Barnes' Notes: Isaiah, vol. 2

by Albert Barnes

Publisher:

Blackie & Son

, 1851

Overview

Albert Barnes and James Murphy wrote this verse-by-verse commentary on Isaiah. Published in the 1800s, it is still well-loved and well-read by evangelicals who appreciate Barnes' pastoral insights into the Scripture. It is not a technical work, but provides informative observations on the text, intended to be helpful to those teaching Sunday School. Today, it is ideally suited to anyone teaching or preaching the Word of God, whether a professional minister or layperson.

Contents

Top Highlights

“There is a love of litigation; a desire to take all the advantage which the law can give; a desire to appeal to the law, not for the sake of having strict justice done, but for the sake of doing injury to others, and to take some un due advantage.” (Page 344)

“Of light, it is literally true that God made it; and emblematically truer that he is the source of knowledge, prosperity, happiness, and pure religion.” (Page 149)

“But they that wait upon the Lord. The word rendered ‘wait upon’ here (from קָוָה), denotes properly to wait, in the sense of expecting. The phrase, ‘to wait on Jehovah,’ means to wait for his help; that is, to trust in him, to put our hope or confidence in him. It is applicable to those who are in circumstances of danger or want, and who look to him for his merciful interposition. Here it properly refers to those who were suffering a long and grievous captivity in Babylon, and who had no prospect of deliverance but in him. The phrase is applicable also to all who feel that they are weak, feeble, guilty, and helpless, and who, in view of this, put their trust in Jehovah.” (Pages 76–77)

“The meaning is, that the most chosen or select of the human family—the most vigorous and manly, must be worn down by fatigue, or paralyzed by sickness or death; but that the powers of God never grow weary, and that those who trust in him should never become faint.” (Page 76)

“The design here is, to contrast the most vigorous of the human race with God, and to show that while all their powers fail, the power of God is unexhausted and inexhaustible.” (Page 76)

Product Details

• Title: Barnes' Notes: Isaiah, vol. 2
• Authors: Albert Barnes and James Murphy
• Publisher: Blackie & Son
• Publication Date: 1851
• Pages: 446

About Albert Barnes

Albert Barnes graduated from Hamilton College, Clinton, New York, in 1820, and from Princeton Theological Seminary in 1823. Barnes was ordained as a Presbyterian minister by the presbytery of Elizabethtown, New Jersey, in 1825, and was the pastor of the Presbyterian Church in Morristown, New Jersey (1825–1830), and of the First Presbyterian Church of Philadelphia (1830–1867).

He held a prominent place in the New School branch of the Presbyterians during the Old School-New School Controversy, to which he adhered on the division of the denomination in 1837. In 1836, he had been tried (but not convicted) for heresy, mostly due to the views he expressed in Notes on Romans of the imputation of the sin of Adam, original sin and the atonement; the bitterness stirred up by this trial contributed towards widening the breach between the conservative and the progressive elements in the church. He was an eloquent preacher, but his reputation rests chiefly on his expository works, which are said to have had a larger circulation both in Europe and America than any others of their class. Of the well-known Notes on the New Testament, it is said that more than a million volumes had been issued by 1870. The Notes on Job, the Psalms, Isaiah and Daniel were also popularly distributed. The popularity of these works rested on how Barnes simplified Biblical criticism so that new developments in the field were made accessible to the general public.