The Whore of Babylon
Remember, in Rev 17 it says that the whore is the GREAT CITY? True, yet this isn’t the Church in Rome, for the GREAT CITY is the place where the Lord was crucified (Revelation 11:8). It also refers to the city where the Lord was crucified allegorically as Sodom and Egypt. In Isaiah 1:10 Israel is referred to as Sodom & Gomorrah. In Ezekiel 16:26 - Egypt is listed among the first who she engaged in promiscuity with.
In Ezekiel 16:29 it sates that Jerusalem (the harlot) extended her promiscuity.
Isaiah 1:21 below, God calls Jerusalem a harlot, which is another word for whore:
“How the faithful city has become a harlot, she that was full of justice! Righteousness lodged in her, but now murderers.”
Israel is also called a harlot in Jeremiah 3:6:
"The LORD said to me in the days of King Josiah: “Have you seen what she did, that faithless one, Israel, how she went up on every high hill and under every green tree, and there played the harlot?”
Ezekiel 16:2 says that Jerusalem has abominations:
"Son of man, make known to Jerusalem her abominations,
Ezekiel 16:23-42 gives a detailed account of her harlotry, giving the blood of her children to her lovers, and her idolatry. Count how many times she’s called a harlot.
Jesus Himself condemns Jerusalem in Matthew 23:29-38
`If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’ Thus you witness against yourselves, that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets."
" I send you prophets and wise men and scribes, some of whom you will kill and crucify, and some you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from town to town, that upon you may come all the righteous blood shed on earth"
Truly, I say to you, all this will come upon THIS generation (the generation that was living at the time of Jesus’ preaching). “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, killing the prophets and stoning those who are sent to you! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not! Behold, your house is forsaken and desolate.”
Here we see Jesus foretelling the destruction of Jerusalem by pagan Rome in 70 AD. So who destroyed the Whore of Babylon? Babylon did, which was pagan Rome.(Babylon is a code name for Rome, which symbolized sexual and immoral excess). Why was Jerusalem destroyed? Because they killed the prophets and stoned the ones sent to them. This should sound familiar, because in Revelation 18:20, 24 we heard that:
“Rejoice over her, O heaven, O saints and apostles and prophets, for God has given judgment for you against her!”
“And in her was found the blood of prophets and of saints, and of all who have been slain on earth.” Rev 18:20. Just as Jesus said in Matthew 23:35 “And so upon you will come all the righteous blood that has been shed on earth”
So here we see in Revelation that the Whore of Babylon killed apostles and prophets. Apostles were those that had actually been with Jesus, and prophets only existed up until the first century, way before the Vatican was established. So how could it be the Church in Rome who slew them? Jews of that day, like the murderous Saul, were turning in Christians to the Roman authorities to be tortured and murdered. Thankfully, on his way to Damascus, Saul saw the light of Christ and became the saintly Paul.
Jesus and Revelation agree that Jerusalem has killed the ones sent to it, and Jesus predicts the coming destruction of Jerusalem in this generation, which happened about 40 years later, in 70 AD.
Revelation 17:16 says that the ten horns (symbolizing the rulers of pagan Rome) will destroy the whore by fire, which is exactly what the Romans did to Jerusalem in 70 AD. And then Revelation 17:14 says that the Lamb will conquer them both. This happened in the 4th Century, when Constantine became the first Christian emperor of Rome, who stopped all of the religious persecutions of Christians with the Edict of Milan in 313 AD.
The Vatican does not sit on one of the 7 hills of ancient Rome, Vatican Hill sits across the Tiber River from ancient Rome on one hill, Vatican Hill.
Jerusalem, the great city where Jesus was crucified (Rev 11:8), seems to be the great city, or the Whore of Babylon!
For the record, Jerusalem sits on 7 hills, namely, Scopus, Nob, Mount of Corruption, Old Mount Zion, Ophel, Rock, and New Mount Zion. And at the time of John, Jerusalem did have a lot of power over many Kings of the earth (because Jerusalem was the center of worship of God), as well as being a center of commerce.
And for the record, the word Antichrist appears nowhere in the book of Revelation ! St. John does describe who the antichrist is in 1 John 2 - An antichrist is someone who denies that Jesus is the Messiah.
