37
And Babylon shall be reduced to heaps, a dwelling place for dragons, an astonishment and a hissing, because there is no inhabitant.
Jeremiah 51:37
Apocalypse Revealed # 806
806. "And He has avenged the blood of His servants shed by her hand." This symbolizes a retribution for the injuries and violence done to the souls of worshipers of the Lord.
His avenging the blood of His servants shed by her hand symbolizes a retribution for the injuries and violence done to the souls of worshipers of the Lord, because His avenging symbolizes retribution. To shed blood means, symbolically, to do violence to the Lord's Divinity and to the Word (nos. 327, 684), in this case to worshipers of the Lord, who are meant by His servants. Roman Catholics inflicted injuries and violence on their souls by transferring Divine worship of the Lord to themselves and preventing their reading of the Word.
The Lord is said to have avenged or exacted retribution for the blood of His servants as though He did this to take revenge or punish; but still He does not act to take revenge or punish, just as He does not act out of anger or wrath, even though anger and wrath are occasionally attributed to Him in the Word (see nos. 525, 635, 658, 673 above).
Anger and revenge are attributed to the Lord when evil people are separated from the good and cast into hell, as happens at the time of a last judgment. That time is therefore called wrath and a day of wrath, and a day of vengeance. Not that the Lord is angry or vengeful, but that those people are angry at the Lord and filled with vengeance against Him. The case is like that of a criminal after sentence has been passed, who is angry at the law and filled with vengeance against the judge. For the law is not angry, nor is the judge taking revenge.
[2] Vengeance is meant in this sense in the following passages:
...the day of vengeance is in My heart, and the year of My redeemed has come. (Isaiah 63:4)
The reference there is to the Lord and the Last Judgment.
...the day of Jehovah's vengeance, the year of retribution for the case of Zion. (Isaiah 34:8)
Behold, your God will come for vengeance; for the retribution of God He will come, and He will save you. (Isaiah 35:4)
...these are the days of vengeance, that all things which are written may be fulfilled. (Luke 21:22)
The reference there is to the culmination of the age, when the Last Judgment takes place.
The Spirit of the Lord Jehovih is upon Me... to proclaim the day Jehovah's good pleasure, and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn. (Isaiah 61:1-2)
Shall My soul not take vengeance... for this? (Jeremiah 5:9, 29)
I will take vengeance (on Babylon), and will not allow anyone to intercede. (Isaiah 47:3)
...His thought is against Babylon to destroy it, because it is the vengeance of Jehovah, vengeance for His temple. (Jeremiah 51:11, cf. 51:36)
Sing, O nations, His people, for He will avenge the blood of His servants, and visit vengeance on His adversaries; He will purge His land, His people. (Deuteronomy 32:43)
Isaiah 62
1
For Zion's sake will I not hold my peace, and for Jerusalem's sake I will not rest, until her righteousness go forth as brightness, and her salvation as a lamp that burns.
2
The nations shall see your righteousness, and all kings your glory, and you shall be called by a new name, which the mouth of Yahweh shall name.
3
You shall also be a crown of beauty in the hand of Yahweh, and a royal diadem in the hand of your God.
4
You shall no more be termed Forsaken; neither shall your land any more be termed Desolate: but you shall be called Hephzibah, and your land Beulah; for Yahweh delights in you, and your land shall be married.
5
For as a young man marries a virgin, so your sons shall marry you; and as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so your God will rejoice over you.
6
I have set watchmen on your walls, Jerusalem; they shall never hold their peace day nor night: you who call on Yahweh, take no rest,
7
and give him no rest, until he establishes, and until he makes Jerusalem a praise in the earth.
8
Yahweh has sworn by his right hand, and by the arm of his strength, "Surely I will no more give your grain to be food for your enemies; and foreigners shall not drink your new wine, for which you have labored:
9
but those who have garnered it shall eat it, and praise Yahweh; and those who have gathered it shall drink it in the courts of my sanctuary."
10
Go through, Go through the gates! Prepare the way of the people! Cast up, cast up the highway! Gather out the stones! Lift up a banner for the peoples.
11
Behold, Yahweh has proclaimed to the end of the earth, "Say to the daughter of Zion, 'Behold, your salvation comes. Behold, his reward is with him, and his recompense before him.'"
12
They shall call them The holy people, The redeemed of Yahweh: and you shall be called Sought out, A city not forsaken.
