And there followed another angel, saying; and another, a second angel, followed. That is, of course, the second of the three who here make their appearance in close connection. Each new scene is unfolded by its own special messenger.
Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication; fallen, fallen is Babylon the great, which made, etc. The second "is fallen" is omitted in א, C, etc.
, but is inserted in A, P, some cursives, versions, and Fathers. Omit "city." Babylon is the type of the world power. Like so much of the Apocalypse, the image is supplied by the Book of Daniel. There the kingdom is spoken of as great (Daniel 4:30; cf.
also Isaiah 14:1-32.). In its oppression of the Jewish nation, Babylon is a type of the world power which persecutes the Church of God. At the time when St. John wrote, this power was preeminently possessed and wielded by Rome, and that empire may thus be intended as the immediate antitype of Babylon.
But the description is also applicable to the persecuting power of the world in all ages, and its denial of and opposition to God. Babylon is representative of the world, as Jerusalem is of the true Church of God.