Not at all. It is a consequence of language design of other languages. When you divide by zero in Java, then there is nothing set in stone that prevents the la

Not at all. It is a consequence of language design of other languages. When you divide by zero in Java, then there is nothing set in stone that prevents the language from winding the stack further and executing some code that will analyze the dynamic environment in which the error happened, calling all error handlers found in the dynamic environment, and only then - if no handler transferred control outside the error side - either entering an interactive debugger of some sorts or giving up and crashing. But instead Java goes another way and immediately destroys the stack by throwing an exception. That's a design choice made by Java creators. Lisp's homoiconicity has nothing to do with this. You can also analyze the Python implementation of the condition system posted elsewhere in the comments - that's an example of a condition system in a non-homoiconic language.