Well... look at what the Bible says.
The Lord's table served diluted wine? Really? That was suggested to Timothy because of his stomach problems. But? If it was already diluted by custom?
1 Timothy 5:23
Stop drinking only water, and use a little wine because
of your stomach and your frequent illnesses.
If it were the custom, why even suggest he dilute it? Just tell him to drink wine. And? At the communion table at Paul's ministry? Why was he not having his churches following your so called custom?
1 Corinthians 11:20-22
When you come together, it is not the Lord's Supper
you eat, for as you eat, each of you goes ahead without
waiting for anybody else. One remains hungry, another
gets drunk. Don't you have homes to eat and drink in?
Or do you despise the church of God and humiliate those
who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I praise
you for this? Certainly not!
Some were getting drunk. Why? REAL wine!
France has a tradition of wine with food because the water was bad. They did not dilute with water. And, they did not become a nation of drunks either.
Its this kind of prudishness that turns off many who need to know Christ. It may make the one who already believed feel righteous about himself via legalism. But, it only serves to turn off those who have self control and are seeking Christ. But, the Christ they are presented? Makes them feel that they can not know Christ.
When you come together, it is not the Lord's Supper
you eat, for as you eat, each of you goes ahead
without waiting for anybody else.
One remains hungry,
another gets drunk.
Paul's Churches used REAL wine! Paul would have told them to dilute it with water, not to save some for others. Instead, he told them they should eat and drink in their homes before hand so as to not over indulge when its free at church service.
Don't you have homes to eat and drink in?
Or do you despise the church of God and humiliate those
who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I praise
you for this? Certainly not!
Know the culture of the Bible. Know the thinking (mind) of Christ. Become a true witness.
In Christ, GeneZ
Ha, Ha, Ha reading your response I am characterized as a legalistic teetotaler that made up some theory regarding the dilution of wine during ancient times to rationalize Jesus' drinking of wine.
The reason I believe that people of ancient times normally consumed wine that was first diluted is not out of some sort of dogmatic teetotaler belief but rather because it simply is ancient tradition to dilute wine. I hope to convince you of my position if not this will give you something to think about.
In ancient times the most extensive accounts of people diluting wine as a normal practice comes from the ancient Greeks.
Homer in the Odyssey mentions wine drank in a ratio of 20 parts water to one part wine.
A quotation from a play by Aristophanes reads:
Here, drink this also, mingled three and two. Demus. Zeus! But its sweet and bears the three parts well!
The poet Euenos, who lived in the fifth century
B.C., is also quoted:
The best measure of wine is neither much nor very little;
For tis the cause of either grief or madness.
It pleases the wine to be the fourth, mixed with three nymphs.
In your post you stated that the bible uses the word 'wine' and not 'diluted wine'. That is true but in ancient times they often used the term wine to refer to wine that was first diluted with water.
Plutarch (Symposiacs III, ix), for instance, states:
We call a mixture wine, although the larger of the component parts is water.
Additionally wine that is not diluted is often called strong wine or strong drink. The term wine or oinos in the ancient world, then, did not mean wine as we understand it today but wine mixed with water. Usually a writer simply referred to the mixture of water and wine as wine. To indicate that the beverage was not a mixture of water and wine he would say unmixed (akratesteron) wine.
You might be asking me if there is any evidence in the bible in which a distinction was made between wine and strong drink? Actually there are several. In Leviticus 10:8, 9, we read, And the LORD spoke to Aaron, saying, Drink no wine nor strong drink, you nor your sons with you, when you go into the tent of meeting. . . .'" This distinction is found also in Deuteronomy 14:26; 29:6; Judges 13:4, 7, 14; First Samuel 1:15: Proverbs 20:1; 31:4,6: Isaiah 5:11, 22; 28:7; 29:9; 56:12; and Micah 2:11.
The 1901
Jewish Encyclopedia (Vol. 12, p.
533) states that in the rabbinic period at least yayin [or wine] is to be distinguished from shekar [or strong drink]: the former is diluted with water (mazug); the latter is undiluted (yayin hal). ln the Talmud, which contains the oral traditions of Judaism from about 200 B.C.to A.D.200, there are several tractates in which the mixture of water and wine is discussed. One tractate (Shabbath 77a) states that wine that does not carry three parts of water well is not wine. The normal mixture is said to consist of two parts water to one part wine. In a most important reference (Pesahim 108b) it is stated that the four cups every Jew was to drink during the Passover ritual were to be mixed in a ratio of three parts water to one part wine. From this we can conclude with a fair degree of certainty that the fruit of the vine used at the institution of the Lords Supper was a mixture of three parts water to one part wine. In another Jewish reference from around 60 B.C.we read, It is harmful to drink wine alone, or again, to drink water alone, while wine mixed with water is sweet and delicious and enhances ones enjoyment (II Maccabees 15:39).
In New Testament times should we assume that the consumption of wine was any different than in the Old Testament. There is nothing that speaks definitively, within the New Testament Bible, that speaks of how wine was consumed during the time of Jesus. However, we do have a great deal of writings from the early church fathers that speaks of this very issue.
Justin Martyr around A.D.150 described the Lords Supper in this way: Bread is brought, and wine and water, and the president sends up prayers and thanksgiving
(Apology 1, 67,
5). Some sixty-five years later Hippolytus instructed the bishops that they shall eucharistize [bless] first the bread into the representation of the Flesh of Christ; and the cup mixed with wine for the antitype of the Blood which was shed for all who have believed in Him
(Apostolic Tradition XXIII, 1).
Unmixed wine and plain water at the Lords Supper were both found unacceptable. A mixture of wine and water was the norm. Earlier in the latter part of the second century Clement of Alexandria stated:
It is best for the wine to be mixed with as much water as possible. . . . For both are works of God, and the mixing of the two, both of water and wine produces health, because life is composed of a necessary element and a useful element. To the necessary element, the water, which is in the greatest quantity, there is to be mixed in some of the useful element [Instructor II, ii, 23.324.1].
So there you have it, wine as it was understood during ancient times, was understood to be a mixture of wine and water. Undiluted wine is understood to be strong drink. Is there anything wrong with drinking wine as we do today? Of course not, as long as we drink responsibly. Understanding how Jesus and people of his time drank wine is not a mater of religious dogma but of having the correct understanding of the historical context.