Who is Babylon the Great, the woman who rides the Beast in Revelation 17–18?

Traditionally the answer to this question has been Rome or the Roman Catholic Church or Rome as a symbol of present or future realities. However, I wonder if the beast is the figure related to Rome (Dan 9:26; Rev 17:9) while the woman represents apostate Jerusalem.

Observations in favor of the woman as apostate Jerusalem

• Elsewhere Revelation identifies “the great city” (16:19; 17:18; 18:10) as Jerusalem (11:8). The judgment on the great city Jerusalem in 11:13 is the same judgment that came upon the great city Babylon in 16:19. Note that in 16:19 the great city is distinguished from the cities of the nations (Tanner, “Apostate Jerusalem,” 16–17; Burns, “Marriage,” 291; Provan, “Revelation 18,” 93, 94).
• Note that in Revelation 11 the name Jerusalem is not used. Instead, the city is identified as “the great city that symbolically is called Sodom and Egypt, where their Lord was crucified” (11:8). So there is a similarity on obliquely naming Jerusalem (Tanner, “Apostate Jerusalem,” 16–17).
• The harlot metaphor is a dominant metaphor for unfaithful Israel in the OT. While twice it is used of other nations (Tyre in Isa 23:15-18, and Nineveh of Assyria in Nah 3:4), elsewhere it is used of Israel (Isa 1:21; 57:8; Jer 2:2, 20; 3:1, 6; Ezek 16:15, 26, 28, 29; 16:35-41; 23:1-21, 30; Micah 1:7; and Hos 4:12) (Tanner, “Apostate Jerusalem,” 17; Burns, “Marriage,” 288; Provan, “Revelation 18,” 92).
• The destruction of the woman by the Beast and the ten horns recalls the destruction of Jerusalem in Ezekiel 23:22–35 (cf. Eze 16:39) (Tanner, “Apostate Jerusalem,” 18; Burns, “Marriage,” 292).
• The name written on the forehead “seems to parody the golden plate on the high priest’s turban” (Burns, “Marriage,” 288).
• The judgment of burning with fire was the judgment on a priest’s daughter if she became a prostitute (Lev. 21:9) (Burns, “Marriage,” 289).
• “it is Jerusalem which is recalled by 18.1, alluding to the divine glory leaving the temple and city in Ezekiel, and by 18.2, with its language of religious defilement. It is Jerusalem which fits best the covenant language of 18.5, where the city’s sins, rather than her love, have cleaved to God; 18.23-24 is based on Jer. 25.10, which is an oracle against Judah and Jerusalem; and so on” (Provan, “Revelation 18,” 93–94).
• The items of the city’s trade are largely items used of the temple and temple service. Exceptions, such as chariots and horses, recall Solomon (the builder of the Temple with materials from Tyre), who acquired chariots and horses in violation of Dt 17 (Provan, “Revelation 18,” 95).
• Revelation 18:24 (cf. 17:6) alludes to Matthew 23:35–37, which identifies Jerusalem as “the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it” (Provan, “Revelation 18,” 95).
• “It is certainly intriguing that passages like 18.22-23, with their picture of a city devoid of people and religious festivals, call to mind no book quite so much as the book of Lamentations, set in the period after Jerusalem has fallen and her people are in exile (cf., e.g., Lam. 1.1-5; 2.6-10; 5.14-18)” (Provan, “Revelation 18,” 95). Provan also notes the following:  “Jerusalem is the fallen princess (Lam. 1.1; Rev. 18.2, 7), burned with fire like Sodom (Lam. 2.1-4; Rev. 18.8, 18; and esp. cf. Lam. 4.6 with Rev. 11.8), a haunt for wild animals (Lam. 5.18; Rev. 18.2). She has known the reversal of God’s favour, especially symbolized in the use of vine and vineyard imagery to express God’s wrath rather than God’s blessing (Lam. 1.15; 2.6; Rev. 18.6; cf. Court, Myth, pp. 143-44); and her wealthy people have suffered disaster and deprivation (Lam. 4.5-9; Rev. 18.14-17)” (Provan, “Revelation 18,” 95–96, n. 49).
• I also find the relationship between the beast and the woman to make more sense if the beast is Rome (ruled by Antichrist) and the woman is Jerusalem. If the beast is Rome/Antichrist and the woman is the city of Rome, things get muddy. Revelation 17:16–17 especially get difficult. It is possible that the Roman Empire/Antichrist and the then horns turn on the city of Rome. But it makes much more sense for Rome/Antichrist and the ten kings to turn on Jerusalem and attack Jerusalem. There is also more biblical precedent for this latter view.
• Revelation 17 and 18 would thus stand in starker contrast with Revelation 19 and 21. Adulterous Jerusalem would be contrasted with new Jerusalem (Burns, “Marriage,” 293).

Objections and Responses

• Objection 1: Revelation 17:9 says that the women is seated on seven mountains. This clearly refers to Rome, which is known for being situation on seven hills.
  • Answer: The beast, which is correlated with Daniel’s fourth beast, does have a Rome connection. The seven mountains are related to the seven heads of the beast. The Antichrist is one of the heads of the beast. The woman is therefore distinct from, but related to, the Roman beast.
• Objection 2: Revelation 17:18 identifies the woman as “the great city that has dominion over the kings of the earth.” In John’s day, this would have been Rome.
  • Answer: In the future, it seems that the Antichrist will make Jerusalem his capital. In Scripture, it is Jerusalem (as the seat of the Davidic Messiah) that will have dominion over the kings of the earth. Antichrist will parody this.
• Objection 3: “The detailed picture in ch. 18 of a city at the center of the world’s commerce and (especially) maritime trade fails to fit even the most hyperbolic view that first-century Jerusalem could have had of itself” (Fanning, ZECNT, 449, n. 67).
  • Answer: This objection may be taking the maritime imagery too literally when there are textual indicators pointing in another direction. Some of this imagery is drawn from oracles against Tyre. Revelation 17:1 and 15 pictures the city as seated on many waters. The waters symbolize the peoples and nations (17:15), but they also evoke this Leviathan-beast who comes up from the waters. This imagery stands behind the maritime commerce imagery of chapter 18.
• Objection 4: The city can hardly be Jerusalem since Revelation 18:21 says this city “will be found no more.” The subsequent verses say that musicians, craftsmen, bridegrooms, merchants, and even lights and tools will be found in the city no more. Revelation 19:3 says, “The smoke from her goes up forever and ever.”
  • Answer: Revelation 19:3 is poetic language to speak of the eternal destruction of the city; it perhaps even alludes to the eternal destruction of the inhabitants of this city in the lake of fire. Similarly, Revelation 18:21ff. indicates the complete destruction and removal of this city. Note, however, that the woman is not Jerusalem per se but apostate Jerusalem. Apostate Jerusalem will be entirely done away. A New Jerusalem will replace it.

Significance: By labeling apostate Jerusalem as Babylon, God would be indicating that his own chosen city has by the end become identified with the opposition to God that has been running through the biblical storyline from Genesis 11 onward.