NT Text: Revelation 18:5
OT Source(s):
Source: Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Reference Type: Allusion
Connection Method(s): Analogy + Longitudinal Theme
Significance: Jeremiah 51:9 declares of Babylon, "her judgment reaches to the heavens, it rises to the clouds." Revelation 18:5 echoes: "her sins are piled up to heaven, and God has remembered her iniquities." Both texts use the image of sins/judgment reaching heavenward — a reversal of the Tower of Babel motif (Gen 11:4) where Babylon sought to build to heaven in pride. The phrase also evokes Genesis 18:20-21 where the outcry of Sodom's sin "reached" God. John draws on Jeremiah's specific language about Babylon's sins reaching cosmic proportions to indicate that the measure of guilt is now full and judgment inevitable. The "remembering" of iniquities signals the end of divine patience, just as Jeremiah warned that Babylon's moment of reckoning had arrived.