New Babylon
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New Babylon is a fictional city depicted in the popular Left Behind series. Although the city is fictional, the term is also used to refer to the rebuilt ancient city of Babylon, as depicted in the Bible.
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[edit] New Babylon in Left Behind Series
[edit] Background
In the twinkling of an eye, millions of people all over the world simply vanish. Those left behind are left to search for answers and clues to what has really happened. Airline Captain Rayford Steele arrives home after nearly 1/3 of the passengers in a Chicago-London 747 flight vanish while he is piloting it, only to find that his wife and son have vanished as well. Although in shock, Rayford knows all too well what has happened (after being warned by his wife for years): Jesus Christ has returned to earth and has taken all true believers up to heaven, in an event called "The Rapture". People that disappeared had a personal relationship with God and believed Jesus was their Messiah and Savior.
[edit] The New World
As the world deals with the chaos following the Rapture, the newly-appointed Romanian President, Nicolae Carpathia is invited to speak at the United Nations. Thanks to his charisma and political maneouverings, (and presumably, his ability to hypnotize and brainwash people) the current Secretary-General resigns almost immediately, and Nicolae is propelled into the position of new Secretary-General overnight, apparently "against his wishes." Once in the new position, Nicolae takes several courses of action:
- He asks every country to destroy 90% of their weapons, and to donate the remaining 10% to the UN.
- He renames the UN the Global Community, or GC for short. This comes after he refers - several times - to his plans for the world as that of a "global community." He subsequently gives himself the new title of Potentate.
- Along with appointing cardinal Peter Mathews as the new pope (following the Rapture of his predecessor), he establishes a new one-world religion, called the Global Community Faith, later the "Enigma Babylon One World Faith", with Mathews as its Pontifex Maximus.
- He uses the nearly unlimited financial resources of his late mentor and influential banker Jonathan Stonagal to purchase all of the world's media networks, effectively giving the GC full control of the press. (Carpathia would not have acquired the resources had he not personally killed Stonagal at a private meeting before his first press-conference as Secretary-General, as he was earlier named the sole benefactor in Stonagal's will.)
- He graciously accepts America's Air Force One as the new Global Community One. Air Force One was originally loaned to the GC, but was eventually donated fully as a token of goodwill, and the new Air Force One is a smaller Boeing 757. (see Aircraft (Left Behind))
- He moves the GC headquarters to the city of Babylon, in Iraq which he has renamed New Babylon. This new, modern city, built over the ruins of the ancient city, has apparently been in development for years before the Rapture, and was completely financed by Jonathan Stonagal. The new headquarters is a state-of-the-art 18-storey building presumably designed in the same fashion as that of the UN building.
After the move, Carpathia settles in New Babylon as his new home, and the seat of the New World Order.
[edit] The End of New Babylon
During the next seven years, the world is plunged into the period which the Bible calls: "The Tribulation". One by one, twenty-one judgments from God fall upon the earth, many of which resulting in horrendous cataclysms that claim millions of lives. Some are so supernatural in nature that no possible scientific explanations can be found. Meanwhile, Carpathia and his minions grow increasingly antagonistic to Christianity. At the mid-point of this period, when Carpathia is assassinated and then resurrected by being indwelt by Satan himself, he institutes Carpathianism as the new religion, one of worshipping Carpathia himself. He orders all inhabitants of the earth to worship his image and bear a mark of loyalty (the Mark of the Beast) in their right hands or foreheads. Failure to do so results in the penalty of death by guillotine, euphemised as the "loyalty enforcement facilitator". In the final 3 1/2 years, millions who refuse to follow these orders become martyrs to Carpathia, the one the Bible prophesies as "The Antichrist", or "The Beast".
New Babylon becomes a dark place, where the presence of evil is clearly felt and seen. And the end of the seven years, as Carpathia plans a massive attack on Israel in an epic battle known as Armageddon, New Babylon finally falls to God's judgement, which is carried out in two parts:
- The city is plunged into a darkness so intense that it causes people with the mark to writhe and gnash their teeth in pain. Only true Christian believers can see through this.
- The city is finally destroyed, in one hour, by God himself with fire, and never rebuilt again.
[edit] The Real New Babylon
The events described above are as seen in the Left Behind series, a fictional series of novels about the end of the world. However, the ancient city of Babylon has already been rebuilt to some degree by the former Iraqi authority headed by Saddam Hussein.1 Many believe that New Babylon will arise in the wake of the newly freed Iraqi nation.
There is an ongoing debate about the prophecies in the Bible that point to New Babylon as a real future city. Some believers, such as Roman Catholics, Lutherans, Calvinists, and others believe Babylon represents governments and religions opposing God. Anti-catholics often claim Babylon refers to the Roman Catholic Church. Many evangelical Christians, however, accept these prophecies as true and literal. The Left Behind series follows this view, and so the events described (not the characters) are the events that dispensationalist prophecy scholars and eschatology students (along with the Christians who follow them) believe that will literally happen in the not-too-distant future.
Of interesting note, an article published in the New York Times in July 2006 states that UN officials and the Iraqi administration have plans for restoring Babylon, making it a gem of a new Iraq as a cultural center complete with shopping malls, hotels, and maybe even a theme park.[1]
