A city is a throne. The biblical narrative arc moves from the garden to the city- the garden is the world in its state of potency, the garden-city is the world in its state of glorified perfection. The transfiguration of the world into the city of God captures the element wherein the divine and human wills cooperate unto the perfection of the world. The matter of wood, stone, and gold is integrated together in a single reality where the parts complement each other to form a single whole. This is what sovereignty entails, after all- the capacity to utilize that over which one is sovereign as one pleases. Yet the products of creativity do not exist as ends beyond which there is no further end- rather, one of the fruits of creative labor is the creation of tools through which further work is carried out. The city itself can be viewed in this light:
In scripture and antiquity, the city is the throne of the king. I think we can see this in the way that royal dynasties were tied to particular cities: and sometimes the King would be known by different names according to the throne of the city in which one is speaking (this convention is not simply an ancient one- James I of England is the same person as James VI of Scotland). Yet the city is no mere image of the king's power. It is the practical base of his power- it is in the city that the king gathers together a sufficient number of people of different talents to form an administration and exert control. It is in relation to the city that large workforces can be mustered to erect monumental architecture or granaries in which the food supply can be distributed at will, rather than being dictated by the land. The city is the throne and the land is tied to the city.
Theologically, we can see this play out in many ways in the scriptural narrative. The enemy is "Sin" crouching at Cain's door. Cain falls before him and builds a city. The enemy desires to utilize human activity (which, in virtue of its corporeality, has a natural affinity to the world the enemy is fighting for) to accomplish his own ends. Thus the construction of the city of Cain forms a permanent base of operations in which he moves. Perhaps we are to see the generation of the nephilim in this context: with the the seat of power prepared, the gods descend to exact their terrible rule in person. And if this is correct, then the story of Genesis 11 takes on a new cadence. The building of the city of Babylon is the preparation of a throne for the false king. God disperses the project by turning its builders against each other- endowing them with different tongues and also different cultic identities.
This is perhaps reflected in the ancient notion that the nations were managed by their various patron deities, who were themselves in conflict. Terrestrial war mirrors celestial war. So when God scatters the language (speech) and "lip" (that by which the god is called upon- compare Psalm 16:4) of Nimrod's empire, he weakens its power. And by the eighth century BC, the various fragments of Nimrod's world empire are still fighting. Nimrod founded the cities of Babylon and Assyria alike. There remained, long after his death, a deeply held belief among the Assyrians that they were the natural stewards of Babylon, as reflected in the Assyrian "Synchronistic History". The Enuma Elish, which culminates in the building of the city of Babylon, was found in the Library of Ashurbanipal of Assyria. Tukulti-Ninurta I was famously the king of Assyria who sacked Babylon- and also, if my information is correct, the first king of Assyria to claim the title "King of the Four Corners of the Earth."
On this view, such a claim makes sense: Babylon was conceived as the city of the world, the throne of the divine king and the place where the divine king would interface with his human steward.
This helps us, I think, understand the symbolism which undergirds the conflict between the "two cities" in Scripture- Zion and Babylon, the city of God and the city of man. Zion is the throne of the King. When David conquers Jerusalem, he processes the divine-throne (the ark of the covenant) onto Zion and then sits before that throne. The city of God is that in which creation is reordered, reworked, and restructured around Jesus Christ as His Body. Hence the church is both the city of God and the body of Christ. He is enthroned at its center and sends His life to its peripheries. He is in us, reigning by the Spirit, and we are in Him as the fingers of His rule in the world. The Church is the City of God, the Throne of the King, as it Christizes all things.