That Great City: Revelation 17:18

And the woman that you saw is that great city, which reigns over the kings of the earth.

Greek: καὶ ἡ γυνὴ ἣν εἶδες ἔστιν ἡ πόλις ἡ μεγάλη ἡ ἔχουσα βασιλείαν ἐπὶ τῶν βασιλέων τῆς γῆς.

 English translation with Greek markers: And the woman (γυνη) that thou saw is that great (μεγάλη, mega, large) city (πολις, polis); which reigns (βασιλείαν has kingship) over the kings of the earth. 

   Some of the most compelling, fascinating and challenging prophecies in the Bible are the ones in Revelation; especially those depicting the woman, Babylon the Great. There is an air of mystery surrounding her identity that has intrigued multitudes of Bible students for nearly two-thousand years.  

   Interpretive speculation abounds as to the mystery of the woman and what or who this woman represents. Many claim the woman represents the Catholic Church, or Vatican City, located in Rome, Italy. Some have thought the woman represents the United States or one of its cities such as New York or America's harlot city, New Orleans where demon worship abounds. 

   Others claim the woman represents a 'mystery mother-child religion' that came out of Babel, or the final religious world system directed at the worship of the little horn, the antichrist. Then there are those who are more meticulous regarding scripture who suggest that the woman will be a middle eastern city located in a desert: Jerusalem, Mecca, Tyre, Abu Dhabi, Istanbul or, a new Babylonian city that is yet future. 

   There are many people anxiously watching the preparation of the desert city of NEOM in Saudi Arabia. NOEM is derived from a combination of words, noe; Νέος, a word from the ancient Greek which means NEW, and the letter M; an abbreviation from an Arabic word: Mostaqbal which means Future - NEOM = New Future.

   As of now, the woman is still wrapped in a cloak of mystery as the tribulation has not yet begun and the Holy Spirit is still present.  

   Let's review some things that John documents in Chapter 17 by looking through the lens of verse 18.

And the woman that you saw is that great city, which reigns over the kings of the earth. 

   John is visited by two angels. The first angel has one of the seven vials (bowls) and is recorded in chapter 17. A second descends from heaven in chapter 18; the vantage point and perspective of the second angel gives John more insight into the function and seduction of the woman in question. 

   John records the discussion with the first angel in verses 1 and 2. The angel tells John he there to show him the judgment of the great πόρνης - Greek translation: commercially corrupt one;  English translation: whore, prostitute or harlot, that sits on many waters.

   The woman's pending judgement had previously been announced in Revelation 14:8; 16:19b and will be again in 18:2,10 after a second angel comes down from the highest realms of heaven to show John her destruction.

And there followed another angel saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication. Rev 14:8

   The first angel propels him by the spirit into the wilderness (Greek: ἔρημος, erēmos desolate, barren wasteland aka: desert) to show him a gruesome sight. (verse 3)

   John sees the very epitome of wickedness in the form of a woman ceremoniously flaunting the filth of her impurity while sitting upon a seven-headed beast full of the names of blasphemy. The woman and the beast reside together in the barren wasteland of a desert. The woman is not afraid of this beast but seems rather content and quite pleased with her royal position having kingship (βασιλεύς basileus, sovereign power) over the kings of the earth.

   The woman is a symbolic metaphor for a commercially corrupt harlot city. The whore of Babylon is a city similar to Nineveh who was the mistress of witchcraft and well-favored harlot who sells nations by her harlotries and families by her sorceries. Nahum 3. 

   Not only is the woman of Revelation 17 referred to as a city (Greek: πολις polis) of extreme commercial corruption and harlotry but she is described in the Greek as a μεγάλη, a great city, a megas, a megalē city, a city of enormous physical size and importance, the mother city of many: a supercity – a megacity; also similar to ancient Nineveh.  

   We are later told (verse 9) that the woman sits upon the seven heads of the beast kingdom showing authority over them. The heads belong to the beast kingdom, not the woman, she just sits on them. John is instructed by the angel to use wisdom when deciphering the meaning of the seven heads; John is further told that the seven heads are seven mountains (Greek ὄρη, όρος, óros).This tells us that the mountains are not literal and we are to use wisdom to understand the meaning.  A mountain is used in scripture as a symbolic reference to a kingdom. (Daniel 2:35b; 9:16, Psalms 48:1; Isaiah 66:20; Jeremiah 51:25; Joel 3:17). So now we know that a head represents a kingdom. 

   By her position, the great commercially corrupt one aka: harlot city sits upon seven world kingdoms that belong to and are aligned with the scarlet beast. 

   We know from Daniel 7:23,24 that the beast itself represents the kingdom of ten horns or ten kings. This is the kingdom that the little horn or antichrist will rise from transitioning a wounded beast kingdom into the eighth kingdom or antichrist kingdom during the tribulation. Rev 13:3; 17: 8,11  

   The Greek word John uses for woman in verse 3 and 18 is γυνη meaning woman, wife or bride. This suggests that she is intimately connected to the beast kingdom; an evil city adorned as a harlot wife for an evil king and his kingdom. This is in contrast to New Jerusalem who is the bride or wife of the Lamb. (Rev 21:2, 9b, 10) Both are cities, one is righteous and holy while the other is an apostate bride; a demonic imitation seeped in immoral worldly desires, wickedness and sin. 

   The woman is dressed in the same scarlet color as the beast suggesting they are connected by immorality, sin and bloodshed. The purple she is arrayed in suggests that a pretense of religious royalty presides over the city while the city itself represents carnal desires, luxury and lavishness. She is also beautifully adorned, decked in gold, precious stones and pearls; laden by wealth, greed and worldly riches.

   But in his estate (home, dominion) shall he honor the god of forces: and a god whom his father knew not shall he honor with gold, and silver, and with precious stones and pleasant things. Daniel 11:38

   She carries a golden cup in her hand as a measure of her wickedness. The cup is filled, overflowing with her abominations and the filthiness of her spiritual and commercial impurity, her harlotry and her fornication as she drinks from a den of devils.

You cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of devils: you cannot be partakers of the Lord’s table, and of the table of devils… I Corinthians 10:21

   By scriptural position, she will be the capital city of the antichrist kingdom, or, the capital city of the new world. She may even be the city that houses the beast system of the buying and selling that will be religiously bias, controlling all nations, people, multitudes and tongues of the world. She is the great mega city that rules over the kings of the earth issuing decrees of lawless moral codes, human trafficking, ritual murders, sorceries aka: pharmakeia, idolatry and demon worship. 

   In the Bible, spiritual harlotry is not only defined by the worship of idols or other gods. Harlotry also involves the practice of occultic rituals or seeking out practitioners of the occult: diviners, witches or those who call upon demons in the form of familiar spirits or the spirits of the deceased.

   Upon her forehead she wears a mark: Mystery, Babylon the Great, the Mother of Harlots and Abominations of the Earth. Her harlots (Greek: πορνων - commercially corrupt ones) are as corrupt as she is, distributing her harlotries throughout the earth. Her harlotries, found in chapter 18 are described as her sorceries verse 23, and the souls of men (human lives) verse 13 that are taken into the city as slaves or for sacrifice (17:6; 18:24).

   This is done through her harlots; the kings of the earth, the merchants and other harlot cities under her global jurisdiction. They trade with her, delivering her sorceries to the inhabitants of the earth and send the souls of men back to the Mother city by way of her many imports. (18:13)

   Sorcery is defined by the Greek as her pharmakeia, drugs used in connection with ritual sacrifice, the worship of idols, witchcraft, spell binding and enchantments which the merchants distribute freely into the world. The world has become intoxicated from these sorceries, reeling in madness and man has become primal; worshiping devils and demons and idols of gold and silver, brass and stone, committing murders and stealing human lives. Rev 9:20,21

The rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands, so as not to worship demons, and the idols of gold and of silver and of brass and of stone and of wood, which can neither see nor hear nor walk; and they did not repent of their murders nor of their sorceries nor of their immorality nor of their thefts. 

   We discover in verse 6 that she will be drunk with the blood of the saints and the martyrs of Christ Jesus. In her inebriated state, drunk on wickedness, sin and bloodshed, her golden cup overflows with the wine of her fornication, sloshing out, splattering the heads of the beast on which she sits: the kingdoms of the world poisoning them with her vile and toxic potion. We have read in verse 2 that the kings of the earth willfully commit fornication with her and have made the inhabitants of the earth drunk with the wine of her fornication. This is also repeated in 18:3a and 18:9a.

   In verse 7 the angel says to John that he will tell him the mystery of the woman and of the beast that carries her that has the seven heads and ten horns. The angel begins a succession of passages that reveal the mystery of the beast kingdom. Rev 17:8,9,10,11,12  

   John has already revealed much about the woman in verses 1-6 and 9 which was covered above. He doesn't tell John much more about the woman until verse 15 which describes her vast international reach. He tells John that the ten kings, who have immense amounts of authority and power in the latter days, will hate the harlot and plot to destroy her - verses 16,17. 

   The final clue given to John about the harlot woman is that she is a great city, verse 18, which we covered first.

   And the woman (γυνη, wife, bride) that thou saw is that great (mega) city (πολις, polis); which reigns over the kings of the earth.

    Revelation is the unveiling of a darkened world set in a futuristic time when the wrath of God falls upon the wickedness that rules the world. The harlot city is one of the unveilings of things that will be. 

   John records these events as they were shown to him while in the spirit. He documents a futuristic harlot city named Babylon full of impurity, carnal worldly delights, ritual sacrifice and wickedness intimately connected to a scarlet beast kingdom. 

   The angel lays out clues about a mystery that surround the woman and the beast that carries her. The city itself revolves around international trade, spiritual and commercial corruption (defined as prostitution in the English translation). She is a mega, megalēs city who rises from the ashes of worldwide destruction taking full advantage of the fallen world by using her spiritual lures in the form of sorcery and wicked enchantments. This is a city defined by haughty arrogance and self-worth. Her power is enormous and she is untouchable.

   And, she will remain so until the end of the tribulation period when her sins have reached into heaven and God hath remembered her iniquities. 18:5

   The time of tribulation is very close as the birth pains have already begun! The tribulation period will be a time when God's wrath will be poured out upon a wicked Christ rejecting world. It won't be easy or pretty (in fact it will be quite horrific) and the harlot will make sure that those who have the testimony of Christ Jesus will not enjoy her luxurious hospitality. 

  One city, already in existence sticks out that could be a future Babylon; Istanbul. Istanbul used to be Constantinople, a great city representing Christian Orthodoxy. This city is found in Turkey, home of the seven churches. Constantinople was conquered by the Ottoman empire, a religious sect of the Islamic kingdom that vehemently denies the divinity of the  son of God. The conquest of Constantinople turned the Christian city into an apostate city literally overnight.

  Though Istanbul may simply be one of the many harlot cities that the Mother of harlots rules over in the end of days, it would fit the Revelation 17, 18 criteria. 

   And the woman (γυνη, wife, bride) that thou saw is that great (mega) city (πολις, polis); which reigns over the kings of the earth.