Revelation 18:4

Come out of her, my people - These words appear to be taken from Isaiah 48:20; Jeremiah 1:8; Jeremiah 51:6, Jeremiah 51:45. The poet Mantuanus expresses this thought well: -

Vivere qui sancte cupitis, discelite; Romae

Omnia quum liceant, non licet esse bonum.

"Ye who desire to live a godly life, depart; for, although all things are lawful at Rome, yet to be godly is unlawful.

And I heard another voice from heaven - He does not say whether this was the voice of an angel, but the idea seems rather to be that it is the voice of God.

Come out of her, my people - The reasons for this, as immediately stated, are two:

(a) that they might not participate in her sins; and,

(b) that they might not be involved in the ruin that would come upon her.

The language seems to be derived from such passages in the Old Testament as the following: "Go ye forth of Babylon, flee ye from the Chaldeans, with a voice of singing," Isaiah 48:20. "Flee out of the midst of Babylon, and deliver every man his soul; be not cut off in her iniquity," Jeremiah 51:6. "My people, go ye out of the midst of her, and deliver ye every man his soul from the fierce anger of the Lord," Jeremiah 51:45. Compare Jeremiah 50:8.

That ye be not partakers of her sins - For the meaning of this expression, see the notes on 1 Timothy 5:22. It is implied here that by remaining in Babylon they would lend their sanction to its sins by their presence, and would, in all probability, become contaminated by the influence around them. This is an universal truth in regard to iniquity, and hence it is the duty of those who would be pure to come out from the world, and to separate themselves from all the associations of evil.

And that ye receive not of her plagues - Of the punishment that was to come upon her - as they must certainly do if they remained in her. The judgment of God that was to come upon the guilty city would make no discrimination among those who were found there; and if they would escape these woes they must make their escape from her. As applicable to papal Rome, in view of her impending ruin, this means:

(a) that there might be found in her some who were the true people of God;

(b) that it was their duty to separate wholly from her - a command that will not only justify the Reformation, but which would have made a longer continuance in communion with the papacy, when her wickedness was fully seen, an act of guilt before God;

(c) that they who remain in such a communion cannot but be regarded as partaking of her sin; and,

(d) that if they remain, they must expect to be involved in the calamities that will come upon her. There never was any duty plainer than that of withdrawing from papal Rome; there never has been any act attended with more happy consequences than that by which the Protestant world separated itself forever from the sins and the plagues of the papacy.

18:4 And I heard another voice - Of Christ, whose people, secretly scattered even there, are warned of her approaching destruction. That ye be not partakers of her sins - That is, of the fruits of them. What a remarkable providence it was that the Revelation was printed in the midst of Spain, in the great Polyglot Bible, before the Reformation! Else how much easier had it been for the Papists to reject the whole book, than it is to evade these striking parts of it.