Tongs

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Silicon-tipped locking tongs designed to withstand temperatures up to 500 degrees fahrenheit

Long handled locking tongs designed for outdoor grilling

This article is about the tool. For the secret society, see Tong (organization).

Tongs are gripping and lifting tools, of which there are many forms adapted to their specific use. Some are merely large pincers or nippers, but the greatest number fall into three classes:

Tongs which have long arms terminating in small flat circular ends of tongs and are pivoted close to the handle, as in the common fire-tongs, used for picking up pieces of coal and placing them on a fire.
Tongs consisting of a single band of metal bent round one or two bands joined at the head by a spring, as in sugar-tongs, asparagus-tongs, and the like.
Tongs in which the pivot or joint is placed close to the gripping ends, such as blacksmith's tongs or crucible-tongs.

The tongs are the most-used cooking utensil when grilling, as they provide a way to move, rotate and turn the food with delicate precision.

A special form of tongs, known as "lazy-tongs," consists of a pair of grippers at the end of a series of levers pivoted together like scissors, the whole being closed or extended by the movement of the handles communicated to the first set of levers and thence to the grippers, the whole forming an extensible pair of tongs for gripping and lifting things at a distance.

Tongs also have a special place in matters of theology. An opinion cited in Pirke Avot (Ethics of the Fathers), a Talmudic tractate, states that God created "the original tongs, for tongs must be made with tongs." Jewish thinkers therefore have used tongs as proof to God's existence.