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
May its morning stars grow dark; may it wait in vain for daylight; may it not see the breaking of dawn.
“Let the stars of the twilight thereof be dark - That is, be extinguished, so that it shall be total darkness - darkness not even relieved by a single star.”
Why did I not perish at birth; why did I not die as I came from the womb?
“Why died I not from the womb? - Why did I not die as soon as I was born? Why were any pains taken to keep me alive?”
or with princes who had gold, who filled their houses with silver.
“Or with princes that had gold - That is, he would have been united with the rich and the great.”
There the wicked cease from raging, and there the weary find rest.
“There the wicked cease - from “troubling.” In the grave - where kings and princes and infants lie. This verse is often applied to heaven, and the language is such as will express the condition of that blessed world.”
Both small and great are there, and the slave is freed from his master.
“The small and the great are there - The old and the young, the high and the low. Death levels all. It shows no respect to age; it spares none because they are vigorous, young, or beautiful.”
Why is light given to the miserable, and life to the bitter of soul,
“Wherefore is light given to him that is in misery? - The word “light” here is used undoubtedly to denote “life.” This verse commences a new part of Job’s complaint.”
Why is life given to a man whose way is hidden, whom God has hedged in?
“Why is light given “to a man uhose way is hid?” That is, who does not know what way to take, and who sees no escape from the misery that surrounds him. Whom God hath hedged in - See Notes, Job 1:10.”
“If one ventures a word with you, will you be wearied? Yet who can keep from speaking?
“If we assay to commune with thee - Margin, A word. Hebrew - הנסה דבר dâbâr hanı̂câh. “May we attempt a word with thee?””
Surely you have instructed many, and have strengthened their feeble hands.
“Behold, thou hast instructed many - That is, thou hast instructed many how they ought to bear trials, and hast delivered important maxims to them on the great subject of the divine government.”
Your words have steadied those who stumbled; you have braced the knees that were buckling.
“Thy words have upholden him that was falling - That is, either falling into sin, or sinking under calamity and trial.”
But now trouble has come upon you, and you are weary. It strikes you, and you are dismayed.
“But now it is come upon thee - That is, calamity; or, the same trial which others have had, and in which thou hast so successfully exhorted and comforted them.”
The old lion perishes for lack of prey, and the cubs of the lioness are scattered.
“The old lion - The word used here, לישׁ layı̂sh, denotes a lion, “so called,” says Gesenius,” from his strength and bravery,” or, according to Urnbreit, the lion in the strength of his old ago; see an examination of the word in Bochart, Hieroz. P.”
In disquieting visions in the night, when deep sleep falls on men,
“In thoughts - Amidst the tumultuous and anxious thoughts which occur in the night. The Hebrew word rendered thoughts, (שׂעפים śâ‛ı̂phı̂ym), means thoughts which divide and distract the mind.”
fear and trembling came over me and made all my bones shudder.
“Fear came upon me - Margin, “Met me.” The Chaldee Paraphrase renders this, “a tempest,” זיקא. The Septuagint, φρίκη frikē - “shuddering,” or “horror.” The sense is, that he became greatly alarmed at the vision.”
Then a spirit glided past my face, and the hair on my body bristled.
“Then a spirit passed before my face - He does not intimate whether it was the spirit of a man, or an angel who thus appeared. The belief in such apparitions was common in the early ages, and indeed has prevailed at all times.”
‘Can a mortal be more righteous than God, or a man more pure than his Maker?
“Shall mortal man - Or, shall feeble man. The idea of “mortal” is not necessarily implied in the word used here, אנושׁ 'ĕnôsh. It means man; and is usually applied to the lower classes or ranks of people; see the notes at Isa 8:1.”
how much more those who dwell in houses of clay, whose foundations are in the dust, who can be crushed like a moth!
“How much less - (אף 'aph). This particle has the general sense of addition, accession, especially of something more important;” yea more, besides, even.” Gesenius. The meaning here is, “how much more true is this of man!””
Are not their tent cords pulled up, so that they die without wisdom?’
“Doth not their excellency ... - Dr. Good renders this, “Their fluttering round is over with them,” by a very forced construction of the passage.”
“Call out if you please, but who will answer? To which of the holy ones will you turn?
“Call now - The expressions used here, as Noyes has well observed, seem to be derived from the law, where the word “call” denotes the language of the complainant, and answer that of the defendant.”
I have seen a fool taking root, but suddenly his house was cursed.
“I have seen the foolish - The wicked. To confirm the sentiment which he had just advanced, Eliphaz appeals to his own observation, and says that though the wicked for a time seem to be prosperous, yet he had observed that they were soon overtaken…”
Blessed indeed is the man whom God corrects; so do not despise the discipline of the Almighty.
“Behold, happy is the man whom God correcteth - This verse commences a new argument, designed to show that afflictions are followed by so important advantages as to make it proper that we should submit to them without a complaint.”
He will rescue you from six calamities; no harm will touch you in seven.
“He shall deliver thee in six troubles - Six is used here to denote an indefinite number, meaning that he would support in many troubles.”
You will be hidden from the scourge of the tongue, and will not fear havoc when it comes.
“Thou shalt be hid from the scourge of the tongue - Margin, Or, “when the tongue scourgeth.” The word rendered “scourge” - שׁוט shôṭ - means properly a whip.”
For you will have a covenant with the stones of the field, and the wild animals will be at peace with you.
“For thou shalt be in league with the stones of the field - In the Hebrew, “There shall be a covenant between thee and the stones of the field.” The sense is, they shall not harm thee.”
You will know that your offspring will be many, your descendants like the grass of the earth.
“Thou shalt know also that thy seed shall be great - Margin, “much.” That is, thy posterity shall be numerous. This was one of the blessings supposed to be connected with the favor of God; see the notes at Isa 53:10.”