Revelation 18:8

Therefore shall her plagues come in one day,....

Therefore shall her plagues come - Death, by the sword of her adversaries; mourning on account of the slaughter; and famine, the fruits of the field being destroyed by the hostile bands. Utterly burned with fire - Of what city is this spoken? Rome pagan has never been thus treated; Alaric and Totilas burnt only some parts with fire. Rome papal has not been thus treated; but this is true of Jerusalem, and yet Jerusalem is not generally thought to be intended.

"Strong" is the meaning of God's Hebrew name, "EL." judgeth--But A, B, and C read the past tense (Greek, "krinas"), "who hath judged her": the prophetical past for the future: the charge in Re 18:4 to God's people to come out of her implies that the judgment was not yet actually executed.

Therefore - In consequence of her pride, arrogance, and luxury, and of the calamities that she has brought upon others. Shall her plagues come in one day - They shall come in a time when she is living in ease and security; and they shall come at the same time - so that all these terrible judgments shall seem to be poured upon her at once. Death - This expression, and those which follow, are designed to denote the same thing under different images. The general meaning is, that there would be utter and final destruction. It would be as if death should come and cut off the inhabitants. And mourning - As there would be where many were cut off by death. And famine - As if famine raged within the walls of a besieged city, or spread over a land, And she shall be utterly burned with fire - As completely destroyed as if she were entirely burned up. The certain and complete destruction of that formidable anti-Christian power is predicted under a great variety of emphatic images. See Rev 14:10-11; Rev 16:17-21; Rev 17:9, Rev 17:16. Perhaps in this so frequent reference to a final destruction of that formidable anti-Christian power by fire, there may be more intended than merely a figurative representation of its final ruin. There is some degree of probability, at least, that Rome itself will be literally destroyed in this manner, and that it is in this way that God intends to put an end to the papal power, by destroying what has been so long the seat and the center of this authority. The extended prevalence of this belief, and the grounds for it, may be seen from the following remarks: (1) It was an early opinion among the Jewish rabbies that Rome would be thus destroyed. Vitringa, on the Apocalypse, cites some opinions of this kind; the Jewish expectation being founded, as he says, on the passage in Isa 34:9, as Edom was supposed to mean Rome. […]