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
But if the man does not want to marry his brother’s widow, she is to go to the elders at the city gate and say, “My husband’s brother refuses to…
“And the man like not to take his brother's wife,.... The provision here made by this law, when this was the case, is such as did not take place before it became a law; for then Onan would have taken the advantage of it, and…”
You shall not have two differing weights in your bag, one heavy and one light.
“Thou shalt not have in thy bag divers weights,.... Or, "a stone and a stone" (y); it being usual, in those times and countries, to have their weights of stone, as it was formerly with us here; we still say, that such a commodity is…”
you are to take some of the firstfruits of all your produce from the soil of the land that the LORD your God is giving you and put them in…
“That thou shalt take of the first of all the fruit of the earth,.... This oblation of firstfruits was different front the sheaf of the firstfruits brought at barley harvest in the time of the passover, and from the two wave loaves of wheaten flour…”
Then the priest shall take the basket from your hands and place it before the altar of the LORD your God,
“And the priest shall take the basket out of thine hand,.... To wave it, as Jarchi says, putting his hand under the hand of the owner, and so waving it; and this being waved to and fro towards the several corners of the earth, was…”
When you have finished laying aside a tenth of all your produce in the third year, the year of the tithe, you are to give it to the Levite, the…
“When thou hast made an end of tithing all the tithes of thine increase,.... Which, according to Maimonides (k), is to be understood of the feast, in which all tithes are finished, which is the feast of the passover: the third year, which is the…”
I have not eaten any of the sacred portion while in mourning, or removed any of it while unclean, or offered any of it for the dead.
“I have not eaten thereof in my mourning,.... When in grief and sorrow on account of any afflictive circumstance, for these were to be eaten with joy, Deu 16:11; and especially of the loss of relations by death, when holy things were not to be…”
Write on them all the words of this law when you have crossed over to enter the land that the LORD your God is giving you, a land flowing with…
“And thou shall write upon them all the words of this law,.... Not the whole book of Deuteronomy, as some think, at least not the historical part of it, only what concerns the laws of God; and it may be only a summary or abstract…”
And when you have crossed the Jordan, you are to set up these stones on Mount Ebal, as I am commanding you today, and you are to coat them with…
“And therefore it shall be, when ye be gone over Jordan,.... Some time after they had passed that river: that ye shall set up these stones, which I command you this day, in Mount Ebal; a mountain near Shechem in Samaria, and was, as Benjamin…”
Moreover, you are to build there an altar to the LORD your God, an altar of stones. You must not use any iron tool on them.
“And there shall thou build an altar to the Lord thy God,.... On the same mountain, though not of the same stones.”
You shall build the altar of the LORD your God with uncut stones and offer upon it burnt offerings to the LORD your God.
“Thou shall build the altar of the Lord thy God of whole stones,.... And of such Joshua did build it, Jos 8:31, and thou shalt offer burnt offerings thereon unto the Lord thy God; and very likely sin offerings too; for these frequently went together…”
Then the Levites shall proclaim in a loud voice to every Israelite:
“And the Levites shall speak, and say unto all the men of Israel,.... Rather, "answer (e) and say"; not the whole tribe of Levi, for that stood on Mount Gerizim to bless, Deu 27:12; but the priests of that tribe who were placed in the…”
‘Cursed is he who dishonors his father or mother.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
“Cursed be he that setteth light by his father, or his mother,.... That secretly despises them in his heart, and by looks and gestures mocks at them in a private manner, unseen by others, Pro 30:17; for if he publicly cursed them, that was cognizable…”
‘Cursed is he who moves his neighbor’s boundary stone.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
“Cursed be he that removeth his neighbour's landmark,.... Removes it backward, and steals ground, as Jarchi explains it; this is commonly done secretly; see Deu 19:14, and all the people shall say Amen; See Gill on Deu 27:15; See Gill on Deu 27:16.”
‘Cursed is he who lets a blind man wander in the road.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
“Cursed be he that maketh the blind to wander out of the way,.... By directing him wrong knowingly, or laying a stumbling block in his way, Lev 19:14.”
‘Cursed is he who withholds justice from the foreigner, the fatherless, or the widow.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
“Cursed be he that perverteth the judgment of the stranger, fatherless, and widow,.... Who have none to assist them, and take their part, and therefore judges may be tempted to do an unjust thing; but God is the patron of them, and takes notice of…”
‘Cursed is he who sleeps with his father’s wife, for he has violated his father’s marriage bed.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
“Cursed be he that lieth with his father's wife,.... As Reuben did, and which is forbidden Lev 18:8, because he uncovereth his father's skirt; see Deu 22:30, and all the people shall say Amen; the tribe of Reuben said this as well as the rest.”
‘Cursed is he who strikes down his neighbor in secret.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
“Cursed be he that smiteth his neighbour secretly,.... And kills him, and the murder is not known; the curse of God follows such, and overtakes them sooner or later.”
‘Cursed is he who accepts a bribe to kill an innocent person.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
“Cursed be he that taketh reward to slay an innocent person,.... As an assassin, to murder him privately; or as a judge, that takes a bribe to condemn to death an innocent person: so Aben Ezra observes, that according to the sense of some a…”
Your basket and kneading bowl will be blessed.
“Blessed shall be thy basket,.... Which the Targums of Jonathan and Jerusalem restrain to the basket of firstfruits, and the cake of the first of their dough; but it intends any and every vessel in which they put their provisions for present use, and that…”
The LORD will make you prosper abundantly—in the fruit of your womb, the offspring of your livestock, and the produce of your land—in the land that the LORD swore to…
“And the Lord shall make thee plenteous in goods,.... In all temporal good things, give them an affluence of them, even all things richly to enjoy; the Targum of Jonathan is,"the Word of the Lord shall, &c."”
The LORD will open the heavens, His abundant storehouse, to send rain on your land in season and to bless all the work of your hands.
“The Lord shall open unto thee his good treasure,.... The Lord has his treasures of snow and of hail, and of wind, Job 38:22; but here his good treasure, as appears by what follows, is his treasure of rain.”
The LORD will afflict you with the boils of Egypt, with tumors and scabs and itch from which you cannot be cured.
“The Lord will smite thee with the botch of Egypt,.... Which some understand of the leprosy, Of that sort of it called "elephantiasis", frequent among the Egyptians; See Gill on Lev 13:2.”
You will plant and cultivate vineyards, but will neither drink the wine nor gather the grapes, because worms will eat them.
“Thou shalt plant vineyards, and dress them,.... Plant them and prune them, in expectation of much fruit from them: but shall neither drink of the wine nor gather the grapes; so far from drinking of the wine of them, that they should not be able…”
You will have olive trees throughout your territory but will never anoint yourself with oil, because the olives will drop off.
“Thou shalt have olive trees throughout thy coasts,.... In the several parts of the land of Canaan, which is therefore called a land of olive oil, Deu 8:8, but thou shalt not anoint thyself with the oil; nor any other relations, friends, guests, as was…”
You will father sons and daughters, but they will not remain yours, because they will go into captivity.
“Thou shalt beget sons and daughters, but thou shall not enjoy them,.... Or, "they shall not be thine" (q); being taken from them, and given to others, see Deu 28:32; and for the following reason: for they shall go into captivity; as when the ten…”