Is it true that in Jesus' time wine was non-alcoholic?

Question

Someone stated this in response to another person's question about whether it was okay to drink alcohol. Is there any evidence to back this statement up? I have never heard that before.

Answer 1

Many Baptists will tell you that. They are a denomination seriously against drinking. The answer is no. It was not non-alcoholic. They advised against drinking to much. Common sense. Jesus made wine for a party. No sin just not good to get too much of a snoot full.
In reading the answers many find the question hard to believe. She is right, many many people against drinking for religious reasons claim that wine back then was non-alcoholic and Ive heard it was used to flavor the water. A couple of drops of wine was added to the water to make it taste a little better. They say this explains Jesus turning water into wine. Its a very common belief here in the south. Its an incorrect belief but very common.

Answer 2

If what Jesus and his followers was drinking was non-alcoholic then it wouldn't have been called wine. The Jewish people had been using wine for centuries in various rituals including passover meal (which is what the last supper started out as.) Also, the Romans and Greeks of that period were drinking wine and commenting on its effects. The god of wine, Dionysus was being worshiped at that time and the alcoholic effects of wine were important to that worship.

To have a beverage which is truly non-alcoholic wine and not simply fresh grape juice you have to first ferment and age it and then extract the alcohol. Until recently the only way to do that was by heating to force evaporation which would make it unrecognizable as wine. Today alcohol is removed by low temperature evaporation using a vacuum or filtration. Neither of these technologies would have been available in the first century.

Answer 3

The wine that Jesus made was non-alcoholic. He made grapejuice.

The bible is harmonious book. Solomon said in Proverbs that wine is a mocker and strong drink is raging. Whoever is deceived thereby is not wise.

Jesus rejected the vinegar offered to him on the cross, because the vinegar was produced by fermentation.

The word "wine" could mean both fermented or unfermented. However we learn from the bible about the evil effects of alcohol.

Look at the story of Noah, and Lot. Both got drunk from alcohol and we can see what happened. On one hand, Ham posterity was cursed and on the other, Lot's sons were also his grandsons.

Answer 4

No one can really completely answer this question because there's always the possiblity that the wine was non alcoholic because there is, now, and ( according to most sources) was such a thing as non alcoholic wine in that time. Therefore answering this question is impossible without having actually been there and asking Jesus Himself.

However I urge you to ask youself, would the person who wrote the bible have known that Jesus' wine was non alcoholic and just forgotten to mention it?

Answer 5

No, this is not true, I have included some history about wine, but as you will notice in the Christianity section that until 1859 "grape juice" that was stored for a period of time fermented (ie alchohol).

The earliest evidence suggesting wine production comes from archaeological sites in Georgia and Iran, dating from 6000 to 5000 BC. The archaeological evidence becomes clearer, and points to domestication of grapevine, in Early Bronze Age sites of the Near East, Sumer and Egypt from around the third millennium BC.

In Egypt, wine became a part of recorded history, playing an important role in ancient ceremonial life.

Wine was common in classical Greece,and Rome. Dionysos was the Greek god of wine and revelry, and wine was frequently referred to in the works of Homer and Aesop. Virtually all of the major wine producing regions of Western Europe today were established by the Romans. Wine making technology improved considerably during the time of the Roman Empire. Many grape varieties and cultivation techniques were known. Barrels were developed for storing and shipping wine. Bottles were used for the first time and the early developments of an appellation system formed as certain regions gained reputations for fine wine.

In medieval Europe, wine was consumed by the church and the noble and merchant classes, ale being the drink of the general populace. Wine was necessary for the celebration of the Catholic Mass, and so assuring a supply was crucial.

Grapes and wheat were first brought to what is now Latin America by the first Spanish conquistadores to provide the necessities of the Catholic Holy Eucharist.
Christianity
Wine has been used in many Christian services, particularly the Catholic Mass and Orthodox Divine Liturgy, as part of a sacred ritual called Communion or Eucharist. It originated from Jesus blessing bread and wine during the Gospel accounts of the Last Supper. It was used in nearly all Protestant groups until Welch's creation of commercial grape juice in 1869 by applying pasteurization to grapes to stop the natural fermentation process. The influence of the Temperance movement and Prohibition convinced some to switch from wine to grape juice. As a result, there is an ongoing debate in many American Protestant denominations as to whether the Greek and Hebrew words for wine refer to alcoholic wine or grape juice, though outside such circles the terms are believed to refer to alcoholic wine. Outside the United States, most Protestant groups do use

Answer 6

no. People simply say this because they do not PERSONALLY agree with the fact that he SUPPOSEDLY turned water into wine. This is common among the religious, if they find something in a religious text they do not agree with,they simply create a completely bogus interpretation that they DO agree with.
-People were making alcoholic beverages for HUNDREDS OF YEARS before Jesus ever showed up.

Answer 7

Jesus turned water into wine not grapejuice. The bible says to drink wine for a heavy heart.

Answer 8

The alcoholic content was very low. The water in that part of the world was very BAD and the alcohol was used to kill the bacteria. The water that they got was generally used to bathe and there was a great deal of waste material found in it. They did not use the processing that we do today with our alcohols. Have a great evening.
Eds

Answer 9

No Of course wine was alcoholic.

Answer 10

No if anything it was more alocholic because it was poorly filtered and processed. Besides when you ferment something it releases alcohol. Whoever said it was non-alcoholic was not the sharpest tool in the shed.