Matthew Henry’s Move to Hackney in 1712

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Issue:

Vol. 80 No. 2 (2021)

Published:

Aug 1, 2021
Section
Articles

Keywords:

Matthew Henry, Chester, Hackney, Dissenters, Ministerial calls, Kidney stones, Diabetes

Main Article Content

Allan Harman
Presbyterian Theological College
https://doi.org/10.53521/a269

Abstract

Whereas calls were usually disposed of in a short space of time, the one from Mare Street Chapel in Hackney to Matthew Henry took twenty-three months. The difficulty lay with Matthew Henry himself. He vacillated, alternately wishing to accept the call and then wishing to remain with his beloved congregation in Chester. Pressured from both sides, he tried to withdraw his acceptance of the call, but the people at Hackney held him to his word. Before leaving Chester, he was an ill man, but he drove himself to be a faithful pastor at Hackney while trying to finish his Exposition of Holy Scripture and serve the wider dissenting community in London. Kidney stones and late-onset diabetes seriously affected him, distorting his decision making and ultimately bringing about his death after just two years of ministry in Hackney.

Article Details

How to Cite
Harman, Allan. “Matthew Henry’s Move to Hackney in 1712”. Reformed Theological Review 80, no. 2 (August 1, 2021): 155–173. Accessed April 20, 2024. https://rtrjournal.org/index.php/RTR/article/view/269.

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Author Biography

Allan Harman, Presbyterian Theological College

Research Professor,

References

C. Gordon Bolam et al, The English Presbyterians: From Elizabethan Puritanism to Modern Unitarianism, eds (London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd, 1968).

Collins, Matthew A. and Middleton, Paul, eds, Matthew Henry: The Bible, Prayer, and Piety, (London: T. & T. Clark, 2019). DOI: https://doi.org/10.5040/9780567670243

Henry, Matthew: ‘A Short Account of the Beginning and Progress of our Congregation’, in Roberts, H. D., Matthew Henry and His Chapel 1662–1900 (Liverpool: Liverpool Booksellers, 1900), 72–101.

Henry, Matthew, Diary, 1705-1713, ms. Eng. Misc. e. 330 held in the Bodleian Library, Oxford.

Harman, Allan, Matthew Henry: His Life and Influence (Fearn: Christian Focus, 2012).

Roberts, H. D., Matthew Henry and His Chapel 1662–1900 (Liverpool: Liverpool Booksellers, 1900).

Tong, William, An Account of the Life and Death of Mr. Matthew Henry, Minister of the Gospel at Hackney Who dy’d June 22 1714, in the 52d Year of his Age (London: E. Matthews, M. Lawrence, S. Cliff, 1716).

Williams, J. B., Memoirs of the Life, Character, and Writings of the Rev. Matthew Henry (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1974 [reprint]).