The subject of whether or not a Christian should drink alcoholic beverages may be today\u2019s most controversial Christian subject, especially among younger believers.\u00a0 John MacArthur just posted an article on his website titled, \u201cBeer, Bohemianism, and True Christian Liberty,\u201d which begins, \u201cIf everything you know about Christian living came from blogs and websites in the young-and-restless district of the Reformed community, you might have the impression that beer is the principal symbol of Christian liberty.\u00a0 For some who self-identify as \u2018Young, Restless, and Reformed,\u2019 it seems beer is a more popular topic for study and discussion than the doctrine of predestination.\u201d\u00a0 Then, after listing a number of other once-tabooed subjects, he adds, \u201cCast a disapproving eye at any of those activities, and you are likely to be swarmed by restless reformers denouncing legalism and wanting to debate whether it\u2019s a \u2018sin\u2019 to drink wine or smoke a cigar.\u201d1<\/span><\/sup><\/p>\n Although I\u2019m not in the Reformed camp, I\u2019m afraid the same could be said of many fundamental Baptists.\u00a0 Subjects that, not many years ago, were almost universally agreed to be sinful, are now defended with all the vigor of a Clarence Darrow during the Scopes trial.\u00a0 My youth group from the 1960s (in one of the fastest growing churches in the country) would seem terribly prudish by today\u2019s standards.\u00a0 No wonder many such churches have either had to change or shrink.<\/p>\n It would be an uphill battle merely to advocate moderation in drinking as many conservatives do, but to come to a conclusion that total abstinence is a Biblical mandate, would place one immediately in the backwater of Christian social fellowships.\u00a0 But that is just the conclusion I\u2019ve come to, not just because I find it the overwhelming norm of Christian history, or because the statistics on drinking grow increasingly alarming, but because I\u2019ve become convinced that this is the only consistent biblical teaching.<\/p>\n Subjects like Bible wine are always approached with a certain bias.\u00a0 We think we know what we believe and can give quick answers when asked.\u00a0 But we seldom take the time to refresh our understanding of such subjects and make sure our answers square with the biblical facts.\u00a0 This should be done again and again with the questionable issues of our day.\u00a0 Though we may not change our view (and sometimes we may), we owe it to those behind us to give our best answers.<\/p>\n There are two general views of what Bible wine was.\u00a0 The first is the \u201cone wine\u201d view.\u00a0 This view says that all wine was fermented but to various degrees, and, therefore, everyone drank fermented wine of some kind.\u00a0 One may hold to this view and apply it different ways.\u00a0 One could still abstain totally on grounds of testimony and prudence.\u00a0 Another may drink in moderation (the most common position) but be careful not to over indulge.\u00a0 Another may place no limits on his\/her \u201cChristian liberty.\u201d\u00a0 The other view is the \u201ctwo wine\u201d view which says that the word \u201cwine\u201d in the Bible sometimes refers to fermented wine and sometimes refers to unfermented grape juice.\u00a0 In this view, total abstinence is practiced toward fermented wine (and other intoxicating drinks) but freedom, even blessing, is placed upon drinking the fresh juice of the grape.<\/p>\n The view one takes makes all the difference when approaching Biblical texts that mention wine, especially in the narratives such as Jesus turning water into wine.\u00a0 Was the \u201cgood wine\u201d newly fermented alcohol and brought out at the last when most were drunken anyway?\u00a0 Or was the \u201cgood wine\u201d really fresh, sweet juice that tasted wonderful even late in the supper?<\/p>\n My own re-study of this subject has brought me to the \u201ctwo wine\u201d position.\u00a0 I believe this best fits with the available information and with the Biblical passages that mention wine either as warning or blessing.\u00a0 In this short space I\u2019ll mention four reasons for my conclusion and then apply the \u201ctwo wine\u201d view to some popular passages.<\/p>\n \n Our English dictionaries carry a foregone conclusion that has evolved over time, placing fermented wine first in their list of definitions.\u00a0 Any English reader first thinks of fermented wine.\u00a0 But this wasn\u2019t always so (or hardly ever so).\u00a0 Bacchiocchi traces dictionaries from the present day back to the 1700s showing this digression.2<\/span><\/sup> From about the 1900s back, the first definition was grape juice.\u00a0 Robert Teachout says, \u201cThe problem is that people have taken the very usual meaning of the word (whether in Hebrew, Greek, Latin or English)\u2014as an intoxicating beverage\u2014and have made it the only definition of the word.\u00a0 That is incorrect scholarship!\u00a0 It is inaccurate both biblically and secularly, and it is inaccurate in the English language historically.\u201d3<\/span><\/sup><\/p>\n This means that we as English readers of the Bible have a built-in bias toward wine being fermented due to our popular, current usage.\u00a0 English readers of past years did not carry this bias as we do today.<\/p>\n \n It is also easily shown that the words vinum <\/i>(Latin), oinos <\/i>(Greek), and yayin <\/i>(Hebrew) are all used sometimes of fermented and sometimes of unfermented wine in both ancient literature and (with Greek and Hebrew) in the Scriptures.\u00a0 William Patton\u2019s work, Bible Wines<\/i>, first printed in 1871, quotes Pliny, Plutarch, Josephus, and many others showing this very thing.4<\/span><\/sup> Bacchiocchi, Teachout, and others do the same.\u00a0 For example, Papias, from the first century describes the millennium saying, \u201cVines will grow each with . . . Ten thousand clusters on each twig, and ten thousand grapes in each cluster, and each grape, when crushed, will yield twenty-five jars of wine [oinos].\u201d5<\/span><\/sup> Teachout quotes from a papyrus from the second century which says, \u201cThey paid to the one who had earned his wages pure, fresh wine [oinos<\/i>] from the vat.\u201d6<\/span><\/sup><\/p>\n It would be easy to quote ancient authors and Scriptures that use these original words as fermented wine as all moderationists do.\u00a0 But if, as these (and other) men have done, it can also be shown clearly that these words were commonly used of unfermented grape juice, then only the two wine theory explains all the historic evidence.<\/p>\n \n The crux of the wine argument either way revolves around the nature of fermentation in Biblical times.\u00a0 One wine theorists must suppose that all fruit of the vine was in the process of being fermented.\u00a0 But this is incorrect.\u00a0 Fermentation was a process, but a process that was difficult and had to be monitored carefully if fermented (alcoholic) wine was produced.\u00a0 Likewise, keeping grape juice fresh (called \u201csweet\u201d or \u201cnew\u201d wine) was a process as well, though actually not as difficult as the fermentation process.\u00a0 Grape juice left to itself did what all fruit does, it spoiled and was good for little other than a vinegar.<\/p>\n The nineteenth century French chemist, Jean-Antoine Chaptal wrote, \u201cNature never forms spirituous liquors; she rots the grape upon the branch; but it is art which converts the juice into (alcoholic) wine.\u201d7<\/span><\/sup> This process for fermentation was well known in Bible times.\u00a0 \u201cFermentation is the process whereby yeast germs eat the sugar in the fresh juice and throw off alcohol and carbon dioxide.\u201d8<\/span><\/sup> This is a controlled process in which the juice must be at just the right temperature, air, and yeast or leaven.\u00a0 Without these specific parameters, the juice will either remain juice or spoil.<\/p>\n Similarly, the preservation of grape juice must do the opposite, that is, keep the juice fresh and sweet and avoiding any contact with yeast.\u00a0 This was done primarily by boiling the juice and sealing it from the air.\u00a0 In this manner juice could be kept for a long time in its fresh state.9<\/span><\/sup> The thick, boiled juice (actually like jam) could be easily mixed with water to make a juice drink.\u00a0 The common mixture for drinking was 20:1 and the mixture for the Passover was 3:110<\/span><\/sup> (\u201cfruit of the vine\u201d Luke 22:18).\u00a0 The point is, \u201cwine\u201d in the Bible can be either fermented or unfermented depending on the user\u2019s desire in making it.<\/p>\n \n Nothing could be more clear than that the Bible often calls wine a blessing and often calls it a curse.\u00a0 How are we to account for this dichotomy?\u00a0 Wine is called God\u2019s blessing by Jacob, \u201cTherefore God give thee of the dew of heaven, and the fatness of the earth, and plenty of corn and wine\u201d (Gen. 27:28).\u00a0 Wine was brought as an offering to God (Num. 18:12); was often a sign of coming millennial blessings (Isa. 55:1; Amos 9:13); was also a symbol of the Lord\u2019s blood (Matt. 26:26).<\/p>\n At the same time the Bible is full of prohibitions to wine.\u00a0 Solomon clearly describes wine as a mocker that brings woe, sorrow, drunkenness and addiction (Prov. 23:29-35), its effects are like a serpent\u2019s bite and an adder\u2019s sting (32).\u00a0 He adds that anyone who is deceived by it (wine) is not wise (Prov. 20:1).\u00a0 Habakkuk calls wine a transgression and pronounces a woe to one who gives it to his neighbor (Hab. 2:5, 15).\u00a0 Paul commands us not to be drunk with wine because in it <\/span>(en ho estin<\/i>, \u201cin which is\u201d) is excess (asotia<\/i>, wantonness, debauchery).\u00a0 Not in the drunkenness but in the wine itself.<\/p>\n The best explanation of this dichotomy is the two wine view.\u00a0 The Biblical words yayin <\/i>and oinos<\/i>, and the English word wine<\/i> can mean either fermented or unfermented.\u00a0 God has given us the fruit of the vine (as He did with all fruit) in its created state as a blessing and a refreshment.\u00a0 Man has taken God\u2019s gift and by his own artistic ability (as he has with many of God\u2019s raw materials) and made a poison which God has warned against.\u00a0 The sins of Noah and Lot are examples enough of alcohol\u2019s destructive nature.<\/p>\n \n Did Jesus come to a party where hundreds were drunk with alcohol and give them 120 gallons more?\u00a0 Would He violate the very Scripture He Himself wrote?\u00a0 No.\u00a0 The wine was \u201cgood\u201d because it was fresh.\u00a0 Jesus, the Creator of all fruit and juice, created the same thing He always creates with water and vines only much faster.<\/p>\n New wine must be put in new wine skins so that both wine and bottle will not be destroyed (Matt. 9:17).\u00a0 The usual explanation is that the violent fermentation process will cause the skin to expand and burst if it is not a new skin.\u00a0 But \u201cit is impossible that the must<\/i> [juice] <\/i>could ever have been put into skins to undergo the whole process of fermentation, as is usually stated, the action of the gas given off in the earlier stages of the process being much too violent for any skins to withstand.\u201d11<\/span><\/sup> As Bacchiocchi says, \u201cnew wine was placed into fresh wineskins to insure the absence of any fermentation-causing substance.\u201d12<\/span><\/sup> The mention of new wine skins assures the presence of freshly preserved grape juice, kept from contamination of air and leaven so that fermentation could NOT take place and burst the bottle.<\/p>\n Was Timothy supposed to take a little fermented wine for a stomach that was already ailing (1 Tim. 5:23)? No.\u00a0 Only fresh grape juice would be good for such a stomach.\u00a0 The ancient Pliny said, \u201cFor all the sick, wine is most useful when its forces have been broken by the strainer.\u201d13<\/span><\/sup> Straining the wine was one common way to keep it fresh from contaminates.<\/p>\n Were the apostles accused of being drunk on \u201cnew wine\u201d (Acts 2:13) that was alcoholic?\u00a0 This is the only place where the Greek word gleukos <\/i>is used in the New Testament.\u00a0 It is translated \u201cnew wine,\u201d meaning sweet wine, as our word glucose means.\u00a0 The mockers knew that the apostles only drank sweet wine (grape juice) and thus the heightened mocking of being so stupid as to be drunk on new wine.<\/p>\n Did Jesus use a fermented, leavened product to symbolize His own sinless body and blood?\u00a0 Not in either case.\u00a0 The juice was as unleavened as was the bread (and perfectly acceptable in the Jewish feast).<\/p>\n As I stated, we all come to this discussion with a bias.\u00a0 My bias must be toward the total abstinence of alcoholic beverage for the believer.\u00a0 This two wine view answers the questions much better.\u00a0 It preserves the integrity of the Scripture and our sensibilities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The subject of whether or not a Christian should drink alcoholic beverages may be today\u2019s most controversial Christian subject, especially among younger believers.\u00a0 John MacArthur just posted an article on his website titled, \u201cBeer, Bohemianism, and True Christian Liberty,\u201d which begins, \u201cIf everything you know about Christian living came from blogs and websites in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","episode_type":"","audio_file":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[123],"tags":[185,157],"class_list":["post-1208","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","tag-bible-wines","tag-modern-authors-theological-issues"],"yoast_head":"\nThe definition of the word \u201cwine\u201d<\/strong><\/h2>\n
Ancient authors concur over the ancient languages<\/strong><\/h2>\n
Misunderstanding of the fermentation process<\/strong><\/h2>\n
The obvious dichotomy of blessing and curse among the Biblical usages<\/strong><\/h2>\n
A better explanation of Scripture<\/strong><\/h2>\n