Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Proverbs 6:27
Can a man take fire in his bosom, and his clothes not be burned?
Pro 6:27
Can a man take fire in his bosom, and his clothes not be burned?
The danger of playing with enticements to sin
The law of the acquisition of knowledge is that the mind knows the unknown through the known. It gets at the distant through the near, and at the near through the nearer. It ascends to the Divine through the human, and through the material and the temporal mounts up to the spiritual and eternal. As a consequence, the teaching of the Scriptures in the feature alluded to is more specific and intelligible to such a creature as man than it could be in any other mode. The words of the text directly refer to the sin of adultery. The wise man directs youth to the best defence against every tendency to this evil. That defence he finds in the remembrance of, attention to, and conformity with, the family training he received in the morning of life. Then, in a manner remarkably elegant, he places before him the advantages he would reap by assuming towards the law the attitude prescribed. The law is here personified as a wise counsellor, as a careful guardian, and as an interesting companion. That law will preserve against the particular dangers to which age and circumstances make the young peculiarly liable. It is of prime importance to be kept from the strange woman. In the text the wise man returns again to the necessity of directly resisting the evil in the occasion of it, in the temptation to it, and that from the consideration of the impossibility of playing with the enticement without falling into the sin.
I. Every temptation presented to man addresses itself to a nature that is already corrupt, and therefore liable to take to it. It appears from the history of mankind that there is force enough in temptation, by keeping the mind in fellowship with it, to influence even holy creatures so as to make them fall. So it happened with our first parents in Eden. If there was such force in temptation when there was nothing but holiness in the mind, what must be its power to a creature that is already depraved? Wherever you find a man you find a sinner. The bias of our nature is towards sin, the original propensity of our minds is in the direction of evil. Here lies the danger of playing with temptation. There is something in thee that is advantageous to it. The whole moral nature of man is impaired. The moral deterioration of mankind is such as to expose them to various assaults of temptation, and if any one boldly frequents infectious places, dallying with and fondling the disease, it is impossible for him, possessing the nature he does, to escape the contagion.
II. Man, in playing with the temptation, puts himself directly in the way that leads naturally to sin. Every sin has certain enticements peculiar to itself. The great moral defect of thousands is that they do not recognise the sin in the enticement thereto. Show how, by playing with temptation, a man may develop into a thief, a gambler, or a drunkard. Scripture not only forbids the sin itself, but also all the occasions to it, and the first motions of the heart towards it. Do you desire not to fall into any sin, then shut your ears that you hear not the voice of the temptation; turn your eyes away from looking at it; bind yourself to something strong enough to keep you from falling into its snare. When a man plays with the temptation he is in the middle of the road which leads into the sin.
III. Playing with temptation to any evil shows some degree of bias in the nature to that particular evil. It is in the communion of the mind with the temptation that power resides, and if there be in the mind a sufficient amount of virtue–of virtue the direct opposite of the sin to which the temptation prompts–to keep a man on his guard from playing with it, he is perfectly safe from any injury that may be inflicted by it. In truth, when it is so the temptation is to him no longer a temptation. When a man hates the sin with perfect hatred the temptation to it is hateful to him, and he avoids not only the sin itself, but all occasions to it and all things that might lead thereto. There is in each one of us separately some predisposition to some particular sin, just as in some bodily constitutions there is a predisposition to certain fevers. There may be something in a mans organism making him incline beforehand to some special sin, and thus placing him under an obligation to exercise special vigilance against that sin. Natural predispositions these may be called; but there are others, the result of habit only, equally powerful in their influence and equally dangerous if any advantage be given them to show themselves. And sometimes the natural predispositions are strengthened by habit. When a man plays with any temptation it is proof of some bias toward the sin which is the direct object of the temptation. The playing with the temptation is nothing else than the heart reaching out after the sin, the lust conceiving in the mind.
IV. Playing with temptation only brings man into contact with sin on its agreeable side, and thus gives it an advantage to make an impression favourable to itself on the mind. It must be confessed that sin has its pleasure. It means the immediate satisfaction of the depraved propensities of the nature. Only the pleasure of sin is in the temptation. There you see the impossibility for any one to dally with it without falling a prey to it.
V. Man, through plating with temptation, weakens his moral resistance to the sin, and gradually gets so weak that he cannot resist it. When a man entertains evil suggestion his moral force begins to be undermined. One depraved thought invites another. Playing with temptation eats away the moral energy. The conscience at last gets so depraved that it permits unforbidden what it once condemned, and so step by step, almost unwittingly to himself, the man finds himself utterly powerless to resist temptation. And that is not all, but playing with the temptation keeps a man from the only means through which he might acquire strength to overcome the sin.
VI. Man, by playing with temptation, at last tempts the spirit of God to withdraw his protection from him, and to leave him to himself and a prey to his lust. Scriptures teach that the Spirit of the Lord exerts His influence in different ways to keep one from sin. Sometimes He overrules external circumstances. At other times He influences the mind by means of certain reflections, so that the temptation fails in its effect upon him. When a man continues to play with temptation, permitting his heart always to run in the channel of his lust, beginning to give way to his first impulses and desires, he vexes and grieves Gods Spirit and gradually offends Him so much that He withdraws from him, withholds His protection and allows the temptation in all its force to assault him at a time when lust is strong and the external opportunity perfectly advantageous. And the result is he falls a prey to the temptation. (Owen Thomas, D. D.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 27. Can a man take fire] These were proverbial expressions, the meaning of which was plain to every capacity.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
The question implies a denial; he cannot escape burning. No more can he who burns in lust avoid destruction.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
27-29. The guilt and danger mostobvious.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Can a man take fire in his bosom,…. A whore is compared to fire, and is so called by the poets o; and it is a saying of Pythagoras,
“it is a like thing to fall into fire and into a woman p;”
the Hebrew words , “esh”, “fire”, and , “ishah”, “a woman”, have some affinity in sound; and the phrase of taking it “into the bosom” fitly expresses the impure embraces of a harlot;
and his clothes not be burned? he cannot, it is impossible; and equally vain is it to think that a man can commit whoredom and it not be known, or he not hurt by it in his name and substance, or in his body, soul, and life.
o Plauti Bacehides, Act. 4. Sc. 9. v. 15. “Accede ad ignem hunc”, Terent. Eunuehus, Act. 1. Sc. 2. v. 5. p , apud Maximum, Eclog. c. 39.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
The moral necessity of ruinous consequences which the sin of adultery draws after it, is illustrated by examples of natural cause and effect necessarily connected:
27 Can one take fire in his bosom
And his clothes not be burned?
28 Or can any one walk over burning coals
And his feet not be burned?
29 So he that goeth to his neighbour’s wife,
No one remains unpunished that toucheth her.
We would say: Can any one, without being, etc.; the former is the Semitic “extended (paratactic)
(Note: The denotes the imperfect tense, because it is still extended to the future.)
construction.” The first has the conjunctive Shalsheleth. signifies to seize and draw forth a brand or coal with the fire-tongs or shovel ( , the instrument for this); cf. Arab. khat , according to Lane, “he seized or snatched away a thing;” the form is Kal, as ( vid., Khler, De Tetragammate, 1867, p. 10). (properly indentation) is here not the lap, but, as Isa 40:11, the bosom.
Pro 6:28 A second example of destructive consequences naturally following a certain course is introduced with of the double question. (from , after the form , but for which is used) is the regular modification of gahhalm (Gesen. 27, 2). The fem. is followed here (cf. on the other hand Pro 1:16) by the rhythmically full-sounding form (retaining the distinction of gender), from , Arab. kwy , to burn so that a brand-mark ( , Isa 3:24, cauterium ) remains.
Pro 6:29 The instruction contained in these examples here follows: (Pythagoras in Maximi Eclog. c. 39). is here, as the second in Psa 51:1, a euphemism, and , to come in contact with, means, as , to touch, Gen 20:6. He who goes in to his neighbour’s wife shall not do so with impunity ( ). Since both expressions denote fleshly nearness and contact, so it is evident he is not guiltless.
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
27-29. Take fire Kindle, or keep up a fire a forcible way of saying that this sin cannot go unpunished; the dreadful consequences will, sooner or later, inevitably follow.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Pro 6:27-29. Can a man take fire “The wife of one’s neighbour is as fire: if you deliver yourself up to her impure love, it will consume you: you give admission to a passion which is unconquerable, and in the end will fall under the hand of her enraged husband.” See Pro 6:34.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Pro 6:27 Can a man take fire in his bosom, and his clothes not be burned?
Ver. 27. Can a man take fire? ] Lest any man should reply, ‘I will see to myself, and save one from the afore named mischiefs; I have more wit than to trust any harlot, and more skill than to let it come abroad to my disgrace and detriment’; the wise man answers, that it is as possible to take a live coal from the hearth, and bear it in a man’s bosom without burning his clothes, or to walk upon fire without scorching his feet, as to attempt anything in this kind and to escape Scot free. Flagitium et flagellum sicut acus et filum. Sin and punishment go linked together with chains of adamant. Thy clothes will stink, at least, of that fire; thy feet will blister, at least, with those coals. If the great shower blow over thee, yet thou shalt be wet with the after drops.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Can a man . . . ? Figure of speech Paroemia. App-6.
take = shovel up.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Job 31:9-12, Hos 7:4-7, Jam 3:5
Reciprocal: Job 31:12 – General Pro 5:8 – General
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
6:27 {n} Can a man take fire in his bosom, and his clothes not be burned?
(n) Meaning, that she will never cease till she has brought you to begging, and then seek your destruction.