Job 13:27

Thou puttest my feet also in the stocks,.... Which is one kind of punishment of offenders, and a preservation of them from making their escape; and is a security and reservation of them for further

Thou puttest my feet also in the stocks, and lookest narrowly unto all my paths; thou settest a print upon the heels of my feet. Stocks - in which the prisoner's feet were made fast until the time of execution (Jeremiah 20:2).

Thou encompassest me with thy judgments, that I may have no way or possibility to escape. When thou hast me fast in prison, thou makest a strict and diligent search into all the actions of my life, that thou mayst find matter to condemn me. Thou followest me close at the heels, either to observe my actions, or to pursue me with thy judgments, so that thou dost oft tread upon my heels, and leave the prints of thy footsteps upon them.

Job 13:27 Thou puttest my feet also in the stocks, and lookest narrowly unto all my paths; thou settest a print upon the heels of my feet.Ver. 27. Thou puttest my feet also in the stocks] Mercer here observeth an elegant gradation in God’ s proceeding with Job, as himself describeth it, rising higher and higher in his discourse. 1. God hid his face, and denied him his favour. 2. He counted him as his enemy. 3. He broke him like a leaf or stubble. 4. He wrote bitter things against him. 5. He made him possess the sins of his youth. 6. For his young sins he claps him up close prisoner now in his old age, and there keeps him as with a strict guard following him close at heels if he but stir a foot. Was there ever sorrow like unto Job’ s sorrow? was ever greater severity and rigour showed upon any godly person? Where, then, shall the ungodly and the sinner appear? &c. God’ s wrath is like Elijah’ s cloud, little at first, as a man’ s hand, but soon after very dismal and dreadful; or as thunder, of which we hear at first a little noise afar off, but soon after a terrible crack. Well might Moses say, "Who knoweth the power of thine anger?" Psalms 90:11, Cavebis autem, si pavebis. You will beware if you will be frightened. And lookest narrowly into all my paths] He saith not ways, but paths. Gregory maketh this difference: ways are larger, paths narrower. God then is said to look into all men’ s paths, when he looketh not only at the evil done by them, but at the intention of their mind, which is not so easily discerned but by him, the searcher of all hearts. And for that which followeth, Thou settest a print upon the heels of my feet] Gregory here observeth, that God looketh at the hurt done to others by examples given by men’ s evil doings unto them, leaving a print upon the ground, as it were, whereby others follow them, and so their sin is in this regard made the greater; to which purpose some sense those words, Psalms 49:5, "When the iniquity of my heels shall compass me about." Others make Job’ s meaning here to be, Thou followest me with continual pursuit, as a prisoner that is dogged at heels by his keeper from place to place, lest he should escape. Thou followest me close, and upon the track, like a hunter, Job 10:16. The footsteps of thy wrath (saith an interpreter) are seen upon the soles of my feet (so that from top to toe I have no free part), like as prisoners’ feet are oft swelled with the weight of their fetters.

(27) Thou puttest my feet also in the stocks.—This is illustrated by the language of the Psalms (Psalms 88:8; Psalms 142:7, &c.). There is a difficulty in these two verses, arising from the pronouns. Some understand the subject to be the fetter: “Thou puttest my feet in the fetter that watcheth over all my paths, and imprinteth itself upon the roots of my feet, and it (the foot) consumeth like a rotten thing, and like a garment that is moth-eaten.” Others refer the “he” to Job himself; and others to man, the subject of the following chapter. In the Hebrew future tense the third person feminine and the second person masculine are alike, and the word for fetter, which is only found here and at Job 33:11, where Elihu quotes these words, may possibly be feminine in this place, though it is clear that Elihu understood Job to be speaking of God. Probably by the “he” introduced so abruptly is meant the object of all this watching and persecution.

Verse 27. Thou puttest my feet also in the stocks] בסד bassad, "in a clog," such as was tied to the feet of slaves, to prevent them from running away. This is still used in the West Indies, among slave-dealers; and is there called the pudding, being a large collar of iron, locked round the ankle of the unfortunate man. Some have had them twenty pounds' weight; and, having been condemned to carry them for several years, when released could not walk without them! A case of this kind I knew: The slave had learned to walk well with his pudding, but when taken off, if he attempted to walk, he fell down, and was obliged to resume it occasionally, till practice had taught him the proper centre of gravity, which had been so materially altered by wearing so large a weight; the badge at once of his oppression, and of the cruelty of his task-masters! And lookest narrowly] Thou hast seen all my goings out and comings in; and there is no step I have taken in life with which thou art unacquainted. Thou settest a print upon the heels of my feet.] Some understand this as the mark left on the foot by the clog; or the owner's mark indented on this clog; or, Thou hast pursued me as a hound does his game, by the scent.

27. Thou puttest] Rather, and puttest my feet in &c. The verse describes his afflictions under three figures, all denoting arrest, impossibility of movement or escape, and chastisement. The first words are brought up by Elihu, ch. Job 33:11, cf. Jeremiah 20:2; Acts 16:24. settest a print upon the heels] Rather, and drawest thee a line around the soles of my feet. The figure means that God rigidly prescribed his movements, drawing bounds, which he must not overstep, around his feet. He is a prisoner under rigid surveillance.

Thou puttest my feet also in the stocks - The word rendered “stocks” (סד sad), denotes the wooden frame or block in which the feet of a person were confined for punishment.

27. The stocks — Some kind of clog for the feet, which the culprit shuffled about with him when he moved, perhaps similar to those in more recent times fastened to the feet of malefactors or fugitive slaves.