Can anyone explain to me why some (certainly not all) Christians believe that they mustn't drink alcohol?

After all, Jesus drank it. He turned water into wine. Even at the last supper he said that wine was his body so many Christians use wine in their holy communion.

Why do the no-alcohol christians disapprove of people doing something that Jesus did?

I'm not criticising anyone who holds this belief, I don't care who drinks alcohol and who doesn't, but I'd just like to understand why you believe it?

Well, I could be wrong but I don't recall Jesus partaking of the wine, he just made wine after his mother harrassed him, because they ran out at the wedding. He was like "woman, it's not my time yet!" LOL

But anyway, I don't personally subscribe to that school of thought, but I believe in moderation. We have received instructions that what should not overdo drinking so that we'll get drunk and keel over at the pub, and that's reasonable for someone who's saying they represent Christ.

Why some religious fanatics chose to put a yoke and ban the consumption of alcohol? Same reason some religions say you have to geneflex in front of the crucifix everytime you pass it(nonsense!). Same reason they say don't wear pants in church. Same reason they make you make some stupid sign that supposed to symbolize the sign of a cross. CONTROL AND MANIPULATION. Has nothing to do with true christianity , in my humble opinion

There's a thread on this already and here is my view.
 
P. S.  Jesus did not drink out of the wine he created from water.

Personally, i believe the sin is drunkeness and not drinking wine/alcohol. i read in a study bible dt the wine Jesus and His disciples drank regularly wasn't fermented. i dont know about that. i think if one is prone to getting drunk it would be wiser to avoid alcohol altogether.

Thanks for your comments and the link to the other thread. I didn't realise this had already been discussed. 

That is an interesting thread and it has helped me understand why some Christians do and some Christians don't. It's a very personal decision.

I just don't like it when someone who doesn't takes a snotty attitude when someone else drinks - my brother-in-laws girlfriend was very rude to me when I offered her a drink and asked what she would like out of a long list that included about 8 different non-alcoholic drinks and 2 alcoholic drinks.

Oh and if I once more get offered 'a glass of wine' and get handed a glass of fruit juice instead I think I'll scream

Judges 13:4
Now therefore beware, I pray thee, and drink not wine nor strong drink, and eat not any unclean thing:

Proverbs 20:1
Wine is a mocker, strong drink is raging: and whosoever is deceived thereby is not wise.


Isaiah 5:11
Woe unto them that rise up early in the morning, that they may follow strong drink; that continue until night, till wine inflame them!


they never miss lahi lahi

There is Coke and Fanta Juice etc that is SOFT WINE
THERE OGOGORO THAT IS STRONG DRINK WINE

THET ARE BOTH WINE

Backslider:

Judges 13:4
Now therefore beware, I pray thee, and drink not wine nor strong drink, and eat not any unclean thing:

Proverbs 20:1
Wine is a mocker, strong drink is raging: and whosoever is deceived thereby is not wise.


Isaiah 5:11
Woe unto them that rise up early in the morning, that they may follow strong drink; that continue until night, till wine inflame them!


they never miss lahi lahi

There is Coke and Fanta Juice etc that is SOFT WINE
THERE OGOGORO THAT IS STRONG DRINK WINE

THET ARE BOTH WINE

You just made a mockery of yourself with the highlighted part (emphasis mine) of your statement.

Unless, of course, you're only joking.

@Genial
what mockery are you talking about ?
look at you bible and read Strong drink is Evil Flee all evil even its Appearance

Backslider:

@Genial
what mockery are you talking about ?
look at you bible and read Strong drink is Evil Flee all evil even its Appearance

Re-read my comment before you make any more comments.

Coke and Fanta are not wine?!!!

all fructose and monosacaride sugar is wine based but it is soft wine when it is converted to alcohol by fermentation it is no more soft wine.

Backslider:

all fructose and monosacaride sugar is wine based but it is soft wine when it is converted to alcohol by fermentation it is no more soft wine.

Meaning what exactly?

English1:

Coke and Fanta are not wine?!!!

Yes. Wine is defined by its percentage alcohol content. If it has no alcohol, then it is not wine. All that stuff about Fanta and Coke being kinds of wine is a joke, right?

*

In Psalm 104:15, the Psalmist blessed God for "wine that maketh glad the heart of man". Surely, he wouldnt thank God for it if he considered drinking wine a sin.

hhhhmmm intresting,i think drinking alcohol can be seen in different angles.personally i don't take alcohol but i i do not see anything wrong in taking alcohol but moderation should be the watch word. drinking wine every single day of the week and you don't get drunk,isn't my own version of moderation,the way i see moderation is as drinking once in a while and not getting drunk.

Everything in life must be done in moderation. I think that is the key
Do not allow alcohol to consume your life or liver for that fact, and all shall be good

Christians And Alchohol (CAA):

Eph. 5:18 - And be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess; but be filled with the Spirit.

GL,

There is no such thing as un-fermented wine,anyone who tells you different is a SHIT BRAIN

@Topic,

The Bible metions many pleasures and benefits of drinking moderately.

In Psalm 104:15 states that one God's gift is" Wine that makes the heart of a mortal man rejoice"

In Ecclesiastes 9:7 "eat your food with rejoicing and drink your wine with a good heart"

What did Jesus do?[/b[b]]?

In John 2:9,10 The director of feast said  to the bridegroom about the miraculous wine"Every other man puts out the fine wine first,and when the people are[b] INTOXICATED[/b],the inferior.You reserved the fine wine until now.

If any body av problm wit alcohol they shudn't pull evribody along. D bible was xplicit wen it comes 2 alcohol. D bible preaches moderatn. D apostle Paul urges Timothy @ 1Timothy 5:23, 2 stop takin water but 2 take wine 4 his frequent cases of stomach upset. Any liquid dat lacks alcohol is as gud as water, 4 Paul 2 tel Timothy 2 take wine, den it has a curativ efect on his pain. WINE IS GUD WEN TAKEN IN MODERATION.

mrmayor:

There is no such thing as un-fermented wine,anyone who tells you different is a SHIT BRAIN

A quick search on google just showed me that there is such thing as un-fermented wine, unless of course, the writers of such articles are "SHIT BRAINS" as well.

mrmayor:

What did Jesus do?[/b[b]]?

In John 2:9,10 The director of feast said  to the bridegroom about the miraculous wine"Every other man puts out the fine wine first,and when the people are[b] INTOXICATED[/b],the inferior.You reserved the fine wine until now.

I don't know where you got this from, but The KJV version tell us this:  "And saith unto him, Every man at the beginning doth set forth good wine; and when men have well drunk, then that which is worse: but thou hast kept the good wine until now."

Before you start associating the "drunk" there with intoxication, note that the "drunk" there, as used in the sentence, is simply the past participle of "drink"; which means they drank the good wine to their satisfaction. Other versions use "drunk freely".

Also, I agree with what Kimba said here:  "The wine that resulted from Jesus' miracle power is not the many-months-fermented wine/alcohol that we manufacture today. Remember the Bible says, they drank, meaning the people at the wedding drank the "high quality", enjoyed themselves, celebrated with the Bride and groom, and all of them still knew their way back to their different homes. The Groom went home with His wife, he was not assisted."

If actually the wine was alcoholic, I believe they all must have gone home drunk, afterall, they drunk freely.

goodguy:

Also, I agree with what Kimba said . . . ". . . Remember the Bible says, they drank, meaning the people at the wedding drank the "high quality", enjoyed themselves, celebrated with the Bride and groom, and all of them still knew their way back to their different homes. The Groom went home with His wife, he was not assisted."

May I add that no one arrived somewhere else by surprise,. . . or woke up with the grrom's wife!

Drunk koo, drunkedness nii!!

Goodguy,

Grapes can be pressed for their juice and drank as such a (FRUIT DRINK),it can also be carbonated to produce many (FIZZY) drinks but we are talking about Wine here,in the world wine is only produced by fermentation.

Since you are an expert on search engines,please explain how UN-FERMENTED WINE is produced 2000 years ago in the middle east,how did the Jews make un-fermented wine.I can't wait to here your explanation

IN the 1800s a man tried to produce un-fermented wine,he was successful sort of but the end result is still grape juice not available in First Century middle east.And yes anyone who tells you that 2000 years people where producing unfermented wine is indeed a Shit Brain

Enjoy,

Source: http://www.ohiosbdc-ysu.com/Location/Guide/Oscar_Mayer/Wrigley/Welch_s/welch_s.html

Thomas B. Welch, M.D., the founder of Welch Grape Juice Company, was born in England in 1825. A devout Christian and staunch prohibitionist, Dr. Thomas B. Welch did not like wine being used in his church's communion service. In 1869 he decided to try developing a non-alcoholic substitution. Dr. Welch had an ample supply of grapes on hand, because he lived in the town of Vineland, New Jersey (named for its many vineyards), and it was common for him to receive bushels of the fruit as payment for dental services. Experimenting at night, Welch tried to create a grape beverage that would not ferment and become alcoholic. Fermentation, the dentist knew, occurred when the natural sugar in grape juice was converted to alcohol by yeast particles that collected in the fruit. To prevent this, the yeast would have to be destroyed. Welch accomplished this by placing bottles of grape juice in pots of boiling water, and allowing the heat to kill the yeast.

His creation was called "Dr. Welch's Unfermented Wine," and the dentist tried to persuade churches to use it as the communion beverage. But he met with great resistance. Wine was a key part of the communion ceremony, and replacing it with anything else would be irreligious.

Welch, was very disappointed, because he had been temperance-minded since childhood. His father, Abraham, a Watertown, New York merchant, was a hardworking family man who occasionally liked to drink whiskey from a jug he kept in the cellar. This led to terrible fights with Mrs. Welch, who thought alcohol was from the devil. His parents' arguments most likely helped shape young Thomas' belief in the evil nature of alcohol. This conviction was further strengthened as he grew more active in the church, and became a minister for several years before becoming a dentist.

The prohibitionist dentist kept Welch busy serving the cause of temperance. He became a self-appointed warden of Vineland's dry law, seeing to it that anybody who sold intoxicants within the city limits was prosecuted. During 1870-71 he led crusades in the neighboring communities of Millville and Bridgeton, to convert the towns to Vineland's prohibitionist ways.

For the next twenty years, Dr. Welch's Unfermented Wine remained a family refreshment, enjoyed by the Welches at home, and sold to a few churches for communion purposes. In 1892 Thomas Welch's youngest son, Dr. Charles Welch (he too was a dentist), decided to test out his belief that the grape drink could be successful as a commercial product. Borrowing $5,000 from his father, the forty-year-old Charles set up a juice production facility on the family's property. To make his product more appealing to the general public, he changed its name to Welch's Grape Juice. The following year, Charles introduced his beverage at the Columbian Exposition in Chicago, by giving out free samples of Welch's Grape Juice to millions of fairgoers. As a result of this national exposure, demand for the drink grew so much that Charles gave up his dental practice, and devoted his time to juice making.

Following his success at the Chicago fair, Charles Welch launched a huge advertising campaign in national magazines such as the Epicure, Carter's Monthly, and McClure's. To attract the attention of readers, Welch inserted word puzzles and contests in his ads, once offering $10 to the person who could form the largest number of words from the phrase "Welch's Grape Juice." (The winner came up with 1,366 words.) Charles also promoted the juice as a temperance beverage and healing tonic. A famous company ad featured a maiden with a glass of grape juice and the caption, "The lips that touch Welch's are all that touch mine."

By 1897 Welch's Grape Juice was found at soda fountains alongside root beer and sarsaparilla, and Charles Welch had to relocate the company to Westfield, New York, to be near a larger source of grapes. Elderly Thomas Welch, who had invented the unfermented wine, remained in New Jersey, but he continued to be a silent partner in the business until his death in 1903.

The inventor of Welch's Grape Juice did not live to see his temperance dream realized with the passage of the Eighteenth Amendment in 1919. The growing national Prohibition movement provided a great boost to the revenues of the Welch company, by increasing the demand for grape juice as a social beverage in place of wine.

mrmayor:

Goodguy,

Grapes can be pressed for their juice and drank as such a (FRUIT DRINK),it can also be carbonated to produce many (FIZZY) drinks but we are talking about Wine here,in the world wine is only produced by fermentation.

Since you are an expert on search engines,please explain how UN-FERMENTED WINE is produced 2000 years ago in the middle east,how did the Jews make un-fermented wine.I can't wait to here your explanation

Of course, unfermented wine is the grape juice!

I think the problem here is about the usage of the word "wine" itself. It is a generic word, meaning it can either be fermented or unfermented. This article clears it all: http://www.bible.ca/s-wine-alcohol.htm

Also, those that keep using Timothy 5:23 as an excuse to drink alcohol should read this short article: http://users.tpg.com.au/sarina21/trumpet/unfermentedwineforstomach.html. I believe that should clarify all misconceptions/misinterpretations about that particular verse of the Bible.

Also on the issue of the Marriage at Cana, read this article: http://www.layneministries.com/wine.htm. It explains the type of "wine" actually drunk at the marriage ceremony, and also touches some other important things one ought to know concerning wine and it's usage in the Bible.

goodguy,

Thank you for your reply,now tell me how un-fermented wine was produced 2000 years ago?Sure there must be a technique the Jews used to stop grape juice from fermenting 2000 years ago.

There was no such thing as un-fermented wine 2000 years ago,I challenge to produce any achelogical evidence supporting your idea.

Cheers

First of all, freshly squeezed grape juice begins to ferment after 6 hours.  So, there is a possibility that the wine that was drank in that occasion was a freshly squeezed grape, that was served to the attendants almost immediately.

As for your question, that's very simple. 

The technique the Jews used to preserve grape juice 2000 years ago was by boiling it at a high temperature.  When it had cooled, it was then poured it into vessels, covered and sealed up.  This prevented it from fermenting in a long time.

Also, a famous Roman judge, Cato, once said:  "If you want to keep the grape juice through the whole year, put it in an amphora, seal the stopper with pitch, and sink it in the pond".  I don't know how true this is anyway.

2000 years ago grape juice was worth its weight in gold,the idea that that people produced grape juice,boiled it a left it to cool is laughable,boiling the grape juice makes the juice thicker into a syrup,somewhat like maple syrup,basic chemistry would demonstrate this fact.Oranges,pineapples juices are boiled down to make marmalade.


Farming anywhere in the world is driven by money,why would a farmer or a grape buyer want to boil down grape juice into a syrup rather than ferment and sell as wine which much more profitable.

mrmayor:

2000 years ago grape juice was worth its weight in gold,the idea that that people produced grape juice,boiled it a left it to cool is laughable,boiling the grape juice makes the juice thicker into a syrup,somewhat like maple syrup,basic chemistry would demonstrate this fact.Oranges,pineapples juices are boiled down to make marmalade.

What's laughable about it? Of course, boiling the the grape juice made it thicker into a syrup, and they simply diluted it with water whenever they desired to drink it.

mrmayor:

Farming anywhere in the world is driven by money,why would a farmer or a grape buyer want to boil down grape juice into a syrup rather than ferment and sell as wine which much more profitable.

Those that wanted to keep it as grape juice simply followed the process described above (or any other methods available then). Those that wanted it as wine allowed it ferment, and then sold. It's as simple as that. Who ever told you fruit juices were always produced for commercial purposes?

Moreso, investigations also show that the ancients were far more knowledgeable in the art of preserving fruits and wines than generally presumed: http://www.biblicalperspectives.com/books/wine_in_the_bible/3.html

@goodguy stop decieving yourself.

The fact that some self righteous idiots have tried to condition your mind, and the mind of others that there is anything wrong with alcohol does not mean that anything is wrong with it.

THE WORDS USED FOR BOTH THE WINE JESUS AND HIS APOSTLES HAD DURING THE LAT SUPPER, AND INDEED THE USAGE OF WINE IN THE BIBLE ALWAYS MENT ALCOHOLIC DRINK.
THE ONE NOAH HAD WAS ALCOHOL TOO.

THE BIBLE SIMPLY CONDEMNED DRUNKENESS AND DRUNKEN BOUTS NOT AGAINST DRINKING ALCOHOL.

Pls you guyz should spare me this crap of Friut Juice wine!!!!!!!!!!! Imagine, that is a desecration of the english language.

N/B People assume that something like 'EVA' is called wine, but if you have a bottle of it around you u will never see wine on the label.

THE ENGLISH WORD 'WINE' HAS ONLY ONE TRANSLATION------------------ ALCOHOL
JESUS HAD ALCOHOL, TRUTH REGARDLESS OF HOW THE SELFRIGHTEOUS ONES SEE IT.

@ sage:

You can make noise from now till kingdom come, I really don't care.

Even from dictionary.com, wine is defined as "the juice, fermented or unfermented, of various other fruits or plants, used as a beverage, sauce, etc.: gooseberry wine; currant wine."  That's the 3rd definition there.

I guess the lexicographers are also "self-righteous idiots" trying to "condition our minds".

Did you even bother to go through the link I provided earlier?

GOODGUY,

Read this in S-L-O-W   M-O-T-I-O-N.

Un-fermented grape juice is not Wine,Ribena is unfermented grape juice its not Wine,Root Beer or Ginger Beer is drank by children all over the world its still not beer but a brilliant marketing strategy.

From the 1800s it was technology made it possible to stop grape juice from fermenting but First Century Middle East.
In the below text the Methodist Church used unfermented Grape Juice for communion,again they called it wine another Marketing Ploy.

Wine is made from one process only F-E-R-M-E-N-T-A-T-I-O-N

Source  http://www.gcah.org/Worship/Grape_Juice.htm

1864 GENERAL CONFERENCE RECOMMENDATION
The General Conference Committee on Temperance "earnestly recommends that in all cases the pure juice of the grape be used in the celebration of the Lord's Supper."

Discipline 1864, appendix xvii; Journal, p. 265.

1872 GENERAL CONFERENCE REAFFIRMS ITS RECOMMENDATION OF 1864
The General Conference "recommends the use of unfermented wine on our sacramental occasions."

Discipline 1872, appendix No. 29; p. 384.

1876 PERMISSIVE RUBRIC IS ADDED AT HEAD OF RITUAL FOR HOLY COMMUNION
"The General Conference recommends the use of pure unfermented juice of the grape on Sacramental occasions."

Discipline 1876, par. 484, p. 270; Journal, p. 336.

1880 SEMI-MANDATORY RUBRIC ADOPTED
"Let none but the pure unfermented juice of the grape be used in administering the Lord's Supper, whenever practicable."

Discipline 1880, par., 494, p. 284, Journal, p.397.

1916 MANDATORY RUBRIC ADOPTED
"Let the pure, unfermented juice of the grape be used in administering the Lord's Supper." The phrase "whenever practicable" of the 1880 rubric is deleted.

Discipline 1916, par. 516, p. 401; Jourmal, p. 1347.

Church of the United Brethren in Christ

1881 GENERAL CONFERENCE RECOMMENDATION TO LOCAL CHURCH STEWARDS
"It shall also be his duty[The steward] to provide the elements for the sacrament; and we earnestly recommend the use of unfermented wine."

Discipline 1881, Chapter V, Section III, p. 29.

1885 SEMI-MANDATORY RECOMMENDATION
"It shall also be his duty [The steward] to provide the elements for the sacrament of the Lord's Supper, always securing, if at all possible, unfermented wine."

Discipline 1885, Chapter V, Section III, p. 31.

1889 MANDATORY RECOMMENDATION
"It shall also be his duty [The steward] to provide the elements for the sacrament of the Lord's Supper, always securing unfermented wine."