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.
“And therefore, though it was a time of reformation, Jeremiah continued to foretel the destroying judgments that were coming upon them; for there is no symptom more threatening to any people than fruitless attempts of reformation.”
“As it is an encouragement to ministers to be countenanced and protected by such pious magistrates as Josiah was, so it is a great help to magistrates, in any good work of reformation, to be advised and animated, and to have a great deal of their work done for …”
“Yet he was given to be a prophet, not to the Jews only, but to the neighbouring nations, to whom he was to send yokes ( ch. xxvii. 2, 3 ) and whom he must make to drink of the cup of the Lord's anger, ch. xxv. He is still in his writings a prophet to the natio…”
“Those that are young should consider that they are so, should be afraid, as Elihu was, and not venture beyond their length. The assurance God graciously gave him that he would stand by him and carry him on in his work.”
“Mr. Gataker well observes here, That earthly princes are not wont to go along with their ambassadors; but God goes along with those whom he sends, and is, by his powerful protection, at all times and in all places present with them; and with this they ought to…”
“In a word, he must be faithful; it is required of ambassadors that they be so. In two things he must be faithful:-- (1.) He must speak all that he is charged with: Speak all that I command thee. He must forget nothing as minute, or foreign, or not worth mentio…”
“God not only put knowledge into his head, but words into his mouth; for there are words which the Holy Ghost teaches, 1 Cor. ii. It is fit God's message should be delivered in his own words, that it may be delivered accurately. And those that faithfully do so …”
“It is a strange commission that is here given him: See, I have this day set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms. This sounds very great, and yet Jeremiah is a poor despicable priest still; he is not set over the kingdoms as a prince to rule them by the…”
“God commended him that he was so observant, and so quick of apprehension, as to be aware, though it was the first vision he ever saw, that it was a rod of an almond-tree, that his mind was so composed as to be able to distinguish.”
“Some think that those scoffers referred to this who said ( Ezek. xi. 3 ), This city is the cauldron, and we are the flesh. Now the mouth or face of the furnace or hearth, over which this pot boiled, was towards the north, for thence the fire and the fuel were …”
“When there was friendship between Hezekiah and the king of Babylon they promised themselves many advantages out of the north; but it proved quite otherwise: out of the north their trouble arose. Thence sometimes the fiercest tempests come whence we expected fa…”
“A great trust is committed to him. He is sent in God's name as a herald at arms, to proclaim war against his rebellious subjects; for God is pleased to give warning of his judgments beforehand, that sinners may be awakened to meet him by repentance, and so tur…”
“He was of the priests, and, as a priest, was authorized and appointed to teach the people; but to that authority and appointment God added the extraordinary commission of a prophet. Ezekiel also was a priest. Thus God would support the honour of the priesthood…”
“This young stripling of a prophet is made by the power of God as an impregnable city, fortified with iron pillars and surrounded with walls of brass; he sallies out upon the enemy in reproofs and threatenings, and keeps them in awe.”
“When they believed the Lord and his servant Moses, when they sang God's praise at the Red Sea, when at the foot of Mount Sinai they promised, All that the Lord shall say unto us we will do and will be obedient, then was the kindness of their youth and the love…”
“Idolatrous worships are vanities, Acts xiv. Idolaters are vain, for those that make idols are like unto them ( Ps. cxv. 8 ), as much stocks and stones as the images they worship, and good for as little. [3.] They had with idolatry introduced all manner of wick…”
“Now he pleads with those who persisted in that vain conversation received by tradition from their fathers, and with their children's children, that is, with all that in every age tread in their steps. Let those that forsake God know that he is willing to argue…”
“It was a land abandoned by all mankind, as yielding neither road nor rest. It was no thoroughfare, for no man passed through it --no settlement, for no man dwelt there. For God will teach his people to tread untrodden paths, to dwell alone, and to be singular.”
“Though they were trained up in an observance of him as their God, and had been often told that he brought them out of the land of Egypt, to be a people peculiar to himself, yet they never asked after him nor desired the knowledge of his ways. Secondly, The pri…”
“I brought you into a land of Carmel (so the word is); Carmel was a place of extraordinary fruitfulness, and Canaan was as one great fruitful field, Deut. viii. 7 . [5.] God gave them the means of knowledge and grace, and communion with him; this is implied,”
“It was his heritage, for it was a holy land, Immanuel's land; but they made it an abomination, even to God himself, who was wroth, and greatly abhorred Israel. [4.] Having forsaken God, though they soon found that they had changed for the worse, yet they had n…”
“They had priests that handled the law, read it, and expounded it to them; that was part of their business, Deut. xxxiii. They had pastors, to guide them and take care of their affairs, magistrates and judges; they had prophets to consult God for them and to ma…”
“Baal's prophets joined with Baal's priests, and walked after the things which do not profit, that is, after the idols which can be no way helpful to their worshippers. See how the best characters are usurped, and the best offices liable to corruption; and wond…”
“They parted from a God who was their glory, who made them truly glorious and every way put honour upon them, one whom they might with a humble confidence glory in as theirs, who is himself a glorious God and the glory of those whose God he is; he was particula…”
“What a thing is this, that such a birthright should be sold for a mess of pottage, such a crown profaned and laid in the dust! Why is he made a slave to the oppressor? God provided that a Hebrew servant should be free the seventh year, and that their slaves sh…”