The Conclusion of Hurling A Great Millstone

The strong angel now addresses Babylon the Great, saying: "And the sound of singers who accompany themselves on harp and of musicians and of flutists and of trumpeters will never be heard in you again, and no craftsman of any trade will ever be found in you again, and no sound of a millstone will ever be heard in you again, and no light of a lamp will ever shine in you again, and no voice of a bridegroom and no bride will ever be heard in you again; because your traveling merchants were the top-ranking men of the earth, for by your spiritistic practice all the nations were misled."Revelation 18:22, 23.

In comparable terms, Jeremiah prophesied concerning apostate Jerusalem: "I will destroy out of them the sound of exultation and the sound of rejoicing. the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, the sound of the hand mill and the light of the lamp. And all this land must become a devastated place, an object of astonishment." (Jeremiah 25:10, 11) As the principal pat of Babylon the Great, Christendom will become a lifeless ruin, as so vividly depicted by Jerusalem's desolate condition after 607 B.C.E. The Christendom that once rejoiced lightheartedly and bustled with everyday noise will find herself conquered and abandoned.

Indeed, as the angel here tells John, all of Babylon the Great will change from a powerful, international empire to an arid, desert-like wasteland. Her "traveling merchants," Including top-ranking millionaires, have used her religion for personal advantage or as a cover-up, and the clergy have found it profitable to share the limelight with them. But those merchants will no longer have Babylon the Great as their accomplice. No more will she be hoodwinking the nations of the earth with her mystic religious practices.

Next time: An Appalling Blood guilt.
Revelation Its Grand Climax At Hand! Watchtower Bible And Tract Society, 1988