Revelation 18:5

5 because her sins have reached up to heaven, and God has remembered her crimes.

Revelation 18:5 Meaning and Commentary

Revelation 18:5

For her sins have reached unto heaven
Or "have followed unto heaven"; one after another, in one age after another, until they have been as it were heaped up together, and have reached the heavens; the phrase denotes the multitude of them, God's knowledge and notice of them, and the cry of them to him; see ( Genesis 18:20 ) ( Jonah 1:2 ) the Alexandrian copy and Complutensian edition read, "have cleaved", or "glued", and so the Syriac and Arabic versions seem to have read; her sins were as it were soldered together, and stuck fast to her, and being joined and linked together, made a long chain, and reached to heaven, and cleaved to that, and cried for vengeance:

and God hath remembered her iniquities;
and is about to punish her for them; for as forgiveness of sin is signified by a non-remembrance of it, so punishment of sin by a remembrance of it, and of the persons that commit it; see ( Revelation 16:19 ) .

Revelation 18:5 In-Context

3 For all the nations have drunk from the wine of the passion of her sexual immorality, and the kings of the earth have committed sexual immorality with her, and the merchants of the earth have become rich from the power of her sensuality."
4 And I heard another voice from heaven saying, "Come out from her, my people, so that you will not participate in her sins, and so that you will not receive her plagues,
5 because her sins have reached up to heaven, and God has remembered her crimes.
6 Pay back to her as she herself also paid out, and {pay back double} according to her deeds; in the cup that she mixed, mix double for her.
7 As much as she glorified herself and lived in luxury, give to her so much torment and mourning, because in her heart she said, 'I sit as a queen, and am not a widow, and I will never see mourning!'
Scripture quotations marked (LEB) are from the Lexham English Bible. Copyright 2012 Logos Bible Software. Lexham is a registered trademark of Logos Bible Software.