Revelation 12:9 - Exposition

And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world; cast down (Revised Version); the whole inhabited earth . "The dragon:" so called, because he is the destroyer (see on Revelation 12:3 ). "The ancient serpent," as he was revealed in Genesis 3:1-24 . So in John 8:44 he is "the destroyer from the beginning." "The devil" ( διάβολος ) is the Greek rendering of the Hebrew Satan, נמָשָׂ , "the accuser, the adversary;" reference is made in John 8:10 to the signification of the name, "The Deceiver." Wordsworth says, "The deceits by which Satan cheated the world in oracles, sorcery, soothsaying, magic, and other frauds, are here specially noticed. These were put to flight by the power of Christ and of the Holy Ghost, in the preaching of the gospel by the apostles and others in the first ages of Christianity. Our Lord himself, speaking of the consequence of the preaching of the seventy disciples, reveals the spiritual struggle and the victory: 'I was beholding Satan as lightning fall from heaven' ( Luke 10:17 , Luke 10:18 )." He was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him; cast down to the earth, etc. (Revised Version). "To the earth" in a twofold sense: