Babylon is indeed an important biblical symbol, and it's beneficial to understand what characterizes it! In chapters 17-20 of the Book of Revelation, we see Babylon, the pagan Rome of that time, the beast which is the symbol of all antichrist powers, a caricature of the dominion of Christ. Wherever there is a quest for world domination, the beast is present, Satan, who lies as he did during the temptation of Jesus in the desert, claiming that he owns the whole world and gives it to whom he wishes. This is the diabolic imitation of Christianity. John looks at his own time, sees the evil, the mighty forces of human frailty, the power of the Roman empire, but he also sees that these cannot compare with the power of the resurrection of Jesus Christ because, pardon the expression, they are not in the same weight class. Emperors die, empires vanish, ideologies disintegrate, but the incorruptible body of Christ lives, and a Christian can eat from the tree of life every day. Here too, it is proven that the sufferings of this life are not comparable to the glory that will be revealed to us in the future (Romans 8:18).
Babylon is a symbol, a symbol of Roman power persecuting Christians. But Babylon lives on, and as long as there is human history, there will be Babylon. In the twentieth century, we all witnessed empires collapsing. The older generation still remembers the self-satisfied communist propaganda of the fifties, and the even older generation has memories of the haughty self-glorification of fascist ideology. Both promised world salvation, an earthly paradise, and saw themselves as eternal, while producing mountains of corpses and committing atrocious wickedness. But behold, these too have failed, not primarily for political or economic reasons, but essentially because of an anthropological error: they wanted to build a great and eternal empire against God, which is so contrary to human created nature that it cannot last long.
Of course, unfortunately, new Babylons are also forming, and perhaps every century, every generation is given the opportunity to witness the rise and fall of a Babylon. Our era too produces its own antichrist empire, which I dare not name, just as John did not dare to name his own in his time. Let him who has understanding figure it out. It could be an empire, an organization, a concept, an ideology that opposes God's universal rule. The essence of Babylon is the striving for world domination, characterized by a fierce hatred for the revealed religion, for the mystery of the cross, which first hides behind the veil of tolerance, false peace, saying: man is allowed everything, and then one day openly attacks the Church of Christ. It is characterized by the complete twisting of God's laws, the parliamentary voting down of the Ten Commandments one by one, the complete relativization of the most basic categories, such as male and female, life and death. With a powerful apparatus, it makes the media of the time its vassal, through which it manipulates people's thinking and subverts their values.
Let us not be so naive as to not see behind all this the machinations of the personal evil, Satan. The new Babylons are built according to his plans, even if those who execute the plan do not know who their leader is. Therefore, whenever someone approaches us with fine theories to incorporate us into an organization, let us have the courage to ask in whose name they come, who sent them, to whom they are accountable, from their immediate boss to the highest leader.
Rev. 17:1–6. The harlot on the beast. Through the mediation of one of the angels entrusted with pouring out the seven bowls of wrath, John becomes privy to a new vision. In verses 1-6, the angel shows the seer "great Babylon" (v. 5), upon which judgment will soon be executed. The first descriptor of great Babylon: "the great harlot, who sits upon many waters" (v. 1). Old Testament mode of expression for designating a wicked and idolatrous city as a "harlot" (Isaiah 1:21; 23:16; Nahum 3:4; Hosea 4:12; 5:3; Ezekiel 16:15; 23:1). The ancient Babylon literally "sat" on many waters, built over the irrigation canals led from the Euphrates (cf. Jeremiah 51:13). Rome was not located by the sea, nor did it have a river comparable to the Euphrates. But as we see from verse 15, "she who sits upon many waters" is not to be understood geographically but allegorically. Rome's religious immorality spread throughout the world through the idolatrous and antichrist nature of the emperor cult (cf. 14:8). "The wine of her fornication," offered by the "divine emperor" to all subdued and allied peoples, is the worship of a mortal man instead of the living God. It intoxicates the peoples with the emperor cult, giving them the illusion that the emperors can truly help them in the ultimate questions of life and fate.
The angel takes John "into the wilderness" "in the spirit." The wilderness here does not mean the same as in 12:6, in the case of the woman clothed with the sun. For the church, the "wilderness" means refuge. For the harlot Babylon, it is a sign of desolation, for according to Isaiah 21:1, the judgment came upon Babylon from the wilderness. In the wilderness appears the antithesis of the woman clothed with the sun, the church, a woman sitting on a red beast. The beast is the phenomenon known from chapter 13, which has seven heads and ten horns (cf. 13:1). The color red (cf. 12:3) is the symbolic color of the underworld evil demons in Babylonian mythology. According to the representations that have survived from the ancient Near East, the gods often appear standing or riding on some animal, usually a wild beast. As we will see later, this phenomenon refers to the symbolic embodiment of Rome, the goddess of Rome. The names of blasphemy on the beast are the same as those we encounter in 13:1, the divine titles of the emperor, holy, majestic, divine, god, lord. The woman sitting on the beast was adorned with wealth and laden with jewels. The purple and scarlet are the colors of the Roman emperor and the Roman knights. In her hand, the golden cup full of "abominations and the filth of her fornication." The contents of the cup are the same as the wine indicated in the second verse, the intoxicating wine of the emperor cult; by which the peoples were intoxicated. The name of the woman on the beast was written on her forehead, which revealed the secret of her being. This moment, again, refers to the connection of the phenomenon with Rome, as Roman harlots wore their names on their forehead bands. The name of the woman sitting on the beast: "great Babylon, mother of the harlots and abominations (monstrosities) of the earth." This designation is a biting mockery of the reverse of the name of Rome's mother goddess, and at the same time its judgment. In fact, this Rome and its emperor, revered as gods, are nothing but the source of idolatry, the enemy of the living God, the embodiment of the antichrist spirit and as a monster the destroyer of God's people. Particular attention should be paid to the expression bdelygma in the name of the woman sitting on the beast. The word originates from the Book of Daniel (9:27; 11:13; 12:11). From here it was taken over by the First Book of Maccabees (1:54), and then by Jesus (Matthew 24:15; Mark 13:14). The bdelygma originally referred to the monster that destroyed Jerusalem and God's people, persecuted the Yahweh faith, desecrated the temple, Antiochus IV Epiphanes, a Seleucid ruler. Later it became the apocalyptic name for the antichrist. The monstrosity of the woman sitting on the beast is evident from the following statement: "and I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus" (cf. 18:20.24). Therefore, judgment comes upon her (cf. 6:10; 19:2).
"...whose seat is in the city built on seven hills." - According to Rev 17:9, the whore sits on seven mountains, which, according to our anti-Catholic friends, means the Vatican, as ancient Rome was built on seven hills.
Firstly, the Greek word used here, "horos," means mountain, not hill, as all translations reflect (as do international translations - except for a couple of anti-Catholic translations). The word for hill is "bounos." In the Bible, a mountain is a well-known symbolic expression for kingdoms (cf. Psalm 68:15; Daniel 2:35; Amos 4:1, 6:1; Obadiah 8-21). That this is also the case here is clearly clarified by the Apostle John, for he adds: "And they are seven kings." So the seven mountains represent seven kingdoms or countries, but since the number seven signifies completeness, perfection, the seven kingdoms ultimately denote all the kingdoms of the Earth.
Secondly, the Vatican was not built on seven hills, but only one: Vatican Hill. Moreover, it is not part of the seven hills on which ancient Rome was built. Those are on the eastern bank of the Tiber River, whereas Vatican Hill is on the western bank.