Revelation 16:19

And the great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell: and Babylon the great was remembered in the sight of God, to give unto her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of his wrath.

And the great city was divided into three parts ... This is the first of three very important observations revealed in this verse, and they should not be confused.

1. The great city divided into three parts is clearly connected with the "Jerusalem-Sodom-Egypt" of Revelation 11:13, where was prophesied the collapse of the urban world. Many have missed this. Moffatt's view that the great earthquake "shatters Jerusalem into three parts and utterly destroys pagan cities"[65] is undoubtedly wrong. Moffatt failed to understand that the Jerusalem Sodom-Egypt of Revelation 11 is a figure of urban civilization, and the reference here can have no application at all to the literal Jerusalem. There is no prophecy of the destruction of Jerusalem anywhere in Revelation. John of course knew Jesus' prophecy of the destruction of Jerusalem; but when Revelation was written, the concern of the Christians regarded Rome, not Jerusalem. Incidentally, this is almost certain proof of the writing of Revelation before Jerusalem was destroyed.

2. "And the cities of the nations fell ..." This explains what was meant by the dividing of the city into three parts; it also illuminates the same figure of "a tenth of the city fell" in Revelation 11:13, where it was God's tithe of all wicked cities; here it is "a third," a very significant part, but not the majority that fell. Both figures regard urban civilization, and '"the breaking into three parts means its complete breakup."[66] "The cities of civilization, the achievement of man's demon-driven pride, will ... collapse?[67]

3. "And Babylon the great was remembered in the sight of God ..." "This is the society and the philosophy represented by the two beasts, which in due course will be called Babylon."[68] We consider this comment by Wilcock one of the most discerning encountered anywhere. The Babylon described here is not pagan Rome only, but "Babylon the Great," embracing also that image of pagan Rome that became in time apostate Christianity. Therefore, both the land-beast and the sea-beast (pagan Rome and apostate Christian Rome) are here meant. They are here spoken of as one, since one was an image of the other, and both operated from the same seven hills. The expression "Babylon the Great" is no doubt "the symbol of the whole satanic structure."[69] Again from Wilcock, "Bowl seven sweeps away time and history, and replaces them with eternity."[70] "Both the preceding and the succeeding verses here must be referred to the judgment day."[71]

To give her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of his wrath ... This refers to the complete destruction of the city.[72] Such awful judgments should not blind us to the fact that, "If God were not to punish unrighteousness, the concept of a moral universe would have to be discarded."[73] Although some interpreters have held that, "The utmost limit of this prophetic passage was the end of the Roman world,"[74] many of the ablest expositors have been able to see the deeper meaning that, "The fall of pagan Rome is but one illustration of the overthrow of Babylon."[75] "Each age has its Babylon."[76] We reproduce here a summary of Lenski's wonderful comment on this as it applies to our own times:

How proudly the anti-Christian propaganda builds the Babylon of today! Godless science imagines that the structure cannot fall. Its walls are granite. The Scriptures are only childish stories, myths. How can Papal Rome ever fall? It is built on Peter and overshadows the world. The outmoded "thought patterns" of Scripture have long crumbled into dust, and the scientific religion of reason alone endures. Fall? The very idea is preposterous. But the word of the Lord says, "like the chaff which the wind driveth away" (Psalms 1:4); "the multitude of the strangers shall be as small dust; yea, it shall be at an instant suddenly (Isaiah 29:5); but the WORD OF THE LORD endureth forever."[77]

We will not debate the proposition that John himself knew the full scope and depth of his prophecy, for he probably did not know. To limit the book of Revelation to the human knowledge of the apostle John is to lose sight of it altogether as "the word of the Lord"; and this is where so many fail. The prophets of the Old Testament did not understand all that they were inspired to write, as was mentioned by the apostle Peter (1 Peter 1:10-12); and it is very likely that the same was true of the New Testament writers. We believe this prophecy to be of God through John, thus being significant and relevant to every moment of the entire Christian dispensation, first to last. See in my Commentary in 1Peter (pp. 172-175) for a discussion of the phenomena of the sacred writers not understanding what they wrote.

[65] James Moffatt, op. cit., p. 449.

[66] Leon Morris, op. cit., p. 201.

[67] Michael Wilcock, op. cit., p. 150.

[68] Ibid., p. 141.

[69] Ibid., p. 150.

[70] Ibid.

[71] A. Plummer, op. cit., p. 397.

[72] J. W. Roberts, op. cit., p. 132.

[73] Robert H. Mounce, op. cit., p. 304.

[74] G. B. Caird, The Revelation of St. John the Divine (New York: Harper and Row, 1966), p. 209.

[75] W. Boyd Carpenter, op. cit., p. 610.

[76] Charles H. Roberson, op. cit., p. 125.

[77] R. C. H. Lenski, op. cit., p. 484.