Bible Strands
Job 33:11
He puts my feet in the stocks; He watches over all my paths.’
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — Elihu addresses Job directly, responding to Job’s accusation that God treats him as an enemy. He describes a moment of intense divine surveillance where human movement is restricted and closely monitored.
The words — The Hebrew יָשֵׂ֣ם (ya.Sem) means he puts, and בַּסִּד (ba.Sad) denotes stocks or fetters. Together they frame God’s action as physically restraining and closely monitoring every movement.
The thread — This imagery of restricted feet and watched paths appears in Job 13:27, Job 31:4, and Job 14:16. These passages consistently use the same metaphor to depict divine oversight of human conduct.
Why it lands — The text demands acknowledgment that human actions occur under uninterrupted divine observation. It requires readers to accept that moral accountability operates within a framework of complete exposure.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
He putteth my feet in the stocks, he marketh all my paths.
Cross-references
- Job 13:27 You put my feet in the stocks and stand watch over all my paths; You set a limit for the soles of my feet.
- Job 31:4 Does He not see my ways and count my every step?
- Job 14:16 For then You would count my steps, but would not keep track of my sin.
- Psalms 105:18 They bruised his feet with shackles and placed his neck in irons,
- Jeremiah 20:2 he had Jeremiah the prophet beaten and put in the stocks at the Upper Gate of Benjamin, which was by the house of the LORD.
- Daniel 4:35 All the peoples of the earth are counted as nothing, and He does as He pleases with the army of heaven and the peoples of the earth. There is no one who can restrain His hand or say to Him, ‘What have You done?’”
- Acts 16:24 On receiving this order, he placed them in the inner cell and fastened their feet in the stocks.