Revelation 17:3; In the Spirit, In the Wilderness

Revelation 17:3 So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. 

After his initial speech, the angelic guide removed John to a different vantage point to give him a perspective of the harlot – “so he was carried in the spirit into the wilderness”. Very similar terminology describes John’s prophetic trance in Revelation 21:10.

Revelation 21:10 And he carried me away in the spirit to a great and high mountain, and shewed me that great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God, 

This is the third of the four uses of “in the spirit”. In the other three, John finds himself on earth (Revelation 1:10), in heaven Revelation 4:1, and on a mountain tope (Revelation 21:10).

Revelation 1:10 I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet, 

Revelation 4:1 After this I looked, and, behold, a door was opened in heaven: and the first voice which I heard was as it were of a trumpet talking with me; which said, Come up hither, and I will shew thee things which must be hereafter. 

This time the angel takes him to a place of desolation, s solitary wasteland “into the wilderness”.

A wilderness was a place of refuge for the woman in Revelation 12:14, but this has no relationship to that wilderness.

Revelation 12:14 And to the woman were given two wings of a great eagle, that she might fly into the wilderness, into her place, where she is nourished for a time, and times, and half a time, from the face of the serpent. 

This wilderness alludes to Isaiah’s oracle concerning the wilderness (Isaiah 21:1) which includes the prophecy “fallen, fallen is Babylon” (cf. Revelation 14:8; 18:2; Jeremiah 51:8).

Isaiah 21:1 The burden of the desert of the sea. As whirlwinds in the south pass through; so it cometh from the desert, from a terrible land. 

Revelation 14:8 And there followed another angel, saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication. 

Revelation 18:2 And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird. 

Jeremiah 51:8 Babylon is suddenly fallen and destroyed: howl for her; take balm for her pain, if so be she may be healed. 

This may refer to the desert outside of Babylon of the Euphrates as John’s vantage point for his vision, or it may anticipate the harlot’s desolate condition in the end (Revelation 17:16).

Revelation 17:16 And the ten horns which thou sawest upon the beast, these shall hate the whore, and shall make her desolate and naked, and shall eat her flesh, and burn her with fire.