Christians and Alcohol

Okay, I haven’t planned this one, and I’ll try to keep it short. The question was asked this week in a Sunday morning senior adult Bible class: is drinking alcoholic beverages permitted for Christians? This was way off-topic. The teacher gave a fairly non-committal answer and pulled us back to the subject of the lesson. I fully agree with what little response was given, but I’ll go into a bit more depth here, from my own perspective.

First, though, some generalities and some analogs …

Generalities

I think Paul summed up the general principle in two passages of his letter to Corinth:

1Cor. 6:9   Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, 10 Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.

¶ All things are lawful unto me, but all things are not expedient: all things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any.
—1 Corinthians 6:9–12 KJV

Because of our sin nature, we all sin, and sometimes we do even the things listed in verses 9 and 10. But as redeemed people, we can’t be characterized by those sins, because we have been washed, sanctified and justified. We don’t have a list of things we can or can’t do, yet the desire of our spirit must surely be to honor God in whatever we do or don’t do.

1Cor. 10:20 But I say, that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God: and I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils. 21 Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of devils: ye cannot be partakers of the Lord’s table, and of the table of devils. 22 Do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? are we stronger than he?

¶ All things are lawful for me, but all things are not expedient: all things are lawful for me, but all things edify not.
—1 Corinthians 10:20–23 KJV

The emphasis here is not on sin, but on worship. Greek ethnos, here translated as “Gentiles”, does not mean non-Jews specifically; rather, it refers to “pagans“, who by definition worship the fallen angels who rule much of the world as “gods” (see my recent post, Gods and Demons).

In both passages, Paul is saying that our salvation comes from Jesus, not from legalistic adherence to rules of conduct.

Analogs

Local churches or associations of local churches traditionally (and with Biblical license) set rules for the conduct of their membership. Some of these rules may be related to doctrine, but others may be more an emphasis on maintaining fellowship with folks you might otherwise get crossways to.

An example of the latter is found in Acts 15, where James, the Nasi (president, so to speak) of the Jerusalem congregation, ruled that only a minimal list of standards should be demanded of non-Jews for fellowship with Jewish brothers in Messiah:

[19] “Therefore, my opinion is that we should not put obstacles in the way of the Goyim [non-Jews] who are turning to God. [20] Instead, we should write them a letter telling them to abstain from things polluted by idols, from fornication, from what is strangled and from blood.
—Acts 15:19–20 (CJB)

Note that Jews in the Jerusalem church and elsewhere were still Jews and required to be “Torah Observant.”

Some modern churches are very legalistic, others not so much. The churches I grew up in were, and prohibited, for example,

• Consumption of alcohol;
• Shorts;
• Pants of any kind on females;
• Skirts above the shin for females;
• Hair over the top of the ears for males;
• Handholding (or worse, kissing!) for unmarried couples;
• Mixed bathing;
• “Picture shows”;
• In one church, makeup on ladies.

Scripture doesn’t specifically prohibit any of those things, though many would have been unthinkable in the culture of the day.

There are some things that most Christians today, and many non-Christians, would consider bad that are not condemned in the Bible. The list below shows things that we might like to see addressed more forcefully, but alas, because of “the hardness of men’s hearts“, God saw fit to merely limit, regulate and discourage them—not to prohibit them in all circumstances.

• Slavery;
• Slaughter, including genocide;
• Polygamy;
• Divorce;
• Incestuous marriage;
• (Should I add alcohol consumption here? See below).

The Matter at Hand

In the case of alcohol consumption, there is no direct prohibition, but there are certainly warnings. I’ll mostly limit this discussion to wine, because most relevant references in scripture are to wine in particular. The problem is that the English “wine“, and for that matter the Latin “vinum“, both translate several different words found in the original manuscripts. Some references speak positively of wine, some negatively, and some are neutral. We must here consider what exactly constitutes “wine”, and what is conveyed by the respective terms in the Hebrew and Greek originals.

Merriam Webster’s 11th Collegiate Dictionary defines the English “wine” as,

1 a : the alcoholic fermented juice of fresh grapes used as a beverage b : wine or a substitute used in Christian communion services
2 : the alcoholic usually fermented juice of a plant product (as a fruit) used as a beverage <blackberry wine>
3 : something that invigorates or intoxicates
4 : a dark red

Samuel Bacchiocchi’s book, Wine and the Bible: A Biblical Study on the Use of Alcoholic Beverages, surveyed English dictionaries going back around two centuries, and other secular works going back to Aristotle. He found numerous instances throughout with wording clearly implying that wine has always been a general term referring to both “must” (Lat. vinum mustum, freshly pressed grapes) and fully fermented wine, and all steps in between.

Language Issues

Bacchiocchi presents a case that the original languages of the Biblical manuscripts require that we regard all favorable mentions of wine as referring to unfermented must. Dr. Jim Anderson, past president of Kansas City’s Calvary Bible College, in his book, The Life of Christ, doesn’t present the case as forcefully, but his approach to the language issues is more straightforward.

I have the resources, but neither the time nor the will, to examine all 215 occurrences of “wine” in the English Standard Version. As a lifelong teetotaler, I have no axe to grind, so I’ll go with easy here and mostly paraphrase Dr. Anderson.

• Heb. yayin — Most common OT term for wine. Per Anderson, the word only refers to the fermented product, and all references to it as a beverage (as opposed to medical usage) are negative. This can certainly be said of its use by Noah in Gen. 9, and by Lot in Gen. 19 before his seduction by his daughters. The Strong’s and Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB) dictionaries also equate yayin with intoxicating wine; however, Vine’s Expository Dictionary, which I like a lot, says the yayin refers to juice in any stage of fermentation. Given that Melchizedek is a clear type of Messiah, his presentation of yayin to Abram is hard for me to see as negative in Gen. 14. The alcoholic content in this case is indeterminate from context.
  
• Heb. tirosh — Apparently always refers to “new wine”, i.e., must, with little or no fermentation. In Gen. 27, Isaac was drinking yayin, which may have contributed to the sheepskin deception. In return, Isaac’s blessing of Jacob included a prayer for grain and tirosh.
  
• Heb. shekar — This always refers to “strong drink“, fermented from grains. This type of beverage is never viewed as positive. It isn’t wine, of course, but I include it here as a related subject. Both yayin and shekar are prohibited to priests serving in the Tabernacle. However, in Num. 28, shekar is specified for drink offerings, which are “poured out”, not drunk.
  
• Heb. chomets — Must, when it has fermented, becomes wine, in the familiar sense. Eventually, further fermentation turns yayin into vinegar, also known as “sour wine“, or chomets, which I’m told is bitter, but no longer intoxicating. Chomets was used as a condiment. In Rut. 2:14, Boaz invited Ruth to sit and dip bread into a bowl of vinegar (chomets) for seasoning.
  
• Gr. oinos — Every source that I’ve looked at seems to agree that oinos refers to wine in any stage of fermentation. Only the context can show if the term is used positively or negatively. Not always easy! When Jesus was offered oinos mixed with myrrh at His crucifixion, He turned it down after tasting it (Mk. 15:23). Was that because of fermentation, or because of the myrrh (“gall” in Matthew), which when ingested is a bitter narcotic? In 1Tim. 3:8, “not addicted to much [oinos]” would seem to be speaking of an intoxicant. I’m not sure you can stretch that to be speaking of simple gluttony for grape juice, but again, to make this a negative, you have to assume what you are trying to prove. In 1Tim. 5:23, “a little wine for the sake of your stomach” is clearly speaking of medicinal use, which few would fault.
  
• Gr. ochos — Low grade, sour wine, or vinegar. In Mk. 15:36, Just before His death, Jesus was offered ochos. In the earlier Cana miracle, only the word oinos is used. One would suppose that three levels of fermentation are in view here. The “master of the feast” said that usually “good wine” was served first and poor later. I would assume that “good” meant fresher, so the poor may have been approaching the over-fermenting of vinegar. Jesus’ wine would then be still fresher wine, perhaps not yet fermented at all. Where do we draw the line between good, bad and ugly here? We have only relative taste to go by.

Conclusion

The bottom line here is that I can’t take a final position on the question of whether or not Christians should feel free to drink, in moderation.

I was taught from childhood that “Christians don’t drink”, and I never have. Aside from flavoring agents in steak sauce and French fry batter, I’ve never tasted wine or beer, or anything else intoxicating, and I have absolutely no desire to do so. I would rather that Christians abstained entirely, because I can see absolutely no benefit to it. But having known many obviously good Christians who do occasionally partake, I simply can’t condemn in others what I’m not able to show conclusively that God has condemned.

That said, knowing the dangers and the destruction caused by substance abuse, I must personally believe that, as to my own life and family, consumption of recreational intoxicants and drugs is another of those things that God has declined to prohibit because of the hardness of men’s hearts.