What is "MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT" of Revelation Chapter 17?

This article is from Erika Grey, an evangelical Christian author, eschatologist, journalist and commentator. I never heard of her before but the title of her book caught my attention: “Whore of Babylon in Bible Prophecy: A Book of Revelation Mystery Revealed.”

My friend still thinks Babylon the Great is Jerusalem and international bankers. This is what I told him today:

We must interpret according to the entire context of the chapter.

Revelation 17:1b I will shew unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters:

Revelation 17:15 And he saith unto me, The waters which thou sawest, where the whore sitteth, are peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues.

Is Jerusalem present in the Philippines and throughout the entire world? Rome is only a 3-minute walk from my home.

His reply:

I agree with the context argument and I see the whore ruling over all peoples, languages and nations, and it ain’t the RCC.

My reply:

Tell that to the Filipinos. They’ll tell you the RCC is controlling their government. The former president Duterte will tell you about the evils the Church of Rome has done to his country.

His reply:

I do not dispute that they have that influence. But global control of the dollar has destroyed most nations, put them into serfdom. Through Masons and other secret societies the Vatican is connected to the whore. The banksters control the Vatican as they control London, Washington and all Western govts. They don’t control Russia ATM and that is the reason for the war.

My reply:

If a whore is the opposite of a bride, the RCC makes a much better candidate for being the Whore than international bankers because she calls herself the Bride, the true Church of Jesus Christ, and all those who are not part of her, the true Bible believers, she calls apostates and heretics.

My friend disagrees.

Excerpts from Erika’s book:

November 17, 2017 by Erika Grey

The VATICAN-The Whore of Babylon

While we see that Revelation 17 and 18 describe the Whore of Babylon as riding the seven-headed beast, which perfectly symbolizes the various history of empires and relation to false gods, with greater focus on the Roman Empire, the remaining verses come to life when examining the Vatican.

Vatican City is its own city and even its own country renowned for being the smallest country in the world. It is still located in Rome and is part of the fabric of Rome. It stands across from Rome’s seven hills and rests on its own hill. Not just any hill, but one with a history that literally lines with the description in Revelation 17 and 18 with precise detail.

This report has established that the Whore of Babylon rests on the mountains which are also kings and on their heads are the names of blasphemy because each king or emperor or Pharaoh took the names of the gods, and in some cases believed they were the sons of the gods and were themselves divine.

After Revelation 17 describes the woman as riding the Beast, sitting on top of it, this woman who represents false religion, Revelation 17:6 tells us:

I saw the woman, drunk with the blood of the saints and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus. And when I saw her, I marveled with great amazement.

And in Revelation 18:24:

And in her was found the blood of prophets and saints, and of all who were slain on the earth.

While this refers to the Christians killed under Nero and various Roman Emperors, and those murdered during the Holy Roman Empire during the Reformation, and also to the Christians who will be martyred later, the verses come to even greater life when the details of the Vatican are revealed. Before we look at those details, let’s have a quick overview of Roman History and the Catholic Church:

Quick Roman history and the Church

Jesus was born under the reign of Augustus, 63 BC to 14 AD. Julius Caesar’s stepson. With him began the Roman Empire. His government was followed by Tiberius’s, 14 AD to 37 AD who under his rule Jesus was crucified. After Tiberius’s death, Caligula led the Empire briefly during the time of Paul and the apostles, 37 AD to 41 AD. There is no mention of Caligula in Scripture. Afterwards, Caligula’s uncle Claudius reigned for 13 years 41 AD to 54 AD and the church continued to spread. Claudius distinguished himself from other Roman emperors by his conquest of Britain.

Upon Claudius’s death, Nero took power in AD 54 to AD 68 and was the Caesar referenced by Paul. According to John W. Quinn in Render Unto Caesar the Expository Files.

Ironically, Nero was the Caesar to whom Paul appealed for justice (Acts 25:11). After Paul was delivered to Rome, Nero placed Paul under house arrest (Acts 28:19). Paul writes of teaching the gospel to some of the Praetorian Guard and that some members of Nero’s own household were Christians during his imprisonments (Philippians 1:13; 4:22). Paul was eventually released, but then later rearrested and executed. He writes of his coming execution in 2 Timothy 4, a chapter showing his great faith and confidence.

Nero Galba, Otho, and Vitellius (68-69) had brief reigns.

Vespasian ruled in 69-79 A.D. Vespasian and his sons, the emperors Titus and Domitian, are known as the Flavians. Vespian fulfilled Jesus’ prophecy concerning the destruction of Jerusalem (with his son, Titus, being the commander in the field.) (Matthew 24:1,2).

Titus (79-81 A. D.)The famous eruption of Vesuvius that destroyed the towns of Herculaneum and Pompeii happened during the rule of Titus.

Domitian (81-96 A.D.)Domitian became a cruel tyrant in the later years of his rule, and the period of terror associated with his name ended with his murder.

It is said that under Domitian, John was exiled to the island of Patmos and wrote the Book of Revelation. Domitian was responsible for a great persecution against the churches in Asia Minor. Emperor worship was commanded of the people, and Christians would not oblige (Revelation 16:2). But the message from John assures them of complete and final victory if they would be faithful even unto death (Revelation 2:10). The message speaks of the fall and defeat of Rome, the defeat of Satan, and victory of Jesus and His faithful ones.

It is not a definite history that Domitian banished John. It could have been Nero who sent him to Patmos. Under Domitian John would have been in his 90’s. On the island of Patmos is a plaque referencing John and it attributes Nero sending him to Patmos. One writer brought up how in the book of Revelation the Temple is referenced in Chapter 11 and John is instructed to go and measure the Temple. The destruction of the Second Temple occurred in AD 70 after the reign of Nero. Peter and Paul were killed under Nero and it makes sense that it would have been Nero who would have sent him to Patmos.

The Vatican is built over the Circus of Nero, and the Circus of Caligula. It was begun by Caligula on the property of his mother Agrippina and completed by Claudius, Caligula’s uncle who took over as Emperor after Caligula was assassinated- 41-53 AD. Caligula believed he was a god and he dressed as the various gods including Cybele and Magna Mater, the Queen of Heaven. He was so violent and crazed that he was killed by his own guard after only four years in power.

The Circus was the place of the first massive Christian martyrdoms in 65 AD under Nero. Nero set Rome afire, blamed the Christians, and went after them and put them through the most brutal and torturous deaths. It was under Nero that Paul was beheaded (as a citizen of Rome he could not be crucified) and Peter was crucified upside down. While Paul was killed just outside of Rome, Peter and others were killed in Nero’s circus.

Tacitus a historian who lived at the time recorded the events in the Annals and it is within his writings is the first reference to Jesus Christ. A cemetery was nearby. It is here that the tomb of Peter lay. It was over Peter’s tomb and other martyred saints who lay in the cemetery that the Roman emperor Constantine deliberately built a basilica (Old St. Peter’s) over the site. He used some of the existing structure of the Circus of Nero. The basilica was centered on Peter’s tomb which is located beneath the high altar of the Vatican.

It was as if Satan himself chose the seat of the world’s largest cathedral and home of the Harlot to be above the blood and remains of the martyrs she murdered as if they acted as a sacrifice to her demons and principalities. Revelation 17:6 tells us:

I saw the woman, drunk with the blood of the saints and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus. And when I saw her, I marveled with great amazement.

Not only would the blood of the early martyrs be shed in Nero’s Circus, but the Whore of Babylon’s seat would be built right over their graves as if their murders acted as a Satanic sacrifice to the darkest forces on the earth.

In addition, St. Peter’s lies over the site of several altars and inscriptions commemorative of taurobolia, which was the practice of sacrificing a bull. After the mid-2nd century, bull sacrifice became connected with the worship of Magna Mater the Great Mother of Gods. It was the widespread practice of worship of Babylonian’s Queen of Heaven, Ishtar, who became ISIS in Egypt and by 159 AD, all taurobolia inscriptions mention Magna Mater. A shrine on the right bank of the River Tiber, near the racecourse of Caligula (Gaianum), known from several inscriptions on fragmentary marble altars, dating from 305 to 390 CE, all but one of which were found under the façade of St. Peter’s in 1609. It was possibly an important religious center at the time.

What is even more shocking is that the Magna Mater a.k.a Cybele was brought to Rome from Phrygia in about 205 BC. Her symbol was a sacred stone that is said to now be worshipped at Mecca and as a sacred relic at the seat of Islam.

She was Phrygia‘s only known goddess, its highest deity, and might have even been the state deity of Phrygia. Her Phrygian cult was adopted and adapted by Greek colonists of Asia Minor and spread to mainland Greece around the 6th century BC and was then brought to Rome.

What should be noted about the Magna Mater’s roots in Phrygia, which later came under the control of Pergamum is that in Revelation 2:13 Jesus makes it clear that this Pergamum is where Satan’s throne is and where he dwells. He states:

“I know your works, and where you dwell, where Satan’s throne is. And you hold fast to My name, and did not deny My faith even in the days in which Antipas was My faithful martyr, who was killed among you, where Satan dwells.”

It is no coincidence that the Magna Mater was fetched from Pergamum and its temple ended up on both Paladin Hill and at the site of St. Peter’s Basilica. This is no doubt the woman called “wickedness” who now has a home, which would continue to evolve and cause more bloodshed of the saints.

By the end of the 15th century, having been neglected during the period of the Avignon Papacy, 1309-1377, when Popes resided in France instead of Rome, the basilica had aged and was in need of repair. The first pope to consider rebuilding, was Pope Nicholas V (1447–55). He had plans designed for an entirely new basilica but was never able to achieve them during his reign due to other pressing issues during his reign.

Pope Julius II in hopes of aggrandizing himself after his death with a spectacular tomb within St. Peters, planned far more for St. Peter’s than Nicholas V’s program. His tomb was to be designed and adorned with sculptures by Michelangelo. In 1505, Julius decided to demolish the ancient basilica and replace it with a monumental structure to house his enormous tomb. Michelangelo improved on Bramante’s original design which was based on the Pantheon dome so that it would be able to be performed.

One method employed to finance the building of St. Peter’s Basilica was the granting of indulgences in return for contributions. These indulgences would forgive their sins and release them from punishment or penance by God.

Martin Luther, a German priest, wrote to Archbishop Albrecht arguing against this “selling of indulgences”. He also included his “Disputation of Martin Luther on the Power and Efficacy of Indulgences”, which came to be known as The 95 Theses. This became a factor in starting the Reformation, the birth of Protestantism under which many Christians were brutally tortured and murdered and thus keeping with her description in Revelation 17 and 18.

It is no coincidence that the design that was selected was by Donato Bramante of a large Greek cross with a dome modeled on the dome in the Roman temple; the Pantheon, which had been set up by Augustus. It housed all of the Roman and Greek gods. The Vatican would continue the practice at the Pantheon and would bring into its museums all of the gods held by the Pantheon. Pope Julius II founded the museums in the early 16th century, which lie next to the Vatican.

In the Vatican Museum are about 5000 various statues, many of them of the Roman and Greek gods and all that once stood in the Pantheon. They also house Egyptian and other gods as well.

The Sala Rotonda in the Vatican Museums is modeled after the Pantheon right down to the oculus in the ceiling. The Vatican museum also houses the busts of the various Roman emperors and even showcases Nero’s wife’s bathtub.

The Museum’s extensive collections were obtained by the Popes over the centuries and along with the Greek and Roman Gods, The Vatican Museums themselves were originally founded as collections of works of classical archaeology. The Popes viewed themselves as the legitimate heirs of Roman history. In 1506 the original nucleus of the Vatican Museums’ classic works was set up in the Cortile delle Statue, today known as the Octagonal Court. Here Pope Julius II (della Rovere) displayed an impressive collection of ancient sculptures, including the Belvedere Apollo and the Laocoön which had just been rediscovered after centuries buried on Esquiline Hill. Laocoön, in Greek legend, is a seer and a priest of the god Apollo.

The Bronze Pigna at the Vatican once decorated a fountain in ancient Rome next to the vast Temple of Isis. It now adorns the Vatican; its rightful counterpart. Among the many gods at the Vatican is a statue of the Egyptian goddess Sekhmet, Hercules, Zeus, Diana, Artemis, and the Obelisk in St. Peter’s Square which was brought from Egypt by Caligula.

Obelisks were prominent in the architecture of the ancient Egyptians, who placed them in pairs at the entrance of temples. The obelisk symbolized the sun god Ra, and during the brief religious reformation of Akhenaten was said to be a petrified ray of the Aten, the sun disk. It was also thought that the god existed within the structure.

Obelisks also act as sundials and even more shocking it was found on the Ara Pacis or Altar of Peace that the sun appears at its tip on October 9 the date of the festival of the Temple of Palatine Apollo. Apollo was thew Roman god of the sun. Augustus placed the Temple of Apollo on a spot close to his home before dedicating it on Oct. 9, 28 BC. Apollo, the Roman god of the sun, was Augustus’ patron deity.

According to Evan Andrew’s article, “Mystery of Ancient Roman Sundial Deciphered Using Digital Modeling,” Obelisks were not just native to Egypt but were also discovered in Ancient Assyria, in Nineveh. The Ancient Romans were strongly influenced by the obelisk form, to the extent that there are now more than twice as many obelisks standing in Rome as remain in Egypt.

The most well-known is the 25-meter (82 ft.), 331-metric-ton (365-short-ton) obelisk at Saint Peter’s Square. The obelisk had stood since AD 37 on its site on the wall of the Circus of Nero, flanking Saint Peter’s Basilica: The obelisk was re-erected in Saint Peter’s Square in the 16th century by the architect Domenico Fontana. The obelisk was originally brought to Rome by Caligula.

Obelisks were also discovered in ancient Assyrian civilization, where they were erected as public monuments that commemorated the achievements of the Assyrian king and they were found in Nineveh where they depict military conquests. The Black Obelisk was erected by Shalmaneser III. The reliefs show scenes of tribute bearing as well as the depiction of two subdued rulers, one of which included Jehu the Israelite and Sua the Gilzanean, giving gestures of submission to the king, which historically was a short victory.

The Vatican via its museums houses many of the gods of the ancient world. Catholicism is the product of the merging of the Roman religion of the Magna Mater and other gods with Christianity. The Popes are named Pontifex Maximus after the high priests in the Roman Empire who were the priests who presided over the pagan gods of Rome. The vow of celibacy is an offshoot of the castrated priests who served the Magna Mater. Nuns evolved from the Vestal Virgins who were the priestesses of the Roman goddess of the hearth; Vesta, in the state religion of ancient Rome. With all of these facts, the Vatican is no doubt the identity of the Whore of Babylon of Revelation 17 and 18 and her home. The one that was predicted in Zechariah 5 would be where she would rest on her base or pedestal.

Zechariah’s book was written in 520-518 BC after the fall of Jerusalem to the Babylonians. Worship of the Queen of Heaven was one of Israel’s sins. The Israelites worshipped her in Egypt where ISIS is depicted sitting on a basket, in Zechariah she is thrust down into the basket and removed from Israel and called Wickedness, and she is taken to Babylon to a house to be put on her base. Zechariah reads To build a house for it in the land of Shinar when it is ready, the basket will be set there on its base.

Zechariah 5:7-8 And, behold, there was lifted up a talent of lead: and this is a woman that sitteth in the midst of the ephah. And he said, This is wickedness. And he cast it into the midst of the ephah; and he cast the weight of lead upon the mouth thereof.

Zechariah 5:10-11 Then said I to the angel that talked with me, Whither do these bear the ephah? And he said unto me, To build it an house in the land of Shinar: and it shall be established, and set there upon her own base.

The Vatican is the identity of the mysterious woman named Wickedness in Zechariah 5. Zechariah was written after the Babylonian captivity of Israel and it was this cult that caused Israel to turn from the true God and sin against Him. This is the woman who is carried to Babylon for the building of her temple or house, which is the Vatican.

Revelation 18:2 describes Babylon as a cage for every unclean and hated bird:

And he cried mightily with a loud voice, saying, “Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and has become a dwelling place of demons, a prison for every foul spirit, and a cage for every unclean and hated bird!

These birds represent demons. 1 Corinthians 10:20 and Deuteronomy 32:16-17 tells us that when one worships an idol they are actually worshiping demons. The unclean birds are represented in Leviticus 11:13-19, which states:

And these you shall regard as an abomination among the birds; they shall not be eaten, they are an abomination: the eagle, the vulture, the buzzard, 14 the kite, and the falcon after its kind; 15 every raven after its kind, 16 the ostrich, the short-eared owl, the sea gull, and the hawk after its kind; 17 the little owl, the fisher owl, and the screech owl; 18 the white owl, the jackdaw, and the carrion vulture; 19 the stork, the heron after its kind, the hoopoe, and the bat.

Owls and bats have demonic representations. These are flesh-eating birds that eat blood. Bats eat mosquitoes that feed on blood, some eat fish and frogs. These birds are associated with death. “every foul spirit” and every unclean bird fits the Whore of Babylon with her numerous gods and vile tortures and murders committed in the name of her gods.

It was Julius II who in 1508 commissioned Michelangelo Buonarroti to update the decoration of the Sistine Chapel. Julius II inaugurated the Sistine Chapel with Michelangelo’s new ceiling at a Solemn High Mass on All Saints Day, 1 November 1512.

It should be noted that in the Sistine Chapel, not only does Michelangelo paint Pope Julius II as skinning him alive, but he also painted the Cardinal at the time as a devil. Even more shocking is that within the wall of the Sistine Chapel are 12 goat heads similar to Baphomet’s flanked by demons. Baphomet-like goat heads; a symbol of Satan are painted in the Sistine Chapel. Someone stated that it was to depict animal sacrifices that were done in the Bible. Others thought the goat represented the hell portion of his painting which represents heaven and hell. Whatever the opinion, it is clear that the goat which looks like a Baphomet looks over the Sistine Chapel. This is no coincidence.

The Vatican a Place of Money Changers

The Vatican is a place of money changers, which Jesus clearly condemned in the Gospels. Matthew 21:12 describes:

“And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the seats of them that sold doves, And said unto them, It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves.”

Jesus made it clear that money changes did not belong in God’s Temple and yet money changers are in the Vatican from paying to go into the Vatican to the stories just outside where you can buy all kinds of religious paraphernalia and souvenirs. It is estimated that the Vatican brings in about 80 million euros a year in entrance fees alone. It should be no surprise that the temple of the Whore of Babylon, a house of Satan would have money changers.

The Wealth of the Vatican

The Whore of Babylon wears symbols of great wealth, which also pinpoints the Vatican as the Whore of Babylon.

Revelation 17:4 reads,

“The woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet, and adorned with gold and precious stones and pearls.”

Vatican tickets bring in about 80 million euros a year. The Sistine chapel is worth 400 billion US dollars alone. The Vatican museums possess an estimated 11 trillion US dollars in art.

They display works from the immense collection built up by the Popes throughout the centuries includes some of the most renowned classical sculptures and important masterpieces of Renaissance art in the world. The museums contain roughly 70,000 works, of which 20,000 are on display. The museums currently employ 640 people who work in 40 different administrative, scholarly, and restoration departments.

The Vatican’s great wealth lines perfectly with the description of the Whore of Babylon in the book of Revelation.