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
Swarms of locusts will consume all your trees and the produce of your land.
“All thy trees and fruit of thy land shall the locust consume. Which is a creature that not only consumes grass, and herbs, and the corn of the field, but all green trees; see Exo 10:15.”
the afterbirth that comes from between her legs and the children she bears, because she will secretly eat them for lack of anything else in the siege and distress that…
“And toward her young one that cometh out from between her feet,.... Or her secundine, "her afterbirth", as in the margin of our Bibles; so the Targum of Jonathan and Aben Ezra interpret it.”
The LORD will also bring upon you every sickness and plague not recorded in this Book of the Law, until you are destroyed.
“Also every sickness and every plague which is not written in the book of this law,.... Which is not here mentioned or threatened; and it suggests, that whatsoever sickness or disease that could be thought of or named, or were at any time in any…”
You saw with your own eyes the great trials, and those miraculous signs and wonders.
“The great temptations which thine eyes have seen,.... Or trials, the ten plagues which tried the Egyptians, whether they would let Israel go; and tried the Israelites, whether they would believe in the Lord, and trust in his almighty power to deliver them: the signs…”
For forty years I led you in the wilderness, yet your clothes and sandals did not wear out.
“And I have led you forty years in the wilderness,.... From the time of their coming out of Egypt unto that day, which though not quite complete, is given as a round number.”
When you reached this place, Sihon king of Heshbon and Og king of Bashan came out against us in battle, but we defeated them.
“And when ye came unto this place,.... The borders of Moab, the wilderness before it, to which joined the plains they were now in; see Num 21:13, Sihon king of Heshbon, and Og king of Bashan, came out against us unto battle; not together, but…”
We took their land and gave it as an inheritance to the Reubenites, the Gadites, and the half-tribe of Manasseh.
“And we took their land,.... Which belonged to the two kings, the lands of Jazer, Gilead, and Bashan, fine countries for pasturage: and gave it for an inheritances unto the Reubenites, and to the Gadites, and to the half tribe of Manasseh; who requested it…”
your children and wives, and the foreigners in your camps who cut your wood and draw your water—
“Your little ones, your wives,.... Who are scarce ever mentioned in any special law or solemn transaction: and thy stranger that is in thy camp; not only the proselyte of righteousness, who embraced the Jewish religion entirely, but the proselyte of the gate, who was…”
I am making this covenant and this oath not only with you,
“Neither with you only do I make this covenant and this oath. That is, Moses; for he was ordered to make this covenant with them in the name of the Lord; what promises of good things, or declarations of his mind and will, God would…”
but also with those who are standing here with us today in the presence of the LORD our God, as well as with those who are not here today.
“But with him that standeth here with us this day before the Lord our God,.... Who are before specified according to their dignity, age, sex, and station of life; or rather, "but as with him that standeth", &c.”
Therefore the anger of the LORD burned against this land, and He brought upon it every curse written in this book.
“And the anger of the Lord was kindled against this land,.... For this their idolatry and base ingratitude: to bring upon it all the curses that are written in this book; in this book of Deuteronomy, and particularly Deu 28:16; see Dan 9:11.”
if you obey the LORD your God by keeping His commandments and statutes that are written in this Book of the Law, and if you turn to Him with all…
“If thou shalt hearken unto the voice of the Lord thy God,.... Or rather, "for thou shalt hearken" (p); seeing it is before promised that the Lord would circumcise their hearts to love him, and they should obey his voice, Deu 30:”
The LORD will deliver them over to you, and you must do to them exactly as I have commanded you.
“And the Lord shall give them up before your face,.... To ruin and destruction; the Targum of Jonathan is,"the Word of the Lord shall deliver them up:" that ye may do unto them according to all the commandments which I have commanded you; that is…”
When Moses had finished writing in a book the words of this law from beginning to end,
“And it came to pass, when Moses had made an end of writing the words of this law in a book,....”
“Take this Book of the Law and place it beside the ark of the covenant of the LORD your God, so that it may remain there as a witness against…
“Take this book of the law,.... Not Deuteronomy only, but the whole Pentateuch: and put it in the side of the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God; not in the ark, for there were nothing there but the two tables of stone…”
They will be wasted from hunger and ravaged by pestilence and bitter plague; I will send the fangs of wild beasts against them, with the venom of vipers that slither…
“They shall be burnt with hunger,.... This is the arrow of famine, Eze 5:16; the force of which is such that it makes the skin black as if burnt, Lam 5:10; Onkelos paraphrases it,"inflated or swelled with famine,''which is a phrase Josephus (b) makes use…”
Their wine is the venom of serpents, the deadly poison of cobras.
“Their wine is the poison of dragons,.... Of these creatures, both land and sea dragons; see Gill on Mic 1:8; See Gill on Mal 1:3; Pliny says (l) the dragon has no poison in it; yet, as Dalechamp, in his notes on that writer observes…”
Vengeance is Mine; I will repay. In due time their foot will slip; for their day of disaster is near, and their doom is coming quickly.”
“To me belongeth vengeance and recompense,.... Or, I will repay, or recompence, as it is quoted in Rom 12:19; and so all the three Targums, the Septuagint and Vulgate Latin versions, here, and so Jarchi interprets it.”
which ate the fat of their sacrifices and drank the wine of their drink offerings? Let them rise up and help you; let them give you shelter!
“Which did eat the fat of their sacrifices, and drank the wine of their drink offerings,.... Alluding to the fat of the sacrifices under the law, which was claimed by the Lord as his, and represented as his food, Lev 3:11; and to the drink…”
when I sharpen My flashing sword, and My hand grasps it in judgment, I will take vengeance on My adversaries and repay those who hate Me.
“If I whet my glittering sword,.... That is, I will do it as sure as I live, if I do not, be it so and so; what that is is not said, but left to be concluded.”
On that same day the LORD said to Moses,
“And the Lord spake unto Moses the selfsame day,.... On which he finished the reading of the law, and the above song, which was the seventh of Adar or February; according to the Targum of Jonathan, the day he died on; according to the Egyptian…”
His majesty is like a firstborn bull, and his horns are like those of a wild ox.
“His glory is like the firstling of his bullock,.... Such as were in Bashan, a country possessed by the posterity of Joseph, see Psa 22:12; and so might be called "his" bullock, or a young bull, was reckoned both comely and majestic; so Menis or…”
And concerning Asher he said: “May Asher be the most blessed of sons; may he be the most favored among his brothers and dip his foot in oil.
“And of Asher he said,.... The tribe of Asher, as the Targums of Jonathan and Jerusalem: let Asher be blessed with children; with large numbers, as it appears this tribe was, having in it 53,400 men of war, Num 26:”
So Israel dwells securely; the fountain of Jacob lives untroubled in a land of grain and new wine, where even the heavens drip with dew.
“Israel then shall dwell in safety alone,.... The Canaanites being thrust out of their land, and Israel put into the possession of it, should dwell in safety, or "confidently" (l); without fear of enemies, though surrounded with them on all hands; and though alone, a…”