Can a man take fire in his bosom, and his garments not be burned?
The picture is a question a child could answer: cloth held against live fire burns, every time. The warning is aimed at the man who thinks he can touch his neighbour's wife and walk away unmarked.
The force of the image is how obvious it is. One writer puts this picture beside the one in the next verse:
Two pictures now show the extreme folly of giving in to adultery. First, it is like carrying fire next to your chest. Who would really do that? Probably no one. Yet doing it would be no more foolish than committing adultery. In the same way, most people are not foolish enough to walk on hot coals. But they are willing to do something just as foolish: commit adultery.
The first charge here is folly, not just wickedness. This man does with his soul what nobody would do with his shirt.
Why does anyone try it? One writer shows how the trouble starts small, and why a man expects to get away with it:
But lust works quietly on both sides, and small beginnings, where a marriage already exists, tend to grow into great evils. Satan works on the flesh. He leads people who forget that God is present to take the risk, hoping in vain to escape. But can a man carry fire next to his chest and his clothes not be burned? Can one walk on hot coals and his feet not be scorched? If such corruption cannot escape the fire of human revenge, how much less the fire of God's judgment? Any approach, however small or passing, is dangerous and evil.
Two things stand out. Forgetting that God is watching makes the risk feel safe. And the danger is not only at the end of the road. It is in the first step.
The verses that follow set adultery beside stealing, and stealing comes off better. Hunger draws pity; lust draws none:
When the need is plain, people make allowance for a thief who steals a little rather than starve. But what is as senseless, and as hateful a sin, as adultery? In the one case pity mixes with blame. Nothing can excuse the other. It is the worst disgrace to the husband. It ruins the trapped wife for life. It shames the house and everyone connected with it. And God, who judges it, hates it.
Notice how the burn spreads. One man takes the fire into his clothing, but it scorches four: the husband, the woman, the household, and the man himself, whom God judges.
Since the harm starts at the approach, the answer is not courage but distance. One writer reads the New Testament command the same way, and points to a man who lived it out:
"Flee from sexual immorality." Here you are not told to fight, but to keep far away from it, as Joseph fled from Potiphar's wife. Other sins may not involve the body in this way, but this is sin against one's own body.
Joseph served in Potiphar's house in Egypt. He did not stay to argue; he ran. That is the practical answer to a fire you cannot hold: put it down and leave the room.
The verse asks about clothes, and burnt clothes stay burnt. One writer follows the scorch into the man's later life:
Even in this world the adulterer will get wounds and disgrace, and his shame will not be wiped away… "For jealousy makes a man furious, and he will not spare when he takes revenge." Offering a ransom is useless. No amount of gifts will satisfy a man who cannot rest until the wrong is properly punished.
Some assume forgiveness removes the burn as well as the guilt. One writer keeps the two apart:
Grace can never be lost. God will surely carry every believer through the wilderness and present him in glory. But along the way God's unchanging principles of government touch us just as they touch anyone else. The flesh must not be indulged. Those who belong to Christ have crucified it with its passions and lusts. Treat it as an evil thing. Give it no room and no mercy.
- Fire — the question has only one answer: cloth held to flame burns, and no one is the exception.
- Approach — the burning starts before the sin does. "Any approach, however small or passing, is dangerous and evil," so small beginnings are the real warning.
- Forgetting — men risk it only because they forget that God is present and hope in vain to escape.
- Flight — the response commanded is not to fight the fire but to leave it, as Joseph left Potiphar's house.
- Scar — the wound and shame "will not be wiped away." Grace is never lost, but God's government still touches the believer on the road.
Can one go upon hot coals, and his feet not be scorched?
Two questions sit side by side here: fire carried against the chest, and bare feet on hot coals. Both answer themselves. Solomon asks them for one purpose — to show that a man cannot go near another man's wife and walk away unharmed.
Fire needs no debate. It burns whoever handles it. The man tempted here hopes he will be the exception.
There is a baseness all its own, even among immoral people, when a man tampers with another man's wife. Lust is insidious on either side. Little beginnings, where that relationship exists, are apt to go on to great evils. For Satan acts on the flesh. He leads souls who forget God's presence to take the risk, in the vain hope of escape. But can a man carry fire next to his chest and his clothes not be burned? Or can one walk on hot coals and his feet not be scorched? Any approach, however small or passing, is dangerous and evil.
Human courts are not the last word on it either.
That corruption will not escape the fire of human vengeance, how much less of divine judgment?
Coals scorch the feet — the part that walks a man into trouble. Nobody plans the ruin; they plan the stroll. The danger is a man's confidence in himself.
How many a man who trusted himself has been lured in! A little license rapidly betrays a man into shameful sin. If the Jews were God's people, our relationship is much closer — we are His children, bought with a price, which they in their blindness despised. We are not our own. We are called to beware of an immoral woman, and even more of another man's wife, an adulteress. Here the evil is worse still: ruin of both soul and body, and a special object of God's judgment.
Some people plan one controlled experiment with sin. They tell themselves it is only this once, and that they can stop when they like.
Whoever goes in for sin (for just this once, not much harm in it, don't mean to practice it) does so at his or her peril. On these very lines Solomon in his happier days asks, "Can a man carry fire next to his chest and his clothes not be burned?" (Prov. 6:27). Solomon, with great wisdom and vast resources of wealth, gratified his every whim under the sun. In his old age, as he drew near to the gates of death, all he could do was wail out, "Behold, all was vanity and a striving after wind, and there was nothing to be gained under the sun."
The burn is not always immediate, and the delay deceives people. A fire can smoulder for years before it shows.
We may go on for years in a course of secret evil. We may cultivate some unholy principle, indulge some unholy lust, or give way to some unholy temper or feeling. But the smouldering flame must in the end break out, and show us the real character of our doings. This is a truly sobering thought. We cannot hide things from God, nor cause Him to think that our wrong ways are all right. We may try to reason ourselves into such a thought. We may persuade our hearts by plausible arguments that such and such things are right, good, or lawful. But "God is not mocked: for whatever one sows, that will he also reap."
If the burn is certain, willpower on the coals is not the remedy. The feet need a different route, and it starts in the thoughts.
If we do not want to yield to the sin, we should take care not to walk past the thing that tempts us, or sit at its door. Do not discuss in your thoughts what you do not mean to let into your heart. If we do not mean to be burned, let us not walk on the coals of temptation.
- Fire. The question answers itself on purpose. Clothes burn, feet scorch, and sin works the same way — "any approach, however small or passing, is dangerous and evil."
- Feet. What gets scorched is the part that walks. A man is not ambushed into this sin; he strolls into it, because "a little license rapidly betrays a man into shameful sin."
- Fantasy. Every tempted heart believes it will be the exception. Souls "forget God's presence" and take the risk "in the vain hope of escape."
- Fuse. Delay is not escape. A man may nurse secret evil for years, but "the smouldering flame must in the end break out."
- Flee. Distance is the only safe move. Self-control at close range is not enough: "if we do not mean to be burned, let us not walk on the coals of temptation."