For now thou numberest my steps: dost thou not watch over my sin?
Parallel translations
- WEB But now you count my steps. Don’t you watch over my sin?
- BSB For then You would count my steps, but would not keep track of my sin.
- NKJV For now You number my steps, But do not watch over my sin.
- NASB “For now You number my steps, You do not observe my sin.
- NLT For then you would guard my steps, instead of watching for my sins.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Job feels God counts his every step and watches his sin. He senses constant, searching scrutiny.
Overview
Job laments that God now counts his steps and watches over his sin. Where he hoped for tender care, he feels relentless surveillance. The same divine attentiveness that can comfort here feels oppressive to the sufferer, showing how affliction can color one's sense of God's watchful presence.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 10
- Job 10:6That thou enquirest after mine iniquity, and searchest after my sin?
- Job 31:4Doth not he see my ways, and count all my steps?
- Job 34:21For his eyes are upon the ways of man, and he seeth all his goings.
- Prov 5:21For the ways of man are before the eyes of the LORD, and he pondereth all his goings.
- Ps 139:1–4O LORD, thou hast searched me, and known me.
- Job 33:11He putteth my feet in the stocks, he marketh all my paths.
- Jer 32:19Great in counsel, and mighty in work: for thine eyes are open upon all the ways of the sons of men: to give every one according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings:
- Job 13:27Thou puttest my feet also in the stocks, and lookest narrowly unto all my paths; thou settest a print upon the heels of my feet.
- Ps 56:6They gather themselves together, they hide themselves, they mark my steps, when they wait for my soul.
- Job 10:14If I sin, then thou markest me, and thou wilt not acquit me from mine iniquity.
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.
Sermons and teaching on this passage from across YouTube.
Clear, readable, conservative exposition — the best free place to start on any passage.
Matthew Henry, Barnes, Gill, the Pulpit Commentary, Ellicott, Cambridge, and more — stacked on one page for this exact verse.
The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).
Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
Christ at the center
Job's cry for a mediator who can lay his hand on both God and man, and his confidence that 'my Redeemer lives' and will stand on the earth, reaches forward to Jesus the living Redeemer.
How Job 14:16 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.