The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers, vol. 4

V. Jenks (Congregationalist)—Produces Popular American Commentary

WILLIAM JENKS (1778-1866), Congregational minister and teacher, outstanding Biblical and Oriental scholar and a graduate of Harvard, was a prominent member of the American Antiquarian Society, the Massachusetts Historical Society, the American Oriental Society, and the New England Historic Genealogical Society. He wrote many literary and historical articles and pamphlets for their publications. But his influence was probably felt most through a compilation from earlier writers-his Comprehensive Commentary on the Holy Bible (1834-38), of which twenty thousand copies were sold immediately, with several later editions. It was a work characterized as “the best Family Commentary in the language, and admirably adapted to the wants of Bible—class and Sunday-school teachers,” standing “without a rival for the purpose for which it is intended ³⁰ PFF4 125.1

Thousands of copies of British commentaries were already in circulation in America, but this popular compilation, which professed to contain “nearly all that is valuable in Henry, Scott, and Doddridge,” and extracts from many other authors, all for only fifteen dollars, doubtless gave these writers a much wider reading public in this country, and was possibly the source of many a later reference credited to various originals. It carries an abridgment of Matthew Henry’s commentary in parallel columns with the text; at the end of each section, the “Practical Observations” of Scott; and at the bottom, a series of notes on the Bible content, each with separate credit to Scott and others. PFF4 125.2

In the notes on Daniel and Revelation, Scott seems to be given the principal place. Prominent also are Bishop Newton (often cited through Scott) and Woodhouse. It is interesting to note that this commentary occasionally cites an American writer, such as Griffin or Ethan Smith. The influence of the Comprehensive Commentary would also be in the direction of the prevalent postmillennialism of the time—the expectation of the world’s conversion and universal peace before the second advent and the judgment. PFF4 126.1