but the tongue can no one among men tame; [it is] an unsettled evil, full of death-bringing poison.
James has just listed every kind of creature that man has tamed. Now he comes to the one thing man cannot tame, and the real question is whether anything can.
One writer shows how complete man's rule over the animal world really is:
Here the inspired writer states an undeniable fact. What savage brute has not yielded to man's rule and become his pet or playmate? What bird of the air, fierce or timid, has not bowed to his power and obeyed his will? Even snakes, however cunning, strong, or venomous, have often been tamed to live safely with him. Creatures of the sea have made friends with him and given him honour or service.
The same writer then turns that record against us, and the appeal is not to theory but to what every reader already knows about himself:
But where is the man who has truly tamed either his own tongue or someone else's? Here we can appeal to universal observation, but no less forcibly and painfully to personal experience. It may and ought to be a heart-breaking confession; but is it not entirely true? Who does not know how quick and ready the tongue is to break its bounds; how slow to seek or keep the peace?
The reason lies behind the mouth, not in it:
Speech is the main road by which the heart of man expresses itself. So the only way to really tame the tongue is to tame the heart. But this is impossible for man. The grace and power of God are needed for it. In itself the tongue only gives expression to the deadly poison that lurks in the human heart.
Another writer gives the same idea a picture worth keeping:
It is difficult not to fail, but it is very useful to see that the tongue shows what is working within, just as the hands of a clock show the hidden workings of its wheels.
The poison image is not reserved for obvious cruelty. Words that sound pleasant can carry it best:
It is indeed, as it is called here, an unsettled or unstable evil, full of deadly poison. The poison is never more attractive and dangerous than when someone hands it over in a gilded pill. Good words and fine speeches make the worse case look like the better one. This is a favourite trick of the enemy, and it fits perfectly to deceive innocent hearts.
The poison also spreads beyond the speaker:
Not only does it defile the body, but it can poison the mind. It has been truly said, "Many who live according to the flesh would avoid hitting a man, yet cannot hold back an angry or hard word against a neighbour." One thoughtless or unkind word can easily poison people's minds against someone.
The verse does not say the tongue cannot be tamed. It says no human being can tame it — and commentators press that distinction as the door of hope:
Underneath this dark description of an even darker reality, there is a streak of divine light. Is it written that absolutely no one is able to tame the tongue? By no means. No "human being" can tame it. We can thank God. He is our desire, our expectation, and our strength. It would be a wholly unchristian thought to subdue our own tongue. It is our confidence to look up to God for what is completely beyond our capacity.
One writer traces our repeated failure back to trusting our own strength:
How often have we suffered from some blunder of the tongue and resolved to control that unruly member better next time. But our resolution proved like the morning cloud that passes away. We could only go away and weep over our sad failure in self-control. Why was this? Simply because we took the matter up in our own strength, or at least without a deep enough sense of our own weakness.
One writer draws a useful line between restraining the tongue and taming it. The first is a duty. The second no believer should claim:
A believer may "bridle" his tongue by the power of the Spirit of God. That is, he can put it under restraint, and this is a serious responsibility. But let no one convince himself that he has tamed his tongue. If he does, he will almost certainly learn through painful experience that it is still an unruly evil, full of deadly poison. So it needs constant guarding and restraining.
What fills the heart, then, decides what the restraint produces:
Nothing but the power of the Spirit filling the heart with the grace of Christ can restrain the tongue. When the heart is enjoying the grace and love of Christ, the tongue will speak in grace out of the abundance of the heart.
- Untamed — Man has tamed beasts, birds, snakes and sea creatures. The one creature he has never tamed is himself.
- Untameable — The tongue only reports what is in the heart. To tame the mouth you must tame the heart, and no one can do that.
- Poisonous — The poison spreads to others. It works best when it sounds pleasant: fine speeches are the gilded pill.
- "No human being" — These words are the hinge of hope. No person can tame the tongue. God can, and looking to Him for what is beyond us is the Christian's confidence.
- Bridled — So the believer guards his speech daily but never assumes the tongue is tamed. A heart full of the grace of Christ is what makes speech gracious.
Therewith bless we the Lord and Father, and therewith curse we men made after [the] likeness of God.
The verse sets two uses of one mouth side by side: praise going up to God, and curses going out at people. James's point turns on one fact about those people: they carry God's likeness. That makes the second use unthinkable for anyone who does the first.
The argument here rests on a contradiction anyone can see. One writer points out that speech is God's gift to man, so misusing it is a disorder He could never approve.
From this point our Epistle takes up the ground of obvious and gross inconsistency. Only the most careless can treat lightly a fault that condemns itself. God cannot start such a plain disorder, nor approve it. Speech is an excellent possession, given to man by his Creator, and this is a misuse of it. The inconsistency is least excusable in those who claim a relationship with God and the Lord.
The first half of the verse narrows the audience. Blessing God as Father is not something everyone does.
Unconverted people do not bless God, even the Father. They do not really know God at all, and much less do they know Him as Father. Christians know Him and bless Him in this way, and yet there are times when words of a very contrary sort come out of their lips.
The verse describes people alive now as made in God's likeness. One writer explains how that can still be true after the fall, using a worn coin as the picture.
You might have thought that man at his fall stopped being in the image and likeness of God. But that is not how Scripture presents it… In James 3:9 we find man "made in the likeness of God." We may not fully grasp in what respects man is the image and likeness of God. But it is at least obvious that an image is a representation. When they showed the Lord a coin, He asked whose image it was. They said, Caesar's. It may not have been well made, and so not a good likeness. It may also have been badly battered, as coins often are, yet that would not stop it being the image of Caesar: it represented him, and no one else.
The reason for holding back the tongue is not that people deserve better. It lies in how they were made, and in the mercy we ourselves received.
We are objects of His loving purposes, born of Him by the word of truth. We should be the last to curse anyone, since we ourselves are blessed by pure mercy. It is not that fallen men have any moral worth in themselves, as we above all should know from our own humbling experience. So we at least should never forget how they were brought into being in God's likeness… Instead of cursing others, we want them to obey the truth, share the blessing, and join us in blessing Him who is the source and giver of it all.
The problem is not limited to loud cursing. A quiet, cutting sentence does damage a person would never do with his hands.
Many who live by the flesh would avoid striking a blow, yet cannot hold back an angry or hard word against a neighbour. But if no man can control the tongue, the grace of Christ can do it. The inner man is under the yoke of the Lord, and is gentle and lowly in heart. Christ fills the heart. And because the tongue follows the impulses of the heart, the speech will express that gentleness and lowliness.
The same lips can serve God or serve sin, and one man's story shows how fast the switch can happen.
Through the tongue we can praise and exalt the Lord, bear witness to that worthy Name, tell others of Him and become channels of eternal blessing. But how quickly, if uncontrolled, it may be used in the service of sin. Peter uttered with his tongue his great, God-given confession, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." But a short time later that same tongue became the mouthpiece of Satan. Peter rebuked the Lord for saying that He would go to Jerusalem to suffer and to die.
- Same mouth, worse fault. The sin is not just harsh speech. It is praising God and cursing people with the one gift of speech He gave. And it is least excusable in those who know Him as Father.
- Same stamp, still there. Man fell, but the likeness was not cancelled; like a battered coin, he still represents God and no one else.
- Same mercy, no standing. We do not spare people because they have worth of their own. We spare them because we who bless God were blessed by pure mercy — and we want them to share it.
- Same heart, showing. The tongue follows the heart, so a hard word can strike where a hand never would. No one can tame the tongue by effort. The grace of Christ governs it by filling the heart.
- Same lips, two futures. The mouth that confessed Christ became the mouthpiece of Satan within hours. So let Christ fill the heart, and the speech will follow.