This book was originally a preface to the French Version of the New Testament, published 1718. Bishop Watson observes that this is a work of extraordinary merit. The authors have scarcely left any topic untouched, On which the young student in divinity may be supposed to want information.

Dividing Line Between Destruction of Jerusalem and General Judgment - Matthew 25:1

(On Matthew 12:31)
"Shall be brought down to hell; This is a Scriptural expression to denote extreme abasement or utter ruin. See Isa. xiv. 13—15 ; Ivii. 9. Capernaum was so entirely destroyed that travellers have scarcely been able to find here, half a dozen huts. As to the word hades, (hell,) it does not here signify the place of the damned, and scarcely ever does it have that signification in Scripture. It signifies simply the grave, or the place and state of the dead." (Note in loc. )

(On Matthew 12:43)
"The Jews had often experienced the severe judgments of God ; they had been in some measure reformed, and had obtained mercy. But at last they incurred entire ruin, by obstinately rejecting the gospel, and crucifying the Lord Jesus Christ." (Note in loc.)

(On Matthew 16:28)
"In his kingdom : Jesus Christ may be said to have commenced his reign, at his resurrection, and ascension into heaven ; but the pouring out of the Spirit upon the apostles, and especially the terrible judgment which he executed upon the Jewish nation, about forty years after his death, should be regarded as the consequences and effects of his glorious reign. St. John survived this last event." (Note in loc.)

(On Matthew 25:1)
"It is related in the first verse, that " Jesus went out and departed from the temple : and his disciples came to him to show him the buildings of the temple;" and it is added, in the second verse, that " Jesus said unto them, See ye not all these things ? verily I say unto you, There shall not be left here one stone upon another which shall not be thrown down." First, then, let it be admitted that these words apply, in their immediate reference, to the temple of Jerusalem and its destruction, which, as is known from the history of Josephus, as is here implied.

Let, also, the detailed prediction that follows, through the whole of this and the next chapters, be understood of the events connected with the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple, as far as they can possibly be adapted to those occurrences. It is allowed, however, on all hands, that the whole cannot be so adapted : let then the place be pointed out where the new subject commences. But let this be done in such a manner. as to be consistent with the fact, that a space of not much less than two thousand years at the least, was to intervene, between the accomplishment of the latter part of the prophecy and that of the former : for the first part of it is considered to have been fully accomplished about A. D.70 ; and the remainder not to be accomplished yet: it is also to be recollected, that no events belonging to this intervening period are supposed to be treated of in the prophecy, but that, in whatever place the transition is made, it skips at once from the destruction of Jerusalem to the end of the world. Of course, with these premises assumed, every reader will expect to perceive some well defined mark of so great an hiatus. How will this expectation be answered ? So far from discovering any thing like it, no person can read the two chapters, and draw his inference from their contents atone, without concluding, that the events announced are to follow each other in succession, unbroken by any wide interruption whatever. Accordingly, though commentators are now generally agreed that the hiatus must exist, they are by no means unanimous in fixing its situation.

As before observed, the circumstances foretold as far as the twenty-eighth verse of the twenty-fourth chapter, may, by having recourse, here and there, to figure, be applied to the calamities which befel the Jewish nation: what follows, respecting the coming of the Son of man in the clouds of heaven, and his sending his angels with a great sound of a trumpet to gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other, does not, with equal convenience, admit this application : wherefore many eminent writers consider the prophecies relating to the Jews to terminate with the twenty-eighth verse, and all that follows to belong to the greater events commonly designated as the second coming of the Lord, and the general judgment of the world. Unfortunately, however, let both parts of the chapter denote what they may, they are connected together by the binding word 'immediately': "Immediately after the tribulation of those days, shall the sun be -darkened," &c.—"and then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven." Extreme violence, therefore, is done to the words, by those who thrust in, between the tribulation previously described, and this immediate appearing of the Son of man, an interval of two thousand years ! On this account, other eminent writers understand the appearing of the Son of man, and all the rest of the chapter, to be merely added in amplification of the previous subject; affirming, however, that "Jesus Christ intended that his disciples should consider the judgment he was going to inflict on the Jewish nation, as a forerunner and emblem of that universal judgment he is to exercise at the last day ; " wherefore, they add, "he gives in the twenty-fifth chapter a description of the last judgment ;"

(On Matthew 25:13)
"This may be understood concerning the judgment which Christ would execute upon the Jewish nation, the hour of death, and the day of final judgment.' (Note in ver. 13.)

(On Luke 3:9)
"See Isa. x. 33, 34. In this place, John the Baptist predicts the entire destruction of the temple, the city, and the nation, which came to pass about forty years after the death of Jesus Christ." (Com. in loc)

(On Luke 9:26)
Jesus intended his resurrection, and ascension, and the judgments he would execute on the Jewish nation ; (ver. 27,) signifies 'the preaching of the gospel through the whole world, and the ruin of Jerusalem, which St. John lived to witness." (Note in Luke ix. 26, 27.)

WHAT OTHERS HAVE SAID

C.H. Spurgeon
"BEAUSOBRE (Isaac DE, 1659—1738), and L'ENFANT (JAQUES, 1661—1728). A New Version, with a Commentary. 8vo. Camb, 1790; Lond., 1823, &c. The brief notes are purely literal or illustrative, and are remarkably pertinent. The mass of the volume is taken up with an introduction to the New Testament. "

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES

Jacques L'enfant (April 13, 1661, Bazoche, La Beauce - August 7, 1728, Berlin), French Protestant divine, was born at Bazoche in 1661, son of Paul L'enfant, Protestant pastor at Bazoche and afterwards at Châtillon-sur-Loing until the revocation of the edict of Nantes, when he removed to Cassel.

After studying at Saumur and Geneva, L'enfant completed his theological course at Heidelberg, where in 1684 he was ordained minister of the French Protestant church, and appointed chaplain to the dowager electress palatine. When the French invaded the Palatinate in 1688 L'enfant withdrew to Berlin, as in a recent book he had vigorously attacked the Jesuits. Here in 1689 he was again appointed one of the ministers of the French Protestant church; this office he continued to hold until his death, ultimately adding to it that of chaplain to the king, with the dignity of Consistorialrath. He visited Holland and England in 1707, preached before Queen Anne, and, it is said, was invited to become one of her chaplains. He was the author of many works, chiefly on church history. In search of materials he visited Helmstedt in 1712, and Leipzig in 1715 and 1725. He died at Berlin on 7 August 1728.

An exhaustive catalogue of his publications, thirty-two in all, will be found in J. G. de Chauffepié's Dictionnaire. See also Eugène and Émile Haags' La France Protestante. He is now best known by his Histoire du Concile de Constance (Amsterdam, 1714; 2nd ed., 1728; English trans., 1730). It is of course largely dependent upon the laborious work of Hermann von der Hardt (1660-1746), but has literary merits peculiar to itself, and has been praised on all sides for its fairness. It was followed by Histoire du Concile de Pise (1724), and (posthumously) by Histoire de la guerre des Hussites et du Concile de Basle (Amsterdam, 1731; German translation, Vienna, 1783-1784). L'enfant was one of the chief promoters of the Bibliothèque Germanique, begun in 1720; and he was associated with Isaac de Beausobre (1659-1738) in the preparation of the new French translation of the New Testament with original notes, published at Amsterdam in 1718
 

C.H. Spurgeon
"HAAK'S ANNOTATIONS come to us as the offspring of the famous Synod of Dort, and the WESTMINSTER ANNOTATIONS as the production of a still more venerable assembly; but if, with my hat off, bowing profoundly to those august conclaves of master minds, I may venture to say so, I would observe that they furnish another instance that committees seldom equal the labours of individuals. The notes are too short and fragmentary to be of any great value. The volumes are a heavy investment." (Commenting on Commentaries)