10:6 that 1 you must search out 2 my iniquity,
and inquire about my sin,
10:14 If I sinned, then you would watch me
and you would not acquit me of my iniquity.
13:27 And you put my feet in the stocks 3
and you watch all my movements; 4
you put marks 5 on the soles of my feet.
31:4 Does he not see my ways
and count all my steps?
33:11 6 He puts my feet in shackles;
he watches closely all my paths.’
34:21 For his eyes are on the ways of an individual,
he observes all a person’s 7 steps.
56:6 They stalk 8 and lurk; 9
they watch my every step, 10
as 11 they prepare to take my life. 12
For the music director, a psalm of David.
139:1 O Lord, you examine me 14 and know.
139:2 You know when I sit down and when I get up;
even from far away you understand my motives.
139:3 You carefully observe me when I travel or when I lie down to rest; 15
you are aware of everything I do. 16
139:4 Certainly 17 my tongue does not frame a word
without you, O Lord, being thoroughly aware of it. 18
5:21 For the ways of a person 19 are in front of the Lord’s eyes,
and the Lord 20 weighs 21 all that person’s 22 paths.
1 tn The clause seems to go naturally with v. 4: do you have eyes of flesh…that you have to investigate? For that reason some like Duhm would delete v. 5. But v. 5 adds to the premise: are you also like a human running out of time that you must try to find out my sin?
2 tn The imperfect verbs in this verse are best given modal nuances. Does God have such limitations that he must make such an investigation? H. H. Rowley observes that Job implies that God has not yet found the iniquity, or extracted a confession from him (Job [NCBC], 84).
3 tn The word occurs here and in Job 33:11. It could be taken as “stocks,” in which the feet were held fast; or it could be “shackles,” which allowed the prisoner to move about. The parallelism favors the latter, if the two lines are meant to be referring to the same thing.
4 tn The word means “ways; roads; paths,” but it is used here in the sense of the “way” in which one goes about his activities.
5 tn The verb תִּתְחַקֶּה (titkhaqqeh) is a Hitpael from the root חָקָה (khaqah, parallel to חָקַק, khaqaq). The word means “to engrave” or “to carve out.” This Hitpael would mean “to imprint something on oneself” (E. Dhorme [Job, 192] says on one’s mind, and so derives the meaning “examine.”). The object of this is the expression “on the roots of my feet,” which would refer to where the feet hit the ground. Since the passage has more to do with God’s restricting Job’s movement, the translation “you set a boundary to the soles of my feet” would be better than Dhorme’s view. The image of inscribing or putting marks on the feet is not found elsewhere. It may be, as Pope suggests, a reference to marking the slaves to make tracking them easier. The LXX has “you have penetrated to my heels.”
6 sn See Job 13:27.
7 tn Heb “his”; the referent (a person) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
8 tn The verb is from the root גּוּר (gur), which means “to challenge, attack” in Isa 54:15 and “to stalk” (with hostile intent) in Ps 59:3.
9 tn Or “hide.”
10 tn Heb “my heels.”
11 tn Heb “according to,” in the sense of “inasmuch as; since,” or “when; while.”
12 tn Heb “they wait [for] my life.”
13 sn Psalm 139. The psalmist acknowledges that God, who created him, is aware of his every action and thought. He invites God to examine his motives, for he is confident they are pure.
14 tn The statement is understood as generalizing – the psalmist describes what God typically does.
15 tn Heb “my traveling and my lying down you measure.” The verb זָרָה (zarah, “to measure”) is probably here a denominative from זָרָת (zarat, “a span; a measure”), though some derive it from זָרָה (zarat, “to winnow; to sift”; see BDB 279-80 s.v. זָרָה).
16 tn Heb “all my ways.”
17 tn Or “for.”
18 tn Heb “look, O
19 tn Heb “man.”
20 tn Heb “he”; the referent (the
21 tn BDB 814 s.v. פָּלַס 2 suggests that the participle מְפַּלֵּס (mÿpalles) means “to make level [or, straight].” As one’s ways are in front of the eyes of the
22 tn Heb “all his”; the referent (the person mentioned in the first half of the verse) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
23 tn Heb “[you are] great in counsel and mighty in deed.”
24 tn Heb “your eyes are open to the ways of the sons of men.”
25 tn Heb “giving to each according to his way [= behavior/conduct] and according to the fruit of his deeds.”