Having elicited our negative emotional response to Babylon by means of symbolic portraiture (Rev. 17:1-6), John now explains the meaning of the symbols (17:7-18). Or rather, an angel explains their meaning to John and he to us. By doing so, the angel, through John, reveals the “mystery” of Babylon.
Let us begin where John does, with the grotesque beast (verse 8). It is clearly the sea beast of Revelation 13.1–10, that is, the Antichrist. Two items are noteworthy. First, the Antichrist has divine pretensions. In Revelation 1.4, God is described as “him who is and who was and who is to come” (cf. 1.8; 4.8; 11.17; and 16.5). Here, the angel describes the Antichrist as a person who “was, and is not, and is about to rise.” Second, the Antichrist’s doom is certain. He rises from “the bottomless pit” only to “go to destruction.”
Next, let us turn to the beast’s seven heads (verses 9–11). The angel offers two interpretations of them, one geographical and the other historical. Geographically, “the seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman is seated.” Since the woman is later described as “the great city that has dominion over the kings of the earth,” we should interpret the image as a description of a city set on seven hills. That, rather obviously, is the city of Rome, whose seven hills—Aventine, Caelian, Capitoline, Equiline, Palatine, Quirinal, and Viminal)—were well known in antiquity and whose power was indisputable in the first century. Interestingly, according to most New Testament scholars, Peter also uses “Babylon” as a code word for Rome in 1 Peter 5.13.
Chronologically, the seven heads are “seven kings, five of whom have fallen, one is, the other has not yet come, and when he does come he must remain only a little while.” This is a notoriously difficult passage to interpret, although many New Testament scholars see here an oblique reference to Roman emperors. A common—but by no means universally accepted—solution centers on Nero. According to this interpretation, the five kings who have fallen are Julius Caesar, Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, and Claudius. Nero is the “one is” king, while Galba, Otho, and Vitellius—who reigned in brief succession in A.D. 68–69—are “the other [who] has not yet come” and “must remain only a little while.” The angel now lumps the beast in with these seven kings as “an eighth [king] but it belongs to the seven, and it goes to destruction.” So, then, on this line of interpretation, the Antichrist is also a Roman emperor. But which one?
Now, I know what you must be thinking to yourself: John’s literal explanations are no clearer than his symbolic descriptions, and far less evocative. They are an enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded by mystery. Well, yes, for us they are, at least to a certain extent. And yet, it seems to me, even their enigmatic character is helpful. Just as John’s description of the great prostitute evoked our disgust, so his enigmatic explanations keep us on our toes. If we could nail down who the seven kings were in the past, or who the Antichrist was, we might not be alert to the danger of our own times and the need for our faithfulness and discernment.
The riddle-wrapped, mystery-shrouded enigma keeps us guessing and thus on our toes.
GeorgePWood.com 
Leave a comment