Bible Commentaries

Genesis 19:1 — at last comply, 3. The abominable conduct of the men of Sodom, 4, 5. Lot's deep concern for the honour and safely of his guests, which leads him to make a most exceptionable proposal to those wicked men, 6-8. The violent proceedings of the Sodomites, 9. Lot rescued from their barbarity by the angels, who smite them with blindness, 10, 11. The angels exhort Lot and his family to flee from that wicked place, as God was about to destroy it, 12, 13. Lot's fruitless exhortation to his sons-in-law, 14.

Genesis 22:9 — Verse Genesis 22:9. And bound Isaac his son — If the patriarch had not been upheld by the conviction that he was doing the will of God, and had he not felt the most perfect confidence that his son should be restored even from the dead, what agony must his heart

Genesis 5:32 — 10:21; 1 Chronicles 1:5, c., we learn that Japheth was the eldest son of Noah, but Shem is mentioned first, because it was from him, in a direct line, that the Messiah came. Ham was certainly the youngest of Noah's sons, and from what we read, Genesis 9:22, the worst of them and how he comes to be mentioned out of his natural order is not easy to be accounted for. When the Scriptures design to mark precedency, though the subject be a younger son or brother, he is always mentioned first; so Jacob is

Genesis 9:17 — Verse Genesis 9:17. This is the token — אות oth, The Divine sign or portent: The bow shall be in the cloud. For the reasons above specified it must be there, when the circumstances already mentioned occur; if therefore it cannot fail because of the reasons before

Matthew 27:60 — sacrifice is offered, the atonement made and accepted, he is no longer to be enrolled with the transgressors, and, according to a prophecy delivered nearly seven hundred years before that time, he is to have the burying-place of a rich man. See Isaiah 53:9-10. Had our Lord been buried in the common burial-ground of the malefactors, his resurrection could not have been so distinctly remarked, as the chief priests would never have thought of sealing the stone there, or setting a watch; but now that the

Matthew 27:9 — Verse Matthew 27:9. Jeremy the prophet — The words quoted here are not found in the Prophet Jeremiah, but in Zechariah 11:13. But St. Jerome says that a Hebrew of the sect of the Nazarenes showed him this prophecy in a Hebrew apocryphal copy of Jeremiah; but probably

Luke 1:11 — established: - Thou art a priest for ever, Psalms 110:4.3. The place in which the angel appeared - Jerusalem; out of which the word of the Lord should go forth, Isaiah 2:3, and not at Hebron, in the hill country of Judea, where Zacharias lived, Luke 1:39, which was the ordinary residence of the priests, Joshua 21:11, where there could have been few witnesses of this interposition of God, and the effects produced by it.4. The place where he was when the angel appeared to him - in the temple, which was

Luke 16:1 — CHAPTER XVI. The parable of the unjust steward, 1-8. Christ applies this to his hearers, 9-13. The pharisees take offence, 14. Our Lord reproves them, and shows the immutability of the law, 15-17. Counsels against divorce, 18. The story of the rich man and the beggar, commonly called Dives and Lazarus, 10-31. NOTES ON CHAP. XVI.Verse Luke

Luke 4:18 — Lord immediately adds to it Isaiah 42:7. The proclaiming of liberty to the captives, and the acceptable year (or year of acceptance) of the Lord, is a manifest allusion to the proclaiming of the year of jubilee by sound of trumpet: see Leviticus 25:9, c., and the notes there. This was a year of general release of debts and obligations of bond-men and women; of lands and possessions, which had been sold from the families and tribes to which they belonged. Our Saviour, by applying this text to himself,

John 15:16 — has planted, that his fruit may remain - that the souls whom he has gathered in be not scattered from the flock.8. He must continue instant in prayer, that his labours may be accompanied with the presence and blessing of God - Whatsoever ye shall ASK.9. He must consider Jesus Christ as the great Mediator between God and man, proclaim his salvation, and pray in his name. - Whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, &c. See Quesnel.

Acts 15:20 — which were strangled for the purpose of keeping the blood in the body, as such animals were esteemed a greater delicacy.By the fourth, BLOOD, we are to understand, not only the thing itself, for the reasons which I have assigned in the note on Genesis 9:4, and for others detailed at the end of this chapter; but also all cruelty, manslaughter, murder, c., as some of the ancient fathers have understood it.Instead of τουαιμαρτος, blood, some have conjectured that we should read χοιρειας, swine's flesh

Acts 8:24 — Martyr, Irenaeus, Tertullian; Eusebius, Theodoret, Augustine, and others, on the subject of Simon Magus; and to him, if the reader think it worth the pains, he may refer. The substance of these accounts is given above, and in Clarke's note on "Acts 8:9"; and to say the least of them they are all very dubious. The tale of his having an altar erected to him at Rome, with the inscription, Simoni sancto deo, "To the holy god Simon," has been founded on an utter mistake, and has been long ago sufficiently

1 Corinthians 15:52 — ready to appear before the judgment seat of God.For the trumpet shall sound — By this the apostle confirms the substance of the tradition, there shall be the sound of a trumpet on this great day; and this other scriptures teach: see Zechariah 9:14; Matthew 24:31; John 5:25; 1 Thessalonians 4:16, in which latter place, the apostle treats this subject among the Thessalonians, as he does here among the Corinthians. See the notes there.Shall be raised incorruptible — Fully clothed with a

Galatians 2:1 — II.The apostle mentions his journey to Jerusalem with Barnabas andTitus, 1.Shows that he went thither by revelation; and what he did whilethere, and the persons with whom he had intercourse, 2-8.How the apostles gave him the right hand of fellowship, 9, 10.Here he opposes Peter at Antioch, and the reason why, 11-14.Shows that the Jews as well as the Gentiles must be justified byfaith, 15, 16.They who seek this justification should act with consistency,17, 18.Gives his own religious experience, and

Galatians 3:1 — inquires how they could be so foolish as to renounce the Gospel of Christ and turn back to the law, after having heard, received, and suffered so much for the Gospel, 1-5. Asserts the doctrine of justification by faith, on the example of Abraham, 6-9. Shows that all who are under the law are under the curse, from which Christ alone redeems us; and the promise made to Abraham comes to the Gentiles who believe, 10-14. For the covenant is not by the works of the law, but by promise, 15-18. The law

1 Timothy 4:1 — CHAPTER IV. Apostasy from the true faith predicted, and in what that apostasy should consist, 1-5. Exhortations to Timothy to teach the truth, 6. To avoid old wives' fables; to exercise himself to godliness, 7, 8. To labour, command, and teach, 9, 10, 11. To act so that none might despise his youth, 12. To give attendance to reading and preaching, 13, 14. To give up himself wholly to the Divine work, 15. And so doing he should both save himself and them that heard him, 16. NOTES ON CHAP. IV.Verse

Hebrews 1:2 — which was the most stupendous of all his works. "'Twas great to speak a world from nought;. Twas greater to redeem." 8. As being on the right hand of God, infinitely exalted above all created beings; and the object of adoration to all the angelic host. 9. As having an eternal throne, neither his person nor his dignity ever changing or decaying. 10. As continuing to exercise dominion, when the earth and the heavens are no more! It is only in God manifested in the flesh that all these excellences can

Hebrews 9:4 — Verse Hebrews 9:4. Which had the golden censer — It is evident that the apostle speaks here of the tabernacle built by Moses, and of the state and contents of that tabernacle as they were during the lifetime of Moses. For, as Calmet remarks, in the temple which

James 4:13 — have to say, ye that say, c.To-day, or to-morrow, we will go — This presumption on a precarious life is here well reproved and the ancient Jewish rabbins have some things on the subject which probably St. James had in view. In Debarim Rabba, sec. 9, fol. 261, 1, we have the following little story; "Our rabbins tell us a story which happened in the days of Rabbi Simeon, the son of Chelpatha. He was present at the circumcision of a child, and stayed with its father to the entertainment. The father

1 Peter 2:9 — Verse 9. Ye are a chosen generation — The titles formerly given to the whole Jewish Church, i.e. to all the Israelites without exception, all who were in the covenant of God by circumcision, whether they were holy persons or not, are here given to Christians