Voices and influences
John Gill
The self-taught Baptist Hebraist who pastored one London congregation for fifty-one years and wrote a comment on every verse in the Bible.
Summary
This site quotes John Gill 5,991 times across 66 books, and lists 0 works.
- Lived 1697 to 1771.
- Quoted here most in Psalms: 639 of 5,991.
John Gill
- Lived
- 1697 to 1771
- Tradition
- Reformed Baptist
5 of 5,991 quotations
Own words
Quoted in full, because John Gill died in 1771 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.
A bruised reed shall he not break,.... Various are the thoughts of interpreters, about what is meant by this, and by the smoking flax shall he not quench.
Undated in the archive this site cites.
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Some think the Scribes and Pharisees are designed, whose power Christ could easily crush, and their wrath and fury restrain, but would not, till the time of his vengeance was come. Others that the publicans and sinners are intended, of whose conversion and salvation there were more hope than of the Scribes and Pharisees; and which Christ greatly sought after, and therefore cherished and encouraged them in his ministry and conversation.
Matthew 12:20 A bruised reed He will not break, and a smoldering wick He will not extinguish, till He leads justice to victory. BSB
And Cain talked with Abel,.... Or "said", or "spoke unto" him (l); either what the Lord God said to him in the foregoing verses, as Aben Ezra; or he spoke to him in a kind and friendly manner, and thereby got him to take a…
Undated in the archive this site cites.
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walk in the field with him.
Genesis 4:8 Then Cain said to his brother Abel, “Let us go out to the field.” And while they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him. BSB
And whosoever offereth a sacrifice of peace offering unto the Lord,.... This, as Ben Gersom observes, is distinguished from a burnt offering; for though it was to be perfect, and without blemish, yet not obliged to be a male as that, Lev 3:
Undated in the archive this site cites.
Leviticus 22:21 When a man presents a peace offering to the LORD from the herd or flock to fulfill a vow or as a freewill offering, it must be without blemish or defect to be acceptable. BSB
So David and Abishai came to the people by night,.... Josephus (l) wrongly says, that he took with him both Abishai and Ahimelech; he chose to have but one, for the greater secrecy.
Undated in the archive this site cites.
1 Samuel 26:7 That night David and Abishai came to the troops, and Saul was lying there asleep in the inner circle of the camp, with his spear stuck in the ground by his head. And Abner and the troops were lying around him. BSB
Therefore, behold, I will bring evil upon the house of Jeroboam,.... Calamities, destruction, and ruin: and will cut off from Jeroboam him that pisseth against the wall; not leave a dog of his, or rather a male, see 1Sa 25:22.
Undated in the archive this site cites.
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and him that is shut up and left in Israel; in garrisons or in prisons, in cities or in fields, or in whatsoever situation or circumstances they may be.
1 Kings 14:10 Because of all this, behold, I am bringing disaster on the house of Jeroboam: I will cut off from Jeroboam every male, both slave and free, in Israel; I will burn up the house of Jeroboam as one burns up dung until it is gone! BSB
Influence, on the record
This site quotes John Gill 5,991 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
John Gill was born at Kettering in Northamptonshire on November 23, 1697, the son of a wool merchant who served as a deacon in the dissenting congregation there. Because the family were Nonconformists, the local grammar school effectively closed to him around the age of eleven. So he taught himself. What he taught himself was languages. He worked through Latin and Greek on his own, then Hebrew — and then kept going, into the Targums, the Talmud, and the medieval rabbis. Almost no English Christian of his century read Jewish sources as widely as Gill did, and he read them in the original. He was baptized in 1716, began preaching, and in 1719 was called to a small Particular Baptist congregation at Horsleydown in Southwark, south London. He stayed fifty-one years, until his death. That pulpit had a long life ahead of it: the congregation later moved and eventually became the church that called Charles Spurgeon a century afterward, and Spurgeon spoke of Gill as one of his predecessors. The work he is remembered for is the commentary. Gill wrote an exposition of the entire Bible, verse by verse, book by book — the New Testament first, in three volumes (1746–1748), then the Old Testament in six (1748–1763). It was the first complete verse-by-verse commentary on the whole Bible written by a Baptist, and it is thick with rabbinic material nobody else was bringing to English readers. He also wrote The Cause of God and Truth (1735–1738), a four-part defense of Calvinist doctrine against the Arminian arguments of Daniel Whitby, and late in life A Body of Doctrinal and Practical Divinity (1767–1770), the first full systematic theology produced by an English Baptist. The University of Aberdeen gave him a doctorate in divinity in 1748; he remarked that he had neither asked for it nor deserved it. His theology was high Calvinism, and he pressed it further than most. Gill held to eternal justification and was reluctant to make a free offer of Christ to all who heard him — a position later called hyper-Calvinism, and one that Andrew Fuller and then Spurgeon worked hard to undo among the Baptists. Historians still argue about exactly how far he went. Robert Hall's jab has followed the commentary ever since: it was, he said, a continent of mud. But the mud kept getting reprinted. Augustus Toplady defended him fiercely. Spurgeon kept him on the shelf and praised his learning in Commenting and Commentaries, while rejecting outright his restraint about inviting sinners to come. He preached his last sermon in 1771 and died at Camberwell on October 14 of that year, aged seventy-three. Fifty-one years in one pulpit, a comment on every verse in the Bible, and a body of theology his own denomination has been arguing with ever since. Sources: John Gill, An Exposition of the Old and New Testaments and A Body of Doctrinal and Practical Divinity; John Rippon, A Brief Memoir of the Life and Writings of the Late Rev. John Gill, D.D.; C. H. Spurgeon, Commenting and Commentaries; Timothy George and David Dockery, eds., Baptist Theologians.
5,991 quotations across 66 books
Where this voice is quoted
So to this day Israel has been in rebellion against the house of David.
“So Israel rebelled against the house of David unto this day. In which the writer of this book lived, and so continued until their captivity by the king of Assyria.”
And when Rehoboam arrived in Jerusalem, he mobilized the whole house of Judah and the tribe of Benjamin—180,000 chosen warriors—to fight against the house of Israel and restore the kingdom…
“And when Rehoboam was come to Jerusalem, From Shechem, which was forty miles (n) from Jerusalem: he assembled all the house of Judah, with the tribe of Benjamin, an hundred and fourscore thousand chosen men, which were warriors, to fight against the house of Israel…”
But the word of God came to Shemaiah the man of God:
“But the word of God came unto Shemaiah the man of God,.... A prophet in those days, see 2Ch 12:15 and the word that came to him, as in the Targum, is called the word of prophecy: saying; as follows.”
“Tell Rehoboam son of Solomon king of Judah, all the house of Judah and Benjamin, and the rest of the people
“Speak unto Rehoboam the son of Solomon king of Judah,.... He is called king before, but of what tribe or tribes is not expressly said, only it is implied in 1Ki 12:17 and he is only acknowledged king of Judah by the Lord himself: and…”
One calf he set up in Bethel, and the other in Dan.
“And he set the one in Bethel,.... In the southern part of the land, on the border of Ephraim and Benjamin; and the rather he chose this place, because its name signifies the house of God, and had been a sacred place, where Jacob more…”
And the altar was split apart, and the ashes poured out, according to the sign that the man of God had given by the word of the LORD.
“The altar also was rent,.... Split into two parts perhaps, and one fell one way, and the other another; and the ashes poured out from the altar; the ashes of the burnt offering, these were spilled on the ground; all which was done without any…”
Then the king said to the man of God, “Come home with me and refresh yourself, and I will give you a reward.”
“And the king said unto the man of God, come home with me, and refresh thyself,.... By eating a meal with him, after such a journey he had taken, and delivered his prophecies, and put up his prayers for the king: and I will give…”
But the man of God replied, “If you were to give me half your possessions, I still would not go with you, nor would I eat bread or drink water…
“And the man of God said unto the king,.... In answer to his civility to him, to assure him it was not out of contempt to him, or ill will to him, or slight of his favour, but in obedience to the will of God…”
but the man of God went back with him, ate bread in his house, and drank water.
“So he went back with him,.... In which he sinned; for as he had most certainly the command of God not to eat and drink in that place, he ought to have had the countermand from the Lord, and not trusted to another person.”
but you went back and ate bread and drank water in the place where He told you not to do so, your body shall never reach the tomb of your…
“But camest back, and hast eaten bread and drunk water in the place, of the which the Lord did say to thee, eat no bread, nor drink no water,....”
Then he laid the body in his own tomb, and they lamented over him, “Oh, my brother!”
“And he laid his carcass in his own grave,.... Which he had prepared for himself; for, as he came from Samaria, it could not be the sepulchre of his fathers; and this was showing all the respect, and doing all the honour to him, he…”
And this was the sin of the house of Jeroboam that led to its extermination and destruction from the face of the earth.
“And this thing became sin unto the house of Jeroboam,.... All the above things were sins in themselves, as building high places, and putting priests in them, whoever would; but the sense is, that these were the causes of punishment, or of evil things being…”
Because of all this, behold, I am bringing disaster on the house of Jeroboam: I will cut off from Jeroboam every male, both slave and free, in Israel; I will…
“Therefore, behold, I will bring evil upon the house of Jeroboam,.... Calamities, destruction, and ruin: and will cut off from Jeroboam him that pisseth against the wall; not leave a dog of his, or rather a male, see 1Sa 25:22.”
Anyone belonging to Jeroboam who dies in the city will be eaten by dogs, and anyone who dies in the field will be eaten by the birds of the air.’
“Him that dieth of Jeroboam in the city shall the dogs eat, and him that dieth in the fields shall the fowls of the air eat,....”
Moreover, the LORD will raise up for Himself a king over Israel who will cut off the house of Jeroboam. This is the day—yes, even today!
“Moreover the Lord shall raise up a king over Israel,.... Baasha is meant, 1Ki 15:29. who shall cut off the house of Jeroboam that day; immediately, as soon as on the throne, he should destroy his whole family, as he did, 1Ki 15:29, but what?”
And the length of Jeroboam’s reign was twenty-two years, and he rested with his fathers, and his son Nadab reigned in his place.
“And the days which Jeroboam reigned were twenty two years,.... So that he outlived Rehoboam five years, and lived to the second year of the reign of his grandson Asa: and he slept with his fathers; or died as they did: and Nadab his son…”
And Judah did evil in the sight of the LORD, and by the sins they committed they provoked Him to jealous anger more than all their fathers had done.
“And Judah did evil in the sight of the Lord,.... At the end of three years, from the beginning of the reign of Rehoboam: and they provoked him to jealousy, with their sins which they had committed, above all that their fathers had done; that…”
There were even male shrine prostitutes in the land. They imitated all the abominations of the nations the LORD had driven out before the Israelites.
“And there were also Sodomites in the land, Such as were addicted to unnatural lusts between men and men, which the men of Sodom were guilty of, from whence they had their name: Jarchi interprets the word adultery and some versions render it whoremongers; and…”
Then King Rehoboam made bronze shields in their place and committed them to the care of the captains of the guard on duty at the entrance to the royal palace.
“And King Rehoboam made in their stead brazen shields,.... For the king of Egypt had so stripped him of his gold, that he was not able to replace golden ones: and committed them into the hands of the chief of the guard; or "runners" (p)…”
As for the rest of the acts of Rehoboam, along with all that he did, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah?
“Now the rest of the acts of Rehoboam and all that he did,.... In the course of his reign, that was memorable: are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah?”
And Rehoboam rested with his fathers and was buried with them in the City of David; his mother’s name was Naamah the Ammonite.
“And Rehoboam slept with his fathers, and was buried with his fathers in the city of David,.... Where David and Solomon were buried, 1Ki 2:10 and his mother's name was Naamah, an Ammonitess; which is repeated, that it might be observed as what was the…”
In the eighteenth year of the reign of Jeroboam son of Nebat, Abijam became king of Judah,
“Now in the eighteenth year of King Jeroboam the son of Nebat reigned Abijam over Judah. That is, began to reign; and by this it appears that Rehoboam was in the eighteenth year of his reign when he died, for he and Jeroboam began their…”
Nevertheless, for the sake of David, the LORD his God gave him a lamp in Jerusalem by raising up a son to succeed him and to make Jerusalem strong.
“Nevertheless, for David's sake did the Lord his God give him a lamp in Jerusalem,.... A kingdom there, as the Targum, splendid and glorious, to be continued in his posterity: to set up his son after him; in it: and to establish Jerusalem: to continue…”
And there was war between the houses of Rehoboam and Jeroboam all the days of Abijam’s life.
“And there was war between Rehoboam and Jeroboam all the days of his life. Not the days of Rehoboam, though that was true, and is observed, 1Ki 14:30, but all the days of Abijam, before he came to the throne, and in which, when a…”
As for the rest of the acts of Abijam, along with all his accomplishments, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah?
“Now the rest of the acts of Abijam, and all that he did, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah?....”