BABYLON
BIBLICAL AND THEOLOGICAL HISTORY
© Carlos Padilla – March 2024
Babel and its famous tower, a ziggurat, a pyramid that would reach the heavens, or that would connect the post flood generation with the heavens, with the Divinity, some way. A city capital of a country and of an empire. The more relevant people of the history of Babylon are the prophets Isaiah and Jeremiah who prophesied its fall, but over all the prophet Daniel who governed Babylon with his friends loyal to Yahweh, thrown into the fiery furnace and to the lion’s den, from where the Lord set them free. Before them was Nimrod (rebel), son of Cush, grandson of Noah, the strong hunter of Genesis 10:8-10; Mica 5:6, and founder of the city. And Nebuchadnezzar, the king of the Babylonian Empire in 605 B.C. (Against Apion, 1:9 by Flavius Josephus). But it is the dream of Nebuchadnezzar, interpreted by the prophet Daniel, about the great statue of four different materials, struck after by the stone that became a great mountain that filled the whole earth, which showed that the Babylonian Empire would fall as a punishment of God for destroying Jerusalem and deporting the people of God, being Babylon succeeded by other three empires, which represent in universal history the Medo-Persian Empire, the Greek Empire, and lastly the Roman Empire. Babylon appears in the universal history in three ways, to which we must add the fourth which appears in the Bible, in the book of Revelation. The city that became the capital of the country and of the empire. The country of Babylon. The Babylonian Empire. Babylon the mystical, prophetical, spiritual.
BABYLON – CITY CAPITAL OF THE COUNTRY AND OF THE EMPIRE
Babel, Bab-ilu in Acadian, Greek termination on: “door of God” is the first name of the city of Babylon. Illustrated Bible Dictionary Vila-Escuain pg. 96. Babel only appears twice in the Bible, in Genesis 10:10 and 11:9. The famous story of the Tower of Babel receives its name from the city, which was the beginning oof the kingdom of Nimrod. The rut of the name when referring to the tower is balbel, from balal, which is “confuse” according to the Hebraists Keil and Delitzsch in their Old Testament Commentary. That tower with the form of a ziggurat, it would be one more, like in every city of the time, bur higher, from which they would want to warship the heavens. That was exactly where God said: “…let Us go down and there confuse their language…” Genesis 11, as the judgment of God against the confederation against God planned by Nimrod. Since then, and suddenly, they stopped building and all the population left in all directions and giving origin to different languages.
The city got to be the capital of the country and of the empire of the same name with Hammurabi, and became political and religious centre. But it would be with Nebuchadnezzar when it would reach its greatest splendour in the IV century B.C. who developed the city until it became the most important of its time. The famous hanging gardens that Nebuchadnezzar had built for his wife are copied even today in many places. Herodoto talks of dimensions of 23 km of length, with square shape and through the middle flowed the river Euphrates, with great docks in each shore. Palaces, temples, and brick constructions. According to the prophecy it was destroyed. Archaeology is rich and abundant in the excavation of Shinar, at the shore of the Euphrates, there is even a story by Herodoto on the Tower of Babel, but archaeology of its print is documented since 1913. Furthermore, the archaeological findings prove the worst type of idolatry possible, with multitude of divinities, which is a reference to spiritual slavery which makes it symbolize a religious harlot who seduces the souls to worship the different gods, which has been replicated in the Greek and Roman culture, being the influence of the Roman Catholic saints calendar, a god/es for each problem, a saint of virgin for each problem to whom pray and worship, promises, religious slavery. The Apostle Paul taught on this deviation: “For there is one God, and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all.” (1 Timothy 2:5-6).
BABYLON – COUNTRY
The Bible also calls the country of Babylon as Shinar (Genesis 10:10, Isaiah 11:11) or simply as the country of the Chaldeans (Jeremiah 24:5, Ezequiel 12:13). The area of Mesopotamia, and the territory of the rivers Tigris and Euphrates were part, and from them the capital drank, as well as the country of the Persian Gulf. It was formed by two political regions, Sumer and Accad being some proposed dates of the first occupation 3.000 or 2.500 B.C. and there is not much earlier information. The Sumerians knew the sexagesimal and decimal systems and were the inventors of the cuneiform scripture. The Semites governed since 2.200 or 2.400 B.C.
Elamites and Amorites, but Hammurabi, sixth king of the first dynasty reigned Sumer and Accad, both adopting the name of Babylon, conquering all Mesopotamia. He developed and built great public constructions as well as compiling a legislative code of 282 precepts. Written in cuneiform, there is a copy on black basalt, a stela standing in the Louvre Museum, known as the Code of Hammurabi. A legislation of a clear pagan inspiration, hard on the poof and unmerciful with slaves, favouring the favourites, not caring of the week, nor of children, or elder, nor of foreigners, and does not talk of God. According to Courville it is contemporary of the Law of Moses, which clearly is in another level of mercy and holiness more elevated, which denotes its divine inspiration, with a clear focus on justice, on the week and needed. The 10 Commandments are the anteroom of the 613 precepts of which it is composed.
Defeated by Asyria, by the Aramaic, by Elam for covenant with king Merodach-Baladan in 721 B.C. being king of Babylon. Sent an embassy to king Ezekiah of Judah and defeated by Sennacherib.
After the fall of Jerusalem by Titus, the Roma general, schools of study of the Law, the Torah were founded in Babylon, from where the Babylonian Talmud and the Masoretic Text of the Old Testament would come from, until they could return to Jerusalem. This Masoretic Text is, exactly the one that has been kept as the compilation of the originals of the Hebrew and Aramaic of the 39 books of the canon of the Bible by the Masoretes, a group of masters of the translation of the Torah, the Tanaj, Jewish erudite, who following the most strict methos of copy (they counted every manuscript word by word to check they were exact, amongst other methods), they were the ones used for the Spanish translation of the Bible, Version Reina-Valera as well as the King James Bible.
BABYLON – BABYLONIAN EMPIRE
The history of the Babylonian Empire appears I two different times: the old empire and the new empire. The first begins in the XIX to XVI centuries B.C. and the new about 600 B.C. being this one the one that is part of Daniel’s Prophecy and being the one that symbolizes the head of gold of the statue of the dream of Nebuchadnezzar, the same empire that fell in a demolishing way by the hand of Cyrus king of Persia in 539 B.C., fulfilling the prophecy and being succeeded by the Empire of Medes and Persia.
The old empire extended from Elam to Assyria and to the Mediterranean. Ur-Nammu, first king of the third dynasty of Ur, codified the laws of the Sumerians until Susa. In the 625 B.C. Nabopolasar founded the new empire, as king of Babylon, also known as Chaldean Empire. Destroyed Ninive and his son Nebuchadnezzar II defeated Feroh Necho, and he beautified Babylon so much that he is known as a great builder king, he took Jerusalem twice, and razed it in 585 B.C. From some years before this terrible event, some small silver scrolls were found with the oldest Bible Text of the Old Testament, south of Jerusalem, due to excavation works in the tombs of the valley of Ketef Hennom, in 1979 by professor Barkay, dated between VII and VI centuries B.C. as they were next to other thousand objects, and by palaeography by Dr. Mc Carter, specialist in ancient Semitic scripture of the Johns Hopkins University, containing the Priestly Blessing of Numbers 6:22-26 and Deuteronomy 7. Coincides with the times of prophet Jeremiah, predate the invasion of Nebuchadnezzar and the destruction of Jerusalem and of the first Temple. But not long after Babylon was invaded by Darius, general of Cyrus, king of Persia, who would reign over Babylon between 539 and 332 B.C. when Alexander the Great invaded, domaining until 323, followed by Seleucids, Parthians, until the Muslim Arabs, until the present date.
MYSTICAL AND PROPHETICAL BABYLON
In Revelation we find the mystical and prophetical Babylon, known as Babylon the Great, the mother of harlots and of the abominations of the earth. It is a spirit contrary to God that manifested in the empires of antiquity, in governments of history, and in present society in general, seducing the believer with a culture against holiness, and using deceit and false religion by the devil to fight against God and against his people, whether Israel, or the Church. We know through history that the empire fell, that governments antichrist have fallen and will fall, that the heretic religious system will fall, and that society and the culture against God which offers to live in sin, will fall. The Kingdom of God will be established for eternity and Jesus Christ – Yahshua will reign over the Church, all who love God and will receive His Son Jesus Christ as Saviour.
To go deeper on the prophetic Babylon of Revelation in a mystical and spiritual sense you may read the Prophetical Studies:
Daniel. The man faithful to God. (Being translated).
CONCLUSION
Babylon, in all its versions, has its beginning in the old Babel, with its famous tower, that ziggurat, a pyramid that would reach the heavens, where after the punishment of God was the origin of the different languages that are in the world. We saw how that city got to be the capital of a country and of an empire. We have remembered two leaders of that city, Nimrod, the rebel against God, and Nebuchadnezzar, the king of the Babylonian Empire, another person who saw himself as powerful, and who God also destroyed, not without showing him in the famous dream interpreted by the prophet Daniel, about the great statue of four different material, which prophesized the empires that would succeed it.
Babylon fell by the punishment of God due to the pagan life against God, and also for destroying Jerusalem and deported the people of God. Three empires of history followed her, and also fell. The Empire of Medo-Persia, the Greek Empire, and the Roman Empire.
But, as well as seeing how Babylon concludes its history, which appears in the universal history in three forms, how it is destroyed for being a rebel society against God, which is no other than a symbol of what the society of the world is in all times, as it is now, exactly being that symbol, being the representation of the world of the man without God, we also see it fall prophetically as spiritual and mystical symbol in the last book of the Bible. Revelation reminds us of and prophesizes the fall of the mistic, prophetical and spiritual Babylon, that one which still is in the hearts of many who trust in themselves, or in the world, in society, in religion, or in the church without Christ, that Babylon will fall heavily from the hearts of those who don’t look to Jesus Christ – Yahshua and who still live according to their own mind. The apostle Peter use to call Rome, Babylon (1 Peter 5:13). I close with the worlds in the book of Revelation after the fall of Babylon who merchandises with souls of men (18:13): “…Alleluia! Salvation and glory and honor and power belong to the Lord our God! For true and righteous are His judgments because He has judged the great harlot who corrupted the earth with her fornication; and He has avenged on her the blood of His servants shed by her…” (19:1-2). Amen.
