Voices and influences
Albert Barnes
The Philadelphia pastor who rose at four every morning to write Bible notes for his own Sunday school, and sold a million volumes of them.
Summary
This site quotes Albert Barnes 8,265 times across 66 books, and lists 0 works.
- Lived 1798 to 1870.
- Quoted here most in Isaiah: 746 of 8,265.
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Albert Barnes
- Lived
- 1798 to 1870
- Tradition
- Presbyterian
5 of 8,265 quotations
Own words
Quoted in full, because Albert Barnes died in 1870 and these works are out of copyright. Each citation below names its edition and its year. A citation naming a modernised text means that edition makes its own editorial changes, and that edition's terms are not in this site's record.
For my thoughts are not your thoughts - Interpreters have differed in regard to the connection of this verse with the preceding.
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
Undated in the archive this site cites.
The rest of the quotation
It is evident, I think, that it is properly connected with the subject of pardon; and the sense must be, that the plans and purposes of God in regard to forgiveness are as far above those of people as the heavens are higher than the earth, Isa 55:
Isaiah 55:8 “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways,” declares the LORD. BSB
He hath shewed thee - Micah does not tell them now, as for the first time; which would have excused them. He says, “He hath shewed thee;” He, about whose mind and will and pleasure they were pretending to enquire, the Lord their God.
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
Undated in the archive this site cites.
The rest of the quotation
He had shewn it to them. The law was full of it. He shewed it to them, when He said, “And now, Israel, what doth the Lord thy God require of thee, but to fear the Lord thy God, to walk in all His ways, and to love Him and to serve the Lord, thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, to keep the commandments of the Lord and His statutes which I command thee this day for thy good?” Deu 10:12-13. They had asked, “with what outward thing shall I come before the Lord;” the prophet tells them, “what thing is good,” the inward man of the heart, righteousness, love, humility. And what doth the Lord require (search, seek) of thee? - The very word implies an earnest search within. He would say (Rup.), “Trouble not thyself as to any of these things, burnt-offerings, rams, calves, without thee. For God seeketh not thine, but thee; not thy substance, but thy spirit; not ram or goat, but thy heart.” : “Thou askest, what thou shouldest offer for thee? Other thyself. For what else doth the Lord seek of thee, but thee? Because, of all earthly creatures, He hath made nothing better than thee, He seeketh thyself from thyself, because thou hadst lost thyself.” To do judgment - are chiefly all acts of equity; “to love mercy,” all deeds of love. Judgment, is what right requires; mercy, what love. Yet, secondarily, “to do judgment” is to pass righteous judgments in all cases; and so, as to others, “judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment” Joh 7:24; and as to one’s self also. Judge equitably and kindly of others, humbly of thyself. […]
Micah 6:8 He has shown you, O man, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you but to act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God? BSB
(Compare Exo. 39:1-31.) Moses is now commanded to commit all that pertains to the offerings made to the Lord in the sanctuary to the exclusive charge of the members of a single family, who were to hold their office from generation to generation.
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
Undated in the archive this site cites.
The rest of the quotation
In the patriarchal times, the external rites of worship had generally been conducted by the head of the tribe or family, in accordance with the principle involved in the dedication of the firstborn Exo 13:2; Num 3:12-
Exodus 28:1 “Next, have your brother Aaron brought to you from among the Israelites, along with his sons Nadab, Abihu, Eleazar, and Ithamar, to serve Me as priests. BSB
The leper was to carry about with him the usual signs of mourning for the dead. Compare Lev 10:6 and margin reference.
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
Undated in the archive this site cites.
The rest of the quotation
The leper was a living parable in the world of the sin of which death was the wages; not the less so because his suffering might have been in no degree due to his own personal deserts: he bore about with him at once the deadly fruit and the symbol of the sin of his race. Exo 20:
Leviticus 13:45 A diseased person must wear torn clothes and let his hair hang loose, and he must cover his mouth and cry out, ‘Unclean, unclean!’ BSB
Chambers - (Margin, floors). Rather, a lean-to, which completely surrounded three sides of the building, the north, the west, and the south.
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
Undated in the archive this site cites.
1 Kings 6:5 Against the walls of the temple and the inner sanctuary, Solomon built a chambered structure around the temple, in which he constructed the side rooms. BSB
Influence, on the record
This site quotes Albert Barnes 8,265 times across 66 books.
This site’s own count of what it does with the voice
The life, in order
The life told as one accountfrom this site's record
Albert Barnes was born at Rome, New York, on December 1, 1798. He was headed for the law. At Hamilton College he was converted, changed direction, and went to Princeton Theological Seminary instead, graduating in 1824. His first pastorate was Morristown, New Jersey, from 1825 to 1830. In 1830 he was called to the First Presbyterian Church of Philadelphia, where he preached until 1867 — thirty-seven years in one pulpit. The habit that made him famous was the alarm clock. Barnes rose at four every morning and wrote until nine, before the day's pastoral work began. What he wrote were notes on the Bible for his own Sunday school teachers and Bible class — plain explanations, verse by verse, aimed at people with no Greek and no library. He published them, beginning with the Gospels in 1832. They did not stop. Notes, Explanatory and Practical eventually covered the whole New Testament and much of the Old — Job, the Psalms, Isaiah, Daniel — and sold more than a million volumes in his lifetime, an astonishing number for the period. Generations of American laymen learned their Bible out of Barnes. He was also tried for heresy. His 1829 sermon The Way of Salvation, and then his notes on Romans in 1835, were charged with departing from the Westminster Confession on original sin and the atonement; Barnes taught that Christ's death was a provision made for all rather than a payment restricted in advance to the elect. The Presbytery of Philadelphia suspended him from the ministry in 1835, and the General Assembly reversed the suspension in 1836. He was acquitted, but the fight was one of the fuses of the Old School–New School division that split the American Presbyterian church in 1837. Barnes stood on the New School side. He fought slavery hard and early. An Inquiry into the Scriptural Views of Slavery (1846) took up the biblical arguments the Southern churches used and dismantled them one at a time; The Church and Slavery followed in 1857. The books were read widely in the North during the years the country came apart. His eyesight failed badly in later life, and he kept working with help. He resigned the pulpit in 1867 and died in Philadelphia on December 24, 1870, at seventy-two. What he left is unusual for a scholar. Not a monument — a tool. A working pastor's commentary, written before breakfast for people who had no one else to explain the text, still in print and still free more than a century and a half later. Sources: Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the New Testament and An Inquiry into the Scriptural Views of Slavery; the published minutes of the Presbyterian General Assembly, 1835–1837; Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church; George Marsden, The Evangelical Mind and the New School Presbyterian Experience.
8,265 quotations across 66 books
Where this voice is quoted
Therefore their inhabitants, devoid of power, are dismayed and ashamed. They are like plants in the field, tender green shoots, grass on the rooftops, scorched before it is grown.
“Therefore - Not because you have so great power; but because I have rendered them incapable of resisting you. Were of small power - Hebrew, ‘Short of hand;’ they were feeble, imbecile, unable to resist you.”
But I know your sitting down, your going out and coming in, and your raging against Me.
“But I know - The language of God. ‘I am well acquainted with all that pertains to you. You neither go out to war, nor return, nor abide in your capital without my providential direction’ (see the notes at Isa 10:5-7).”
Because your rage and arrogance against Me have reached My ears, I will put My hook in your nose and My bit in your mouth; I will send you back…
“Because thy rage and thy tumult - Or rather, thy pride, thy insolence, thy vain boasting. Therefore will I put my hook in thy nose - This is a most striking expression, denoting the complete control which God had over the haughty monarch, and his…”
And this will be a sign to you, O Hezekiah: This year you will eat what grows on its own, and in the second year what springs from the same.
“And this shall be a sign unto thee - It is evident that the discourse here is turned from Sennacherib to Hezekiah. Such transitions, without distinctly indicating them, are common in Isaiah.”
And the surviving remnant of the house of Judah will again take root below and bear fruit above.
“And the remnant that is escaped - (See the margin.) Those that are left of the Jews. The ten tribes had been carried away; and it is not improbable that the inhabitants of the kingdom of Judah had been reduced by want, and by the…”
So this is what the LORD says about the king of Assyria: ‘He will not enter this city or shoot an arrow into it.
“He shall not come into this city - Sennacherib encamped probably on the northeast side of the city, and his army was destroyed there (see the notes at Isa 10:28 ff.)”
‘I will defend this city and save it for My own sake and for the sake of My servant David.’”
“For I will defend this city - Notwithstanding all that Hezekiah had done to put it in a posture of defense (2Ch 32:1, following) still it was Yahweh alone who could preserve it.”
So Sennacherib king of Assyria broke camp and withdrew. He returned to Nineveh and stayed there.
“So Sennacherib departed - Probably with some portion of his army and retinue with him, for it is by no means probable that the whole army had been destroyed.”
In those days Hezekiah became mortally ill. The prophet Isaiah son of Amoz came to him and said, “This is what the LORD says: ‘Put your house in order, for…
“In those days - That is, his sickness commenced about the period in which the army of Sennacherib was destroyed. It has been made a question whether the sickness of Hezekiah was before or after the invasion of Sennacherib.”
saying, “Please, O LORD, remember how I have walked before You faithfully and with wholehearted devotion; I have done what was good in Your sight.” And Hezekiah wept bitterly.
“And said, Remember now, O Lord, I beseech thee - The object which Hezekiah desired was evidently that his life might be spared, and that he might not be suddenly cut off.”
And the word of the LORD came to Isaiah, saying,
“Then came the word of the Lord - In the parallel place in 2Ki 20:4, it is said, ‘And it came to pass, afore Isaiah was gone out into the middle court, that the word of the Lord came unto him.’”
“Go and tell Hezekiah that this is what the LORD, the God of your father David, says: ‘I have heard your prayer; I have seen your tears.
“The God of David thy father - David is mentioned here, probably, because Hezekiah had a strong resemblance to him 2Ki 18:3, and because a long and happy reign had been granted to David; and also because the promise had been made to David that…”
This will be a sign to you from the LORD that He will do what He has promised:
“And this shall be a sign unto thee - That is, a sign, or proof that God would do what he had promised, and that Hezekiah would recover and be permitted to go again to the temple of the Lord Isa 38:22; 2Ki 20:8.”
I said, “I will never again see the LORD, even the LORD, in the land of the living; I will no longer look on mankind with those who dwell in…
“I shall not see the Lord - In the original, the Hebrew which is rendered ‘Lord,’ is not Yahweh, but יה יה yâhh yâhh. On the meaning of it, see the note at Isa 12:2 (compare the note at Isa 7:14).”
I composed myself until the morning. Like a lion He breaks all my bones; from day until night You make an end of me.
“I reckoned - There has been considerable variety in interpreting this expression. The Septuagint renders it, ‘I was given up in the morning as to a lion.’”
What can I say? He has spoken to me, and He Himself has done this. I will walk slowly all my years because of the anguish of my soul.
“What shall I say? - This language seems to denote surprise and gratitude at unexpected deliverance. It is the language of a heart that is overflowing, and that wants words to express its deep emotions.”
Surely for my own welfare I had such great anguish; but Your love has delivered me from the pit of oblivion, for You have cast all my sins behind Your…
“Behold, for peace - That is, instead of the health, happiness, and prosperity which I had enjoyed, and which I hope still to enjoy. I had great bitterness - Hebrew, ‘Bitterness to me, bitterness;’ an emphatic expression, denoting intense sorrow.”
For Sheol cannot thank You; Death cannot praise You. Those who descend to the Pit cannot hope for Your faithfulness.
“For the grave cannot praise thee - The Hebrew word here is sheol. It is put by metonymy here for those who are in the grave, that is, for the dead.”
The living, only the living, can thank You, as I do today; fathers will tell their children about Your faithfulness.
“The living, the living - An emphatic or intensive form of expression, as in Isa 38:11, Isa 38:17. Nothing would express his idea but a repetition of the word, as if the heart was full of it.”
And Hezekiah had asked, “What will be the sign that I will go up to the house of the LORD?”
“Hezekiah also had said - What evidence or proof have I that I shall be restored, and permitted to go to the temple?”
At that time Merodach-baladan son of Baladan king of Babylon sent letters and a gift to Hezekiah, for he had heard about Hezekiah’s illness and recovery.
“At that time - That is, soon after his recovery; or after he had amassed great wealth, and was surrounded with the evidences of prosperity 2Ch 32:27-31.”
And Hezekiah welcomed the envoys gladly and showed them what was in his treasure house—the silver, the gold, the spices, and the precious oil, as well as his entire armory—all…
“And Hezekiah was glad of them - Possibly he regarded himself as flattered by an embassage from so great a distance, and so celebrated a place as Babylon.”
Then the prophet Isaiah went to King Hezekiah and asked, “Where did those men come from, and what did they say to you?”
“Then came Isaiah - Isaiah was accustomed to declare the will of God most freely to monarchs (see Isa. 7) What said these men? - What proposition have they made? What is the design of their coming?”
“What have they seen in your palace?” Isaiah asked. “They have seen everything in my palace,” answered Hezekiah. “There is nothing among my treasures that I did not show them.”
“What have they seen? - It is probable that the fact that Hezekiah had showed them the treasures of his kingdom was known in Jerusalem. Such a fact would be likely to attract attention, and to produce inquiry among the people into the cause.”
Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah, “Hear the word of the LORD of Hosts:
“Hear the word of the Lord of hosts - Hear what the mighty God that rules in heaven says of this. This is an instance of great fidelity on the part of the prophet.”