Did jesus drink beer

[lstewartff]

Ahhhh, but what is the deffinition of "drunk":
Happy and a bit loose,
sluring a bit
stumbling around
falling down?

Im not sure.

 

[ckcanady]

We're approaching "offensive" from a point of "discussion".

Please remember that you're in the "general chit chat area" and the rules governing that area. Refrain from offensive, political, or religious talk and follow the rules.

Thanks.

I know "offensive" is discretionary but I think it's a loose discussion about a historical figure. But I do understand the warning as things can sometimes get out of control.

 

[shoreman]

If he did it would have been extreme beer. Wood aged sour Belgian influenced double pilsner triple IPA vanilla infused old whiskey barrel inspired double concocted farmhouse decoction barnyard imperial mild aged on peaches soaked in maple syrup that was hop infused with rye then triple fermented aged in old cider barrels soaked in Cabernet grapes from a coolship bottled in a limited edition run of bag labeled silk screened one of a kind glass formed at a farm in Flanders with brett infused sand.

 

[Revvy]

I get asked this question from time to time since I'm a preacher and a home brewer. I certainly don't claim to be much of a bible scholar though.


I have always loved that the first miracle recorded in the Book of John is Jesus making wine. Lots of it. At least 120 gallons of it. And it was awesome. And it was after people had been drinking.

While the English translation doesn't mention beer specifically in the Bible, it is hard to ignore historical fact that beer was around during that time and in that region. Also, since Jesus spent a lot of time in places that most "religious" people wouldn't go, chances are there was beer around. Either way, beer or wine, it's obvious that Jesus was ok with alcohol. Alcohol in and of itself is amoral.

I've actually done a lot of research over the years on organized Religion's, especially Christianity's views on alcohol....I've also done a lot of research on the history of many religious taboos, especially as they relate to Christianity.

I came upon something recently...might have been in the book "The Search for God and Gunness" that at that time the term "wine" may have been the cultural catch all phrase for any fermented beverage; that there wasn't really a sophisticated distinction between that which was made with grain, or fruit or honey, like there is today. In fact if you look at some of Caligione's research for some of the beers he's made based on historical/archeoloigal research many of the beverage contained multiple fermentables. Look at the the residue from the burial urn of King Midas, from which his Midas Touch was made, it contain the fermented residue of grapes, barley, and honey.

The beer based on ancient Egypt, Ta Henket was made with Bappir (bread) and doum-palm fruit, again a hybrid beer and wine concoction.

I don't know 2,000 years ago necessarily if there were any pure distinction between "beer" or "wine," but I'm pretty sure Jesus, and everyone else for that matter, drank fermented beverages...even if they were only lightly fermented.

We know fermented beverages were consumed in most of the ancient world, for the same reason they were drank into the 1800's in Western Society- Because water was too dangerous to drink...AND it was a caloric intake - "Liguid Bread."

So yeah it was highly unlikely that Jesus DIDN'T consume alcohol....because everyone did as a matter of survival.

In fact it wasn't until the mid part of the Temperance movement, around the start of WWI, that Beer, and wine actually came in conflict with Christianity.

According to Maureen Ogle in Ambitious Brew, that in the early pre-prohibition period at the beginning of the Temperance movement, beer was actually considered the "good" alcohol. Compared to rum and other spirits. There were all these things, even put out by the temperance movement saying beer was benign.

Beer was healthy, it was "liquid bread" they even believed that you couldn't get drunk on beer.

But when anti-German sentiments aroused by World War I fed the flames of the temperance movement (one activist even declared that “the worst of all our German enemies are Pabst, Schlitz, Blatz, and Miller”), that beer was lumped along with all the other alcoholic beverages.

Over the years I've posted a lot of stuff about Christianity and other religion's views on Alcohol.

In the history of Christianity, alcoholic prohibition is a relatively new idea. In fact, alcohol was a normal part of life. In Colonial America, the Puritans expected Christians to drink (Hearn, 1943). In the 1700s, a Baptist minister created the formula for bourbon whiskey (Hailey, 1992). During the 1800s, many Southern ministers operated stills, and sold alcohol (Hearn, 1943). Parishioners who owned stills would tithe their alcohol; and preachers' salaries often included whiskey. All this began to change, however, as the Temperance movement took shape (Hailey, 1992).

The idea that alcohol was dangerous was not new, though. In 600 B.C. Pathagoras noted, "drunkenness is an expression identical with ruin." In 44 B.C., Cicero wrote, "a sensual and intemperate youth hands over a worn-out body to old age," when he drinks to excess. Centuries later, Muhammed declared, "there is a devil in every berry of the grape" (Hearn, 1943). In fact, Islam has a total prohibition of alcohol, proclaiming drinking a sin (Parshall, 1989). Chaucer wrote in A.D. 1380, "character and shame depart when wine comes in." Clearly, for thousands of years, men have known of the dangers of alcohol. Knowledge about the dangers of alcohol stopped few from drinking, however. Jesus not only drank, his first miracle was turning water to wine; and he used wine as a symbol of the salvation through his blood (Hearn, 1943; Jn 2; Lk 22:20).

For Southern Baptists, too, alcohol was a part of life. That is until the Temperance movement began to infiltrate the religious denominations in America. Finally, in 1896, the Southern Baptist Convention officially denounced alcohol and asked that churches excommunicate anyone who sold or drank alcohol. For the first time in Southern Baptist history, drinking was considered immoral. The success of this measure is debatable. A Southern Baptist study has shown that in the 1990s, 46 percent of members drink alcohol (Hailey, 1992).

Investigation shows that although people knew of the danger in alcohol, throughout history, Christian prohibition is a new, and rather American, phenomenon. The decisions of churches to abstain came out of the American Temperance movement. David Hailey, though supporting the SBC's resolution, admits that biblical support for abstinence was an after-thought. Christians had decided, for social reasons, that alcohol was wrong. Only then, did they turn to the Bible to find support (Hailey, 1992).

(I kinda like that first paragrah....paid in hooch, eh? )

From ALCOHOLIC PROHIBITION IN SOUTHERN BAPTIST CHURCHES AND ITS IMPLICATION ON THE PRIESTHOOD OF BELIEVERS

I've never done an in-depth study yet, of the history of Islam's (Mohammed's) prohibition against alcohol....because it seems to me that drinking water in the Levant would be just as risky as anywhere else. I would not be surprised to find that they consumed something that actually WAS alcoholic as well (at least enough to prevent people from getting sick- Like a table/kid's beer, something low gravity) But like I mentioned above they didn't consider it as a means of "drunken-ness." People drank it to survive.

Unless the specific region where Mohammed lived and taught had a hugely available source of fresh water, that in his mind there was truly no survival need to drink alcohol...But I don't know specifically where he did his thing...and find it unlikely any body of water was totally safe to drink.

 

[ckcanady]

Revvy

I have done a lot of research as I'm a history major and love controversial topics and ended up with much the same. I have not looked much into Muhammed either. But this is exactly what I was looking for. There has not been much "mainstream" insight on the subject of Jesus and consumption of alcohol.
But I have to ask if you had a chance to sit down with either Jesus or Muhammed what would you share with them?

 

[mattd2]

I'd go with a simple Pale Ale, since they both seem to be humble people

 

[Revvy]

I'd probably like to try whatever it was that Jesus made. I'd also like to try some of those original concoctions that Sam Caligione and that anthropologist that worked with him tried to recreate. I'd like to see of the Funeral drink of King Midas was close to Midas touch.

 

[Revvy]

Revvy

There has not been much "mainstream" insight on the subject of Jesus and consumption of alcohol.

I think the reason is, that despite what some extremely conservative fundamentalists might believe....it wasn't a big deal. Alcohol played an entirely different role in society back then, for thousands of years, until the 1800's; you drank it as food, and you drank it in place of water (which could get you sick, or was hard to come by) to stay hydrated. You really didn't have many alternatives if you wanted to live.

Consuming alcohol wasn't the problem, but "Drunkeness," might have been. Going overboard.

Now we eat meat or some form of protein at every meal, we have access to clean water, we have the ability to pasteurize what we consume to prevent food borne illness, when those needs are taken care of alcohol's role shifts to that of an object of pleasure more than food....and that's why shortly after it's role of Liquid Bread disappears in the 1900's, alcohol starts to get on the radar of the moralists.

 

[ezzellca]

PBR, since Jesus was a kind of a hipster.

 

[Dr. Francois]

I have always assumed that ancient beer was more akin to kvas than modern beer, which is to say not nearly as good.

Tart, low alcohol, and very inconsistent from batch to batch. Wait...that descrbes my first three years as a homebrewer, too.

 

[julioardz]

Randy Mosher's book, Tasting Beer, mentions that the art of making beer was well established by 3000 BC. The Sumerians, Babylonians, and subsequent cultures had the ability to make different beer styles, including red, brown, and black beer, young and aged beer, strong and weak beer. However, hopped beers didn't appear until around 1000 AD. I've read somewhere else, not sure where, about gruit being used to flavor beer before hops became a common flavoring addition. This was a blend of herbs and spices, some even narcotic I think, but I believe this all came years after the time of Jesus.

If this is all true, I imagine the beer being produced in that area of the world around that time was probably more sweet than I care for. I've never tried an uhopped beer, but I can't imagine it tasting that great. I enjoy the flavor of dipping my finger in the mash and chewing on some of the grains, but I wouldn't be able to handle a pint of wort or bowl of mashed grains. I also don't care much for modern spiced beers, so I doubt I would like a gruit ale, but I haven't tried one.

 

[cluckk]

Check out Biblical Archaeology Review Sept/Oct 2010 (Vol 36, No. 5) for an article showing that the Old Testament definitely recommends beer. Deut 14:26 commands as part of the worship of God the consumption of cattle, sheep, wine, or other fermented drink (beer) in the presence of the Lord as part of worship. Jesus would have taken part in this as well. I will try to find the reference, but in Northern Europe ale was used for the Eucharist until it was banned by the Church, who happened to control much of the wine production.

 

[Jayhem]

This thread made me think of this song:

I think Jesus would definitely make a mean homebrew...most likely that homebrew would not only taste like heaven but cure what ailed ya! :rockin:

 

[Homercidal]

Some scholars believe that the Romans had a hand in modifying, or clarifying, if you will, the bible to state that wine was drank, as opposed to whatever was implied by the original authors.

The reason is that Roman Scholars identified with wine having an elevated status among them. To them beer was a drink for the common person. In many places the original writings had a somewhat ambiguous word, so they substituted as they saw fit.

The fact was, wine was not nearly as common in the middle east as wine, while wine was very common in Italy. Only Kings and other royals had easy access to wine in biblical regions (for the most part).

That's the theory anyway. Most likely it was a simple fermentation from grain (bread) and was drank young and possibly without much flavoring to balance the sweetness. It was well known that fermented grain beverage was given to workers as sustenance building the pyramids and other things that had a written record.

 

[cluckk]

Actually most theories of extreme redaction are easily disproven through basic textual criticism. We actually only have well founded reasons to doubt the original wording of about 5% of the New Testament. Wine was well known and attested as a drink in the first century AD among Jews and Gentiles of the eastern empire--much of the Eastern Empire had already decided for wine instead of beer, at least in public events and worship (see McGovern's Uncorking the Past). Its was even mandated in the ritual and practice of much of the Old Testament--including documents we know their form predates any supposed Roman redaction. Among the poorer classes--like soldiers--a common drink was wine vinegar watered down. We see this when the executioners dipped a sponge into wine vinegar for Jesus to drink on the cross. Beer had been reduced more to a home beverage created by the woman of the house to feed her family on a daily basis.

It would not be unreasonable to conclude that much of Jesus' childhood was spent consuming Mary's version of a small beer to slake his thirst and chase his bread and lentils.

 

[mattd2]

.... Among the poorer classes--like soldiers--a common drink was wine vinegar watered down. We see this when the executioners dipped a sponge into wine vinegar for Jesus to drink on the cross...

But why would they give a man that that are executing anything more than water? That doesn't make any sense, give him something that takes time and is a usable food item or give him the scungy dirty water? Unless he was given wine vinegar as further torment during his last moments as I wouldn't like to drink it unless I was completely dehydrated.

 

[WesleyS]

But why would they give a man that that are executing anything more than water? That doesn't make any sense, give him something that takes time and is a usable food item or give him the scungy dirty water? Unless he was given wine vinegar as further torment during his last moments as I wouldn't like to drink it unless I was completely dehydrated.

So that the prophetic words at Psalm 69:21 would be fulfilled.

 

[Sir Humpsalot]

I just heard that the pope is getting a Twitter account. I think I'm going to ask him directly.

 

[jsv1204]

I have always loved that the first miracle recorded in the Book of John is Jesus making wine. Lots of it. At least 120 gallons of it. And it was awesome. And it was after people had been drinking.

I love this. The best part is that it was good stuff! What I have heard is that the duration of the wedding was proportional to the amount of wine. When the wine ran out, so did the guests! Jesus comes along and delivers 100 gallons plus of wine to the folks who have already drank everything else. I can't imagine the party!

For my money, if he was ever offered a pint, he would have taken it.

 

[Barnzy02]

How Beer saved the world

 

[signpost]

Thanks for this thread. I enjoyed it.

 

[ckcanady]

I just heard that the pope is getting a Twitter account. I think I'm going to ask him directly.

I would love for the Pope to answer the Question " what is considered a 'Strong Drink' in the time of Jesus?". And what was more common/ likely for Jesus to drink?

 

[lumpher]

Either way, beer or wine, it's obvious that Jesus was ok with alcohol. Alcohol in and of itself is amoral.

i don't think i get this... the ultimate morality is ok with something innately immoral?

 

[WesleyS]

i don't think i get this... the ultimate morality is ok with something innately immoral?

Alcohol isn't immoral. The overindulgence in alcohol is immoral.

 

[hoppyhoppyhippo]

Id say he only drank beer since grains were alot more common than grapes ..im sure it just got lost in translation

But Jesus's time would have fallen under Roman rules, and the ME was greatly influenced by the Greeks. Both of whom love their wine. So I don't think having wine shipped in would be an irregularity.

as far as drinking in the bible, it's all translation shenanigans. Any form of pressed grape in hebrew or greek has the same word. So Grape Juice and Wine are the same. So were they actually drinking wine as we know it? Or Grape Juice?

I mean in the end who cares, but I'd like to think that Jesus wouldn't mind sitting down and enjoying a good beer.

 

[user 117534]

as far as drinking in the bible, it's all translation shenanigans. Any form of pressed grape in hebrew or greek has the same word. So Grape Juice and Wine are the same. So were they actually drinking wine as we know it? Or Grape Juice?

Most wine was fermented in Jesus' time, though you are correct that the Greek and Hebrew make no distinction. However, in one parable Jesus explains you don't put new wine into old wineskins because they will burst. That is undoubtedly from fermentation, most likely from wild yeast on the grape skins when they were pressed.

 

[hoppyhoppyhippo]

Most wine was fermented in Jesus' time, though you are correct that the Greek and Hebrew make no distinction. However, in one parable Jesus explains you don't put new wine into old wineskins because they will burst. That is undoubtedly from fermentation, most likely from wild yeast on the grape skins when they were pressed.

Very true. I think at the time what they drank both. It was kind of like drink what you could to stay alive.

 

[norsk]

If there actually was a Jesus character, pretty sure he'd have been fine with drinking beer.... Numerous passages in the Bible written by a variety of people on the issue of people drinking wine to excess... good and bad.... Based on years of studying the Bible, pretty sure he'd be an IPA kind of guy...

 

[LeBreton]

But Jesus's time would have fallen under Roman rules, and the ME was greatly influenced by the Greeks. Both of whom love their wine. So I don't think having wine shipped in would be an irregularity.

No need to have it shipped in, the ME was making plenty of their own wine at the time, if anything, they were the ones exporting the stuff. Back then, they were the agricultural center of the ancient world.

There is not doubt the ancients loved a good drink. Pliny has an entire chapter of his Encyclopedia dedicated to 'wine' and it's not a short chapter. Those guys were fermenting anything and everything with sugar in it.

Anyone have a clone for Jesus's '5 minute wedding wine' ?

 

[aiptasia]

Just use some common sense. There weren't many preservatives used during the era (except maybe salt curing) so pretty much as soon as grape juice was pressed, it started gradual fermentation. The same for beer or any other grain beverage, i'm sure the originators in several world cultures discovered that boiling some partially sprouted grains created a nice sweet drink, and not long after that, the wild yeasts turned it into a nice alcoholic drink. I would also tend to believe that, while grapes weren't accessible to the common man, that grains were. So, I would deduce that grain beverages would have been much much more common than wine.