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Echoes of Revelation
Revelation never quotes the Old Testament outright, yet no New Testament book refers to it more. See both texts side by side, why they don’t match, and what John does with them.
Revelation 18:4, come out of her, my people
The call to God's people to leave Babylon before her plagues fall repeats Jeremiah's and Isaiah's call to the exiles to flee Babylon.
Revelation 18:4, in every translation this tool compares.
A fire alarm is a kindness, because it tells people to leave before the building burns. Jeremiah told the exiles in Babylon to run from the city and save their lives from God's anger. Isaiah told them to leave and touch nothing unclean. A voice from heaven gives John's readers the same call: leave Babylon, so you do not share her sins or her plagues.
A command to God's people to come out of Babylon. The Greek of Jeremiah 51:45 reads come forth from her midst, my people (exelthete ek mesou autes, laos emos). Revelation 18:4 reads come out of her, my people (exelthate, ho laos mou, ex autes). Isaiah 52:11 adds go forth and touch nothing unclean.
Jeremiah's exiles were to leave a real city when its fall came. Beale says John's readers are to separate from Babylon's sins, not move house: their escape is moral, not physical. Jeremiah gives one reason, to escape God's anger. John gives two: not to share her sins and not to receive her plagues.
Beale says the call is aimed at wavering believers inside the church, tempted to join Babylon's idolatrous trade. They are to stay in the world as witnesses but not belong to it. The unclean of Isaiah 52:11 fits the unclean spirits of 18:2.
Not a call to leave society. Beale says Christians are not told to withdraw from economic life, though they may be shut out of it for refusing to compromise.
Beale says the call is patterned after the repeated calls of Isaiah and Jeremiah, especially Jeremiah 51:45, with Isaiah 48:20, 52:11 and Jeremiah 50:8 and 51:6. In Jeremiah 51 the coming judgment is the reason for leaving, and the city becomes a haunt of jackals (51:37), as in 18:2. Isaiah 52:11 adds touch nothing unclean, meaning Babylon's idols, which fits the threefold unclean of 18:2. Paul uses Isaiah 52:11 in 2 Corinthians 6:17. Beale also hears the angel's word to Lot to get out of Sodom (Genesis 19:15), and possibly Abraham leaving Ur. Keener cites Jeremiah 51:6, 45 and notes Zechariah 2:7 and Genesis 19:17. The NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible ties the call to Jeremiah 51:6 and 51:45, the ESV Study Bible to Isaiah 52:11 and Jeremiah 51:6-9, 45, and the CSB Study Bible's cross-references list Isaiah 52:11 and Jeremiah 50:8; 51:6, 9, 45. Wright hears Isaiah 48:20 and 52:11-12 and above all Jeremiah 51:45. The grade is drawn here: the words are Jeremiah's almost exactly.
The sources agree on Jeremiah. They differ on who is addressed. Beale says it is believers within the confessing church. The CSB Study Bible mentions a few who see the rapture here. The NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible notes that Jeremiah meant a prophecy of future flight, since he had told the exiles to settle in Babylon (Jeremiah 29:7). MacArthur reads a call to God's people to break free of the system before it is destroyed, and perhaps also a call to the chosen to come to faith.
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- G. K. Beale, The Book of Revelation (New International Greek Testament Commentary), comment on 18:4
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Revelation 18:4
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, note on Revelation 18:4
- ESV Study Bible, note on Revelation 18:4
- CSB Study Bible, note on Revelation 18:4 and cross-references at 18:4
- N. T. Wright, Revelation for Everyone, comment on Revelation 18:1-8
- Septuagint, Jeremiah 51:45, 51:6 and Isaiah 52:11, Interlinear Greek-English Septuagint
- SBL Greek New Testament (MorphGNT), Revelation 18:4
- John MacArthur, The MacArthur Study Bible (ESV), note on Revelation 18:4
