Rapture: The End-Times Error That Leaves the Bible Behind (46 page)

Nero (emperor number six) was the Caesar when The Apocalypse was penned. It was ultimately under the rule of Vespasian (emperor number seven) that Jerusalem was sacked and the Temple destroyed. That is why the beast has seven heads (GR2).

Here the humanity of John, the son of thunder (Mark 3:17), shines through. Although St. John has already given us an explanation of the seven heads, he cannot resist designating an eighth emperor. The mere mention of an eighth emperor illustrates John’s awareness of the nature of God’s Kingdom. Although the eternal Kingdom of Christ has been established, there will still be earthly governments here on earth, in this case another Roman emperor.

“As for the beast that was and is not, it is an eighth but it belongs to the seven, and it goes to perdition” (17:11). This is the same beast that “ascend[ed] from the bottomless pit” earlier in this vision (17:8). The beast that ascended is a clear reference to the “king … the angel of the bottomless pit … Abaddon,” who appeared at the head of the locust/scorpion army of the fifth trumpet! These visions really do review the same events again and again.

We have already determined that Abaddon was General Titus, the son of Vespasian. This would explain how he “belongs to the seven[th]”—by blood relation. How is it that Titus “was and is not” (17:11)? As of 68 A.D., Titus had been in Judea with his father for the war in 67 and 68 A.D. He was there, twice. But when Nero committed suicide, Vespasian sent Titus to Rome. This would explain the phrase “is not.” At this time, General Titus is not in Judea.

But Titus would return, to the consternation of Jerusalem. Considering his role in the winepress, is it any wonder that he would “go to perdition” (17:11)?

So once again we see one symbol, the sea-beast, serving as a sign for more than one reality. At times the beast is most clearly Nero; here it is most evidently Titus. In either case, however, the individual represents the Roman Empire, which is the primary reality that the beast symbolizes. But notice that these realities are all related in their fulfillment. They complement one another, just as Mary complements the Church, just as Moses complements the Law, and just as Elijah complements the Prophets.

Rip Van Winkle would be proud. Rapturists totally ignore the minute details already fulfilled by the harlot and the scarlet beast she rides. The shear number of details that fit the eight kings makes it outrageous for rapturists to ignore their clear fulfillment. They expect a future reformulation of the Roman Empire to fulfill these prophecies. They look to ten nations of the European Union as the ten kings. (This idea is much less ballyhooed about now that there are fifteen nations and counting in the European Union.) But why look for something in the future that has already been fulfilled, and in such detail? At the risk of sounding harsh, may I suggest that this is almost akin to what the Sanhedrin did? They, too, refused to see the detailed fulfillment of the Messianic prophecies in their own day. They, too, looked elsewhere for a fulfillment. They, too, wanted that fulfillment to be more physical and less spiritual. They, too, were wrong, trapped in their own kind of Winkle Warp.

Just as the seven heads have a double meaning, so do the ten horns of the sea-beast (GR4). We have seen that they were the ten provinces of the Roman Empire. Now St. John uses them to signify ten future kings, or emperors, who “have not yet received royal power, but they are to receive authority as kings for one hour, together with the beast” (17:12). This is obviously not a reference to the provincial kings who crossed the dry Euphrates with Titus to gather at Armageddon. This description clearly says they are
future
kings.

Their opponent is different as well. The beast and the ten provincial kings are presently at war with the harlot, Jerusalem. But these future emperors “will make war on
the Lamb”
(17:14). The object of their hatred will be Christ and His Church, rather than Jerusalem. It must have been sobering reading for Christians reeling from the Great Tribulation. St. John makes it very clear that even after the victory of Rome over Jerusalem, they will still have emperors of Rome eager to persecute them.

Nero is identified by the early Church Fathers as the first to use the official authority of the Roman empire to persecute Christians. But there would be “ten” more persecuting emperors who followed in his wake (
TBR
, 372), ten being the number of completeness (GR2).

The persecution ebbed and flowed and finally reached a climax around 303 A.D., during the reign of Emperor Diocletian. Entire towns of the empire, such as Phrygia, were executed down to the last person when they refused to sacrifice to the emperor. Tertullian wrote in the early third century: “If the Tiber reaches the walls, if the Nile does not rise to the fields, if the sky doesn’t move or the earth does, if there is famine, if there is plague, the cry is at once: ‘The Christians to the lions!’ ” (
APO
, 40:2). As St. John writes elsewhere in The Apocalypse, “Here is a call for the endurance and faith of the saints.”

Civil war raged in the empire after the death of Diocletian, and the next uncontested emperor of Rome was Constantine the Great in 324 A.D. He legalized Christianity, so that people would not be persecuted simply because they were members of the Church.

The Apocalypse had promised the struggling Church that this future persecution would be temporary. These persecutors would be “kings for one hour.” The short reign of these ten persecuting kings is contrasted with the Christ. Although the kings of the dragon appear invincible, they are not. They are only speed bumps on the road to eternity.

This is meant to draw a sharp contrast between the forces of the dragon and the forces of the Lamb. The ten kings “receive[d] authority
for one hour
.” With all its power, even the beast “was and
is not
.” Christ is a superior King. We learned at the beginning of The Apocalypse that Christ is He “who is and who was and who is to come” (1:4, 8). He is “the firstborn of the dead … the Alpha and the Omega” (1:5, 8). He states, “I am the first and the last, and the living one; I died, and behold I am alive forevermore” (1:17–18).

This is the essence of the Truth that the Rider on the white horse proclaims: live for the dragon, and enjoy yourself now. Live for God now, and be rewarded for all eternity.

After the plagues have run their course, another angel announces the results: “Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great!” (18:2). This should not surprise us, as this was declared by the second angel in the battle strategy of the Lamb.

We have finally found an article of fact on which the dragon and the Lamb can agree: Jerusalem should be nicknamed Babylon. The allies of the dragon, with their emphasis on power, would view this as the supreme compliment. The allies of the Lamb would understand this name as St. John intends it: it is a harbinger of this city’s doom because of its prideful disregard for God and His holiness.

An angel from Heaven warns the Christians, “Come out of her, my people” (18:4). The message is clear: get out of Jerusalem. Two reasons are given.

First, “lest you take part in her sins” (18:4). This hearkens back to the message of the letters to the churches and the oft-repeated admonition to endure and keep faith. It also reflects the admonitions in Hebrews, which we examined earlier. Given the environment of “Babylon” (Jerusalem) at the time of St. John’s visions, the holiness of the Christians was a major concern. Josephus describes the activities going on at the time in Jerusalem, but I will not detail them; they would make for very uncomfortable reading.

But the biggest sin of “Babylon” is mentioned toward the end of this vision: “All nations were deceived by thy sorcery” (18:23). Under the Davidic covenant, Jerusalem (Zion) was to be a light to the nations, a beacon that would point them to the true God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. The Minor Prophets illustrate this clearly with their message to the nations. But instead of telling the Truth to the nations, as the Lamb did, Jerusalem “deceived” them in accord with the battle strategy of the dragon. This was her greatest sin. She did not live up to the covenantal responsibilities of David’s heirs. In fact, she killed those who tried to: “In her was found the blood of prophets and of saints” (18:24).

There is a second reason given for Christians to come out of Jerusalem, though. Leave, “lest you share in her plagues” (18:4). This echoes the warnings of the Olivet Discourse, but put into the context of the Great Battle that St. John is describing. We can hear the words of Jesus: “Flee to the mountains.… Let him who is on the housetop not go down.… Let him who is in the field not turn back.… For then there will be great tribulation” (Matt. 24:16–21). Judgment was coming upon “Babylon.” The message is clear: if you are there, you will share in its pain.

But even as her destruction unfolds, Jerusalem remains in complete denial. “Since in her heart she says, ‘A queen I sit, I am no widow, mourning I shall never see’ ” (18:7). This passage is lifted almost verbatim from Isaiah’s description of the original Babylon before her destruction (47:7–9). The Babylon of old grew complacent in her impregnability. In fact, Belshazzar was throwing a party at the very moment the Persian army was entering his stronghold. The old Babylon was mistaken in her complacency, and so was Jerusalem, the new Babylon. We have already noted the jeering of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, even after Titus had breached some of her defenses.

Jerusalem had been “widowed” before this. When Jerusalem was conquered by Babylon, it was described as “widowhood” because God her “husband” had forsaken her (Isa. 54:4–5).

She did not realize it in time, but now it was happening again half a millennium later. God turned His back on the Old Covenant when she rejected His Son, the Messiah. Zechariah made this clear when he broke his two staffs. The Old Covenant was being supplanted, never to be revisited again (Appendix Three). Jerusalem had traded the love of a faithful Husband for the powerful thrill of a scarlet beast, and now she would be required to face the consequences of her spiritual harlotry.

An angel announces that the city warranted this judgment: “A mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone and threw it into the sea” (18:21). Once again St. John reminds his readers of the destruction of the original Babylon, this time by referencing a story from Jeremiah.

Before the destruction of the first Babylon, God had instructed Jeremiah to act out a drama to drive home his prophecy of defeat and captivity. Jeremiah wrote down the prophecies concerning the fall of Babylon. He instructed one of the Jewish prisoners to take these prophecies with him into captivity in Babylon. The Jew was to “read all these words, and say, ‘O Lord, Thou hast said concerning this place that Thou wilt cut it off, so that nothing shall dwell in it, neither man nor beast, and it shall be desolate forever.’ When you finish reading this book, bind a stone to it, and cast it into the midst of the Euphrates, and say, ‘Thus shall Babylon sink, to rise no more, because of the evil that I am bringing upon her’ ” (Jer. 51:61–64). The old Babylon was judged for its treatment of God’s holy people and vessels. Her fate was analogous to that of a stone sinking into a river. St. John draws a parallel to the sinking destruction of the new Babylon, Jerusalem (GR3).

The angel closes his statement with the phrase that reminds us, once again, that this is the ancient city of Jerusalem: “In her was found the blood of prophets and of saints, and of all who have been slain on earth.” That is why Jerusalem is being judged. Ever since God had chosen and loved His Old Covenant People, they had disregarded His messages. Their rejection had culminated in the Crucifixion of His Son.

Indeed, the millstone was an apt illustration. Jerusalem’s destruction was complete. First, the Temple was destroyed by the Romans in 70 A.D. It took the Romans three years to dismantle the city defenses and eventually erect a pagan shrine on the Temple site. Almost seventy years later, in 132 A.D., the Jewish leaders felt that perhaps their exile had been completed. The chief rabbi in Israel proclaimed Simon bar Kochba to be the Messiah. By 136 A.D., Roman soldiers stood once more victorious within Jerusalem. This time, the Romans completely leveled the city and expelled all Jews from Jerusalem. “Babylon the great … has become … a haunt of every foul spirit, a haunt of every foul and hateful bird” (18:2). Roman law made it punishable by death for a Jew to be caught within the boundaries of Jerusalem.

When the destruction finally takes place, the allies of Jerusalem’s secularized leadership are dismayed at its destruction. Three times this vision mentions that “in one hour has the judgment come.” This lament is taken up by the kings (18:10), then the merchants (18:17), and finally the sailors (18:19). All of these mourned the destruction of a powerful, wealthy, sophisticated trading center. “No one buys their cargo anymore, cargo of gold, silver, jewels and pearls, fine linen, purple, silks and scarlet … spice, incense, myrrh, frankincense, wine, oil … cattle and sheep” (18:11–13). Many of these expensive items were used in Temple worship at Jerusalem. Notice that there is no mourning over her spiritual demise. That had happened long before.

But there is another reaction to the destruction of Jerusalem and its Temple. In contrast to the three allies of Jerusalem (kings, merchants, and sailors), the three victims of the Jerusalem’s savage and relentless persecutions are told by the angel with the millstone to rejoice: “Rejoice over her, O Heaven, O saints and apostles and prophets, for God has given judgment for you against her!” (18:20).