Psalms 105:16-18 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

He called for a famine That is, he brought a famine upon the land. He brake the whole staff of bread Bread, which is the staff or support of men's lives. He sent a man before them Who was to nourish them in the famine: sent him, by the direction of his secret providence, many years before the famine began. Such are the foresight and timely care of Divine Providence. Whose feet they hurt with fetters Being unjustly charged with a most heinous crime. He was laid in iron Hebrew, נפשׁו ברזל באה, the iron entered his soul, which seems to be added emphatically, to aggravate the misery of his imprisonment, and to show how grievous it was to his very soul. Undoubtedly the false accusation, which was the cause of his imprisonment, the injury which was done him, and the foul and public scandal which lay upon him, must have pained him extremely.