What SnozzleBerry wrote.
Plus: When working with strongly alkaline substances, such as lye or basified soup, always wear gloves. The gloves will not only protect your skin, they will also prevent the fats in your skin from being hydrolyzed, or as it is also called: saponified -> turned into soap - literally. Saponification of finger fat makes your hands soapy and slippery. This leads to increased risk of dropping whatever you are holding. A rubber glove will not saponify and will keep its grip.
Apart from the obvious containment methods mentioned by SnozzleBerry, another method is putting the jar in a cotton bag in a plastic bag while you are handling it. If the lid comes off, the plastic bag contains the spill (or at least stops it from splashing all over the place). If the jar breaks, the cotton bag adds a little protection to the plastic bag (and your hands) from being shredded by the sharp glass shards.
