The Woman Babylon and the Marks of Empire

<p>The Great Whore of the Book of Revelationthe hostile symbolization used to illustrate the authors critique of empirehas attracted considerable attention in Revelation scholarship. Feminist scholar Tina Pippin criticizes the use of gendered metaphors Babylon as a tortured womanwhich she asserts reflect an inescapably androcentric even misogynistic perspective. Alternatively Elisabeth Schssler Fiorenza understands Johns rhetoric and imagery not simply in gendered terms but in political terms as well observing that Babylon relies on conventionally coded feminine language for a city.</p><p>Shanell T. Smith seeks to dismantle the either/or dichotomy within the Great Whore debate by bringing the categories of race/ethnicity and class to bear on Johns metaphors. Her socio-cultural context impels her to be sensitive to such categories and therefore leads her to hold the two elements woman and city in tension rather than privileging one over the other. Using postcolonial womanist interpretation of the woman Babylon Smith highlights the simultaneous duality of her characterizationher depiction as both a female brothel slave<b>and</b>as an empress or imperial city. Most remarkably however Smiths reading also sheds light on her own ambivalent characterization as both a victim and participant in empire.</p>