Revelation 20:3Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Those who, on the basis of these words of the Apocalypse, concluded that the first resurrection will be bodily paid special attention, among other things, to the number one thousand.

They found in it an indication that the saints would have, as it were, a kind of Sabbath rest for that length of time.

It would be a holy rest after the labors of six thousand years, from the time man was created and, as punishment for his great sin, cast down from the blessedness of Paradise into the miseries of this present mortality.

Thus, according to the words of Scripture, "With the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day" (2 Pet 3:8), when six thousand years are completed, equal to six days, there would follow a seventh day.

This would be the Sabbath, as it were, in the last thousand years, with the resurrection of the saints for the celebration of this Sabbath.

This opinion could be tolerated to some extent if it supposed that, on that Sabbath, the saints would have certain spiritual joys from the presence of the Lord.

We ourselves once thought this. But when they assert that those raised at that time will give themselves over to the most excessive bodily banquets, with so much food and drink that they will not observe any moderation, but will exceed the measure of unbelief itself, no one but the carnal can believe this.

The spiritual call those who believe this by the Greek name chiliasts. Translating the name literally, we may call them thousandarians.

It would take long to refute them separately. Rather, in the present case, we must show how this passage of Scripture should be understood.

"And he cast him," it says, "into the abyss, and shut him in." By this last name, the abyss, is signified the countless multitude of the impious, whose hearts are immeasurably deep in malice against the Church of God.

It is said that he was "shut" there not because the devil had not been there before, but because, having been removed from believers, he began to possess the impious more strongly.

For the one who is not only estranged from God, but also hates God's servants without any cause or reason, is under the devil's power to a greater degree.

"And he shut him in, and set a seal over him, that he should deceive the nations no more until the thousand years were ended." That is, He took measures so that he could not come out, or transgress what had been forbidden.

The addition, "and set a seal over him," means, in my opinion, that He wished it to remain hidden who belongs and who does not belong to the devil's portion.

For in the present age this is entirely hidden. It is unknown whether one who seems to stand will fall, or whether one who seems to lie fallen will rise.

By the seal and the confinement, the devil is restrained and prevented from deceiving those nations belonging to Christ, whom he previously deceived or held in his power.

God chose them before the foundation of the world, to rescue them from the power of darkness and transfer them into the Kingdom of His beloved Son, as the Apostle says (Eph 1:4; Col 1:13).

What believer does not know that even now the devil deceives the nations and drags them with himself into eternal punishment? Yet he deceives only those who are not appointed to eternal life.

Nor should it disturb us that he often deceives even those who, having already been regenerated in Christ, enter upon the way of God.

For "the Lord knows His own" (2 Tim 2:19). From among these he will drag no one into eternal condemnation.

The Lord knows them as God, from whom nothing future is hidden. He does not know as man does, who sees a man in the present, if indeed he sees one whose heart he does not see.

Man does not see what another will be afterward, and he does not even see this about himself.

Therefore the devil is bound and shut in the abyss so that he may no longer deceive the nations of which the Church consists, those whom he previously deceived and held in his power before the Church existed.

For it is not said, "that he should deceive no one," but "that he should deceive the nations no more." By these nations, without any doubt, he meant the Church.

It says, "until the thousand years are ended." This means either what still remains of the sixth day, consisting of a thousand years, or all the years that still remain to be lived in this age.

These words, "that he should deceive the nations no more until the thousand years are ended," should not be understood as though afterward he will deceive only those nations of which the predestined Church consists.

He has been restrained by bonds and confinement from deceiving them.

Here either the expression is the sort sometimes found in the Scriptures, as in the Psalm: "So our eyes look to the Lord our God, until He has mercy upon us" (Ps 122:2).

This clearly does not mean that, after He has mercy, the eyes of the Lord's servants will no longer look to the Lord their God.

Or, more probably, the order of the words is this: "And he shut him in and set a seal over him until the thousand years were ended."

The intervening words, "that he should deceive the nations no more," are an insertion. They do not depend on the place they occupy, but have their own meaning, as though added afterward.

Thus the whole saying could be stated as follows: "And he shut him in and set a seal over him until the thousand years were ended, that he should deceive the nations no more."

That is, He shut him in until the thousand years were ended, so that he should no longer deceive the nations.

"After this," it says, "he must be released for a little while." If being bound and shut in means, for the devil, being unable to deceive the Church, does his release mean that he will have this ability?

By no means. He will never deceive the Church, predestined and chosen from the foundation of the world, of which it is said, "The Lord knows His own" (2 Tim 2:19).

And yet this Church will be here even when the devil is released, just as it has been here from the time of its founding.

It will remain here all the time in those members of it who are born and take the place of those who die.

For a little later he says that the released devil will drag the nations deceived by him throughout the whole world into war against her, and that the number of these enemies will be like the sand of the sea.

"And they went up over the breadth of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city. And fire came down from God out of heaven and devoured them.

And the devil who deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and they will be tormented day and night unto the ages of ages" (Rev 20:8-10).

This last passage already concerns the final judgment. I thought it necessary to cite it here so that no one would think the Church will not be on this earth during that brief time when the devil is released.

Otherwise one might think that the released devil either will no longer find her here, or will destroy her by every kind of persecution.

Therefore, for all the time covered by the book in question, that is, from the first coming of Christ to the end of the age, when His second coming will take place, the devil will be bound.

Yet he will not be bound in such a way that these very bonds prevent him, during the interval called a thousand years, from deceiving the Church. In no way will he deceive her, even after his release.

If being bound meant that he had no ability and no permission to deceive, what would his release mean except receiving the ability and permission to deceive?

But let this not be so. The binding of the devil means that he is not permitted to bring temptation to the full extent that he can give it by power or cunning.

He would deceive men by violently compelling them, or by fraudulently drawing them to his side.

If this were permitted to him for so long a time, and amid such faintheartedness among the majority, he would force very many to fall, whom God wishes to preserve from this.

He would also prevent them from believing. So that he might not do this, he is bound.

He will be released when the time is short. According to Scripture, he will rage with all his own powers and those of his adherents for three years and six months.

Those with whom he will have to wage war will be such that this assault of so great an army will not break them.

But if he were never released, his malicious power would not be sufficiently revealed. The most faithful patience of the holy city would not be sufficiently tested.

Nor would it be made sufficiently clear how wonderfully the Almighty made use of his great malice.

For the Almighty did not completely cut off his ability to tempt the saints, though He removed him from their inner man, in which faith in God dwells.

Thus his attacks, being outward, would be of benefit to them.

He bound him in his own followers so that the devil, by pouring forth and exercising the whole force of his malice, would not destroy the countless weak ones by whom the Church had to be increased and filled.

He would have turned away from pious faith those who were going to believe by fear, and robbed of courage those who had already believed.

But God released him at the end so that the city of God might see what powerful adversary it conquered, to the glory of its Redeemer, Helper, and Liberator.

What, then, are we in comparison with those saints and faithful ones who will be at that time?

For their testing, such an enemy will be released, with whom we struggle with great danger even while he is bound.

Nevertheless, during this interval, there undoubtedly have been and are some soldiers of Christ so wise and brave that, if they were living in this mortality when the devil is released, they would most wisely foresee and most patiently endure all his snares and assaults.

These bonds were not only laid upon the devil when the Church, having passed beyond the boundaries of Judea, began to spread among ever new nations.

They are laid upon him now and will be laid until the end of the age, when the devil will be released.

For even now people are converted to the faith from the unbelief in which he held them, and without doubt they will be converted until that very end.

In relation to each of them, that strong one is necessarily bound when someone is snatched from him as his possession.

The abyss in which he is shut did not disappear with the death of those who lived when his confinement began.

Others, being born, took their place. Until this age is ended, they will be replaced by haters of Christians, in whose blind and dark hearts he will be shut as in an abyss.

But a question arises. In those last three years and six months, when the released devil will rage with all his power, will anyone receive the faith who did not hold it before?

If so, how will the saying retain its force: "How can one enter a strong man's house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man?" (Mt 12:29).

This saying seems to compel us to suppose that, in that little time, no one will enter the ranks of the Christian people.

The devil will fight against those whom he already finds to be Christians. If any of these are conquered and pass over to his side, they should not be counted among the predestined sons of God.

For not in vain does the same Apostle John, who wrote the Apocalypse, say in his epistle concerning certain persons: "They went out from us, but they were not of us.

For if they had been of us, they would have remained with us" (1 Jn 2:19).

But what will happen with little children? It is utterly improbable that that time will not find among Christian children infants just born and not yet baptized.

It is also improbable that no one will be born in those very days, or, if such are born, that their parents will not in some way bring them to the font of regeneration.

If this happens, how will these possessions be snatched from the devil when he is already loosed, since no one can enter his house to plunder his goods unless he first binds him?

Here it speaks of the overthrow of the devil that took place during the Lord's sufferings. The devil considered himself strong, but Christ our almighty God bound him, delivered us from his power, and condemned him to be cast into the abyss. This is also clear from the fact that the demons begged Him not to send them into the abyss. The binding of the devil is also witnessed by the cessation of idol worship, the destruction of pagan temples, the end of bloody sacrifices, and the spread throughout the whole world of the knowledge of God's will. The great Irenaeus testifies that at the coming of Christ the devil first learned that he was condemned to the abyss and Gehenna. Therefore I think that what was said above should be understood as the condemnation of the devil by Christ.

It is said: "After this he must be released for a little while." Of what little time does John speak? Of the time between the Lord's becoming man and the completion of the present life. For it is not great, even if it seems great, when it is measured and compared with the past and the future. If, according to the faith of the Holy Scriptures, our Lord appeared bodily at the last, eleventh hour, then the span until the end of time would rightly be called little. But even if the devil is released, Lord, place bonds again upon his plots against us. For Thou reignest over us, and to Thee belongs glory unto the ages. Amen.

By the binding of the devil and his confinement in the abyss is understood here the overthrow of his power, accomplished through the coming of Jesus Christ to earth and His saving sufferings for the human race. The Evangelist John says directly that Jesus Christ appeared in the world to destroy the works of the devil (cf. 1 Jn 3:5). The Lord Himself also spoke of this: "Now is the judgment of this world; now the prince of this world will be cast out" (Jn 12:31). Indeed, the binding and weakening of the devil during the earthly life of Christ the Savior was evident. Unclean spirits trembled at a single word of Christ, obeyed His disciples in His name (cf. Lk 10:17), and in general obeyed all Christians according to their faith in the Son of God. Historically this was expressed in the fall of paganism and the spread of Christianity. The thousand years are the time from the Lord's becoming man until the coming of the antichrist.

Thus, after the crushing of paganism by the Cross of Christ in the ancient Roman Empire, the devil was deprived for an indefinite time of the power and ability to corrupt and destroy nations with his former ease and freedom. That this truly refers to the binding of the devil after the overthrow of Roman paganism is clear from the direct connection between the Seer's words and the preceding vision, which depicts the fall of Roman paganism (Rev 18, 19). Since this fall occurred not suddenly, but gradually, it is difficult to determine with positive exactness from which point the final fall of paganism should be reckoned. Therefore some interpreters assign an earlier date to this event, while others assign a later one.