What Old Testament prophecies connect with Revelation 18:18's imagery? “and cried out at the sight of the smoke from her burning. ‘What city was ever like this great city?’ ” Smoke and Flames of Judgment • Genesis 19:28 — Abraham “looked down… and saw dense smoke rising from the land, like smoke from a furnace.” • Isaiah 34:9-10 — Edom’s streams “will be turned to pitch… its smoke will rise forever.” • Jeremiah 51:25-26, 37, 58 — Babylon destined to be “burned with fire,” left a “heap of ruins.” • Isaiah 13:19-22 — Babylon “will be overthrown like Sodom and Gomorrah,” never again inhabited. Laments Echoed at the Harbor • Ezekiel 27:30-32 — Merchant-sailors “cry out bitterly over you,” asking, “Who is like Tyre, like her silenced in the heart of the sea?” • Revelation 18:18 repeats both the maritime setting (watching from ships) and the rhetorical question (“What city was ever like…?”). Babylon’s Fire Promised Long Ago • Jeremiah 50:32, 40 — “The proud one will stumble and fall, with no one to lift him up… It will be inhabited no more, just as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah.” • Isaiah 47:9-14 — Sorceries cannot save Babylon; “fire will burn you up.” • Jeremiah 51:64 — “So will Babylon sink and never rise again, because of the disaster I am bringing upon her.” Sodom’s Pattern of Sudden Ruin • Deuteronomy 29:23 — Land scorched “like the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah… which the LORD overthrew in His fierce anger.” • Isaiah 1:9 — Without God’s mercy, Judah “would have become like Sodom.” Revelation 18 mirrors that abrupt, fiery judgment. Key Threads Tying the Prophecies Together • Visible, rising smoke signals finality (Genesis 19; Isaiah 34; Revelation 18). • Maritime merchants mourning links Tyre’s fall (Ezekiel 27) with end-time Babylon (Revelation 18). • Desolation language (“no one will dwell there”) repeats across Isaiah 13; Jeremiah 50-51; Revelation 18. • The rhetorical question “Who/what city is like…?” ties Ezekiel 27 and Revelation 18, highlighting unmatched former splendor now reduced to ashes. |
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