He seized the dragon, the old serpent, which is the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole inhabited earth, and bound him for a thousand years,
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He seized the dragon, the old serpent, who is the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole inhabited earth, and bound him for a thousand years,
He seized the dragon, that ancient serpent who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years.
And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years,
And he laid hold on the dragon, the old serpent, which is the Devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years,
And he took the dragon, the old snake, which is the Evil One and Satan, and put chains on him for a thousand years,
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Our Lord Jesus Christ himself said, "No one can enter the strong man's house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man." By "strong man" he means the devil, who was able to hold the human race in bondage. By his "goods" that Christ was to "plunder," he means God's future faithful ones whom the devil was keeping for himself because of their ungodliness and various sins. It was for the purpose of binding this strong man that John, in the Apocalypse, saw "an angel coming down from heaven … who bound [the ancient serpent] for a thousand years." The angel, that is, checked and repressed his power to seduce and possess those destined to be set free.Now, the "thousand years" can, so far as I can see, be interpreted in one of two ways. One interpretation is that this event is to take place in the sixth and last millennium (the sixth "day"), the latter span of which is now passing, and that when John spoke of the last part of this millennium as a "thousand years" he was using, figuratively, the whole to indicate a part. (After this "sixth day" will come the "sabbath" that has no evening, namely, the endless repose of the blessed.) The other interpretation makes the "thousand years" stand for all the years of the Christian era, a perfect number being used to indicate the "fullness of time." For the number one thousand is the cube of ten. Ten times ten equals one hundred, which is already a square, but still a plane figure. To give it depth and make it a cube, one hundred is further multiplied by ten to make a thousand. Now it is true that the number one hundred is sometimes made to stand for "all." Thus, the Lord promised to anyone leaving all things to follow him, "he shall receive a hundredfold." … How much more properly, then, does the number one thousand stand for the whole, since it is the cube, whereas one hundred is only the square of ten? In the same way there is no better interpretation of the text, "he has remembered his covenant forever: the word that he commanded to a thousand generations," than to take "a thousand" as meaning "all" generations.
Matthew Henry · Verses 1–3
Here is a vision, showing by a figure the restraints laid on Satan himself. Christ, with Almighty power, will keep the devil from deceiving mankind as he has hitherto done. He never wants power and instruments to break the power of Satan. Christ shuts by his power, and seals by his authority. The church shall have a time of peace and prosperity, but all her trials are not yet over.
Cross-references: Treasury of Scripture Knowledge. Hebrew and Greek data from STEPBible.org (Tyndale House, Cambridge), CC BY 4.0. Library: sources.
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