The Voices
Matthew Henry
The Chester nonconformist who rose before dawn for ten years to write a whole-Bible commentary plain enough for a farming family to read at the table.
Short bio
Matthew Henry was born on October 18, 1662, at Broad Oak in Flintshire, on the Welsh border — a few months after the Act of Uniformity threw his father out of the Church of England. Philip Henry was one of roughly two thousand ministers ejected in 1662 for refusing to conform. He lost his living, kept preaching where he could, and taught his children at home. Matthew was a sickly boy who is said to have been reading Bible chapters aloud with comment at three years old. He grew up in a house where family worship happened twice a day and where nonconformity had a price attached to it. He studied under Thomas Doolittle at an academy for dissenters, then went to London in 1685 to read law at Gray's Inn — a sensible career for a man whose religion barred him from the universities. He gave it up. In 1687, at twenty-four, he was privately ordained and went to Chester as minister of a Presbyterian congregation. He stayed twenty-five years. He preached twice on Sunday, catechized the children, lectured on weeknights, visited constantly, and preached in the surrounding villages and in the county jail. The congregation grew to some hundreds of communicants and built a chapel in Crook Street. He began the commentary in November 1704. His method was ordinary and brutal: rise at four or five in the morning and write before the day's work, then take up the evening after it. He wrote for the family table — for a farmer reading aloud to his household, not for a scholar. The result is not technical. It is the text explained clause by clause and then pressed home, with a gift for the memorable line that has kept it quoted for three hundred years. In 1712 he moved, reluctantly, to a congregation at Mare Street, Hackney, in London. On June 22, 1714, riding back toward Hackney after preaching in Chester, he was thrown from his horse near Nantwich. He died that night at Tarporley, aged fifty-one. He had finished through the end of Acts. Thirteen fellow ministers completed Romans through Revelation from his notes and papers, and the whole *Exposition of the Old and New Testaments* was published in six volumes. It has never gone out of print. Its readers make the case for it better than any summary can. George Whitefield read it through four times, the last time on his knees. Spurgeon told his students in *Commenting and Commentaries* that every minister ought to read it entirely and carefully through at least once. John Wesley abridged it for his people. It sits on more shelves, in more languages, than any other commentary written in English. Sources: Matthew Henry, *An Exposition of the Old and New Testaments*; J. B. Williams, *Memoirs of the Life, Character and Writings of the Rev. Matthew Henry*; C. H. Spurgeon, *Commenting and Commentaries*; *Diaries and Letters of Philip Henry*, ed. Matthew Henry Lee.
Notable works
2 listed
| Title | Year | Description |
|---|---|---|
| An Exposition of the Old and New Testaments | 1710 | — |
| Directions for Daily Communion with God | 1712 | — |
Where to find them
Their words on MannaFest
14,170 quotes across 66 books
Where this voice speaks on the site — each quote links to the verse it was chosen for.
“8 And Moses took the blood, and sprinkled it on the people, and said, Behold the blood of the covenant, which the L ORD hath made with you concerning all these words. The first two verses record the appointment of a second session upon mount Sinai, for the mak…”
“Moses was sure that he who called him would protect him; and even those glorious attributes of God which are most terrible to the wicked the saints with a humble reverence rejoice in. He that walks righteously, and speaks uprightly, is able to dwell even with …”
“They might well afford to offer liberally for the honour of God, while they lived at free quarters, having food for themselves and their families rained upon them daily from heaven. We also must own that we have our all from God's bounty, and therefore ought t…”
“This propitiatory covering, as it might well be translated, was a type of Christ, the great propitiation, whose satisfaction fully answers the demands of the law, covers our transgressions, and comes between us and the curse we deserve. Thus he is the end of t…”
“The apostle calls them cherubim of glory shadowing the mercy-seat, Heb. ix. It denotes their attendance upon the Redeemer, to whom they were ministering spirits, their readiness to do his will, their special presence in the assemblies of saints ( Ps. lxviii. 1…”
“In allusion to this mercy-seat, we are said to come boldly to the throne of grace ( Heb. iv. 16 ); for we are not under the law, which is covered, but under grace, which is displayed; its wings are stretched out, and we are invited to come under the shadow of …”
“(3.) A type of the spiritual provision which is made in the church, by the gospel of Christ, for all that are made priests to our God. In our Father's house there is bread enough and to spare, a loaf for every tribe.”
“The treasure of this light is now put into earthen vessels, 2 Cor. iv. The branches of the candlestick spread every way, to denote the diffusing of the light of the gospel into all parts by the Christian ministry, Matt. v. 14, 15 . There is a diversity of gift…”
“Nothing was left to his own invention, or the fancy of the workmen, or the people's humour; but the will of God must be religiously observed in every particular. All God's providences are exactly according to his counsels, and the copy never varies from the or…”
“Thus the churches of Christ and the saints, though they are many, are yet one, being fitly joined together in holy love, and by the unity of the Spirit, so growing into one holy temple in the Lord, Eph. ii. This tabernacle was very strait and narrow; but, at t…”
“But the builders of the gospel church said, Silver and gold have we none; and yet the glory of their building far exceeded that of the tabernacle, 2 Cor. iii. How much better is wisdom than gold!”
“We have not boldness to enter into the holiest, in all acts of devotion, by the blood of Jesus, yet such as obliges us to a holy reverence and a humble sense of our distance. Another veil was for the outer door of the tabernacle,”
“Church-privileges are movable goods, from one place to another; the gospel is not tied to any place; the candlestick is in a tent, and may easily be taken away, Rev. ii.”
“Now this brazen altar was a type of Christ dying to make atonement for our sins: the wood would have been consumed by the fire from heaven if it had not been secured by the brass; nor could the human nature of Christ have borne the wrath of God if it had not b…”
“There an altar was ordered to be set up, to which they must bring their sacrifices, and on which their priests must offer them to God: and this altar was to sanctify their gifts. Here they were to present their services to God, as from the mercy-seat he gave h…”
“He appoints their livery; their work was holy, and so must their garments be, and unanswerable to the glory of the house which was now to be erected,”
“A blessed thing it is when real holiness goes, as the ceremonial holiness did, by succession in a family. The priests' garments appointed, for glory and beauty,”
“(2.) That the people might thereby be possessed with a holy reverence of that God whose ministers appeared in such grandeur. (3.) That the priests might be types of Christ, who should offer himself without spot to God, and of all Christians, who have the beaut…”
“Righteousness is the girdle of his loins ( Isa. xi. 6 ), and should be of ours, Eph. vi. He is girt with strength for the work of our salvation, and is ready for it.”
“Though the people were forbidden to come near, and obliged to keep their distance, yet by the high priest, who had their names on his breast-plate, they entered into the holiest; so believers, even while they are here on this earth, not only enter into the hol…”
“The ephod was the garment of service; the breast-plate of judgment was an emblem of honour: these two must by no means be separated. If any man will minister unto the Lord, and do his will, he shall know his doctrine.”
“How near should Christ's name be to our hearts, since he is pleased to lay our names so near his! and what a comfort it is to us, in all our addresses to God, that the great high priest of our profession has the names of all his Israel upon his breast before t…”
“But it was a shadow of good things to come, and the substance is Christ. He is our oracle; by him God in these last days makes known himself and his mind to us, Heb. i. Divine revelation centres in him, and comes to us through him; he is the light, the true li…”
“Some make the bells of the holy robe to typify the sound of the gospel of Christ in the world, giving notice of his entrance within the veil for us. Blessed are those that hear this joyful sound, Ps. lxxxix. The adding of the pomegranates, which are a fragrant…”
“Holiness becomes his house and household. The high priest must be sequestered from all pollution, and consecrated to God and to his service and honour, and so must all his ministrations be. All that attend in God's house must have Holiness to the Lord engraven…”