D4T,
I am still quivering under my desk in the fetal
position, just plain skeerd to take on this issue because I know you've got some "partial preterist punch pending".
Since our last exchange, I have sought God's counsels and have meditated on some scriptural settings, in particular:
Jer 51:6-12,
Rev 14:7-12, 16:15-21, 17 1-7, and
Rev 18.
My premise (admittedly a bias) is that the
city of Babylon we read about in the OT would be a foreshadow of what Mystery Babylon would be in the realm of spiritual dynamics.
I submit that as Jerusalem was a center in the dynamic of natural Israel and New Jerusalem is the revelation of God's holy assembly, the same applies to Babylon and Mystery Babylon. Mystery Babyon will not be a place, but rather a community comprised of believers in some false salvation (I was searching for God to provide me some clearer phrase to express this, but for now I do not have a better one). The power that comes from earthly wealth is worshipped as the alternative to abiding in God's house. This is why I made an earlier reference to Balaam as a natural example; seeing gain as godliness.
We read in Jerimiah 51:7 that Babyon was God's GOLDEN CUP and those nations that drink from it become drunken, the identical language is applied to the Great Whore of
Rev 17:4.
Babylon [hath been] a golden cup in the LORD'S hand, that made all the earth drunken: the nations have drunken of her wine; therefore the nations are mad.
The fornication bears a fruit. The fruit supplies the feedstock for a wine. The wine induces a drunken condition.
I continue to be drawn to a couple of strange things:
SEDUCTION is at the core of this MYSTERY BABYLON, but I am confident it is not in any manner SEXUAL. Since we understand the power of seduction as it pertains to a harlot and fornications, it is used as the language to convey the imagery; the rulers, kings, and nations are drawn to her ability to provide pleasures.
Then the most fascinating thing is recorded by John in
Rev 17:6
And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration.
John looked upon this imagery WITH GREAT ADMIRATION. An image that he understood to be drunken with blood of Saints and martyrs.
What ever it is, its seduction transcends our normal ability to even imagine; its inticements are fully enveloped with a mystical charm and beauty (of some kind). So much so, that it prompts the angel to ask:
Wherefore didst thou marvel?
So. prompted by this thread's OP, I speculated and proposed a MYSTERY (spiritual) alternative [faith] that 'invests' all confidence in the riches (a Golden Cup) in the economies of this world. Then, I wondered outloud (possibly, in hindsight a mistake), concerning whether the blood of saints and martyrs may resulted from something similar to what charmed John...that in looking into this Golden Cup of Mystery Babylon, their vision was overtaken by something 'marvelous' and they were trapped.
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