isaiah 47-48

Read Isaiah 47-48 at Bible Gateway.

Go forth from Babylon! Flee from the Chaldeans!
With a voice of singing, declare, proclaim this,
Utter it to the ends of the earth;
say, “The LORD has redeemed His servant Jacob!” Isa 48:20

These two chapters declare the judgment that is coming upon Israel’s oppressor, Babylon, whom the LORD used to carry Judah into captivity and destroy the Temple. Notice, when God is proclaiming what He will do for Jacob, and Israel, He does not say, Judah, flee from Babylon! Listen to me, O Judah! Judah, the southern kingdom, was the one carried away into captivity by Babylon. However, the LORD is addressing all Israel and all Jacob, everyone who came from Jacob’s twelve sons, as well as the generation of those who seek the LORD’s face (Psa 24:6), who are to be counted as the native born in Israel (Exo 12:49, Eze 47:22).

So we know that this prophecy has broader implications than just the one fulfillment of Judah’s return from Babylonian captivity, just as we have been seeing is the case with Isaiah. Now the northern kingdom, the ten tribes, were carried away by Assyria, not Babylon. How is it that the LORD is telling even them to go forth from Babylon and to flee the Chaldeans?

I believe He is talking about Babylon in its broadest sense: Babylon who is Babel, the root of all rebellion against God, the originator of idolatry and paganism, the mother of the occult, astrology, sorceries and enchantments. Babylon is in fact, this woman:

So he carried me away in the Spirit into the wilderness. And I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast which was full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. The woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet, and adorned with gold and precious stones and pearls, having in her hand a golden cup full of abominations and the filthiness of her fornication. And on her forehead a name was written:

MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH. Rev 17:3-5

The command for God’s people to flee Babylon is repeated in the next chapter of Revelation:

And I heard another voice from heaven saying, “Come out of her, my people, lest you share in her sins, and lest you receive of her plagues.” Rev 18:4

The call is for all of God’s people to come out of Babylon. Babylon is the metaphor for the kingdoms of this world, worldliness, living according to the commandments of men and not the commandments of God. Babylon’s traditions are enshrined in both Judaism and Christianity. Rabbinical Judaism added commandments to Torah from the Talmud or the Oral Law, which was birthed among the Jews when they were in Babylonian captivity. Certain elements of Christianity, especially those elements that Christians have retained from Catholicism, have also come from Babylonian paganism, such as making God’s holiest day Sun Day and not the Sabbath (the sun god was the supreme god of Babylonian idolatry); or replacing the LORD’s feast days with Babylon’s holiest feast days, the nativity of the sun god on the winter solstice, and the festival of Eastre or Ishtar at the spring equinox.

Jesus told us that at His return, it would be like the days of Lot, the day that Lot went out of Sodom (Luk 17:26-30). God sent messengers to Lot in Sodom, and told him, Go forth from Babylon, er, Sodom! Flee the Chadeans, er, the Sodomites! For the LORD is going to destroy this city, and He does not want you, righteous Lot, to partake of her sins and to receive of her plagues — therefore flee the city (Gen 19).

How do we go forth from Babylon and flee the Chaldeans? Depart from Babylonianism: evolution, witchcraft, sorcery, enchantments, astrology. The number of believers, who believe God, go to church, read their Bible, and entertain talking with the dead, love Harry Potter, or read horoscopes, is growing, and it continually shocks me! Flee from Babylon, believers! Depart from her laws and return to God’s Law! Depart from her holidays and return to the LORD’s feast days! Depart from materialism and seeking after pleasure and amassing wealth, hurting others and justifying it by saying, “It’s business” — that is also Babylonianism!