Paul Baynes (c.1573–1617) was an English clergyman. Described as a “radical Puritan”, he was unpublished in his lifetime, but more than a dozen works were put out in the five years after he died. His commentary on Ephesians is his best known work; the commentary on the first chapter, itself of 400 pages, appeared in 1618.

Life

He went to school at Wethersfield, Essex

Wethersfield, Essex

Wethersfield is a village and a civil parish on the B1053 road in the Braintree district of the English county of Essex. It is near the River Pant. Wethersfield has a school, a post office, a fire station and two places of worship. Nearby settlements include the town of Braintree and the village of...

. A pupil and follower of William Perkins, he graduated B.A. in 1593/4, M.A. in 1597, and was elected a Fellow of Christ's College Cambridge in 1600, a position he lost in 1608 for non-conformity. He was successor to Perkins as lecturer at the church of St Andrew the Great in Cambridge, opposite Christ's; they were considered the town's leading Puritan preachers.

Influence

Baynes was an important influence on the following generation of English Calvinists, through William Ames

William Ames

William Ames was an English Protestant divine, philosopher, and controversialist...

, a convert of Perkins, and Richard Sibbes

Richard Sibbes

Richard Sibbes was an English theologian. He is known as a Biblical exegete, and as a representative, with William Perkins and John Preston, of what has been called "main-line" Puritanism.-Life:...

, a convert of Baynes himself. This makes Baynes a major link in a chain of "Puritan worthies": to John Cotton, John Preston

John Preston (clergyman)

John Preston D.D. was an English puritan minister of the church, and master of Emmanuel College, Cambridge.-Upbringing:John Preston was the son of Thomas Preston, a farmer, was born at Upper Heyford in the parish of Bugbrook, Northamptonshire, and was baptised at Bugbrook church on 27 October...

, Thomas Shepard and Thomas Goodwin

Thomas Goodwin

Thomas Goodwin , known as 'the Elder', was an English Puritan theologian and preacher, and an important leader of religious Independents. He served as chaplain to Oliver Cromwell, and was imposed by Parliament as President of Magdalen College, Oxford in 1650...

. Ames quoted Baynes: "Beware of a strong head and a cold heart", an idea that would be repeated by Cotton Mather

Cotton Mather

Cotton Mather, FRS was a socially and politically influential New England Puritan minister, prolific author and pamphleteer; he is often remembered for his role in the Salem witch trials...

, who was grandson to John Cotton.

Further reading

• Andrew Atherstone, The Silencing of Paul Baynes and Thomas Taylor, Puritan Lecturers at Cambridge, Notes and Queries (2007) 54, pp. 386-389.