Zechariah 8:2 - Joseph Benson's Commentary of the Old and New Testaments - Bible Study & Commentary

Verse 2

Zechariah 8:2. I was jealous for Zion with great jealousy With great care that she should not, as formerly, sin against my love and her own welfare, and with a great desire to do her good, and rescue her from her enemies. Jealousy is properly the passion of a lover, or husband, made up of love, care, and anger, in their highest degrees, for his beloved, and against all that he thinks hurtful to her. Thus God had greatly loved Zion, had been careful of her honour and welfare, and displeased with her sins, which first hurt her, and then with the Chaldeans, who violated her. And I was jealous for her Or toward, or against her, as לה may be rendered; with great fury Hebrew, חמה , heat, or wrath, namely, for her sins. In a note on Zechariah 1:14, Blayney gives it as his opinion, that the jealousy there spoken of was God’s resentment against his people for their disloyalty and misbehaviour toward him. “In this opinion,” he here says, “I am confirmed by the present passage, where not the least mention is made of the persecuting nations. That God’s jealousy bespeaks wrath toward the object of it, needs no other proof than his own words, Numbers 25:11.”

Joseph Benson's Commentary of the Old and New Testaments

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Joseph Benson

Joseph Benson's Commentary of the Old and New Testaments

One of the most eminent of the early Methodist ministers in England, Joseph Benson was born at Melmerby, in Cumberland, Jan. 25, 1748. At sixteen he became a Methodist and was converted. In 1766 Mr. Wesley appointed him classical master at Kingswood School. He devoted himself closely to philosophy and theology, studying constantly and zealously.Joseph Benson became a Methodist circuit rider in 1771. A close associate of Wesley, he was chosen to be a member of the Legal One Hundred who governed the Conference at Wesley's death and he was president of the Conference two times. As one of post-Wesley Methodism's most popular preachers, he sometimes addressed crowds of over twenty thousand. Wesley established an extensive organization, including the circuit riding system and a media or press to showcase books, pamphlets, and a monthly magazine. After the death of John Wesley, Joseph Benson took over the Methodist/Wesleyan movement and the organization that Wesley created.During the Bristol dispute of 1794 he led the conservative Church Methodists and was against moves which suggested that the Methodists were breaking ties with the Church of England; he was one of the last leaders to contend for the methods and philosophy of eighteenth-century Wesleyan Methodism. The circulation of The Methodist Magazine rose from ten thousand to twenty-four thousand per issue on his watch, and it was one of the most widely read periodicals in pre-Victorian England. He was an able writer, serving as apologist against Joseph Priestley, as biographer of John Fletcher, and as author of a multi-volume commentary on the Bible.Benson was influential in Methodism, and through the press, especially the magazine, he was able to extend his influence to non-Methodists as well. He and other Methodist leaders, through preaching and publication, disseminated their conservative social and political credo and may be credited in part with creating a climate in which the seeds of Victorianism could thrive.... Show more

One of the most eminent of the early Methodist ministers in England, Joseph Benson was born at Melmerby, in Cumberland, Jan. 25, 1748. At sixteen he became a Methodist and was converted. In 1766 Mr. Wesley appointed him classical master at Kingswood School. He devoted himself closely to philosophy and theology, studying constantly and zealously.... Show more

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