20:2 a thousand years. See note on vv. 1–10.

bound him. Satan’s power to influence the nations is suppressed. Premillennialists and some postmillennialists associate this event with the beginning of an extraordinary future era of peace and prosperity, contrasting with the present (1 Thess. 2:18; 1 Pet. 5:8). Amillennialists think that the binding of Satan has already taken place through Christ’s death and resurrection (12:9; Matt. 12:29; John 12:31; Col. 2:15). The present spread of the gospel to the nations, as initiated in Acts, is the result of a restriction on Satan’s power to deceive. Possibly this restriction on Satan’s power is closely associated with the present temporary demise of the beast (17:8).