"Babylon the Great Has Fallen!"

Treading the Vine of the Earth

The visionary treading is done by horses, for the blood trodden out from the vine reaches "The bridles of the horses."  Since the term "horses" usually refers to war operations, this must be a time of war. The armies of the heavens that follow Jesus  into the final war with Satan's system of things are said to tread "the winepress of the Thereanger of God the Almighty."  (Revelation 19:11-16)  These are clearly the ones that do the treading of the vine of the earth.  The winepress is "trodden outside the city," that is, outside heavenly Zion.  Indeed, it is fitting that  the vine of the earth should trodden on earth. But it will also be "trodden outside the city" in that no harm will come to the remaining ones of the woman's seed, who represent the heavenly Zion on earth.  These together with the great crowd will be safely hidden within Jehovah's earthly organizational  arrangements. - ISAIAH 26:20, 21. 

This vivid vision has a parallel in the crushing of the kingdoms of the earth by the Kingdom stone represented described at Daniel  2:34, 44.  There will be an extermination.  The river of blood from the winepress is very deep, up to the bridles of the horses, and it extends for distance of 1,600 furlongs."  This huge figure, produced by multiplying the square of four by the square of ten (4x4x10x10), emphatically conveys the message that evidence of the destruction will involve all the earth.  (Isaiah 66:15, 16) The destruction will be complete and irreversible. Never, no never again, will Satan's vine of the earth take root! - PSALM 83:17, 18.

Living as we do deep in the time of the end, the vision of these two harvests is very meaningful.  We have only to look around us to see the fruits of Satan's vine.  Abortions and other forms of murder; homosexuality, adultery, and other forms of immorality, dishonesty and lack of natural affection-all such things make this world vile in Jehovah's eyes. Satan's vine bears the fruit of a poisonous plant and wormwood."  It's ruinous, idolatrous course dishonors mankind's Grand Creator.  (Deuteronomy 29:18; 32:5; Isiah 42:5, 8) What a privilege it is to be actively associated with the John class in the harvest of the wholesome fruitage that Jehovah is bringing forth  to Jehovah's praise!  (Luke 10:2)  May all of us be determined that we will never be tainted by the vine of this earth when Jehovah's adverse judgment is executed. 

Next time: "Babylon the Great Has Fallen!" - 'The Wine of Her Fornication'

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"Babylon the Great Has Fallen!"

 Treading the Vines of the Earth

With the harvest of salvation completed, it is time for another harvest.  John reports: "And still another angel [the fifth] emerged from the  sanctuary that is in heaven, he, too, having a sharp sickle. And still another angel [the sixth] emerged from the altar and he had authority over the fire. And he called out with a loud voice to the one that had the sharp sickle, saying:  "Put your sharp sickle in and gather the clusters of the vine of the earth, because its grapes have become ripe." (Revelation 14:17, 18)  The angelic hosts are entrusted with much harvesting during the Lord's day, separating the good from the bad!

The fifth angel comes from Jehovah's presence in temple sanctuary: hence, the final harvest also takes place according to Jehovah's will.  The angel is commanded to begin his work by a message relayed through another angel that  "emerged from the altar."  This fact is most significant, since faithful souls underneath the altar had asked:  "Until when Sovereign Lord holy and true, are you refraining from judging and avenging  our blood upon those who dwell on the earth?"  (Revelation 6:9, 10)  With the harvesting of the vine of the earth, this cry for vengeance will be satisfied.

But what is "the vine of the earth"?  In the Hebrew Scriptures, the Jewish nation was spoken of as Jehovah's vine.  (Isaiah 5:7; Jeremiah 2:21)  Similarly. Jesus Christ and those who will serve with him in God's Kingdom are spoken of as the vine. (John 15:1-8)  In this setting, the significant characteristic of a vine  is that it produces fruit, and the true Christians  vine has produced abundant fruit to Jehovah's praise. (Matthew 21:43)  "The vine of the earth," therefore, must be, not this genuine vine but Satan's imitation of it, his corrupt visible system of government over mankind, with it various "clusters" of demonic fruitage produced over the centuries.  Babylon the Great, in which apostate Christianity is so prominent , has exercised great influence over this poisonous vine.  -Compare DEUTERONOMY 32:32-25.

Judgment must be executed!   "And the angel thrust his sickle into the earth and gathered the vine of the earth, and he hurled it into the great winepress of was trodden outside the city, and blood came out of the winepress as high up as the bridles of the horses, for a distance of a thousand  six hundred  furlongs." (Revelation 14:19, 20)  Jehovah's indignation against this vine has long since been announced.  (Zephaniah 3:8) A prophecy  in this book of Isiah leaves no doubt that whole nations will be destroyed when the winepress is trampled.  (Isaiah   63:3-6) Joel too prophesied that huge  "crowds," whole nations, would trampled to destruction in "the winepress," in "the low plain of the decision. (Joel 3:12-14)  Truly, a stupendous  harvest the like of which will never again occur!  According to John's vision, not only are the grapes harvested but the whole symbolic vine is cut down and thrown into the winepress to be trampled. So the vine of the earth, will be stamped out and will never be able to grow again. 

Next  time: "Babylon the Great Has Fallen!" - Conclusion of Treading the Vine of the Earth

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"Babylon the Great Has Fallen!"

Harvest of the Earth

Others also are to benefit in this day of judgment, as John goes on to tell us:  "And I saw and look! a white cloud, and upon the cloud someone seated like a son of man, with a golden crown on his head and a sharp sickle in his hand.  And another angel   [the fourth] emerged from the temple sanctuary, crying with a loud voice to the one seated on the cloud: 'Put your sickle in and reap, because the hour has come to reap, for the harvest of the earth is thoroughly ripe.'  And  the one seated on the cloud thrust in his sickle on the earth, and the earth was reaped." -REVELATION 14:14-16.

The identity of the one seated on the cloud is not in doubt.  Seated on a while cloud, resembling the son of man and with a golden  crown, his clearly Jesus, the Messianic King that Daniel also saw in vision.  (Daniel 7:13, 14; Mark 14:61, 62) But what is the harvest here prophesied?  While on earth, Jesus likened the discipling work to the harvesting of the world field of humanity.  (Matthew 9:37, 38; John 4:35, 36) The climax of this harvesting comes in the Lord's day, when Jesus is crowned as King and executes judgment on behalf of his Father.  Thus, his time of ruling, since 1914, is also the joyful time for bringing in the harvest.- Compare DEUTERONOMY 16:13-15.

Although he is a king and a judge, Jesus waits for word from Jehovah his God before beginning to reap.  That word comes from "the temple sanctuary" by means of an angel.  Immediately Jesus obeys.  First, from 1919 on, he has his angels complete the harvesting of the 144,000.  (Matthew 13:39-43; John 15:1-5, 16)  Next, the harvest ingathering of the great crowd of other sheep takes place. (John 10:16; Revelation 7:9)  History shows that between 1931 and 1935 a goodly number of these other sheep  began to appear .  In 1935 Jehovah opened to the understanding of the John class the real identity of the great crowd  of  Revelation 7:9-17.  Thenceforth, much emphasis was placed on the ingathering of this crowd.  By the year 2005,  its number has exceeded the six million mark, and it is still increasing, Surely, the one like a son of man has reaped a bountiful, joyous harvest during this time of the end. - Compare EXODUS 23:16; 34:22.

Next time: "Babylon the Great Has Fallen!" - Continued

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"Babylon the Great Has Fallen!" - Conclusion of Endurance for the Holy Ones

Those who have the mark of the wild beast will also be destroyed completely, as if by fire. As the prophecy later reveals,, their dead bodies will be left unburied  for animals and birds to eat.  (Revelation 19:17, 18)  So, clearly, they are not being literally  tortured forever!  How are they "tormented with fire and sulfur"?   In that proclamation  of truth exposes  them and warns  them of God's coming judgment.  Therefore they vilify God's people and, where possible, slyly persuade the political beast to persecute and even kill Jehovah's Witnesses.  As a climax, these opposers will be destroyed as with fire and brimstone.  Then "the smoke of their torment ascends forever and ever" in that God's judgment of them will serve as a touchstone of ever again Jehovah's rightful sovereignty is challenged. That issue will have been settled for all eternity.

Who deliver the tormenting message today? Remember, the symbolic locusts have authority to torment the men who do  not have the seal of God on their foreheads.  (Revelation 9:5)   Evidently, these ones under angelic direction are the tormentors. Such as the persistence of the symbolic locusts that "day and night they have no rest, those who worship the wild beast and its image, and whoever receives the mark  of its name." And finally, after their destruction, the monumental evidence of that vindication of Jehovah's sovereignty.  "The smoke of their torment," will ascend forever and ever.  May the John class  endure until that vindication is complete! "Here is where it means endurance for the holy ones, those who observe the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus." - REVELATION 14:12.  

Yes, endurance for the holy ones" means that their worshipping Jehovah is exclusive devotion through Jesus Christ.  Their message is not popular. It leads to opposition, persecution, even martyrdom. But they are strengthened  by what John  next reports:  "And I heard a voice out of heaven say: "Happy are the  dead who die in union with the Lord from this time onward.  Yes, says the spirit, let them rest from their labors, for the things that did go right with them." - REVELATION 14:13.

This promise harmonizes well with  Paul's prophesy concerning Jesus' presence:  "Those who are dead in union with Christ will rise first.  Afterward we the living who are surviving  [those of  the anointed ones  who survive in to the Lord's day] will, together with them be caught away in clouds to meet the Lord in the air." (1 Thessalonians 4:15-17) After Satan's ouster from heaven, those who are dead in union with Christ rose first.  (Compare Revelation 6:9-11.)  Afterward, those of the anointed ones who die during the Lord's day are promised a special privilege.  Their resurrection  to spirit in the heaven is instantaneous, "in the twinkling of an eye." (1 Corinthians 15:52)  How  marvelous this is!  And their works of righteousness continue right on in the heavenly realm.

Next time: "Babylon the Great Has Fallen!" -Continued

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"Babylon the Great Has Fallen!"

 Endurance for the Holy Ones

Now the third angel speaks: "And another angel, a third followed them, saying in a loud voice: "If anyone worships the wild beast and its image and receives a mark on his forehead or upon his hand, he will also drink of the wine of the anger of God that is poured out undiluted in the cup of his wrath." (Revelation 14:9, 10a) At Revelation 13:16, 17, It was revealed during the Lord's day those who do not worship the image of the wild beast would suffer-even be killed. Now we learn that Jehovah has determined to bring to judgment, those "having the mark of the wild beast or the number of its name."  They will forced to drink a bitter 'cup of wrath' of Jehovah's anger. What will this mean for them? In 607  B.C.E.., when Jehovah forced Jerusalem to drink "his cup of rage," the city experienced "despoiling and breakdown, and hunger and sword" at the hands of the Babylonians.  (Isaiah 51:17, 19)   Similarly, when idolizers of earth's political powers and their  image, the United Nations, get to drink the cup of Jehovah's wrath, the result will be a calamity for them.  (Jeremiah 25:17, 32, 33) They will be utterly destroyed.

Even before that happens, however, those with the mark of the beast have to undergo the tormenting effects of Jehovah's disapproval.  Speaking of worshipper of the wild beast and its image, the angel informs Joh: "And he shall be tormented with the fire and sulphur in the sight of the holy angels and in the sight of  of the Lamb.  And the smoke of their torment ascends forever and ever, and day and night they have no rest, those who worship the wild beast and its image, and whoever receives the mark of its name." - REVELATION 14:10b, 11.

Some have viewed the mention here of fire and sulfur ("fire and brimstone," King James Version) as a proof of its existence of a hellfire.  But a brief look at a similar prophecy shows the real import of these words in this context. Back in the days of Isaiah, Jehovah warned the nation of Edom that they would be punished because of their enmity toward Israel.  He said: "Her torrents must be changed into pitch, and her dust into sulphur; and her land  must become  as burning pitch, By night or day it will not be extinguished; to time indefinite  its smoke will keep ascending. From generation to generation sge will be parched forever and ever no one will be passing through her." - ISAIAH 34:9, 10.

Was Edom hurled into some mythical hellfire to burn forever?  Of course not.  Rather, the nation completely disappeared from the world scene as if she had been totally consumed with fire and sulfur. The final result of the punishment was, not everlasting torment but "emptiness  . . . wasteness . . . nothing." (Isaiah 34:11, 12)  The smoke 'ascending to time indefinite' vividly illustrates this.  When a house burns down, smoke keep coming up from the ashes for some time after the flames have died down, providing onlookers with evidence that there has been destructive  conflagration. Even today God's people remember the lesson to be learned from the destruction of Edom.  In this way,  'the smoke of her burning' is still ascending in a symbolic way.

Next time: "Babylon the Great Has Fallen!" - Continued

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"Babylon the Great Has Fallen!"

 The Wheat and the Weeds

In his parable of the wheat and the weeds, Jesus spoke of a man who sowed fine seed in a field.  But "while men were sleeping," and enemy came and over sowed-weeds. Hence, the sower of the fine seed is the Son of man; the field is the world; as the fine seed these are the sons of the kingdom; but the weeds are the sons of the wicked one; and the enemy that sowed them is the Devil."  He then showed that the wheat and the weeds would be allowed  to grow together until  "the conclusion of the system of things," when the angels would  "collect out" the symbolic weeds." - MATTHEW 13:24-30, 36-43.

What Jesus and the apostles Paul and Peter warned about happened.  "While men were sleeping," either after the apostles fell asleep in death or when Christian overseers became drowsing in guarding the flock of God, Babylonish apostasy sprouted right inside the congregations.  (Acts 20:31)  Soon the weeds greatly outnumbered the wheat and  hid it from view.  For a number of centuries, it might have appeared that the seed of the woman had been completely engulfed by the voluminous skirts of Babylon the Great. 

By the 1870's  anointed Christians began to make determineed efforts to disassociated themselves from the whorish ways of Babylon the Great.  They abandoned false doctrines that Christendom had brought in from paganism and boldly used the Bible in preaching that the times of the Gentiles would end in 1914.  The chief instrument of Babylon the Great, the clergy of Christendom, opposed the stirrings of restoration of true worship.  During the first world war, they took advantage of wartime hysteria to try to stamp out that small group of faithful Christians.  In 1918, when their activities were almost completely suppressed, it appeared that Babylon the Great had succeeded. She seemed to have triumphed over them. 

As we previously noted, the proud city of Babylon experienced a disastrous  fall from power in 539 B.C.E. then the cry was heard: "She has fallen! Babylon has fallen!"  The great seat of the world empire ha had fallen to the armies of  Medo-Persia under Cyrus the Great.  Although the city itself survived the conquest, her fall from power was real, and it resulted in the release of her Jewish captives. They returned to Jerusalem to reestablish pure worship there. -ISAIAH 21:9; 2 CORINTHIANS 36:22, 23; JEREMIAH 51:7, 8.

In our time the cry that Babylon the Great has fallen has also been heard! Babylonish Christendom's temporary success in 1918 was  sharply reversed in 1919 when the remnant of anointed ones, the John class, was restored by a spiritual resurrection. Babylon the Great has fallen as far as having any captives hold on God's people was concerned. Like locusts, Christ's anointed brothers swarmed  out of the abyss, ready for action.  (Revelation 9:1-3; 11:11, 12)  They were the modern "faithful and discreet slave." and the Master appointed them  over all His belongings on earth.  (Matthew  24:45-47)  Their being used in this way proved that Jehovah had utterly rejected Christendom despite her claim to be his representative on earth.  Pure worship was reestablish, and the way was open to complete the work of sealing the remnant of the 144,000-the remaining ones of the seed of the woman, the age-old enemy of Babylon the Great. All of this signaled a crushing defeat  for that satantic religious  organization. 

Next time: "Babylon the Great Has Fallen!"-Continued

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"Babylon the Great Has Fallen!"

 Babylon's Disgraceful Fall

Let us examine in more detail the circumstances surrounding the disgraceful fall of Babylon the Great.  The angel her tells us that "Babylon the Great . . . made all the nations drink of the wine of the anger of her fornication."  What does this mean?  It relates to conquest.  For example, Jehovah told Jeremiah: "Take this cup  of the wine of  rage out of my hand, and you must make all the nations to whom I am sending you drink it. And they must drink and shake back and forth and act like crazed men because of the sword that I am sending among them." (Jeremiah 25:15, 16)  In the sixth and seventh centuries B.C.E. , Jeremiah used ancient Babylon to pour out a symbolic cup of tribulation for many nations to drink, including apostate Juda, so that even his own people were taken into exile. Then, in her turn, Babylon fell because her king exalted him against Jehovah,  "the Lord of the heavens." - DANIEL 5:23.

Babylon the Great has also made conquests, but for the most part, these have been more subtle. She has "made all the nations drink" buy using the wiles of a prostitute, committing religious fornication with them.  She had enticed political rulers into alliances and friendships with her.  Through religious allurements, she has schemed political,  and economic oppression.  He has fomented religious persecution and religious wars and crusades, as well as national wars, for purely political and commercial reasons. And she has sanctified these wars by saying they are God's will, when they aren't.

 Religion's involvement in the wars and politics of the 20th century is common knowledg-as in Shinto Japan, Hindu India, Buddhist Vietnam,  "Christian Northern Ireland(A and Latin America, as well as others-not overlook the army chaplain's part on both sides of the two world Wars in urging young men to slaughter one another.  A classic example of the philandering of Babylon the Great, is the share  she had in the Spanish Civil War of 1936-39, in which at least 600,000 people were killed. This bloodspilling was provoked by supportrers of the Catholic clergy and their allies, in part becauise the wealth and position of the church was threatened by Spain's legal government

Since Babylon the Great is the religious part of Satan's seed, she has always made Jehovah's  "woman," Jerusalem above," her main target.  In the first century, the congregation of anointed Christians was clearly identified as the woman's seed.  (Genesis 3:15; Galatians 3:29; 4:26) Babylon the Great tried hard to conquer that chaste congregation by seducing it into committing religious fornication.  The apostle Paul  and Peter warned that many  would succumb and a great apostasy would result.  (Acts 20:29, 30; 2 Peter 2:1-3) Jesus' messages o the seven congregations  indicated that toward the end of John's life, Babylon the Great was making some progress in her efforts to corrupt. (Revelation 2:6, 14, 15, 20-23) But Jesus had already shown how far she would be permitted to go. 

Next time: "Babylon the Great Has Fallen!" -The Wheat and the Weeds

From the jw.org publications

"Babylon the Great!" Has Fallen!"

 IT IS the hour of God's judgment!  Listen, then, to the divine message:  "And another, a second angel followed Babylon the Great has fallen, she who made all the nations drink of the wine of the anger of her fornication! " (Revelation 14:8) For the first time, but not the last, Revelation focuses attention on Babylon the Great, Later,  Chapter 17 describes her as a voluptuous harlot.  Who is she? As we shall see, she is a global empire, she is religious, and she is Satan's counterfeit system that he uses in fighting against God's woman.  (Revelation 12:17) Babylon the Great is the entire world empire of false religion. She includes all religions that preserves the religious teachings and practices of ancient Babylon and that manifest her spirit.

It was at Babylon, more  than 4,000 years ago, that Jehovah confused the tongues of the would-builders of the Tower of Babel.  The different language groups were scattered to the ends of the earth, taking with them  the apostate beliefs and practices that are the basis of most religions to this day. (Genesis 11:1-9) Babylon the Great is the religious part of Satan's organization.  (Compare John 8:43-47.)  Her most prominent segment today  is apostate Christendom, which emerged as a powerful, lawless organization in the fourth century after Christ, with creeds and formalisms derived, not from the Bible, but largely from Babylonish religion. - 2 Thessalonians 2:3-12. 

You may ask,  "Since religion still exercises great influence on the earth, why does the angel announce that Babylon the Great has fallen?  Well, what resulted after 539 B.C.E. when ancient Babylon fell?  Why, Israel was freed to return to its homeland and restore true worship there!  So the restoration of spiritual Israel in 1919 to a radiant spiritual prosperity, which continues and expands to this day, stands as evidence that Babylon the Great fell in that year. 

No longer does she have power of restraint over God's people.  Moreover, she has come into deep trouble within her own ranks. Since 1919 her corruption, dishonesty, and immorality have been widely exposed in most of Europe, few people go to church anymore, and in some socialistic  countries, religion is regarded as "the opium of the people."  Disgraced in the eyes of all lovers of God's Word of truth, Babylon the Great now waits on death row, as it were, for the execution of Jehovah's righteous judgment on her.

Next time: "Babylon the Great Has Fallen!" 

From the jw.org publications

Babylon the Great -Conclusion

 Why is it urgent to get out of Babylon the Great without delay?

Revelation 18:4: "Get out of her,  my people, if you do not want to share with her in her sins, and if you do not want to receive part of her plagues."

Revelation 18:21: "A strong angel lifted up a stone like a great millstone and hurled it into the sea, saying: "Thus with a swift pitch will Babylon the great city be hurled down, and she will never be found again."

Luke 21:36: "Keep awake, then, all the time making supplication that you may succeed in escaping all these things that are destined to occur, and in standing before the Son of man."  (Keep awake is symbolic for spiritually.) 

What will happen to people who did not know Bible truth and lived and died in the past as part of Babylon the Great?

Acts 17:30: "God has overlooked the times of such ignorance, yet now he is telling mankind that they should all everywhere repent." 

Acts 24:15: "There is going to be a resurrection of both the righteous and the unrighteous."  (As to which ones of  "the unrighteous" will be raised, God will decide.)

Job 34:12: "For a fact, God himself does not act wickedly, and the Almighty himself does not pervert judgment." 

Next time: Babylon the Great Has Fallen

From the jw.org publications

Babylon the Great -Continued

 Why can religions that profess to be Christians properly be viewed as a part of Babylon the Great, along with those who know nothing of the God of the Bible? 

James 4:4: Adulteresses, do you not know that the friendship with the world  is enmity with God? Whoever, therefore, wants to be a friend of the world is constituting himself an enemy of God." (So, though they know what the Bible says about God, they make themselves his enemies if they choose friendship with the world by  imitating its ways.)

2 Corinthians 4:4; 11:14, 15: "The god of this system of things has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, that the illumination of the glorious good news about the Christ, who is the image of God, might not shine through."  Satan himself keeps transforming himself into angel of light. It is therefore nothing great if his ministers also keep transforming themselves into ministers of righteousness..  But their end shall be according to their works."  (Thus Jehovah's chief adversary, Satan the Devil himself, if really being honored by all who do not worship the true God in the manner that He has appointed, even though they may claim to be Christians. See also  (1 Corinthians 10:20.)

Matthew 7:21-23: "Not everyone saying to me [Jesus Christ], 'Lord, lord," will enter into the Kingdom fo the heavens, but the one doing the will of my Father who is in the heavens will.  Many will say to me in that day,  'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and expel demons in your name, and perform many powerful works in your name?  And yet then I will confess to them: "I never knew you! Get away from Me, you coworkers of lawlessness.

Note: When the true God is mentioned here, it does not mean the one of tradition mean celebrating all holidays and birthdays, it means the true God, Jehovah who never ever celebrated any of that phony crap.  Most of that is paganism, which is not true Christianity.  Nor did Jesus Christ celebrate anything. 

Next time: Babylon the Great - Conclusion

From the jw.org publications