Author	Thread: On Revelation 18: 23 - Christ Is Not In Babylon, Its Merchants and Its Pharmakeia
Admin	On Revelation 18: 23 - Christ Is Not In Babylon, Its Merchants and Its Pharmakeia Posted : 20 Nov, 2013 06:48 AM On Revelation 18: 23 - Christ Is Not In Babylon, Its Merchants and Its Pharmakeia "And the light of a candle shall shine no more at all in thee; and the voice of the bridegroom and of the bride shall be heard no more at all in thee: for thy merchants were the great men of the earth; for by thy sorceries were all nations deceived." Revelation 18: 23 In this brief and somewhat cryptic verse, John, writing from the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and perhaps not fully understanding what the Spirit was telling him to write, gives us a great deal of knowledge. But we have to understand the language of metaphor to grasp all the knowledge in the verse. The light of the candle not shining any longer in Babylon, and the voice of the bridegroom and of his bride not being heard in Babylon is not too difficult to understand. Except that the literal "hermeneutic" of John Darby, C.I. Scofield, Lewis S. Chafer and others insists that all scripture must be interpreted literally. Pharmakeia, translated as sorceries has a double meaning. It can mean pharmakeia as drugs, or it can refer to sorcery as a form of deception. Babylon has deceived the people, the nations with its false doctrines. "For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies." Revelation 18: 3 is sometimes referred to as the maddening wine of Babylon. Babylon is deceptive and its "wine" makes people mad. The "wrath of her fornication" refers back to Revelation 17: 1-11, especially to Revelation 17: 2-5, on the kings having relations with Babylon, and Babylon as Mystery Babylon the Great, etc. (I have to write one version of Revelation 17: 2-5 for Christian dating For Free and a different version for other Christian forums, since it takes time to figure out what words are being censored by CDFF). Babylon is the organized Christian community after the falling away from sound doctrine of II Thessalonians 2: 3-4, and Babylon is the II Timothy 3 church. I want to get into the pharamakeia as drugs part of Babylon's deceiving the people by its sorceries and into the emporoi, translated as merchants. Merchants is from emporoi, which Strong's Exhaustive Concordance, number 1713, says means "a wholesale tradesman." A Linguistic Key To the Greek New Testament, Vol 2, by Fritz Riennecker, 1980, page 508, says emporoi means "...merchants who deal in foreign imports and exports." They include the world traders. So, the emporoi are not just local small businessmen, but are international merchants, now the giant international corporations.. Sorceries is from the Greek pharmakeia, Strong's Exhaustive Concordance number 5331, which is said to mean "medication, �pharmacy,� magic, literally or figuratively - sorcery, witchcraft.� So sorceries in Revelation 18: 23 can mean both that the merchants as world traders of Babylon drug the nations with their medications, but also in a broader sense, Babylon and her merchants, the giant international corporations, deceive the world by their more figurative �magic� or witchcraft, the allure and bait of these merchants to appeal to the flesh of men. Remember I John 2: 16, �For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.� The giant international pharmaceutical corporations, many of whom are headquarted in the United States, where they have power and influence, and the medical profession, are also the world traders, the emporoi. Being international traders the emporoi are linked to the financial elite, the big bankers. So, we can see that just in that one verse, Revelation 18: 23, there is knowledge about Babylon not only being metaphoric for Christianity after the falling away from sound doctrine, but also for deception being worked in a broader way than just be false religion and about economics and the financial elite. In the Nazi regime there was a large conglomerate of corporations - the Internationale Geshellshaft Farbenindustrie, or I.G. Farben, run by the Swiss banker Herman Schmitz. Drug, or pharmaceutical corporations, were an important part of I.G. Farben, including the Bayer Company, Merck, and Hoechst. A branch of the German parent company of Merck was established in the United States. In 1891, George Merck, grandson of the German Emanuel Merck, took over the Merck New York office and established Merck & Company. In about 1902 the American Merck Company made and sold chemicals including bismuths, iodides, and narcotics such as morphine and cocaine. This was the George W. Merck who was head of Merck and Company, a large American pharmaceutical outfit. Merck remains one of the giant U.S. pharmaceutical corporations, with its origins in Germany, where the parent company was part of the Nazi business empire. And Revelation 18: 1-3 tells us that an angel who has great power and lit up the earth with his glory cried with a strong voice "Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird. 3. For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies." Babylon, including the giant pharmaceutical corporations as the merchants of the earth, and their well paid salesmen the doctors, becomes so corrupt that God will judge it by bringing it down. Babylon will become a waste place spiritually inhabited by devils. On an Internet site the authors of an article, Has Drug-Driven Medicine Become A Form of Human Sacrifice?, tell us: "Given this unseemly state of affairs, some believe we are on the precipice of a medical end-of-times or �Pharmageddon," if you will, where medicine is no longer directly associated in any way with healing, but rather is a form of mass control and a highly organized means of simultaneously defrauding the public of its wealth and health." The link to this site is: http://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/Health_and_Healing/conversations/topics/69172 "After all, is there any greater absurdity than a medical model that treats the symptoms of disease with sub-lethal dosages of toxic chemicals and in which there is no attempt to uncover, understand or remove the causes of those imbalances?" Here they cite part of Revelation 18: 23, "...for thy merchants were the great men of the earth; for by thy sorceries were all nations deceived." They are interpreting this part of Revelation 18: 23 to mean that the drug companies and doctors as the merchants (emporoi, the world traders, or international merchants) are deceiving the nations (the peoples the world) by their pharmakeia, or drug sorcery. As a part of the Babylon of prophecy the drug companies and the medical establishment are deceiving the nations by using drugs. The medicine men and drug companies claim their drugs heal people, but in reality many of the toxic chemicals they sell at enormous prices are harmful to the human body. And this site goes on to say that "The sole reliance on Pharmaceuticals reveals quite a lot about the agenda underpinning modern medical practice. The Greek word Pharmakon has the following meanings: poison, potion, charm, spell, enchantment." But the origin of the word goes back much farther: A Pharmakas in Ancient Greek religion was a kind of human scapegoat (a slave, a cripple or a criminal) who was chosen and expelled from the community at times of disaster (famine, invasion or plague) or at times of calendrical crisis, when purification was needed. [Source: Wikipedia]� �The term "pharmakos" later became the term "pharmakeus" which refers to "a drug, spell-giving potion, druggist, poisoner, by extension a magician or a sorcerer." A variation of this term is "pharmakon" a complex term meaning sacrament, remedy, poison, talisman, cosmetic, perfume or intoxicant. From this, the modern term "pharmacology" emerged. [Source: Wikipedia]� "One no longer has to look to religion for the absolutist claim to truth. Medical science has laid claim to the body in the same way that religions once laid claim to the soul. The physician today -- albeit a glorified "applied pharmacologist" -- has become the "priest of the body," capable of influencing the course of life or death by the quality, or combinations, of nostrums (s)he is able to apply to the problem (i.e. patient) at hand." And - there is a connection of the giant pharmaceutical corporations back to the Nazis. Revelation 6: 5 says "And when he had opened the third seal, I heard the third beast say, Come and see. And I beheld, and lo a black horse; and he that sat on him had a pair of balances in his hand." The Black Horse is the same beast as the leopard in Daniel 7: 6, "After this I beheld, and lo another, like a leopard, which had upon the back of it four wings of a fowl; the beast had also four heads; and dominion was given to it." This beast is Nazi Germany, plus the post-World War II influences that came from the Nazi movement, especially in the U.S. as we assimilated many Nazi intelligence operatives and scientists after 1945. The Black Horse also metaphorically represents Internationale Geshellshaft Farbenindustrie, or I.G. Farben, the huge corporation that operated during the Nazi era. Post Reply
View Profile History	On Revelation 18: 23 - Christ Is Not In Babylon, Its Merchants and Its Pharmakeia Posted : 20 Nov, 2013 08:18 AM WHAT CITY BUILT ON 7 HILLS AND GREAT SEA PORT WILL BE THE HEADQUARTERS OF 666 DURING THE 1260-DAY GREAT TRIBULATION?? {666 is called the Beast 36 or 6X6 times in the book of Revelation} Revelation 13:5,7 The Beast {666} will exercise his authority for 42 {30-day} months {or 1260 days}... And he will be given power to make war against the saints and conquer them. {See Dan 7:25} Rev 17:18: The *WOMAN you saw {In Revelation17:1-18} is the great *CITY that will rule over the kings of the earth. Rev 17:3,5,6,8,9,12,13, 18: I saw a WOMAN sitting on a scarlet Beast {666} with 7 heads and 10 horns...The Beast, which you saw, once was {alive}, now is not {Alive in AD 96}, and will come out of the Abyss {Or Hell} and go to his destruction {See Rev 19:19,20} This title was written on her forehead �Mystery: Babylon the Great: Mother of Prostitutes and of the Abominations of the earth.� I saw that the WOMAN was drunk with the blood of the saints, the blood of those who bore testimony to Jesus. The Beast {666}, which you saw, once was {alive}, now is not {Alive in AD 96}, and will come up out of the Abyss {Or Hell} and go to his destruction {See Rev 19:19,20} ...This calls for a mind with wisdom. The 7 Heads are SEVEN HILLS {ROME} on which the WOMAN sits {Or reigns}... The 10 horns you saw are 10 kings who will give their authority to the Beast {666}...The WOMAN you saw is the great *CITY that rules over the kings of the earth. Revelation 18:17-20,24 �Every sea captain, and all who travel by ship, the sailors, and all who earn their living from the sea, will stand far off. When they see the smoke of her burning, they will exclaim, �Was there ever a city like this great city?� They will throw dust on their heads, and with weeping and mourning cry out: �Woe, Woe, O great *CITY, where all who had ships on the sea became rich through her wealth! In one hour she has been brought to ruin! Rejoice over her, O heaven! Rejoice saints and apostles and prophets! God has judged her for the way she treated you....In her was found the blood of prophets and of saints, and of all who have been killed on the earth.� Most Bible scholars believe that the book of First Peter was written shortly after the beginning of Nero�s Roman persecution of Christians in AD 64 because of I Peter 4:12,13 & 5:8,9. We know that Peter and his wife were living in Rome at this time. Peter was inspired to write in I Peter 5:13: �She {Peter�s wife} who is in *BABYLON* {Nickname for *ROME*!} sends you her greetings, and so does my son Mark.� Apparently some Christians including Peter were inspired to call ROME �BABYLON� after Nero�s terrible persecution of Christians starting in AD 64. This is very interesting since the evil city of the End-Times is called �BABYLON� 6 times in Revelation 14:8; 16:19; 17:5; 18:2,10,21. All encyclopedias agree that Babylon was completely evacuated in 275 BC and completely destroyed by 141 BC. The Wikipedia encyclopedia states, "By 141 BC, when the Parthian Empire took over the region, Babylon was in complete desolation and obscurity." The only question that remains is: Was Babylon rebuilt so that there could be people living in Babylon around AD 65 when Peter wrote 1 Peter 5:13??? Which leads us to the promises of God in Jeremiah 50:1-3,13: This is the word the Lord spoke through Jeremiah concerning Babylon.."Babylon will be captured... A nation from the north will attack her and lay waste her land. No one will live in it; both men and animals will flee away!" Also read Jeremiah 52:52:61-64: And God ALWAYS keeps His promises. If you check out the latest Iraqi Tour Guides you will notice the following statement: "Today, Babylon lies COMPLETELY in ruins. A large and splendidly carved stone lion is all that remains of its former glories." I was a missionary in Jerusalem and Jerusalem was never known as the city on 7 hills. It has always been known as the city on 6 mountains {Not Hills} as per Wikipedia {Jerusalem Mountains} which are {1} Mount Herzl {2} Mount of Olives {3} Mount Zion {4} Mount Scopus {5} temple Mount {6} Har Menuchot. �Babylon� {Nicknamed Rome by Peter} is a �GREAT SEAPORT� in Rev 18:17-19; JUST LIKE ROME and UNLIKE Babylon whose ruins are NOW 4 miles from the very shallow Euphrates River; and UNLIKE Jerusalem which is 2000 to 3000 feet above sea level and 35 miles from the Mediterranean Sea. Babylon is also completely FLAT whereas the End-Time "Babylon" will be a city built on 7 Hills JUST LIKE ROME!!� Rev 17:18: �The woman you saw {Rev 17:3--Who sits with the Beast with 7 heads} is the great *CITY* {Rome--nicknamed Babylon in I Peter 5:13--See Rev 17:5a} that will rule over the kings of the earth.� The headquarters of 666 will be destroyed about 2 weeks before the Last Day.{See Rev 16:10-16} Rev 18:19: �Woe! Woe, O great *CITY*, where all who had ships on the sea became rich through her wealth! In one hour she has been brought to ruin! Rejoice, saints and apostles and prophets! God has judged her for the way she treated you...In her was found the blood of prophets and of the saints and of all who have been killed on the earth!� The mention of �seven hills� in conjunction with the Harlot Woman (Rev. 17:9) is often seen as an allusion to seven hills known to be associated with Rome: The Rome view is also built upon the assumption that the seven hills of Revelation 17:9 identify the topography of the ancient city of Rome. Because literature of the ancient world contains dozens of references to the seven hills of Rome, the ancient city of Rome was universally known as the city of the seven hills. Thus, such a topographical reference would immediately suggest Rome in the minds of John�s original audience. This suggestion is especially true given the fact that the seven hills were the nucleus of the city on the left bank of the Tiber River and given the fact that an unusual festival called the septimontium received its name because of this topographical feature. Rome has always been known as the CITY built on 7 Hills by Romulus from whom Rome gets its name. The following is a quote from Wikipedia Encyclopedia: The Seven Hills of Rome (Italian: Sette colli di Roma) east of the river Tiber form the geographical heart of Rome, within the walls of the ancient city. The SEVEN HILLS are: Aventine Hill, Caelian Hill, Captoline Hill, Palantine Hill, Quirinal Hill and Viminal Hill. In addition, the notion that John�s audience would have understood the imagery of Revelation 17 as referring to the topography of Rome seems strengthened by the discovery of the Dea Roma Coin minted in A.D. 71 in Asia Minor. One side of the coin contains the portrait of the emperor. The reverse side of the coin depicts Rome, a Roman pagan goddess, sitting on seven hills seated by the waters of the Tiber River. There are obvious similarities between the Dea Roma Coin and the imagery of Revelation 17. In both cases, the goddess and the harlot are seated on seven hills and are seated either on or by the waters (Rev. 17:1). In addition, the name of the goddess was thought by many Romans to be Amor, which is Roma spelled backwards. Amor was the goddess of love and sexuality. Thus, both the woman on the coin and the woman in Revelation 17 represent harlotry (Rev. 17:5). Furthermore, the coin equates Roma with the power of the Roman Empire, which was active in persecuting Christians of John�s day. The placement of Vespasian on one side of the coin and Roma on the other makes this connection. . . . The goddess is also pictured as holding a sword, which may depict Rome�s imperial power. This imagery parallels with the woman in Revelation 17 who is said to be drunk with the blood of the saints {Rev. 17:5,9} :angel::angel::angel::angel::angel::angel::angel: Post Reply
View Profile History	On Revelation 18: 23 - Christ Is Not In Babylon, Its Merchants and Its Pharmakeia Posted : 20 Nov, 2013 09:07 AM The theology of John Darby, C.I. Scofield and Lewis S. Chafer not only claims that God now has two peoples, disagreeing with Christ in John 10: 16 and with Paul in Romans 12: 4-5, the theology differs from or rejects - or tries to ignore - other New Testament scriptures. And then there is the huge problem of the literalist "hermeneutic" of Darby, Scofield, Chafer, Lindsey and all the false prophets of that bent. The language of metaphor is used all over the Old Testament and in the New Testament, especially in the Book of Revelation. Their literalist "hermeneutic" leads them into fables, like their one man anti-Christ figure, who is said to make a treaty with national Israel, and then go into their newly rebuilt temple and desecrate it, a story not much different from what you might find in old comic books. "Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which minister questions, rather than godly edifying which is in faith: so do." I Timothy 1: 4 "For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; 4. And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables." I Timothy 4" 3-4 "For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty." II Peter 1: 16 Remember Hal Lindsey's Cobra Helicopters are a literalist interpretation of the locust-scorpions of Revelation 9: 1-11. What the literalist "hermeneutic" does to the metaphoric language of scripture is remove the knowledge in the metaphoric language and replace it with fables - or with other literal interpretions like saying Babylon in Jeremiah 50 and 51 and in Revelation 17 and 18 is about the historical Babylon whose capital was in present day Iraq. In rejecting the knowledge given by God in metaphoric language the literalist "hermeneutic" of Darby et al runs into Hosea 4: 6, "For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty." Isaiah 5: 13 says "Therefore my people are gone into captivity, because they have no knowledge: and their honourable men are famished, and their multitude dried up with thirst." "Therefore thus saith the LORD of hosts; Because ye have not heard my words, 9. Behold, I will send and take all the families of the north, saith the LORD, and Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon, my servant, and will bring them against this land, and against the inhabitants thereof, and against all these nations round about, and will utterly destroy them, and make them an astonishment, and an hissing, and perpetual desolations. 10.Moreover I will take from them the voice of mirth, and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom, and the voice of the bride, the sound of the millstones, and the light of the candle. 11. And this whole land shall be a desolation, and an astonishment; and these nations shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years. 12. And it shall come to pass, when seventy years are accomplished, that I will punish the king of Babylon, and that nation, saith the LORD, for their iniquity, and the land of the Chaldeans, and will make it perpetual desolations." Jeremiah 25: 8-12 Then, Jeremiah 50 and 51 use Babylon as a metaphor for the captivity of physical Israel to false doctrines and practices. God gives them over to their false doctrines and calls what they are now captive to - their doctrines and practices - Babylon. But he calls them out of that captivity to false doctrines in Jeremiah 51: 6, "Flee out of the midst of babylon, and deliver every man his soul: be not cut off in her iniquity; for this is the time of the Lord's vengeance; he will render unto her a recompence." The followers of Darby get this wrong and think it is calling those of physical Israel out of literal Babylon. But Babylon as a metaphor for God's people being in captivity to their own false doctrines and false practices runs twice. Look at Revelation 17 and 18, here again is Babylon as metaphor for God's people, who the followers of Darby insist is their "church," being in false doctrines and practices. "Come out of her, my people, and be ye not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues." Revelation 18: 4. Would Darby's people again say Revelation 18: 4 is calling God's people out of literal historical Babylon? Who knows what they might come up with? Post Reply
View Profile History	On Revelation 18: 23 - Christ Is Not In Babylon, Its Merchants and Its Pharmakeia Posted : 20 Nov, 2013 09:18 AM What came out was "In rejecting the knowledge given by God in metaphoric language the literalist "hermeneutic" of Darby et al runs into Hosea 4: 6, "For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty." The highlighting and copy function did not work right and it put in the previous quote from II Peter 1: 16. Hosea 4: 6 actually says "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee..." Post Reply