephesians Christ is named first, and rightly so.
The word "mystery" is not decoration. The reason the angel must interpret her is that she has been misread for centuries by sincere people.
For she is a mystery. She is not like the Babylon of old, the plain and open enemy of the people of God. She is a riddle, so hard to read that many of God's people in every age have taken her — prostitute as she is — for the pure bride of the Lamb. Yet here, for all ages, the riddle is solved for those who are close enough to God to understand it.
The angel names the woman and the beast as two things. One writer shows they cannot be the same.
This is in fact the main subject of the chapter. It describes the woman above all, and her connections with the beast, the Roman empire. For beyond all denial, the woman and the beast are two distinct things. If the beast is the Roman empire, the woman cannot be. She may be seated on the beast, but for that very reason she is not the same thing. And the woman is not only distinct from the beast. Later we find that the beast turns against the woman and takes his part in destroying her.
The phrase "that carries her" describes a working arrangement, and writers read the arrangement as temporary.
She sits upon the many waters (see verse 15), and she rides upon the beast. For a time he is under her control. Religion then rules politics and uses them for the expansion of her own power.
- Wonder — John was not shocked by open evil. He was shocked by a system welcomed as the true church of God while it killed Christ's witnesses.
- Question — The angel's question holds the answer. The best thing on earth, once corrupted, becomes the worst corruption.
- Mystery — She is a riddle. Every age has mistaken her for the Lamb's own bride. Only those who stay close to God can read her.
- Double — The angel explains two things, not one. Together they counterfeit the mystery of Christ and the church.
- Distinction — The woman rides; the beast carries. Religion uses political power for a season — and the same beast will later turn and destroy her.
The beast which thou sawest was, and is not, and is about to come up out of the abyss and go into destruction and they who dwell on the earth, whose names are not written from the founding of the world in the book of life, shall wonder, seeing the beast, that it was, and is not, and shall be present.
An angel is explaining John's vision, and he starts with the beast's strange life story: a past, a gap, and a return. Two questions follow: which power is this, and why does its return leave the world amazed?
The clause "was, and is not" is not a puzzle but a timetable. Commentators identify the beast as the Roman empire and trace three phases of its history.
The Roman empire was to have three stages. The first is its original imperial form, when John suffered under the last of the Caesars. Next comes its state of non-existence, from about the fifth century, when the Goths and Vandals broke it up. That is its condition now. But then there is a third stage, and it is in that last condition that it is to be found in open opposition to God and the Lamb.
That middle stage answers a common objection: no such empire exists today.
It may be alleged that the Roman empire does not exist in our days. That is one more proof of what we have been saying... It existed; next, it exists no more; then, it will come out of the pit. It will have a really diabolical character; it will be a full expression of the power of Satan.
The verse names where the beast comes back from: the abyss. Commentators stress that this is worse than anything the empire ever was before.
Even when it rose up against the Son of God, Scripture did not say then that it had come up out of the abyss. When the empire finally reappears, it will wear a still more clearly devilish character than it ever had of old.
Chapter 13 already showed Satan backing the beast. This verse pushes the point further, to its very origin.
Revelation 13 showed us that Satan would support and direct the empire in its revived form. Here we discover that Satan will produce it. And it will enslave the minds of all those false religionists who have dragged the faith of Christ down to a mere religion of earthly things.
God's providence has always stood behind human government. This last form of the beast ends that arrangement.
There is a time coming when power will cease to be ordained of God. This is the point to which the last phase of the Beast refers. In His providence God did authorize the world-empires of old. That principle continues as long as the church is here below... But the day is at hand when Satan will be allowed to have things his own way. For a short time (what a mercy that it is to be only so!) Satan will bring forth an empire suited to his purposes.
Older English Bibles end the verse with "and yet is," which sounds like a contradiction. Commentators differ. Kelly blames a faulty Greek text and reads a simple future — "and shall be present," with no paradox intended. A. J. Pollock keeps the older wording and reads it of the present moment:
The verse ends with the remarkable expression, "Behold the beast that was, and is not, and yet is." This shows that the Roman Empire does not exist right now, yet all the elements for its revival are at hand. It exists potentially.
What separates those who marvel from those who don't is not intelligence but grace.
Divine grace is that alone which makes any to differ; and of this we are reminded here. The power at work in the revival of the beast is clearly beyond the power of man. And how many today seem to assume that any power greater than man's must be divine! This is the essence of the "strong delusion" which God sends upon those who have not received the love of the truth, that they might be saved.
Revelation mentions more than one register, and they are not the same. One can lose names; this one cannot.
The elect had their names written in the book of life from the foundation of the world. Ah! these future times were all thought of and provided for in the foresight of God... We read of another book of life in Revelation 3:5. There it is the book of Christian profession, true and false. So some names will be erased and others will stand. But in our chapter the book, or register of life, is the book of reality. So no name can be blotted out.
The verse names the beast's doom in the same breath as its rise.
"Goes into destruction," or perdition. This happens at the start of the millennial reign, and Revelation 19:17-21 describes it vividly... The two great chiefs — the head of the secular power and the head of the religious power — are thrown alive into the lake of fire.
- Was — the empire had a real past under the Caesars, and it rose up against the Son of God.
- Is not — its collapse is not a failure of prophecy but a stage in it. Its absence today confirms the prophecy.
- Rises — it comes back up out of the abyss. Satan does not just back it now; he produces it, and government breaks loose from God's ordering.
- Wonders — the earth-dwellers marvel. They assume that any power greater than man's must be divine. Only grace makes anyone differ.
- Perishes — the same sentence that predicts its rise names its ruin. Yet the names written from the foundation of the world can never be erased.
Here is the mind that has wisdom The seven heads are seven mountains, whereon the woman sits.
Revelation 17 stops mid-vision to hand the reader a key, and that key calls for a certain kind of mind. The angel says the seven heads mean two things: hills and rulers. Commentators read the hills as God's plain clue to where this woman has her seat.
Understanding here is not automatic. One writer explains why God made the mark so plain:
Here is the mind that has wisdom, the divine secret for an understanding heart. There need not be much doubt about what the seven mountains point to, and in general there has not been. That Rome was the seven-hilled city is familiar to every schoolboy... In this way God points out what He is speaking of here, in a way plain even to unspiritual souls, if that can be. He has even, if one may say so, gone out of His way to give a needed plain mark of identification. So His saints may know whose blood this system would shed, and who would need the comfort of knowing that He was against this "mother and mistress of the churches."
The detail about mountains works as a location clue. It also rules out the old Babylon in Chaldea, which stood on a plain:
This is a material point, though simple. It is a local mark, intended to show the wise mind where this woman has her seat. There ought not to be the least doubt that it is a reference to Rome. It is true that the name "Babylon" had been used for it, just as Revelation 11 uses Sodom and Egypt as figures for Jerusalem. But the Chaldean capital had nothing to do with the city of Revelation 17. That city had long since passed away as an imperial city, while verse 18 says of this Babylon that it has dominion over the kings of the earth. More than this, the literal Babylon in Chaldea stood on the plain of Shinar. Here the woman sits on seven mountains, and all the world knows that this is the well-known mark of Rome.
The same heads carry two meanings at once. That alone shows this is picture-language. The woman rides the beast, and she also sits on hills:
The seven heads have a double application: first they are seven mountains, on which the woman sits. We may learn here how, while giving much more light as to facts, a symbol cannot be taken literally. The woman was sitting on the beast. So Rome is seated on seven hills, as well as on the Roman empire by its influence. But, besides this, the heads of the beast were seven forms of power which characterised it.
Naming hills ties this religious system to one city, not just to an empire. But her title "mother of harlots" widens the picture:
The seven-hilled city is everywhere recognised as Rome. This identifies the beast with the Roman Empire. But the heads are also the "seven mountains on which the woman is seated." So this is not a mere general link between the empire and this religious apostasy. It is a local link between the religion and the city... As "the mother of harlots," she may have children who walk in her own evil ways but have no direct link with Rome. The principles of idolatry, and of worldly trade unfit for the bride of Christ, have eaten into a large part of Christendom that does not call itself Roman Catholic.
The heads carry a second meaning too: government. These forms of rule followed one another in one city:
It is hard to doubt that these heads or kings refer to the various forms of power which followed each other in Rome. Other beasts were simply said to have one head. But in Rome we hear of seven heads, and the interpreter's words show that these came one after another, not side by side. The figure covers the complete variety of political power that should mark that empire. "Five," it is said, "have fallen." These were the earlier kinds of power in Rome. One head was ruling at that time — the sixth. So the five fallen heads pointed to kings, consuls, decemvirs, military tribunes, dictators, or the like, which had been in Rome before but had now yielded to the emperor.
Commentators differ over what the five fallen heads were. One writer rejects the view that they were the first five Roman emperors:
There might have been some ground for calling these emperors "horns," but "heads" they cannot be. They each and all represent one head or form of government, namely, the imperial.
- Wisdom — The verse calls for an understanding heart. God gives the clue so His people can know this system and take comfort that He stands against it.
- Mark — Seven mountains is a plain mark of place. It rules out the old Babylon in Chaldea, which stood on flat ground.
- Symbol — The heads mean two things at once: hills and rulers. So the vision speaks in pictures, not in flat facts.
- Reach — Her seat is one city. But as "mother of harlots" her principles have spread far past that one system.
- Kings — The heads are forms of rule that followed one another. Five had fallen and the sixth was ruling at the time. Commentators differ on naming the five.
And there are seven kings five have fallen, one is, the other has not yet come; and when he comes he must remain [only] a little while.
The angel has just told John that the seven heads carry a double sense: they are seven mountains, and they are also seven kings. Verse 10 places those kings on a timeline: five gone, one present, one still to arrive.
The word "kings" here means a run of governing systems that followed one another in Rome. The angel's count — some fallen, one standing, one still ahead — shows they never overlapped.
"There are seven kings," says the Spirit of God: "five of whom have fallen, one is, the other has not yet come." It is hard to doubt that these heads or kings refer to the various forms of power which followed each other in Rome. Other beasts were simply said to have one head. The Macedonian empire might become four heads, and these were clearly at the same time, not one after another. But in Rome we hear of seven heads. From the language of the interpreter, these are not at the same time but in succession. The figure refers to the complete variety of political power that would mark that empire.
Commentators who name the five list offices that ruled Rome before the emperors:
"Five have fallen." These are Kings, Consuls, Dictators, Decemvirs, and Military Tribunes.
Commentators differ over the five. Two popular identifications fail on the same ground: the symbol here is a head.
Some have applied the five fallen heads to the successive kingdoms of Egypt, Assyria, Babylonia, Greece, and Persia. Others think the reference is to Rome's first five emperors — Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, and Nero. The first idea cannot be right, for it is the Beast, that is, the Roman empire, that is before us in the prophecy. Nor can the second theory be right, for the heads are different forms of government. There might have been some ground for calling these emperors "horns," but "heads" they cannot be.
The present tense fixes the moment the angel is speaking from. Since the beast itself at that moment "is not," the only present left is the writer's own lifetime.
The heads are also seven kings. They rule one after another, not at the same time. Five had already fallen, one was, and another was yet to come, only to exist for a short time. The beast himself is the final one. Imperial Rome was clearly what existed in the apostle's day. "One is" we must take as applying to the apostle's day. At the time of the vision the beast itself "is not." The only other present time would be the time the apostle lived in.
A long stretch of history lies between the sixth head and the seventh. In it the empire was not there at all.
"The other has not yet come." So between the breakup of the empire and its future devilish reappearance many centuries have passed. "When he comes he must remain only a little while." This is the seventh head. It is the rise of the fallen empire under new conditions, as presented in chapter 13:1.
The brief span given to the seventh becomes a test.
Here again we find this last ruler, whose duration is so brief, has been by some attributed to the papacy. That seems unreasonable. A system which has existed for so many centuries should not be taken as the one that only continues for "a little while," especially when this king is put in connection with five other kings which had passed away.
One writer sees Napoleon as a shadow of the last head, perhaps even the seventh. He still warns against turning a likeness into a fulfilment.
It is quite true that events often foreshadow the fulfilment of a prophecy. The first Napoleon passed across the stage of the world. By his energy and speed of conquest he was an undoubted shadow of the final head of the Roman Empire, if not the seventh head himself. But it is a mistake to think that striking agreements with the thing predicted mean you have found the complete fulfilment.
And the believer loses nothing by not knowing the details:
To understand the prophetic word you do not require history. Suppose the simple Christian believes that the five forms of power fell before the existing imperial one — what of importance can history add? He is assured on the word of God that there were five, though he may not know their histories or their characters. Further details are of no importance to the believer.
- Heads, not men. The seven kings are seven forms of Roman government. They come one after another, not side by side.
- Five fallen. Kings, Consuls, Dictators, Decemvirs and Military Tribunes had all gone before John wrote.
- One is. The sixth head was the imperial line of the Caesars. It stood in John's own day, which dates the vision from his present.
- One to come. The seventh is the fallen empire rising again under new conditions. Centuries pass first, in which the beast "is not."
- Only a little while. Its short span rules out any long-running system. It also warns against pinning the prophecy on a passing figure from history.
And the beast that was and is not, he also is an eighth, and is of the seven, and goes into destruction.
The angel has just counted seven kings: five fallen, one reigning, one still to come. Now he adds a figure who breaks the count — a beast that is both an eighth and one of the seven. The riddle is how something can be new and old at once, and why its single stated future is ruin.
One writer traces the beast through four stages. The first two are already behind us:
It "was." The Beast existed as one huge united empire under a long line of emperors. "Is not." It has no political existence now. The countries and lands once inside it are still there, of course, but the empire itself came to a shameful end in A.D. 476. That ancient empire, famous and vast, has not existed for many centuries.
The number marks a new source of power behind the empire:
The Beast in its last and worst state comes up out of the abyss. That is different from how it first rose, and different from its future revival by human hands. So it stands as a complete picture on its own, and that earns it the name an "eighth." Satan revives it, and that devilish character is why it is given this number. Revelation 13 shows the empire coming back by human means; Revelation 17 shows its revival from hell.
The number itself carries this sense elsewhere in Scripture:
EIGHT. A new start outside the order of creation, yet linked to it: so it stands for resurrection. Circumcision came on the eighth day, when a new fellowship began. Eight people were saved in the ark, to start a new world… The new form of the future Roman empire will be the eighth.
New in origin, but not new in kind:
When he has risen, he will be the "eighth" — that is, under his eighth "head," or form of government. Still he "is of the seven," because although he has only just risen to power, it is only an old, earlier form of power brought back. In the kind of power, it is one of the seven brought into being again; but in the way it actually appears, it is an "eighth," or new headship over the empire.
The verse speaks of the beast, yet the seven heads were kings. One ruler so fills the empire that the two names become one:
The eighth head is one individual ruler, yet he bears the name of the beast, or the empire, because in character he is the empire. He stands at the top, directing all its authority. He is of the seven, because some earlier form of power will carry on, or be taken up again. But he will be the eighth, because something about him will be so unusual that it deserves a name of its own.
Some push this identification too far. One writer warns against that:
Some see the beast (the empire) and its last head as one, and so have even argued for the literal resurrection of a person here. That is only a wild fancy. Real resurrection could only come from God, and the beast in its last form is completely under Satan's power. So the rising up out of the abyss is figurative, just as the beast itself is.
Commentators do not agree on how the eighth relates to the seventh king of verse 10. One takes the eighth to be the seventh head revived in the same person:
He himself will receive a deadly wound… So he falls as the seventh head, but rises by Satan's power as the eighth head.
Another keeps them as two men. The seventh gives way to the "little horn":
The seventh head continues for a short time only. We may take him to be a person of importance, in control when the empire first reappears. Then the "little horn" — Satan's own choice — takes his place. That horn rises up looking "greater than its companions," and three kings fall before him.
The other heads simply fell. This ending falls on persons, and it takes the empire down with it:
The two great leaders, heads of the political power and of the religious power, are thrown alive into the lake of fire; those under them and their armies perish forever. The first five heads fell one after another. Then the sixth came to a violent end. The seventh merges into the eighth, and the eighth suffers a judgment more terrible than anything in history. This head and the Beast are one, so if the head is destroyed the whole Beast must go into utter ruin.
- Was — the empire really existed, ruled by a long line of emperors, and then it ended.
- Is not — the empire is gone today, but that is not the end of the story; it comes back.
- Eighth — the number marks a new start, and what makes it new is that Satan, not God, raises it.
- Of the seven — the form is nothing new; an old shape of imperial power comes back under a new head.
- Destruction — the eighth head and the beast are one, so its judgment is not decline but the lake of fire and utter ruin.
And the ten horns which thou sawest are ten kings, which have not yet received a kingdom, but receive authority as kings one hour with the beast.
The angel now explains the ten horns John saw on the scarlet beast. It raises two questions: who are these ten kings, and when do they rule?
One writer gives both the wide sense of "horn" and the narrow one, then sets the ten beside the seven heads of the earlier verses.
These horns refer to royal persons. The word "horn" stands for power in general, but as used here it refers to kings. So the ten horns stand for that many separate royal persons or their kingdoms. Another writer has put it well: "The ten kingdoms will exist at the same time, unlike the seven heads, which came one after another."
The angel says these kings have no kingdom yet. Commentators say the verse points to something history has never produced.
It is very clear that this is still future. Never in the past did the Roman empire consist of ten kingdoms welded together, as this prophecy plainly describes. In ancient times Rome's vast lands were under one government. But in the future ten separate kingdoms will be welded firmly together. Each will keep its own ruler, yet all will follow the general leadership of one head.
Daniel's visions stand behind this picture.
Anyone who has carefully read Daniel's explanation of the statue that King Nebuchadnezzar saw in his dream, and Daniel's own vision of the fourth beast with the angel's explanation, will be ready to understand the ten horns or kings of this chapter. Put these scriptures together, and it is very plain. The final form of the restored western Roman Empire will be ten kingdoms, all of them joined in one alliance under a single imperial head — the beast.
Much turns on this short phrase, and one writer weighs the grammar behind it.
The grammar here, like the word "at," supposes the same starting point for the beast and the ten horns. But it adds the other and main piece of information: they receive authority as kings for one hour with the beast. This is not the Roman empire as it once was, without the kings. Nor is it the kings as they were afterwards, without the empire. It is both together — the revived empire in its place, the kings in theirs, lasting for the same span, until they all perish together at the appearing of Jesus.
Commentators differ on what is new for these kings. One reads their authority as belonging to this league, and the hour as a very short term.
These kings may not be new rulers. The authority they receive may refer only to this present league. So we need not think they became kings at this time. But they are given power now for one special object, for a very brief term, only "for one hour." Yet that is long enough to carry out their dreadful purpose of making war with the Lamb.
This one verse rules out any fulfilment in the centuries after Rome fell. The empire and the ten kings never stood together.
"One hour with the beast" — mark this. It is the clear evidence that this had not been going on since the fall of the Roman Empire, when the northern nations invaded. Those nations broke it up and, for the time, destroyed the beast — gave it its deadly wound. These receive power one hour with the beast: therefore the beast must come up again. It existed at first without these kings. Then these kings existed without it, and you have the ten kings without the beast. At the end you get the ten kings with the beast.
That gap in history drove some readers to identify the beast with the pope.
In the Middle Ages there may have been ten kings. That was the reverse of the ancient state, where the Beast ruled without them. But there was no Beast, no imperial system with lesser chiefs or vassal kings under it. This is what drove men to the idea of making the pope the Beast. But that idea is wholly unable to cover or meet the word of God.
The kings do not lose their thrones by joining the beast. They hand over what they have, and the combined force turns against Christ.
Here we have kingdoms that still exist. Without ceasing to be kingdoms, they have given their power to one head, who leads them all as a whole. "They will make war on the Lamb, and the Lamb will conquer them, for He is Lord of lords and King of kings, and those with Him are called and chosen and faithful."
- Horns. The ten horns are ten kings or their kingdoms. They stand side by side at one time, unlike the seven heads, which followed one another.
- Not yet. They have no kingdom yet. No age of history has shown ten kingdoms welded together under one imperial head.
- Together. "One hour with the beast" means kings and empire hold power for the same span. Not the empire without the kings. Not the kings without the empire.
- Therefore future. The two must hold power together, so the beast has to rise again. Readings that place the fulfilment in the past, the papacy included, fall short.
- Then judged. The kings hand their power to one head and make war on the Lamb. He conquers them, and all perish together at the appearing of Jesus.
These have one mind, and give their power and authority to the beast.
Ten rulers agree to put everything they have behind one man. The questions are what holds them together, why proud nations would ever accept this, and what they will do with the pooled power.
Why would ten rulers do this? One writer points out that no army forced them:
The ten nations are not forced into alliance with the Beast by military conquest. Rather, they have one mind and give their power and strength to the Beast. Of course these nations want the advantage of a strong leader. They also want mutual protection and economic advantage. This "one mind" therefore is one purpose, not really unity of heart and soul.
Another writer puts the whole weight of the verse on where that purpose is aimed — the entire will of these ten rulers bends toward one man:
The whole mind and purpose of these ten sovereigns is to yield themselves entirely to the will and service of the Beast (v. 13).
Nothing in history matches this. Nations have always worked the other way, each guarding itself against any one power growing too large:
"They have one mind, and give their own power and authority to the beast." So far history has shown the reverse of this. The horns have constantly opposed each other, and sometimes even the pope. Since then the world has not seen an imperial power to which all bow. Have we not all heard of the balance of power? Nations have worked at this constantly, in case any one power should become the beast. If a few join on one side, others are sure to help the other. They are jealous of any one power gaining such overwhelming authority and power as to govern the rest. But in the time really in view here all this political manoeuvring will be over.
Another writer describes the arrangement, and uses Napoleon as an illustration:
The ten kings "shall give their strength and power to the beast." There will be an imperial head — an emperor — and ten kings who will give him their power. The kingdoms will continue to exist, but it will be a confederation of them. As an illustration, we may point to the kingdoms of Spain, Holland, Westphalia, and others under Napoleon. There has been the beast. There may have been ten kings. But there have never yet been ten kings giving their power to the beast who was not, and who then came into existence again.
They hand over power without losing their thrones. They stay kings, and they submit by choice:
And now note the character and actions of these ten kings. "They have one mind and give their power and strength to the beast." They are lesser kings. They are distinct from the beast, and yet entirely and willingly subject to him.
But no proud nation submits like this by choice. One writer finds the reason outside the kings themselves:
How does this come about? The answer comes a little later. "God has put it into their hearts to fulfil His will." It is not their own will. A nation that values its independence would refuse to stoop like that. Is there anything a kingdom would be more ashamed of than being nothing but the servant of a harsh, driving power? But here they submit completely.
So what do they do with all that pooled power? One writer points to the war that follows:
The ten kings are the beast's willing servants. They back his Satanic schemes, even to the point of madness in making war with the Lamb. Men are going to become so puffed up in mind, so self-confident and so arrogant that they will throw themselves against the mighty power of God. Borrowing the language of 1 Corinthians 8:5, we may say this. However many lords and kings there may be in heaven and on earth, the Lamb is Lord and King of them all. The beast and his followers are included.
Their story does not end with the beast. One writer traces it from their alliance to their own judgment:
The ten kings give their authority to the beast, and join him in his opposition to Christ. God uses them to do His will in executing His judgment on the false church before they come in for judgment at Armageddon.
- Agreement — "one mind" means shared purpose, not shared heart. No army conquers them. They want a strong leader and mutual protection, so they hand their power over.
- Surrender — they keep their thrones and still obey the beast. No proud kingdom would accept that. God has put it in their hearts.
- Novelty — history has nothing like it. Nations have always blocked any one power from ruling the rest. That balancing act ends here.
- Target — they aim all that power at the Lamb. Human arrogance finally throws itself against God.
- Outcome — God uses these kings to judge the false church. Then they face judgment themselves at Armageddon. The Lamb is Lord and King of them all.
These shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome them; for he is Lord of lords and King of kings and they [that are] with him called, and chosen, and faithful.
In Revelation 17, ten kings hand their power to the beast. Together they turn that power against Christ. Verse 14 gives the outcome of that war before it describes the war, and it names who stands with Him.
The angel does not report a battle here. He announces its outcome, and the detailed account comes later in the book.
Here we have the final public act of the beast and his allies. Revelation 19:19-21 describes the conflict in full. The angel here simply notes the fact, passing over many intervening events. The war has not yet begun, but it is looked at in advance. Its outcome is not in doubt at all: "The Lamb will conquer them." Victory is certain before the fighting starts. The mighty Conqueror is King of all who reign, and Lord of all who exercise authority. He is supreme.
The Conqueror keeps the name "the Lamb" — the name He carries all through the book, from the seals to the last war.
As He had redeemed His saints by blood, so now He redeems the inheritance by power. It is the Lamb who opens the seals, and at once judgment takes its course (Rev. 6:1). It is before the wrath of the Lamb that the nations cry out in terror (Rev. 6:16). And it is against the Lamb that the nations make war, under the leadership of the beast, only to be overcome. They then discover that the Lamb of God — the One they had despised and nailed to a cross, and crowned with a crown of thorns — is the Lord of lords and King of kings.
The chapter sets two companies side by side. The kings pool their power and give it away; the Lamb's companions carry the titles God gave them.
They give their kingdom and power to the beast; they have one mind about this... They will make war on the Lamb: this will be their conduct and their end... Then we see His companions, the church and the armies of heaven, brought forward ahead of time. He is not alone: those with Him are "called, and chosen, and faithful."... The allied kings gave their power to the beast, and it was man's will that did it. The Lamb's companions, by contrast, were called, and chosen, and faithful.
Some take the ones with Him to be angels. One word in the verse points elsewhere.
Angels are faithful, and one passage calls them "chosen." But we never hear of angels being "called." "Calling," however, is a special mark of believers... So the companions of Christ in this victory over the beast and the false prophet — the armies of heaven that come out with Him — are not angels. They are saints: believers called by God's grace, whom God had already taken before this time to be "always with the Lord."
Commentators differ on how wide that company is. Darby names the church; Walter Scott includes every redeemed person then in heaven.
The fighting forces, the armies of heaven, are made up of all the redeemed who are then in heaven. There will be other companies of saved persons in heaven besides the Church (Heb. 12:23). The whole body of heavenly saints go with their Lord through the opened heaven. They come down to crush the united opposition to the rights of the Lamb.
The wording also settles a question of timing.
So it is evident from this, that the heavenly saints are already gone to the Lord. It is not that the Lord receives them now; they are with Him in the conflict, and before the conflict begins. Revelation 19:14 confirms this... Christ is coming to attack the great enemy on earth whom Satan uses. But it is heaven that opens. From there comes not only Christ, but also "those with Him, called and chosen and faithful."
The three descriptions are not repetition. Each looks at a different point.
Everyone who takes part in this conflict, under such a famous Leader, is described as "called and chosen and faithful." Called in time (2 Tim. 1:9); chosen in eternity (Eph. 1:4); and proved faithful in every relationship of life, even to death (Matt. 25:21-23; Rev. 2:10).
- War — the kings unite, give their power to the beast, and turn it on Christ. The verse records their last public act before it happens.
- Won — the outcome is settled in advance. The One they attack is King of all who reign and Lord of all who hold authority.
- Lamb — the Conqueror keeps the name Lamb. The One they nailed to a cross now redeems the inheritance by power.
- Company — those with Him are saints, not angels, because "called" marks believers; they come with Him out of heaven, already His before the war starts.
- Credentials — called in time, chosen in eternity, faithful to death. The kings gave their power away by their own will; these belong to Christ by God's calling and choice.
And he says to me, The waters which thou sawest, where the harlot sits, are peoples and multitudes and nations and tongues.
The angel who showed John the vision now explains it. He tells him what the waters under the woman stand for. A woman sits over the massed peoples of the world. How does a religious system gain that hold? And how far does it reach?
One writer treats the angel's explanation as a key for other prophecies too. He also notes a fixed contrast between water and dry land:
Verse 15 gives us another key to understanding prophecy. It declares that the waters of the sea on which the woman sits (v. 1) are "peoples and multitudes and nations and languages." Of course, she sits on the Beast, which involves ten nations (v. 3). But her influence reaches wider still. It is over many Gentile nations. The waters symbolize the Gentile nations, just as the land speaks of Israel.
The wording does not put the woman on top of an ocean. One commentator explains the phrase with a familiar comparison:
Sitting by the many waters does not mean that she sat physically on top of them. It means she sat beside them. You may say, for instance, that London is seated on the Thames. No one with common sense would take that to mean London was built over the bed of the river. It means the Thames is the stream that gives London its character. In the same way, the prostitute is described as seated on — that is, beside — the many waters. Verse 15 explains what those waters are… The picture shows the wide-spread influence this corrupt woman has.
Writing on the creation account, where God separates sea from land, the same writer draws out what the restless sea says about people:
The land speaks of what is solid and stable, in contrast to the unstable mass of the ocean waters. The heaving waters speak of the flesh in its unstable emptiness, whether the flesh in unbelievers or in believers. In the same way, Revelation 17:15 speaks of the waters as "peoples and multitudes and nations and languages." There the flesh shows itself in all its constant turmoil and disorder.
Earlier in the chapter the woman rides the beast, a political power with limits. Her following spills past them. One writer sets that reach beside what she truly cares about:
The prostitute's attractions trap and captivate the peoples and nations, both organised and unformed, and especially those outside the limits of the existing Roman world. She sits enthroned in greatness, decked with the glories of the world, but she does not have the love of her deceived followers. There is display, but no reality. She has no heart for Christ, though she shamelessly claims to be His bride… She cares most about gold (Rev. 18:12); she cares least about the souls of people (v. 13). The four divisions of the human family show how far the woman's influence reaches.
Commentators differ over which system is in view, though many name Rome. One argues that the world-wide scope in this verse is what separates her from every other corrupt religion:
This puts beyond dispute the difference between the prostitute and all other religious systems… No doubt there are many religious systems bad enough. I am far from saying that Romanism is the only corruption of Christianity. But is there no real difference? Others may do harm in their own land. But the dreadful plague-spot of Rome is this: she claims to be the universal mother and ruler, and she corrupts every land. Her claim to rule the whole world is what points her out as the city of confusion… The result will be that her lovers will all turn on her. The ten horns — the very ones she most wanted to win and hold — will hate her in the end.
One writer turns her tireless activity into a question for the reader:
Local influence has never satisfied the false Church. She has always claimed to be "Catholic," that is, universal. She has stretched her evil arms north, south, east, and west. She has corrupted and harmed all who have sunk under her power, and above all she has dishonoured Christ, whose name she has claimed to own. We all know her ceaseless activity through her many agents and societies. If only we were as earnest in spreading the precious truth of Christ!
- Key — The angel gives the meaning himself: the waters are peoples. That one key opens the water and land picture elsewhere in prophecy.
- Waters — The sea pictures people as restless and unstable, unlike solid ground.
- Seated — She does not float on the waters. They mark her character, the way a river marks a city. The masses are her element.
- Reach — Her power runs past the empire she rides, over four divisions of the human race. Yet it is display without reality: gold first, souls last.
- Mark — Her claim to be mother of the whole world is what identifies her, and in the end her own lovers turn on her. Her tireless reach rebukes believers who are slow to spread the truth of Christ.