21 Scarlet Woman

Painting by G. Roland Smith

Read Revelation 17 here

21 Scarlet Woman

John is carried into a desert where he is shown a woman dressed magnificently in scarlet, gold and precious jewels who is sitting on a scarlet beast.  She is holding a golden cup in her hand, filled with abominable things, and written on her forehead are the words, “Mother of Prostitutes and Earth’s Abominations”, for she and the kings of the earth had committed adultery together.

The Scarlet Woman is a powerful and gaudy symbol of spiritual prostitution, which is to couple in a most attractive and seemingly justifiable way a desire to control and manipulate others with high principles of truth (the ‘kings of the earth’).  This is the abominable ‘golden cup’ of moral behaviour and piety to gain status, power and influence.

“[In the desert] I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast that was covered with blasphemous names… [She] was dressed in purple and scarlet, and … held a golden cup in her hand, filled with abominable things, and the filth of her adulteries.”

(chapter 17 verses 3 and 4)

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