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"It was a dark and stormy night." Rev. 16:17-21
"It was a dark and stormy night." In his imagined persona as a world-famous author, the Peanuts cartoon character Snoopy, sometimes began his novels, "It was a dark and stormy night." Charles Schultz, Snoopy's creator, had him use this phrase because "it was a cliché and had been one for a long time." It came from the opening sentence of English novelist Edward Bulwer-Lytton's 1830 novel Paul Clifford:
It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents--except at
occasional intervals when it was checked by a violent gust of wind
which swept up the streets, rattling along the housetops, and fiercely
agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness.
Writer's Digest described it as "the literary poster child for bad story starters." On the other hand, the American Book Review ranked it as No. 22 on its "Best first lines from novels'' list. What do you think?
The opening words used to begin a story is called a prologue, because it introduces us to what is to come and provides us with clues that guide us to intended meanings found within a story. That's what we have in Revelation 16:17-21. Thus, when the seventh angel pours out his bowl into the air, the resulting "dark and apocalyptic stormy night" provides us perspective on the collapse of Babylon in detail (Rev. 17-19). The horrors of the seventh bowl plague share in the symbolic significance of Revelation's number seven: they represent in some sense the completion of God's judgment against evil in accord with His plan of salvation. The extended account of God's wrath poured from the seventh bowl not only indicates His battle against evil is at long last completed--It is done! It also spells out more fully the character of the anti-Christian kingdom God has overcome. Satan's entire system is now to be judged: his religious system (the harlot, Rev. 17), his political and economic system (Babylon, Rev. 18), and his military system (the armies, Rev. 19).
Babylon the Great represents any great center of pagan power, and certainly represented Rome in the first century, which determines daily life for everyone at any time in human history. The description of Babylon and its punishment is an impression of social evil and its destiny. As such, Babylon is the counterpart of the new Jerusalem, the symbol of the God's community where divine blessing is finally found. Several features of Babylon's fall are of significance in understanding this anti-Christian kingdom in Revelation. First, Babylon's ruler, the beast, is responsible for his demise, as well as Babylon's (Rev. 17:8-16). Whether or not this vision predicts Rome's fall is unimportant; its critical purpose is to transmit timeless truth about the structures and ruling elite of the social order in any age. Secular power always corrupts the powerful and any who submit to anti-Christian norms and values. While injustice and even suffering are sometimes the result of rejecting the secular for the sacred, and while suffering heaped upon injustice may wear down many who try to be faithful and tempts some to compromise, the ultimate reality is this: secular power brings destruction upon itself. To lose our life by resisting the norms and values of an anti-Christian kingdom and its rulers is to gain life. The "real world" is the kingdom of God since it's the kingdom left standing at the end of the age. Second, the dehumanizing values that characterize the evil empire are more clearly in view here than anywhere else in John's vision. The grief of those who lament the fall of Babylon (Rev. 18:9-19) is centered not upon the loss of human life but upon the loss of the city and its great wealth.
According to Revelation, at the foundation of evil's self-destruction is its love and concern for Mammon and self rather than for God and neighbor. Perhaps implicit in this narrative is the conviction that if the people of God abandon the gospel for the seductions of worldliness, then the "center of pagan power" itself is lost to the self-corrupting influences of its own rulers and social institutions. Of course, John's apocalyptic view of society is rather fatalistic: without the presence of God's people, who now stand outside the city (Rev. 15:2), Babylon the Great is doomed to destruction.
Everything John writes down describes finality, beginning with the loud voice that announces, "It is done!" Of various natural phenomena that confirm God's edict on earth, the most devastating is the severe earthquake unlike any that has ever occurred since man has been on earth." The earthquake carries symbolic significance as a clue: in Old Testament and intertestamental writings, earthquakes signal the apocalypse of God's final judgment. Further, this hailstorm suggests God's judgment concludes what the first great hailstorm helped to announce (Rev. 11:19): God has triumphed through the exalted lamb. In this case, God's judgment is exacted especially on the great city ... Babylon the Great, the center of secular power. The city is destroyed--split into three parts--as the recipient of a cup filled with the ... fury of God's wrath (Rev. 14:8). It's the contents of this cup John is now prepared to describe in detail in Rev. 17-19.
John provides two additional clues that help measure the totality of the city's destruction. First, the earthquake has devastated the very ground on which Babylon is built; islands ... and mountains, a complete geophysical reality, are leveled into a plain. Second, the people of Babylon cursed God because the plague of hail was so terrible. Without the protection provided by Babylon's buildings or nature, its citizens are exposed to God's horrific wrath, symbolized by the huge hailstones of about a hundred pounds each. The impression left by John's description of the devastating earthquake concerns not so much the completeness of God's triumph over evil as its inevitability. At this point, then, those who hate God, curse Him, a final act of resignation to the Lord's sovereignty and God's certain punishment.
How we respond to judgment reveals the condition of our hearts. Although these judgments are brought against unbelievers, we can learn from their negative example about how not to respond to spiritual discipline. At the end of the trumpet judgments many will refuse to repent (Rev. 9:20-21), and at the conclusion to the bowl judgments many will curse God on account of the intense heat, pains and sores, and huge hailstones (Rev. 16:9, 11, 21). The ungodly respond to judgment not by humbling themselves, changing their ways, and crying out for mercy but by blaming, even cursing, God. New Testament professor of Theology, Joseph Mangina once said, "Although the beast cannot sever the bond between God and his creature--even when we curse, we have God's name on our lips--he can so warp the creature that it hates the one who made it." The way we respond to perceived discipline reveals the condition of our heart. Sadly, some of us who claim to be Christians regularly respond by refusing to repent and consistently blaming God and His people, when what's needed is a humble acceptance of personal responsibility and repentance.
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Rev. Charles Eldredge is a member of Maitland Church of the Brethren. He has a Facebook page and can be contacted by email: ce1133 @verizon.net.