Introducing Barnes Notes on the Old Testament: Psalms

Barnes’ Notes

Notes

on the

Old Testament

Albert Barnes

PSALMS

Volume 1

Blackie & Son

London

Reprinted from the 1870–72 edition published by Blackie & Son,

London

Reprinted 1983 by Baker Book House Company

ISBN: 0-8010-0838-7

EDITOR’S PREFACE

The Psalms have ever been held in the highest appreciation by the Church. We are familiar with the testimonies of Augustine, Luther, and Calvin to the excellence of the Psalms. We know that the piety of the Church has been fed by the Psalms for thousands of years; that they have come singing down through the ages, sustaining the sufferers, and inspiring the heroes of every time. It is a good sign of our times that these precious songs of Zion are attracting more attention amongst us, and that not only on the part of men whose professional duties may be supposed to demand it, but also from men occupying the highest place in literature and politics. The Christian public, not long ago, were surprised and delighted when informed that our great Prime Minister had been whiling away some dreary hours in the House of Commons last session by translating into Greek Toplady’s beautiful hymn, “Rock of Ages, cleft for me.” We think many will be equally delighted with the following beautiful testimony to the Psalms of David on the part of Mr. Gladstone. He says—“In that book, for well nigh three thousand years, the piety of saints has found its most refined and choicest food, to such a degree, indeed, that the rank and quality of the religious frame may in general be tested, at least negatively, by the height of its relish for them. There is the whole music of the human heart, when touched by the hand of the Maker, in all its tones that whisper or that swell, for every hope and fear, for every joy and pang, for every form of strength and languor, of disquietude and rest. There are developed all the innermost relations of the human soul to God, built upon the platform of a covenant of love and sonship, that had its foundations in the Messiah, while, in this particular and privileged book, it was permitted to anticipate his coming.” It is reassuring, in these rationalistic times, to meet in such quarters with so profound a reverence for the Divine Word, and so keen a relish for its beauty, and appreciation of its spiritual power. At the same time, Commentaries on the Psalms and Introductions have greatly multiplied among us of late. For a long time we had almost nothing in our language on this deeply interesting portion of Scripture but the work of Bishop Horne, of the excellence of which, in a purely practical and devotional point of view, it would be impossible to speak too highly; but something was needed that would go deeper down and bring up the precious gems that lay in the hidden depths of the Psalter. We do not forget Bishop Horsley, Professor Bush, and others, or the earlier writers from which Mr. Spurgeon has drawn so largely in his recent work. Yet of really good expositions of the Psalms the number was very small. But now we have Plumer, Perowne, Alexander, M‘Michael (on the Pilgrim Psalms), Binnie, Bonar, Spurgeon, and Barnes, with many more on the whole or on detached portions of the book.

The works now named are all of them of high excellence. In Mr. Barnes’ three volumes the reader will find the same thorough and painstaking research, the same fulness, the same delightful perspicuity, the same beauty and practical power, that characterized his previous works, and have given them so extended popularity both in this country and in America. Our author sat down to his work on the Psalms with a full conviction of the difficulty of the task, and full knowledge of the peculiar and varied qualifications requisite to enable one to produce a satisfying exposition of this portion of the Word of God. He himself states these qualifications well. Among them he enumerates, after noticing the necessity of Hebrew and other learning, the possession of the imaginative faculty in such strength as will give sympathy with the poetic spirit of the Psalms; and also, and not least, the possession of the devotional element, with deep and long experience of the life of godliness, to enable the expositor to sympathize with the varied feelings and frames of the sanctified heart. The better half of the Psalms must ever remain a sealed book to the unsanctified expositor, however learned or qualified in other respects. Mr. Barnes has risen to a higher level here than many who have trodden in the same path before. Piety and practical experience of Divine things are often prominent, and are never awanting, and rest always on a basis of sound criticism and sober expository judgment. It is this union of the practical and critical element, in just proportion, that constitutes the distinguishing excellence of our author’s exposition, and entitles it, we think, to rank among the best, if not to be regarded as indeed the best Commentary on the Psalms, that has yet appeared in our language. The work has also this peculiar feature of interest, that it is the last which, in all probability, the author will issue. His growing weakness of sight, and the infirmities of advancing years, have disposed, if not compelled, him to lay down his pen; and his many labours on the Word of God have found a fitting close in these notes and meditations on a book which furnishes the sweetest music for the soul in the evening of life, and the best preparation for the eternal rest. It is well to cease from the labours of life, and fall asleep with the harp of David making grave sweet melody in one’s ears all the way down through the valley of age and the valley of death, to be lost only in the higher melody of angelic harps before the throne.

It remains only to state the peculiarities of this edition. The text has been subjected to careful revision. The reader will not find additional and corrective notes as in the volumes previously edited by us. The reason is twofold. First, the Author’s views have been somewhat modified, and his theology has mellowed and ripened with years. Even in those passages where the old peculiarities appear, there is less angularity and more careful and guarded language. We have been particularly struck with the sound and clear views generally expressed on the principles which regulate the interpretation of the Old Testament prophecies, as quoted and appealed to in the New. The principle of accommodation finds little countenance at the hands of our Author. The Messianic Psalms, too, are interpreted in a way that leaves nothing to be desired. The second reason is, that a mere reference to the additional notes, when required, seemed all that was necessary for readers already in possession of the previous volumes of our edition of Barnes.

In the Appendix, however, will be found very many and valuable additional notes, in the form of brief extracts, from the best writers and commentators on the Psalms. These extracts have been selected with care, and on the principle of exhibiting the scope of the Psalm, giving special attention to the Messianic Psalms, and of presenting throughout only such things as appeared to us to approach to the character of gems in psalm literature, or at all events to have some special excellence entitling them to be placed under the reader’s eye. The works we have mainly used for this purpose are—Hengstenberg, Delitzsch (of which the proof-sheets of the English translation were kindly furnished by Messrs. Clark of Edinburgh), Plumer, Kitto, Thrupp, Perowne, Alexander, Bonar, Calvin, Luther, Horne, Binnie, and Spurgeon. The name of the author in every instance is given along with the extract from his work. The selection is confined within a limited range, and is also in itself limited. The space at our command did not admit of more, and the limitation will perhaps be less regretted if the selection shall be found to be judicious.

Altogether it is believed that these volumes will be found fitting companions for the numerous volumes already issued of Blackie’s Edition of the Expository Works of Albert Barnes. The Notes on the Psalms, it should be observed, have a close connection with those on Isaiah and Daniel, and form, besides, the necessary complement of the Exposition on the New Testament. The quotations from the Psalms are so abundant in the New Testament, that the author’s views on some of the most important passages of Scripture can only be fully obtained by a comparison of the Notes on both places. In a word, the Notes on the Old Testament and on the New are mutually illustrative of one another.

R. F.

PREFACE

These Notes on the Book of Psalms complete my labours in endeavouring to explain and illustrate the sacred Scriptures. At my time of life—with the partial failure of vision with which I have been afflicted for more than twelve years—with the other cares and burdens resting on me—and with the moral certainty that the infirmities of age, if I am spared, must soon come upon me, I could hope to accomplish no more; and I shall attempt no more.

These Notes were commenced more than twelve years ago, and were undertaken in pursuance of a desire long cherished. For this work I had been making preparation for several years previous by the collection of such Commentaries on the Psalms as I could obtain, that might assist me in preparing something on this portion of the Sacred Volume that might at once be useful to others, and might make it my duty and privilege, in this the closing labour of my life, in this department, to contemplate the beauties of this book by a close study—an employment than which none could be more appropriate for one who looks at the end of all his earthly labours as rapidly approaching.

The work has been prosecuted with such leisure as I could command—the whole of it having been written, as all my other Commentaries have been, in the early hours of the morning, uniformly closing my daily task in this respect as the hour of nine was reached. By this arrangement I have secured the time which I have employed in preparing the Notes on the New Testament, on Job, on Isaiah, on Daniel, and now on the Psalms, without entrenching on what I felt might properly be required of me in my pastoral labours; and, at the same time, I have secured to myself personally the inestimable benefit of commencing each day with the contemplation of a portion of the Word of God.

In the long period which has elapsed since these Notes on the Psalms were commenced, I have been frequently compelled to interrupt my studies by the condition of my eyes; and, in more than one instance, the work has been wholly suspended for more than a year at a time, with little hope that it would be resumed again. Some apology, I trust, may be found in these facts for the manifold defects which I have too much reason to suppose will be observed by all who consult these volumes. I have performed my work as well as I could; but I have not accomplished my own cherished hopes in regard to it. It is not what I fondly trusted it might be; it is not what a work on the Psalms should be. Some of the reasons for the failure I have stated at length in the Introduction, § 8.

It is of more interest to me than it can be to the public to say that I cannot close these labours, continued through so many years of my life, without deep emotion. The very fact that any work of life is ended, however humble or unimportant it may be in itself, is fitted to suggest solemn reflections to a man’s own mind. The nature of the work in which I have thus been engaged is such as to give great additional solemnity to these reflections. He undertakes a work of great responsibility, who engages in the task of endeavouring to explain the Word of God, and who may thus give direction to the views, perhaps, of thousands, on subjects that may affect their destiny for ever.

In looking, now, at a labour of this kind continued for nearly forty years, and entered on with no expectation of the results which have been reached, while I am grateful for the patronage extended to my efforts in this country and abroad, I cannot be insensible to the responsibility of having in that time sent forth to influence my fellow-men more than half a million of volumes of Commentary on the Scriptures in my native land, and perhaps more than this number in England, Scotland, and Ireland; and of having been permitted, to a limited extent at least, thus to speak in the French and Welsh languages, in the languages of India, and in the language spoken by the millions of China.

With such feelings of gratitude, and with, I trust, some proper sense of my responsibility, I now close this part of the labour of my life, and commend these volumes, as I have endeavoured to do those which have gone before them, to the blessing of God.

ALBERT BARNES.

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