THE MOTHER OF ALL APOSTASIES
By R. C. P.
The Mystic Power That Has Worked Through All Ages
A Mighty Struggle with Her in the Last Days IN Rev. 14: 8, an apostate movement is revealed in the following statement: “Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication.” The chronology of this special apostasy locates it following the announcement of the Judgment message. Verses 6, 7. This announcement is a prelude to that of verses 9-14, announcing the last message before the second coming of Christ. It is therefore a last-day movement. The primary significance of the word “Babylon” is, “Gateway to heaven.” Young, in his unabridged concordance, defines410the word “Babel,” “confusion, gate of Bel. . . . Perhaps when Nimrod founded the city, he gave it the name of Babil, ‘gate of Il,’ or ‘gate of God.’ After the confusion of tongues, the name was connected by the Hebrews with the root balal, to confound.” Thus through their apostasy, even the city they founded as the “gateway to heaven,” the “gate of God,” became confusion through the mingling of error with truth. This was illustrated by the pure speech of the people being confused at the time their languages were confounded, on account of their apostasy, when they in unbelief attempted to build the Tower of Babel. The ancient city of Babylon, which for many centuries was the center from which radiated the false doctrines of the pagan system of worship, is here made the symbol of this last-day apostasy. The dragon of the twelfth chapter of Revelation represents satanic power as manifested through empires dominated by paganism. Satan is the king of the Babylonian system. Isa. 14: 4-14. In Rev. 14: 8, it is plainly stated that the Babylonian religious system has ever dominated all nations. “She made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication.” This scripture clearly shows that the Babylonian religious system controls by force instead of conviction. From the city of Babylon the first earthly kingdom developed. See Gen. 10: 10, margin. As the apostasy here symbolized by the city of Babylon does its work through nations by influencing them to enforce its false creed, this message of Rev. 14: 8 is designed as a special message of warning against enforced religion, or a union of church and state. ORIGIN OF THE BABYLONIAN SYSTEM
After the fall of man, God improved the earliest opportunity to present the pure gospel of faith in Christ through the symbol of sacrificial offerings as the sinner’s only hope. Satan, the king of the Babylonian system, at once perverted this great truth, and led Cain to offer the fruit of the ground as a gift of penance to appease the wrath of an offended God. This was the beginning of the Babylonian system of salvation by works. The system of penances first introduced in Cain’s offering was an apostasy from the gospel of salvation by faith, which was prefigured by the offering of animals upon whose heads man confessed his sins, and they were then slain by his own hand as his substitute, bearing his death penalty. These sacrificial offerings prefigured Christ, as the Lamb of God, in love bearing and removing the sins of the world. In the offerings of Cain and Abel are represented the two religious systems. In Cain’s worship there were manifested three distinct lines of apostasy,—first, apostasy from the truth of salvation by faith; second, a religion of works adopted as a creed; third, the creed supported by force, resulting in persecution with the death penalty as the ultimatum to offenders. From the very beginning of the career of the Babylonian system as it emanated from Satan, its king, and operated through individuals and confederacies, before the origin of nations, God ever manifested His opposition to its creed. “The Lord had respect unto Abel and to his offering: but unto Cain and to his offering He had not respect.” Gen. 4: 4, 5. The conflict between these two religious systems is clearly traceable from the days of Cain and Abel to the development of the Babylonian empire. THREE DIVISIONS OF BABYLON
In Rev. 16: 19, Babylon, as represented by the symbolic city of old, is said to be divided into three parts: “And the great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell: and great Babylon came in remembrance before God, to give unto her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of His wrath.” This same Babylonian system that has dominated all past nations, and still dominates them, and will do so to the close of time, is responsible for all the religious persecution that has ever cursed the world. “And in her was found the blood of prophets, and of saints, and of all that were slain upon the earth.” Rev. 18: 24. As previously shown, the Babylonian system is a religion of works. It is an apostasy from the Christian system of faith. It is a religion of force, which is an apostasy from the religion of love. What three divisions of the great system of religion by force have presented themselves before the world as dominating all nations?—They are paganism, the papacy, and apostate Protestantism. These three divisions of the Babylonian system cover the history of nations. They are all developed by apostasy from the true faith. The Lord holds this Babylonian system of enforced religion responsible for the blood of all martyrs slain upon the earth since the fall of man. As already shown, when the city of Babylon was founded, she was claimed to be “the gateway to heaven,” or “gate of God.” Her later creed, founded upon an apostasy that emanated from the city of Babylon and other cities throughout the world, formed the great Babylonian apostasy of pagan times. There were several distinct lines of apostasy in the pagan division of the Babylonian system: First, an apostasy from the true God to the worship of many false deities. Second, an apostasy from the true Sabbath, which was a weekly reminder of the true God, to the pagan sun holiday. Third, an apostasy from faith to a formal creed. Fourth, an apostasy from a religion of love to religion by force. Fifth, an apostasy from the true view of the kingdom of Christ; resulting in the enforcement of a creed, and Christ’s crucifixion. APOSTASY FROM THE TRUE GOD
The history of the Babylonian kingdom abounds with records of apostasies from the true God to the worship of false deities. As Cain’s religious creed was an apostasy from the true faith in his day, so the pagan division of the Babylonian system was an apostasy from the true faith in the days of the Babylonian kingdom. God ever sought to restore the people of the Babylonian empire to the true faith. He was so insistent in His efforts to recover that empire from apostasy that He sent King Nebuchadnezzar out into the fields for seven years to eat grass as an ox, until his hair had grown as eagles’ feathers, and his nails as birds’ claws. His object in doing this is stated thus: “And they shall drive thee from men, and thy dwelling shall be with the beasts of the field: they shall make thee to eat grass as oxen, and seven times shall pass over thee, until thou know that the Most High ruleth in the kingdom of men, and giveth it to whomsoever He will.” Dan. 4: 32. Nebuchadnezzar accepted the correction, and returned to the true worship of God. Dan. 4: 34-37. But there came a reaction under the reign of later kings, and the Babylonian empire died apostate. Dan. 5: 17-30. The same apostasy is prominently seen in Egypt. God at length arose in His majesty, and sent Moses and Aaron under a divine commission from His throne to say to Pharaoh and his kingdom, “Let My people go, that they may serve Me.” Ex. 8: 1. As shown in Exodus, chapters 8-15, through most powerful manifestations of His displeasure against Egypt for her oppression of His people and His opposition to the false gods of the Babylonian system under the pagan division, He made Himself known as the true God, and branded all false divinities as weak and worthless usurpers. The same apostasy is traceable through Medo-Persia, Grecia, and Rome pagan. Polytheism was the prevailing custom of all the nations influenced by the pagan religious system.