Did People During Biblical Times Drink Alcoholic Drinks For Their Mood Altering Effects?

 

There are some Christians who claim that because alcoholic drinks in Biblical times were extremely watered down, the positive statements in the Bible about wine [and by implication other alcoholic drinks] had nothing to do with its mood altering effects. Here are some comments I made on facebook to someone who holds that view.

You said something about how the connection between wine and gladness and merriment was similar to or paralleled by the gladness and joy from eating regular food and bread, and therefore doesn't imply the benefit of wine has anything to do with the mood altering effects of alcohol. But if you actually eat freshly baked bread made with actual yeast [as I do when I bake my own bread] you can often strongly taste and smell the fermentation that went into rising the dough. Therefore I wouldn't be surprised if the connection in the Bible of both wine and bread making glad/joyful/merry/strong did, in the perception of the ancients, have to do with the fermentation process of both wine and bread [cf. Eccl. 9:7; 10:19; Ps. 104:15].

I don't know how you define the word "intoxicating." One can use the word to refer only to sinful drunkeness whereby one has lost control, or one can also use it to refer to a mildly altered mood and state of consciousness resulting from the effects of alcohol (which some people call a "buzz"). I'll use the phrase "mood altering" to refer to the non-sinful "buzz" that alcohol can give.

Though we have biblical commands not drink wine in order to get drunk or to the point of getting drunk [e.g. Eph. 5:18], there is no explicit or implicit biblical command that amounts to "Thou Shalt Not Drink Wine for Its Mood Altering Effect." We also know that ancient cultures (including Semitic ANE ones) understood the mood altering effects of alcohol. Given the Sorites Paradox, it's difficult to determine exactly how much one has been affected by alcohol to the point of sinfulness. The famous sorites paradox has to do with a "HILL" of something [like a hill of sand]. If you take one grain of sand from a hill of sand does it cease being a hill? What if you took another? And another [etc.]? How many grains of sand constitute a "hill"? Similarly, how much consumption constitutes moving from mild mind altered effects of alcohol to straight out drunknessess? In one sense, one can tell extreme cases, in another sense the border line is fuzzy. Given that ancient peoples knew the mood altering effects of alcohol [which can lead to drunkeness] and given the sorites paradox applied to drinking alcohol, it stands to reason that when the Bible talks about being made "merry with wine" [e.g. 2 Sam. 13:28; Esth. 1:10] or associates wine with merriness/gladness it's alluding to the mood altering effects of alcohol. To deny that seems to be the more difficult and implausible position. Passages like John 2:10 and Luke 5:39 seem to acknowledge that licit non-sinful partaking of wine can alter one's perceptions. Hence, acknowledging and allowing for the drinking of alcohol for its mood altering effects.

The way you avoid that common sense implication is to appeal to ancient extra-Biblical texts that say that wine was diluted with much water. But that assumes the practice was consistently applied throughout all the different times, places and cultures in the ancient world. But that doesn't follow. There might even have been different Jewish sects who had different rules regarding the ratios of how many parts of water to parts of pure wine to be mixed. Or even to dilute it at all. Even the same sect can change its extra-Biblical rules as time goes on just as the extra-Biblical legalism of American Baptists in the 1940s differs from those of the 1990s & 2020s. Nor does your view take into account the understandable human "temptation" [for good or for bad] to make drinks strongly alcoholic. One can't just assume the positive Divine permission to drink "strong drink" in Deut. 14:26 doesn't refer to beverages as strong as (or stronger) than our modern beers. It's not clearly and certainly the case [i.e. true] that your view that the word "wine" in the passage probably refers to grape juice while "strong drink" refers to highly diluted fermented wine. The text doesn't even use the phrase "new wine." But just "wine." The phrase "new wine" seems to be used in the Bible to refer to both unfermented grape juice as well as newly fermented wine (depending on context).

Below are some Biblical passages where the context of alcohol consumption is sometimes positive and sometimes negative and sinful. Many seem to acknowledge the mood altering effects of alcoholic drinks when read in light of what I wrote above.

John 2:10 and *said to him, "Every man serves the good wine first, and when the people have drunk freely, then he serves the poorer wine; but you have kept the good wine until now."
[[[ The implication being once the buzz sets in, the difference in quality is less noticeable ]]]

Luke 5:39    "And no one, after drinking old wine wishes for new; for he says, 'The old is good enough.'"

Zech. 10:7 "Ephraim will be like a mighty man, And their heart will be GLAD AS IF FROM WINE; Indeed, their children will see it and be glad, Their heart will rejoice in the LORD.
[[[ The implication is that there's a direct connection between drinking alcoholic wine and gladness ]]]

Gen. 43:34 He took portions to them from his own table, but Benjamin's portion was five times as much as any of theirs. So they feasted and drank freely with him.
[[[ The 5X might include alcoholic drinks ]]]

Ruth 3:7 When Boaz had eaten and drunk and his heart was merry, he went to lie down at the end of the heap of grain; and she came secretly, and uncovered his feet and lay down.

Eccl. 9:7 Go then, eat your bread in happiness and drink your wine with a cheerful heart; for God has already approved your works.

Eccl. 10:19 Men prepare a meal for enjoyment, and wine makes life merry, and money is the answer to everything.

2 Sam. 13:28 Absalom commanded his servants, saying, "See now, when Amnon's heart is MERRY WITH WINE, and when I say to you, 'Strike Amnon,' then put him to death. Do not fear; have not I myself commanded you? Be courageous and be valiant."

Esther 1:10 On the seventh day, when the heart of the king was MERRY WITH WINE, he commanded Mehuman, Biztha, Harbona, Bigtha, Abagtha, Zethar and Carkas, the seven eunuchs who served in the presence of King Ahasuerus,

Ps. 4:7 You have put more joy in my heart than they have when their grain and wine abound.
[[The word "grain" might be a metonym for bread which can be leavened/fermented.]]

Ps. 104:15 And WINE WHICH MAKES MAN'S HEART GLAD, So that he may make his face glisten with oil, And food which sustains man's heart.

Earlier I wrote to the person:

The word "merry" and "glad" [cf. PS. 104:15] are synonyms (at least in English). Given the passages i cited above and the rest of Scripture there seems to have been an expectation in Biblical times that drinking alcohol had mood altering effects that can be seen as both good in moderation and bad when in excess. It also seem to me that when we say that wine has medicinal properties we shouldn't limit that to physical ailments but also to mental/psychological ailments and hinderances as well. The Biblical cultures seem to also have understood [as many modern people do] that alcohol can positively act as a "social lubricant."

I say that as someone who has never gotten drunk [i barely drink] and as one who acknowledges that alcohol is probably the most abused and destructive recreational drug out there. I just want to be careful not to condemn or shame people for enjoying a biblically licit activity.

Doing so can even lead to its abuse. Because it can create a mystique about alcohol that can align drinking alcohol with recklessness & rebellion [cf. wild parties]. Whereas cultures that don't have that mystique and even allow minors to partake in alcohol in small quantities don't have as much incidents of alcoholics. It's like taking off the "Do Not Walk On Grass" sign resulting in less people walking on the grass. Whereas using the sign entices the rebellious nature of people to do what's forbidden. That's a danger of extra-biblical legalism.