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The Great Controversy
the martyrs of Jesus.” Babylon is further declared to be “that great city,
which reigneth over the kings of the earth.”
Revelation 17:4-6, 18
. The
power that for so many centuries maintained despotic sway over the
monarchs of Christendom is Rome. The purple and scarlet color, the
gold and precious stones and pearls, vividly picture the magnificence
and more than kingly pomp affected by the haughty see of Rome. And
no other power could be so truly declared “drunken with the blood of
the saints” as that church which has so cruelly persecuted the followers
of Christ. Babylon is also charged with the sin of unlawful connection
with “the kings of the earth.” It was by departure from the Lord, and
alliance with the heathen, that the Jewish church became a harlot; and
Rome, corrupting herself in like manner by seeking the support of
worldly powers, receives a like condemnation.
Babylon is said to be “the mother of harlots.” By her daughters
must be symbolized churches that cling to her doctrines and traditions,
and follow her example of sacrificing the truth and the approval of God,
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in order to form an unlawful alliance with the world. The message of
Revelation 14
, announcing the fall of Babylon must apply to religious
bodies that were once pure and have become corrupt. Since this
message follows the warning of the judgment, it must be given in the
last days; therefore it cannot refer to the Roman Church alone, for that
church has been in a fallen condition for many centuries. Furthermore,
in the eighteenth chapter of the Revelation the people of God are called
upon to come out of Babylon. According to this scripture, many of
God’s people must still be in Babylon. And in what religious bodies
are the greater part of the followers of Christ now to be found? Without
doubt, in the various churches professing the Protestant faith. At the
time of their rise these churches took a noble stand for God and the
truth, and His blessing was with them. Even the unbelieving world
was constrained to acknowledge the beneficent results that followed
an acceptance of the principles of the gospel. In the words of the
prophet to Israel: “Thy renown went forth among the heathen for thy
beauty: for it was perfect through My comeliness, which I had put
upon thee, saith the Lord God.” But they fell by the same desire which
was the curse and ruin of Israel—the desire of imitating the practices
and courting the friendship of the ungodly. “Thou didst trust in thine
own beauty, and playedst the harlot because of thy renown.”
Ezekiel
16:14, 15
.