Double for sins

Revelation 18 calls on the Lord to pay back the harlot city for all that she has done, and elaborates by asking the Lord to return her “double for her all her sins” (18:6). Restitution, it seems, is double restitution.

What is the double restitution and why? Apparently, the harlot city has committed a double sin and she is to receive an equivalent double punishment.

Isaiah 40:2 clarifies further. There, Zion is said to have been paid “double for her sins.” As the prophecy develops, Zion is said to have suffered widowhood and bereavement of children. These are the twin judgments she has endured for her sins. Eventually, Babylon will have to drink the same cup of judgment, and Babylon will receive the same judgment – her women will become widows and her children will be slaughtered.

This is the background for the harlot city of Revelation, called “Babylon” but literally Jerusalem. She has attacked the saints and drunk their blood. She has made women widows and destroyed the seed of the woman. When the tables are turned and she drinks the cup of wrath to its dregs, she will receive double: She will be left a widow and she will lose her children.