[adiaireton8]

The whole of Christian tradition and the fathers take Peter's use of the term 'Babylon' as a reference to Rome. No Bible scholar worth his salt claims that there is any evidence that Peter was ever in modern day Iraq.

I have to ask, Why do you not want it to be true that Peter was in Rome? It seems to me that you desparately don't want to acknowledge that Peter was in Rome. That you just made up the notion that Luke claimed Peter was imprisoned by Herod in 44 AD, apparently in order to attempt to refute Jerome, is telling. Why do you kick against the goads?

-A8

[Uncle Chip]

The whole of Christian tradition and the fathers take Peter's use of the term 'Babylon' as a reference to Rome. No Bible scholar worth his salt claims that there is any evidence that Peter was ever in modern day Iraq.

You wouldn't be siding with the theologians of your "separated brethren" on this, would you? Oh how I have heard the protests from Rome about being called "Babylon"!!!! And now you are insisting that we call Rome "Babylon?

All kidding aside, though, even the churches of the Reformation and later have their "patriarchs" and "traditional interpretations", but when confronted with the facts of Scripture, those things should give way. Unfortunately, they often do not.

The basic rule of hermeneutical interpretation is that the plain meaning of Scripture is to rule over the imaginative meaning. If it is possible and probable that "Babylon" means "Babylon" then without further consternation, it means "Babylon". Why would this be the only place in the New Testament when a writer had to hide the fact of where he is? Peter was not deceptive. He was just straight-forward. Rome was Rome. Babylon was Babylon, and every Jew knew what Babylon was and where it was.

If Rome was known as Babylon, then why didn't all the "Fathers" refer to the Church of Babylon instead of the Church of Rome? What Peter meant by "Babylon" and what John meant by the term, might be different, as the latter was writing figuratively.