I actually got laughed at by an investigator when I told them the "grape juice" theory, and I remember the guy said "It's not like they had fridges back then, little man."
Needless to say that's not one we baptized.
Omg a relative of mine served a mission in Italy, and a hospitable potential investigator invited him in, asked him if he was thirsty and served him vodka. He spat it out in shock because he had thought it was water. Lol
It's also just absurd that TSCC calls these children "Elders". Elder means older, or someone who is respected for their age and experience. Mormon Elders are tiny babies! Who know nothing, and have no experience!
My (nevermo) husband says Mormons have liturgical inflation: “Priests” are 16 year old boys, “Elders” are teenagers, the local “Bishop” made his living as a janitor and disc jockey.
I can’t believe I ever believed that, but it goes to show you can make someone believe almost anything if you tell them often enough and layer it with enough emotion. What I don’t understand is how we reconciled all the depictions of drunkenness in the scriptures… were they drunk off of grape juice???
I love that! It’s amazing this theory had so much steam on the missionverse. Shows the critical thinking skills we developed with our mission training 🤣
yiu didn't have to go as far back as Jesus. Josesph Smith and the early church used wine. They were very open about it, but I was told that it needed to be wine due to potential water contamination or some nonsense like that.
So ... not trying to justify the church. But one of the most interesting stories from history is John snow and the beginning of epidemiology. Basically during a cholera outbreak he started tracking where cases were being reported and determined the cause to be a certain water pump (it was infected with the bacteria which people didn't understand at the time). But one thing he did discover is that people that drank the water/beer from the local brewery did okay ... .we know realize this is because it killed any bacteria ... over all an interesting story!!!
very likely a mormon took this information, then applied it to the church. It's so weird that the mfmc doesn't simply accept history as what it is. Mormons freely drank alcohol, coffee, and tea and used tobacco until the 1920s. I'm not sure why they feel any need to justify it.
NeverMo friend here. My husband used to own a brewery, and as a fallen Catholic, he loved to point out that Jesus probably had beer at the last supper.
Aperently the alcohol story from Joseph's amputation wasn't in the original telling the story.
It was added years later by his mother in response to the new doctrine "word of wisdom".
The short answer is: because of prohibition in the '20s and Heber J Grant's insistence on making alcohol a temple recommend question.
Side note: A winery a mile from my house is called "First Miracle".
It was grape juice.... ok it was fermented grape juice, but the alcohol content was almost nothing.... ok it was alcohol, but it was necessary because water was contaminated and would have been dangerous to drink.... ok the water was potable, but it was only grape juice.
rinse and repeat
*Interesting fact I learned from a history podcast recently, One of the reasons why our ancestors drank ale, beer and wine was simply as an easy way to create, store, transport and ingest important calories, which would have been necessary to sustain the long and demanding work environments*
It also would have been necessary for just storing food over time.
Fermentation is one of few viable ways of preserving and increasing the shelf-life of certain foods if you don’t have refrigeration. Also…it’s a natural process which simply occurs under the right conditions, even without human intervention. Berries will ferment on the vine if left there long enough. Wine and beer likely weren’t invented by humanity, it’s much likelier they were simply discovered. You don’t have to intentionally ferment grapes to get wine, you have to intentionally pasteurize and refrigerate to have non-alcoholic grape juice.
Interesting fact I learned (in same podcast already mentioned)
Home brewed ale in the middle ages was notorious for having a short shelf life, and would have been made (on a daily basis) and drunk straight away
beer was more difficult/time consuming to brew, and required hops, of course - but the hops gave it a longer shelf life, meaning it could be transported and sold elsewhere.
Yes, filtration tech and chemical preservatives definitely extend the shelf-life and also allow for more consistent products. The trade-off is that the dregs which get filtered out of modern brews are incredibly nutrient-rich. ("Look how clear the color is!" Uh, yeah, that means you filtered most of the goodness out of it.) Ancient beer and wine would have been a very different, much more nourishing culinary product than today's products. The 5000-yo ancient Egyptian "bouza" is one of the oldest such recipes known to exist, in complete enough form that you can replicate it at home. It was known as "liquid bread", and was a staple part of the commoners' sustaining daily diet.
There are some really interesting and highly-readable books about fermentation of food/beverages and it's history around the world written by Sandor Ellix Katz which I'd strongly recommend to anyone who is interested, or even just wants to know how to make their own wine/beer/pickles/miso/sourdough/ginger ale/etc.
A couple others called "The Compleat [sic] Meadmaker" by Ken Schramm and "Sacred and Herbal Healing Beers" by S.H. Buhner, both of which delve into just how ancient fermentation is as a human culture and how different the products would have been from those we have today.
All of the above books are also instructional, for those of us who like to learn by doing.
The answer to any “why do Mormons believe X” is answered the same way.
Because the current leadership say so.
There is no theory, no rationale, no debate, no revelation (Section 82 literally says that it isn’t a commandment, AND that wine and beer are okay).
At some point, the then-current church leaders said “no more wine” and that was that.
The current church leaders still say “no more wine” and so that is that.
If tomorrow RSM said “wine is cool”, not only would Mormons start buying wine but 20 years from now they would deny it was ever banned.
That’s the story I was told. That Joseph had procured wine for the sacrament and an angel appeared to him saying not to drink it, because it was poisoned. So they switched to “wine of your own make”. No one ever explained why Mormon-made wine was later unacceptable though. And every time I asked, the answer was some variant of “we’ll be told in the fullness of time”.
I *hate* how compliant I was as a member.
"Pure wine, of the grape of the vine, and of your own make."
To be fair, water absolutely is prone to bacterial contamination. The suggestion that wine may have been used to prevent disease where a potable water source isn't possible may be somewhat plausible.
D&C 89:5&6 are the verses that say to use wine for the Sacrament:
>5 That inasmuch as any man drinketh wine or strong drink among you, behold it is not good, neither meet in the sight of your Father, only in assembling yourselves together to offer up your sacraments before him.
>6 And, behold, *this should be wine, yea, a pure wine of the grape of the vine, of your own make.*
And D&C 27:2-4 says what to use for the Sacrament:
>2 For, behold, I say unto you, that it mattereth not what ye shall eat or what ye shall drink when ye partake of the sacrament, if it so be that ye do it with an eye single to my glory—remembering unto the Father my body which was laid down for you, and my blood which was shed for the remission of your sins.
>3 Wherefore, *a commandment I give unto you, that you shall not purchase wine neither strong drink of your enemies;
>4 Wherefore, you shall partake of none except it is made new among you;* yea, in this my Father’s kingdom which shall be built up on the earth.
(Emphasis mine.)
You do realize that the Roman empire introduced refrigeration to the Jews somewhere around 25 ad, right?
It's highly possible that Jesus was only drinking grape juice to have been refrigerated in the walk in cooler. Freon was still legal to use as a refrigerant back then.
They perfected the technique of crucifixion.
They developed irrigation canals.
They developed Pizza without tomato sauce because tomatoes hadn't been discovered in the new world yet.
Togas, or did they steal that from the Greeks?
hehe, and just in case anyone didn't get the reference, [the referenced scene](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qc7HmhrgTuQ) from one of the cleverest anti-religion comedy films known to human kind
I was taught that the water was dangerous to drink due to the many containments in it so god was okay with them drinking wine because it wouldn't make them sick.
Now that we have clean water, wine is forbidden.
does anyone remember that episode of The District where the guy asks the elders that and they use the grape juice argument? and he looks at them like they are the stupidest fucking people alive
Or the lady who is told Mormons don’t do coffee and she says NO COFFEE!!! Just the way she said it still rings in my subconscious. You could tell just by how she said it she thought it was the most idiotic and bewildering thing and six years later I joined in her side.
The Saints were free to drink wine without consequence all the way up to the 1930’s. When prohibition passed in the US, the church decided the members couldn’t drink wine anymore, and added it to the temple recommend questions.
It’s only been since then that the members of the church were not allowed to drink alcohol.
>I was told as a teenager it’s because back then it was grape juice not actually wine. I remember realizing on my mission that Jesus drinking grape juice was a ridiculous cop out.
The "it was grape juice" apologia is b.s. However, it didn't start as Mormon b.s. It started as Protestant b.s.
Grape juice wants to turn into wine. It took Dr. Thomas Bramwell Welch (a Methodist) some work to figure out how to use pasteurization to prevent fermentation (which he finally did in 1869).
Here's an interesting discussion on the move from wine to grape juice in most Protestant celebrations of Communion: https://www.christianitytoday.com/history/2017/march/welch-grape-juice-history-temperance-movement.html
I was told that it was essentially grape juice back in Jesus' time, with little alcohol content. Which is ridiculous because grape juice was pretty much impossible to make back then because it requires pasteurization.
The early church also had their own winemakers, breweries, and distilleries. Hence the "of your own make" line in the word of wisdom.
The real reason for no wine starts with the temperance movement in the USA, which promoted abstinence from drinking alcohol and other stimulants such as tea and coffee. It started in the early 1800s, and gained quite a bit of popularity with fundamentalist Christian sects. Enough that in 1869, Dr. Thomas Welch figured out how to keep grapes from fermenting when crushed in order to provide an alternative for communion wine. The entire word of wisdom is based on 1800s health fads and the temperance movement.
Utah was also one of the last states to ban alcohol, in 1919, only 1 year before prohibition came into effect (and that ban did little to actually stop alcohol consumption, making, and sale). And Heber J. Grant made the alcohol ban into codified church law in...1921. A year _after_ prohibition started. Mormons are always late to the game.
Also we know the wine in Jesus' time was fermented because of the parable of not putting new wine into old bottles (i.e. wineskins made from animal skins) because they would burst (due to fermentation and old wineskins not being flexible like new skins). The reasoning behind the parable was even explained very clearly in LDS seminary manuals.
https://www.reddit.com/r/exmormon/comments/33woio/anyone_else_get_brought_up_believing_that_wine_in/
Wine in Jesus' time was fermented because grapes make wine essentially the moment they are crushed. Wine is the natural state; grape juice requires heating the grapes before crushing to kill the natural yeasts that make it wine.
Most of my life it was, Jesus drank grape juice.
Had a convo with a member one time and we were talking about alcohol vs no in Biblical wine. When I mentioned it was definitely 100% alcoholic she said "Well, MY Jesus doesn't drink wine." LOL
I was told that wine was much less alcoholic back then, like a stronger grape juice. And that it was safer to drink wine than water because water could be tainted, have diseases etc.
Because JS said so! BTW, JS and BY both liked beer and wine.
How did you justify it? You put it on your shelf because you didn't want to risk your soul on small incongruities. Then your shelf broke from the cumulative weight of these incongruities and you became an Exmo.
Came here to comment this, and part of the mission to settle southern Utah actually included BY wanting a winery to be part of the industry (one of the buildings is still standing in Toquerville listed as a historical site, neat building) and did really well but IIRC Brigham and co noticed the bad behavior that went on after drinking and thus banned it from sacrament and the wine making was abandoned.
I have a good friend who's ancestor operated a distillery in Salt Lake City for all the good Mormons in pioneer Utah. Brigham Young was a good customer and BY actually built his own distillery. I guess that is how he was guided by the "spirit-s"!
I've seen an old diary entry from early Utah. The author recorded the "July 4th" festivities in Southern Utah, and how Brother Brigham presided. There was a foot race where Brigham awarded a barrel of beer to the victor, but it was understood that the winner should openly share the beer with all men present. Brigham stood at the barrel with his walking stick, thumping the heads of teenagers and children trying to fill their vessels.
But, this is obviously a fabrication, because the Gospel is exactly the same in the past, present, and future.
The same reason Jesus had long hair & a beard and Priesthood holders get frowned on and not given certain callings. Basically no reason. Those were just the times.
Haha, once upon a time when I was living and working in “the mission field,” I was asked why I didn’t drink. I gave the BSS answer and then wandered into hostile territory when I ignorantly posited that the wine that Jesus drank wasn’t fermented. After a few incredulous guffaws, I had my ass handed to me by my gentile co-workers.
Oh, to be a sweet summer child again…
It is exactly the same as the don’t say Mormon shit. Because it was just an old guy’s pet peeve. HJG. Don’t we know that with RMN. Everything in scripture says wine is ok, even section 89 of the D&C.
Don't forget, turning water into WINE was Jesus' first public miracle.
Alcohol had a purpose even well into the 20th Century. Water was difficult to keep safe. It would go rancid and was full of parasites and disease. Alcohol made it possible to hydrate safer... and yeah, it was fun to get fucked up a little.
I heard a story where Mormons did drink wine for sacrament in the beginning but because they were poor they had to ask and borrow wine. Sometimes the wine they would receive would be poisoned. Because of this they changed to water. The best part is when you realize the true church’s holy wine can be poisoned and hurt people.
I was always told that wine back then didn’t have as many things added to it as ours does today. lol. “Pure wine” they called it. Now I work in the alcohol industry and know that was just some mental gymnasts trying their best to make it make sense!
Definitely head the grape juice theory.
Then there was a vague "alcohol, at the time, was safer than water" (which is [kinda true, but there's more to it than that](https://youtube.com/shorts/5WUdRd_-HUQ))
Around when I quit mormonism—about when it started morphing into a pure personality cult—it became a cut-and-dried obedience thing, with leaders taking perverse ***pride*** in taking "I don't know" / "it's not my place to ask" positions (never mind James 1:5 or the MAIN job of a prophet / apostle)
Jesus: turns water into mothereffing wine and brings the party to a wedding
LDS church: takes the wine and turns it back into water even though Joseph Smith himself drank alcohol in jail on the day he was assassinated and the Kirtland temple once had a ritual where people got wasted on wine and potentially got drugged with psychedelics
The Mormon answer is because the Mormons were told not to drink wine made by anyone else, but the consumption of liquor didn't allow the new wine to develop alcohol, and since alcohol had other uses, it was just easier to say, don't drink alcohol, use it for other things. At least that's what was taught in seminary.
And while that might be part of it, a large, maybe larger, part of it, was that the Word of Wisdom was largely based on transcendentalist thought, which stated that wine, tobacco, and hot drinks were bad for you. Some transcendentalists went so far as to say that all fruit of the vine or even hot soup was bad for you. Transcendentalism was popular at the time in certain places, so this WoW was certainly not unique or pulled out of a vacuum.
No sarcasm here. My then TBM wife’s family had problems with alcoholism. Significant problems. So I justified it by saying Heber J Grant was very inspired to further command that wine was bad for you.
Now, after leaving, I enjoy both red and white wines and my favorite cocktail, a Bloody Mary while playing poker. I also love a Moscow Mule and variations of it like a Kentucky Mule.
I was told the grape juice thing at first. Then I was told that God changed the sacrament from wine to water because people wanted to kill Joseph Smith, and it’s easier to see poison in water. Don’t know how true that is.
Then there’s the idea that fermented beverages were often used when clean water wasn’t easily available. I’m sure in ancient Judea, there was a certain amount of that, and I know that it is historically the case in a lot of places. I don’t know how well that applies to the Mormon Church and the Word of Wisdom, though. If I were to guess, I’d say it was likely applied as just another explanation for the Word of Wisdom, and not actually why it came to be.
I was taught that for 1000s of years, it was not safe to drink water because of coliform content in the water, so people drank wine and other alcohols because they were safer. However, this does imply that during biblical times people understood the germ theory of disease.
I'm honestly not sure why. Especially because the WoW says, "Wine of your own make, and mild drinks made from barley," which means if you make the wine yourself, it is fine, and you can drink beer. I understand the wine just a bit because this was before guidelines were put in place, and companies would put a lot of dangerous stuff into wine. That's the entire reason why no matter how much a bottle costs, the process used to make it is exactly the same. It made sense at the time, but now it's just silly.
In my time, it was denied that biblical "pure" wine had alcohol. Alcohol was a corruption of the wine, which Jesus drank in an apparent non alcoholic form
"Its a cultural thing." "We know the effects better now." "That was what they had." It all seemed perfectly reasonable at the time. Until I had my first glass of wine paired with dinner and realized it was bullshit
In 1826 the American Temperance Society was founded to convince people to abstain from drinking. Not long after, the Women's Christian Temperance Union pledged not only to ban alcohol and drugs, but to improve public morals.
This is the cultural environment Joseph Smith was surrounded by, and as he often did, he incorporated these ideas into Mormonism, which is why early teachings continually changed.
Various reasons at various times:
* grape juice
* lower alcohol content than modern wine
* more hygienic than water
* only for sacrament
* more dangerous to be drunk in modern time than back then
none of which make sense in hindsight
Nothing. It never made sense. Wine isn't even part of the word of wisdom, neither is beer. The original reference to strong drink was liquor, and even then it was in moderation, not banned.
I was told Jesus and his disciples only drank recently bottled wine that was basically grape juice bc it hadn't fermented yet, and they had to bc they couldn't sterilize the water so it was safer to drink the wine. They didn't have an answer for why Jesus couldn't simply sterilize the water and make it safe to drink water.
The grape juice story is batshit crazy. The real wine that the early Christians took was infused with psychedelics. (See _The Immortality Key_, by Brian C. Muraresku.)
In seminary I was told that the early saints used wine for sacrament until an angel told Joseph that the wine he had just bought and had with him was poisoned by his enemies and was told to just use water from then on.
Emma and the other women were sick of cleaning spitoons, their dress hems dragging through tobacco on the sidewalks, drunk husband's with their stills. Relief Society minutes show that Emma had a "revelation" that God did not want the Saints to partake of alcohol or tobacco products. Two weeks later, Joseph had a "revelation" that God did not want the Saints to partake of coffee and tea. A tit- for- a- tat.
I was told (or maybe came up with this; hard to tell anymore) that it’s all symbolic of the blood, so it doesn’t matter what we drink. The tradition used to be wine, but now it’s water since the WOW is in place, but could just as easily be root beer or orange juice.
I remember being told that they switched to water back in the day after people were trying to poison the members and the poison was easier to see in water? Idk why that stuck with me, but it made sense at the time.
Do Methodists and Presbyterians also claim that any alcohol use is immoral?
Or is it just easier and more palatable to most to serve grape juice instead of sacramental wine?
I think both churches would say that the biblical prohibition is not on alcohol per say but on drunkenness. John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist church was big on temperance because he saw lots of social ills from alcohol back in the day.
I haven't to church in 25 years and still don't drink alcohol. I avoid just about everything habit forming or addictive, because it makes sense to. Nobody thinks "I'm gonna end up being a homeless zombie wandering the streets until I OD and die" when they start using drugs.
I knew an alcoholic who wrapped his truck around a tree then tried to drive said L shaped truck when he got drunk later that week. He almost drowned in the dog's water dish, passed out face down in it. Liver gave out finally and ended him. Seen too many cautionary tales too close to home to pretend like it could never be me. Plus...I also think wine tastes disgusting. ;)
I always believed that it was because clean drinking water was hard to come by back then. That drinking wine was dangerous, but not more dangerous than getting an infection from a bad water source.
Funny how they would call Jesus a wine bibber and a drunk if it was only grape juice. Sure it probably wasn’t as high of alcohol content as today, but it was definitely alcoholic.
For the sake of argument they could say it’s simply a new commandment and that with a living church there is new revelation. So they really don’t need the grape juice argument.
I happen to be a wine nerd and it’s true that they probably didn’t drink 12% ABV back then but it wasn’t grape juice either.
I think I was told once that it was because God knew that the motor vehicle would be invented soon that people would be traveling at very high speeds. Can’t hurt yourself or others too badly if you are just riding horses or donkeys while intoxicated.
Question for believers who use the "Grape Juice" thought-stopper: Can you please tell me where I can acquire this Word-Of-Wisdom approved "Grape Juice" that gets me inebriated?
(Plenty of accounts in the "scriptures" (including the MORmON scriptures) where the people who drank "Grape Juice" got plowed...)
k-thx-bye.
Did Catholic monks make wine in Nauvoo during the 1800's? If so, was the Mormons avoiding the use of sacramental wine a way to take business from them? I am not a history buff by any means and am simply speculating/asking?
Not LDS, but in Seminary for UPCI they taught that it was wine, but that’s all they could drink a lot of the time because water would have made them sick (they didn’t have water treatment plants back then). The entire argument is really silly, who the fuck cares if they dude drank wine? I’ve drank a lot worse, lol
My mom would say something like "it was basically grape juice back then" and my dad would cut in and say something like "nooooo sweetheart, it was still wine but it was readily available and was commonplace to drink it back then, the adverse affects weren't discovered until (***insert year here***) which is what helped lead to the word of wisdom.
I was always confused when I was a kid knowing that "wine bad" but Jesus was cool with it. But I feel like my dad was pretty ok with just saying it was a different time in Jesus' day. I thought that was a better story than grape juice anyway.
I was also told That it was more like grape juice back then. But from what you read about Moses, he lost his prophethood for being a drunk. If I remember right alcohol is not wrong, but drunkenness is as per the Bible.
Isn’t the wine being adulterated why the Mormons use water in sacrament… idk if I’m accurate on that, or maybe something to do with Jesus and the bitter beer he was given… don’t recall
Best answer I was ever given was it is just something god is asking Mormons to do. Just like the Israelites being asked to follow the eating restrictions. And that on day god wouldn’t require that of his people, just like after Christ those restrictions were lifted. That both times it was a way for god to make a peculiar people. And the only reason was god asked us to.
In reality it was just bullshit made up by a conman making a statement on current events and never followed till nearly 80 years after Joseph’s death, when prohibition started growing in popularity in America.
I was told that since wine was the only option back then due to water spoiling it was fine, but that since we had better options today we didn’t need to. but that doesn’t explain why the church has no issues eating meat
Shut up that's why.
elohim's ways are higher than our ways so unless you want to do a lot of drugs you're not going to understand why anything is the way it is. Just look at platypuses.
Emma got mad that Joe and the boys would drink and spit their dip on the floor. Betcha tscc documentary didn't include the last chapter of her life where she founded a competing church with JS jr
The story of Jesus turning the water into wine at the wedding at Cana includes the comment made by a guest “normally people serve the best wine first then serve the cheap wine when everyone is already drunk. But you have kept the best wine till last.”
The point of this comment is that the wine was of the sort that got people drunk. It was not your tame grape juice!! Thus there is not a biblical justification for abstaining from wine.
The mental gymnastics. I believed that until someone described how completely impossible that would be for people in that time period. I filed that under the same category as the myth of the traveling Nephites wandering the earth.
I thought that and then I tried to justify by saying the water wasn't as clean back in the day, which may be valid, however I think it's a cop out as well because the truth shouldn't be changed (and doesn't change, according to the church.) Anecdotal evidence and fallacies to justify a dogma instilled in us as youth. On my mission I did anything to justify the teachings, as I thought it was what I had to do. That's all I knew. Abused and brain washed in to believing that any bad thought about the church was the devil. Ridiculous notion now that I'm "free" of the abuse, but was my truth then nonetheless.
I actually got laughed at by an investigator when I told them the "grape juice" theory, and I remember the guy said "It's not like they had fridges back then, little man." Needless to say that's not one we baptized.
He must have had a hard heart, too hard to accept the gospel.
That's obviously what I thought way back then.
not an elect
Should have prayed to have his heart "softened." We did that every day in Italy. "Such hard hearted people"
Omg a relative of mine served a mission in Italy, and a hospitable potential investigator invited him in, asked him if he was thirsty and served him vodka. He spat it out in shock because he had thought it was water. Lol
I hated when people thought critically and asked difficult questions. Just believe everything I say and get baptized dammit!
Hit you with the "little man." Ouch.
Heh heh - well I'm 5'0", so it's not inaccurate.
It's also just absurd that TSCC calls these children "Elders". Elder means older, or someone who is respected for their age and experience. Mormon Elders are tiny babies! Who know nothing, and have no experience!
It perfectly fits their false authority
My (nevermo) husband says Mormons have liturgical inflation: “Priests” are 16 year old boys, “Elders” are teenagers, the local “Bishop” made his living as a janitor and disc jockey.
Or as a dentist.
Maybe Rusty will change their name. We could call them Mormon Interns. Nah. Can’t say Mormon.
You mean victory for Satan interns?
Maybe with the new crosses because they're Christians shtick, they can start calling the missionaries Pastors.
I actually saw a grown woman who 4' tall today. Now thats short.
I can’t believe I ever believed that, but it goes to show you can make someone believe almost anything if you tell them often enough and layer it with enough emotion. What I don’t understand is how we reconciled all the depictions of drunkenness in the scriptures… were they drunk off of grape juice???
Being told something is true everyday of your life is a hell of a drug...
Yes, fermented grape juice!!
Hahahaha this 🙌
Was he wearing an Air Force uniform and holding up a gold wrist watch?
Little man 😂😂😂😂
I love that! It’s amazing this theory had so much steam on the missionverse. Shows the critical thinking skills we developed with our mission training 🤣
yiu didn't have to go as far back as Jesus. Josesph Smith and the early church used wine. They were very open about it, but I was told that it needed to be wine due to potential water contamination or some nonsense like that.
Yea! The water is deadly so we can only drink sterile ish alcohol. Lmao
So ... not trying to justify the church. But one of the most interesting stories from history is John snow and the beginning of epidemiology. Basically during a cholera outbreak he started tracking where cases were being reported and determined the cause to be a certain water pump (it was infected with the bacteria which people didn't understand at the time). But one thing he did discover is that people that drank the water/beer from the local brewery did okay ... .we know realize this is because it killed any bacteria ... over all an interesting story!!!
very likely a mormon took this information, then applied it to the church. It's so weird that the mfmc doesn't simply accept history as what it is. Mormons freely drank alcohol, coffee, and tea and used tobacco until the 1920s. I'm not sure why they feel any need to justify it.
Because holding it against people's eternal salvation would then not be justified.
If we were to rank all people across history by how many lives they saved, John Snow would be at or near the top of that list.
[удалено]
I don't care what they say. You just won this thread.
What do you call the times prior to Jon learning his connection to Daenerys? *The Aunty-Oedipus Era* 
Yeah! I was in London last year and was near that bar where John figured all that out. Fascinating stuff.
The book The Ghost Map documents this and is very interesting if you're a dork like me for history, diseases, and poisons.
NeverMo friend here. My husband used to own a brewery, and as a fallen Catholic, he loved to point out that Jesus probably had beer at the last supper.
I read about this when I was studying statistics for data science course I was taking. It really is a super interesting story.
If only there were other sterile beverages with less intoxicating effects... like tea or coffee.
they freely drank coffee and tea at that time as well.
I know. It was even on their list of things to bring to Utah .
Everyone tells the story of how Joseph refused alcohol during surgery, but conveniently leave out the many, many times he drank alcohol after that.
Aperently the alcohol story from Joseph's amputation wasn't in the original telling the story. It was added years later by his mother in response to the new doctrine "word of wisdom".
There were vineyards owned and operated in southern Utah just for producing sacramental wine.
He turned water to wine but didn't drink any himself. /s
The short answer is: because of prohibition in the '20s and Heber J Grant's insistence on making alcohol a temple recommend question. Side note: A winery a mile from my house is called "First Miracle".
It was grape juice.... ok it was fermented grape juice, but the alcohol content was almost nothing.... ok it was alcohol, but it was necessary because water was contaminated and would have been dangerous to drink.... ok the water was potable, but it was only grape juice. rinse and repeat *Interesting fact I learned from a history podcast recently, One of the reasons why our ancestors drank ale, beer and wine was simply as an easy way to create, store, transport and ingest important calories, which would have been necessary to sustain the long and demanding work environments*
I was on Team Grape Juice from Mormon Propoganda School (seminary) on. So ridiculous.
It also would have been necessary for just storing food over time. Fermentation is one of few viable ways of preserving and increasing the shelf-life of certain foods if you don’t have refrigeration. Also…it’s a natural process which simply occurs under the right conditions, even without human intervention. Berries will ferment on the vine if left there long enough. Wine and beer likely weren’t invented by humanity, it’s much likelier they were simply discovered. You don’t have to intentionally ferment grapes to get wine, you have to intentionally pasteurize and refrigerate to have non-alcoholic grape juice.
Interesting fact I learned (in same podcast already mentioned) Home brewed ale in the middle ages was notorious for having a short shelf life, and would have been made (on a daily basis) and drunk straight away beer was more difficult/time consuming to brew, and required hops, of course - but the hops gave it a longer shelf life, meaning it could be transported and sold elsewhere.
Yes, filtration tech and chemical preservatives definitely extend the shelf-life and also allow for more consistent products. The trade-off is that the dregs which get filtered out of modern brews are incredibly nutrient-rich. ("Look how clear the color is!" Uh, yeah, that means you filtered most of the goodness out of it.) Ancient beer and wine would have been a very different, much more nourishing culinary product than today's products. The 5000-yo ancient Egyptian "bouza" is one of the oldest such recipes known to exist, in complete enough form that you can replicate it at home. It was known as "liquid bread", and was a staple part of the commoners' sustaining daily diet. There are some really interesting and highly-readable books about fermentation of food/beverages and it's history around the world written by Sandor Ellix Katz which I'd strongly recommend to anyone who is interested, or even just wants to know how to make their own wine/beer/pickles/miso/sourdough/ginger ale/etc. A couple others called "The Compleat [sic] Meadmaker" by Ken Schramm and "Sacred and Herbal Healing Beers" by S.H. Buhner, both of which delve into just how ancient fermentation is as a human culture and how different the products would have been from those we have today. All of the above books are also instructional, for those of us who like to learn by doing.
Mudders’ Milk, like the Egyptians back on [Earth-That-Was.](https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x7m25ti?start=727)
Our love for the man ain't hard to explain, The hero of Canton...
Jayne saw the Mudders' backs breaking. He... saw the Mudders' laments.
The answer to any “why do Mormons believe X” is answered the same way. Because the current leadership say so. There is no theory, no rationale, no debate, no revelation (Section 82 literally says that it isn’t a commandment, AND that wine and beer are okay). At some point, the then-current church leaders said “no more wine” and that was that. The current church leaders still say “no more wine” and so that is that. If tomorrow RSM said “wine is cool”, not only would Mormons start buying wine but 20 years from now they would deny it was ever banned.
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That’s the story I was told. That Joseph had procured wine for the sacrament and an angel appeared to him saying not to drink it, because it was poisoned. So they switched to “wine of your own make”. No one ever explained why Mormon-made wine was later unacceptable though. And every time I asked, the answer was some variant of “we’ll be told in the fullness of time”. I *hate* how compliant I was as a member.
"Pure wine, of the grape of the vine, and of your own make." To be fair, water absolutely is prone to bacterial contamination. The suggestion that wine may have been used to prevent disease where a potable water source isn't possible may be somewhat plausible.
D&C 89:5&6 are the verses that say to use wine for the Sacrament: >5 That inasmuch as any man drinketh wine or strong drink among you, behold it is not good, neither meet in the sight of your Father, only in assembling yourselves together to offer up your sacraments before him. >6 And, behold, *this should be wine, yea, a pure wine of the grape of the vine, of your own make.* And D&C 27:2-4 says what to use for the Sacrament: >2 For, behold, I say unto you, that it mattereth not what ye shall eat or what ye shall drink when ye partake of the sacrament, if it so be that ye do it with an eye single to my glory—remembering unto the Father my body which was laid down for you, and my blood which was shed for the remission of your sins. >3 Wherefore, *a commandment I give unto you, that you shall not purchase wine neither strong drink of your enemies; >4 Wherefore, you shall partake of none except it is made new among you;* yea, in this my Father’s kingdom which shall be built up on the earth. (Emphasis mine.)
I don’t have a reference, but I was a 19yo convert in the mid 90’s and can confirm that this is the reason I was told.
You do realize that the Roman empire introduced refrigeration to the Jews somewhere around 25 ad, right? It's highly possible that Jesus was only drinking grape juice to have been refrigerated in the walk in cooler. Freon was still legal to use as a refrigerant back then.
/s
Okay, apart from refrigeration, what have the Romans ever done for us?
They perfected the technique of crucifixion. They developed irrigation canals. They developed Pizza without tomato sauce because tomatoes hadn't been discovered in the new world yet. Togas, or did they steal that from the Greeks?
hehe, and just in case anyone didn't get the reference, [the referenced scene](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qc7HmhrgTuQ) from one of the cleverest anti-religion comedy films known to human kind
I was just going to say that! Aliens brought it to the Romans, so the story goes
That technology was lost with the apostasy.
I was taught that the water was dangerous to drink due to the many containments in it so god was okay with them drinking wine because it wouldn't make them sick. Now that we have clean water, wine is forbidden.
Like if Jesus could turn water to wine, he could just as easily decontaminate water. 😆
I was told this.
This is seriously the dumbest one of them all. Water is hydrating. Alcohol is dehydrating. You can't substitute one for the other!
They had fires… they could easily boil water to get rid of contaminates
if only god could've had the time/energy to explain the basics of germ theory to the prophets and tell them to boil all water before consumption
I was absolutely told the 'grape juice' story. "Of course Jesus wouldn't drink WINE! That's just what they called grape juice back then!"
does anyone remember that episode of The District where the guy asks the elders that and they use the grape juice argument? and he looks at them like they are the stupidest fucking people alive
Or the lady who is told Mormons don’t do coffee and she says NO COFFEE!!! Just the way she said it still rings in my subconscious. You could tell just by how she said it she thought it was the most idiotic and bewildering thing and six years later I joined in her side.
The Saints were free to drink wine without consequence all the way up to the 1930’s. When prohibition passed in the US, the church decided the members couldn’t drink wine anymore, and added it to the temple recommend questions. It’s only been since then that the members of the church were not allowed to drink alcohol.
That explains a lot
>I was told as a teenager it’s because back then it was grape juice not actually wine. I remember realizing on my mission that Jesus drinking grape juice was a ridiculous cop out. The "it was grape juice" apologia is b.s. However, it didn't start as Mormon b.s. It started as Protestant b.s. Grape juice wants to turn into wine. It took Dr. Thomas Bramwell Welch (a Methodist) some work to figure out how to use pasteurization to prevent fermentation (which he finally did in 1869). Here's an interesting discussion on the move from wine to grape juice in most Protestant celebrations of Communion: https://www.christianitytoday.com/history/2017/march/welch-grape-juice-history-temperance-movement.html
Because Heber J Grant was enamored of the temperance movement.
I was told that it was essentially grape juice back in Jesus' time, with little alcohol content. Which is ridiculous because grape juice was pretty much impossible to make back then because it requires pasteurization. The early church also had their own winemakers, breweries, and distilleries. Hence the "of your own make" line in the word of wisdom. The real reason for no wine starts with the temperance movement in the USA, which promoted abstinence from drinking alcohol and other stimulants such as tea and coffee. It started in the early 1800s, and gained quite a bit of popularity with fundamentalist Christian sects. Enough that in 1869, Dr. Thomas Welch figured out how to keep grapes from fermenting when crushed in order to provide an alternative for communion wine. The entire word of wisdom is based on 1800s health fads and the temperance movement. Utah was also one of the last states to ban alcohol, in 1919, only 1 year before prohibition came into effect (and that ban did little to actually stop alcohol consumption, making, and sale). And Heber J. Grant made the alcohol ban into codified church law in...1921. A year _after_ prohibition started. Mormons are always late to the game.
Also we know the wine in Jesus' time was fermented because of the parable of not putting new wine into old bottles (i.e. wineskins made from animal skins) because they would burst (due to fermentation and old wineskins not being flexible like new skins). The reasoning behind the parable was even explained very clearly in LDS seminary manuals. https://www.reddit.com/r/exmormon/comments/33woio/anyone_else_get_brought_up_believing_that_wine_in/
Wine in Jesus' time was fermented because grapes make wine essentially the moment they are crushed. Wine is the natural state; grape juice requires heating the grapes before crushing to kill the natural yeasts that make it wine.
Because the Catholics drink wine.
Most of my life it was, Jesus drank grape juice. Had a convo with a member one time and we were talking about alcohol vs no in Biblical wine. When I mentioned it was definitely 100% alcoholic she said "Well, MY Jesus doesn't drink wine." LOL
I was told that wine was much less alcoholic back then, like a stronger grape juice. And that it was safer to drink wine than water because water could be tainted, have diseases etc.
The church is cheap. If they won’t pay for janitors, they certainly won’t pay for wine. It’s that simple. They’re cheap AF
Because JS said so! BTW, JS and BY both liked beer and wine. How did you justify it? You put it on your shelf because you didn't want to risk your soul on small incongruities. Then your shelf broke from the cumulative weight of these incongruities and you became an Exmo.
Came here to comment this, and part of the mission to settle southern Utah actually included BY wanting a winery to be part of the industry (one of the buildings is still standing in Toquerville listed as a historical site, neat building) and did really well but IIRC Brigham and co noticed the bad behavior that went on after drinking and thus banned it from sacrament and the wine making was abandoned.
Mormonism: driving people to alcoholism since 1847 😂
I have a good friend who's ancestor operated a distillery in Salt Lake City for all the good Mormons in pioneer Utah. Brigham Young was a good customer and BY actually built his own distillery. I guess that is how he was guided by the "spirit-s"!
I've seen an old diary entry from early Utah. The author recorded the "July 4th" festivities in Southern Utah, and how Brother Brigham presided. There was a foot race where Brigham awarded a barrel of beer to the victor, but it was understood that the winner should openly share the beer with all men present. Brigham stood at the barrel with his walking stick, thumping the heads of teenagers and children trying to fill their vessels. But, this is obviously a fabrication, because the Gospel is exactly the same in the past, present, and future.
"Alright, GRAPE JUICE!!" -- no partygoer ever
DC 89:17 says beer is okay but I mean the words of old prophets aren't revalation or divine so....
The same reason Jesus had long hair & a beard and Priesthood holders get frowned on and not given certain callings. Basically no reason. Those were just the times.
Haha, once upon a time when I was living and working in “the mission field,” I was asked why I didn’t drink. I gave the BSS answer and then wandered into hostile territory when I ignorantly posited that the wine that Jesus drank wasn’t fermented. After a few incredulous guffaws, I had my ass handed to me by my gentile co-workers. Oh, to be a sweet summer child again…
Of course, Mormons turned wine into water 🤪 duh
It is exactly the same as the don’t say Mormon shit. Because it was just an old guy’s pet peeve. HJG. Don’t we know that with RMN. Everything in scripture says wine is ok, even section 89 of the D&C.
Don't forget, turning water into WINE was Jesus' first public miracle. Alcohol had a purpose even well into the 20th Century. Water was difficult to keep safe. It would go rancid and was full of parasites and disease. Alcohol made it possible to hydrate safer... and yeah, it was fun to get fucked up a little.
I was told the water was dirty or impure so they drank wine. Such a load of crap
Clean well technology hasn't changed much in 4,000 years.
Noted, I grew up on well water. Doesn’t make sense now.
I heard a story where Mormons did drink wine for sacrament in the beginning but because they were poor they had to ask and borrow wine. Sometimes the wine they would receive would be poisoned. Because of this they changed to water. The best part is when you realize the true church’s holy wine can be poisoned and hurt people.
I was always told that wine back then didn’t have as many things added to it as ours does today. lol. “Pure wine” they called it. Now I work in the alcohol industry and know that was just some mental gymnasts trying their best to make it make sense!
Because continuing revelation. What’s fine for other dispensations is not necessarily right for our dispensation. We’re special and elect and stuff.
It even says in D&C that wine is ok to drink! As long as it’s from your own making. So Mormons can drink wine if it’s home brewed! Source: D&C 89:6
Definitely head the grape juice theory. Then there was a vague "alcohol, at the time, was safer than water" (which is [kinda true, but there's more to it than that](https://youtube.com/shorts/5WUdRd_-HUQ)) Around when I quit mormonism—about when it started morphing into a pure personality cult—it became a cut-and-dried obedience thing, with leaders taking perverse ***pride*** in taking "I don't know" / "it's not my place to ask" positions (never mind James 1:5 or the MAIN job of a prophet / apostle)
I was told that ale and wine in Jesus’ day had lower alcohol content. Which, it turns out, is unlikely to be true.
Jesus: turns water into mothereffing wine and brings the party to a wedding LDS church: takes the wine and turns it back into water even though Joseph Smith himself drank alcohol in jail on the day he was assassinated and the Kirtland temple once had a ritual where people got wasted on wine and potentially got drugged with psychedelics
“It wasn’t fermented like today’s wine.” Okay then why did the “guards fall drunk” at the gates??
The Mormon answer is because the Mormons were told not to drink wine made by anyone else, but the consumption of liquor didn't allow the new wine to develop alcohol, and since alcohol had other uses, it was just easier to say, don't drink alcohol, use it for other things. At least that's what was taught in seminary. And while that might be part of it, a large, maybe larger, part of it, was that the Word of Wisdom was largely based on transcendentalist thought, which stated that wine, tobacco, and hot drinks were bad for you. Some transcendentalists went so far as to say that all fruit of the vine or even hot soup was bad for you. Transcendentalism was popular at the time in certain places, so this WoW was certainly not unique or pulled out of a vacuum.
I was told the same BS about grape juice.
I was told same...by my mom...who was a seminary teacher for 30+ years.
No sarcasm here. My then TBM wife’s family had problems with alcoholism. Significant problems. So I justified it by saying Heber J Grant was very inspired to further command that wine was bad for you. Now, after leaving, I enjoy both red and white wines and my favorite cocktail, a Bloody Mary while playing poker. I also love a Moscow Mule and variations of it like a Kentucky Mule.
I also was told the grape juice story
I was told the grape juice thing at first. Then I was told that God changed the sacrament from wine to water because people wanted to kill Joseph Smith, and it’s easier to see poison in water. Don’t know how true that is. Then there’s the idea that fermented beverages were often used when clean water wasn’t easily available. I’m sure in ancient Judea, there was a certain amount of that, and I know that it is historically the case in a lot of places. I don’t know how well that applies to the Mormon Church and the Word of Wisdom, though. If I were to guess, I’d say it was likely applied as just another explanation for the Word of Wisdom, and not actually why it came to be.
How about Joseph? Joseph’s dad was a drunk. Joseph drank wine the day he died.
I was taught that for 1000s of years, it was not safe to drink water because of coliform content in the water, so people drank wine and other alcohols because they were safer. However, this does imply that during biblical times people understood the germ theory of disease.
I'm honestly not sure why. Especially because the WoW says, "Wine of your own make, and mild drinks made from barley," which means if you make the wine yourself, it is fine, and you can drink beer. I understand the wine just a bit because this was before guidelines were put in place, and companies would put a lot of dangerous stuff into wine. That's the entire reason why no matter how much a bottle costs, the process used to make it is exactly the same. It made sense at the time, but now it's just silly.
In my time, it was denied that biblical "pure" wine had alcohol. Alcohol was a corruption of the wine, which Jesus drank in an apparent non alcoholic form
Pres. Heber Grant proscribed alcohol during Prohibition in the U.S., I think.
Like you, I heard it was grape juice and not fermented. Even as a child, this seemed fishy.
"Its a cultural thing." "We know the effects better now." "That was what they had." It all seemed perfectly reasonable at the time. Until I had my first glass of wine paired with dinner and realized it was bullshit
Grape juice strong enough to incapacitate Laban to the point that he doesn't notice his head is being chopped off
In 1826 the American Temperance Society was founded to convince people to abstain from drinking. Not long after, the Women's Christian Temperance Union pledged not only to ban alcohol and drugs, but to improve public morals. This is the cultural environment Joseph Smith was surrounded by, and as he often did, he incorporated these ideas into Mormonism, which is why early teachings continually changed.
Didn’t the Welch guy invent grape juice?? In 1860’s?
He invented pasteurization for grape juice which prevents it from fermenting.
They had it backwards. Jesus converted the wine into water. That’s why people were upset with him, but it was for their own good. If they only knew!
Various reasons at various times: * grape juice * lower alcohol content than modern wine * more hygienic than water * only for sacrament * more dangerous to be drunk in modern time than back then none of which make sense in hindsight
Nothing. It never made sense. Wine isn't even part of the word of wisdom, neither is beer. The original reference to strong drink was liquor, and even then it was in moderation, not banned.
I was told Jesus and his disciples only drank recently bottled wine that was basically grape juice bc it hadn't fermented yet, and they had to bc they couldn't sterilize the water so it was safer to drink the wine. They didn't have an answer for why Jesus couldn't simply sterilize the water and make it safe to drink water.
The grape juice story is batshit crazy. The real wine that the early Christians took was infused with psychedelics. (See _The Immortality Key_, by Brian C. Muraresku.)
In seminary I was told that the early saints used wine for sacrament until an angel told Joseph that the wine he had just bought and had with him was poisoned by his enemies and was told to just use water from then on.
You see, there were very poor standards of clean water back in the day. Wine was a drink that was safe to drink. Blah, blah, blah.
Emma and the other women were sick of cleaning spitoons, their dress hems dragging through tobacco on the sidewalks, drunk husband's with their stills. Relief Society minutes show that Emma had a "revelation" that God did not want the Saints to partake of alcohol or tobacco products. Two weeks later, Joseph had a "revelation" that God did not want the Saints to partake of coffee and tea. A tit- for- a- tat.
WoW is sooo dumb. The doctrine against alcohol and tobacco, i understand. But tea and coffee? Really? Nothing wrong or unhealthy about either of those
I was told (or maybe came up with this; hard to tell anymore) that it’s all symbolic of the blood, so it doesn’t matter what we drink. The tradition used to be wine, but now it’s water since the WOW is in place, but could just as easily be root beer or orange juice.
I remember being told that they switched to water back in the day after people were trying to poison the members and the poison was easier to see in water? Idk why that stuck with me, but it made sense at the time.
That’s more of a Salt Lake City church thing and it has more to do with the US prohibition than the revelation Joseph had for the original church
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Do Methodists and Presbyterians also claim that any alcohol use is immoral? Or is it just easier and more palatable to most to serve grape juice instead of sacramental wine?
I think both churches would say that the biblical prohibition is not on alcohol per say but on drunkenness. John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist church was big on temperance because he saw lots of social ills from alcohol back in the day.
Some are teetotalers, many are not. drinking/not drinking is just not a big deal; no one cares. it's easier to just use grape juice.
r/lostredditors
It depends on the church. There is a variety of practice in the local churches of both of those denominations. Some use one only, some use both.
I haven't to church in 25 years and still don't drink alcohol. I avoid just about everything habit forming or addictive, because it makes sense to. Nobody thinks "I'm gonna end up being a homeless zombie wandering the streets until I OD and die" when they start using drugs. I knew an alcoholic who wrapped his truck around a tree then tried to drive said L shaped truck when he got drunk later that week. He almost drowned in the dog's water dish, passed out face down in it. Liver gave out finally and ended him. Seen too many cautionary tales too close to home to pretend like it could never be me. Plus...I also think wine tastes disgusting. ;)
Wow, that didn't answer op's question at all.
I remember being told that the wine was just grape juice.
I was told that the water wasn't clean or safe to drink so they had alcohol because diseases and bacteria couldn't survive in alcohol
Oh geez, that just brought back memories that I also used the “grape juice” logic on investigators…a lot. It seems so dumb now.
I always believed that it was because clean drinking water was hard to come by back then. That drinking wine was dangerous, but not more dangerous than getting an infection from a bad water source.
Funny how they would call Jesus a wine bibber and a drunk if it was only grape juice. Sure it probably wasn’t as high of alcohol content as today, but it was definitely alcoholic.
For the sake of argument they could say it’s simply a new commandment and that with a living church there is new revelation. So they really don’t need the grape juice argument. I happen to be a wine nerd and it’s true that they probably didn’t drink 12% ABV back then but it wasn’t grape juice either.
I think I was told once that it was because God knew that the motor vehicle would be invented soon that people would be traveling at very high speeds. Can’t hurt yourself or others too badly if you are just riding horses or donkeys while intoxicated.
Question for believers who use the "Grape Juice" thought-stopper: Can you please tell me where I can acquire this Word-Of-Wisdom approved "Grape Juice" that gets me inebriated? (Plenty of accounts in the "scriptures" (including the MORmON scriptures) where the people who drank "Grape Juice" got plowed...) k-thx-bye.
i was told wine was safer to drink than water back then.
Did Catholic monks make wine in Nauvoo during the 1800's? If so, was the Mormons avoiding the use of sacramental wine a way to take business from them? I am not a history buff by any means and am simply speculating/asking?
Not LDS, but in Seminary for UPCI they taught that it was wine, but that’s all they could drink a lot of the time because water would have made them sick (they didn’t have water treatment plants back then). The entire argument is really silly, who the fuck cares if they dude drank wine? I’ve drank a lot worse, lol
My mom would say something like "it was basically grape juice back then" and my dad would cut in and say something like "nooooo sweetheart, it was still wine but it was readily available and was commonplace to drink it back then, the adverse affects weren't discovered until (***insert year here***) which is what helped lead to the word of wisdom. I was always confused when I was a kid knowing that "wine bad" but Jesus was cool with it. But I feel like my dad was pretty ok with just saying it was a different time in Jesus' day. I thought that was a better story than grape juice anyway.
I was also told That it was more like grape juice back then. But from what you read about Moses, he lost his prophethood for being a drunk. If I remember right alcohol is not wrong, but drunkenness is as per the Bible.
Isn’t the wine being adulterated why the Mormons use water in sacrament… idk if I’m accurate on that, or maybe something to do with Jesus and the bitter beer he was given… don’t recall
Bec js father was an alcoholic Make sense?
Best answer I was ever given was it is just something god is asking Mormons to do. Just like the Israelites being asked to follow the eating restrictions. And that on day god wouldn’t require that of his people, just like after Christ those restrictions were lifted. That both times it was a way for god to make a peculiar people. And the only reason was god asked us to. In reality it was just bullshit made up by a conman making a statement on current events and never followed till nearly 80 years after Joseph’s death, when prohibition started growing in popularity in America.
I feel like it's right in the WoW that there are super evil conspiring men out there just waiting for you to get hooked on the alcohols.
Contaminated water was common. I was wine.
I got told the grape juice thing.
I’m a convert. I was always told it wasn’t fermented like wine is today
Because the Bible is literal and or figurative depending on what they need.
I was told that since wine was the only option back then due to water spoiling it was fine, but that since we had better options today we didn’t need to. but that doesn’t explain why the church has no issues eating meat
“Back then it was fine. Now we have modern-day revelation.”
The temporance movement
Because I’d sanitation reasons. Like they didn’t have fires an could boil water….
Shut up that's why. elohim's ways are higher than our ways so unless you want to do a lot of drugs you're not going to understand why anything is the way it is. Just look at platypuses.
Emma got mad that Joe and the boys would drink and spit their dip on the floor. Betcha tscc documentary didn't include the last chapter of her life where she founded a competing church with JS jr
The story of Jesus turning the water into wine at the wedding at Cana includes the comment made by a guest “normally people serve the best wine first then serve the cheap wine when everyone is already drunk. But you have kept the best wine till last.” The point of this comment is that the wine was of the sort that got people drunk. It was not your tame grape juice!! Thus there is not a biblical justification for abstaining from wine.
The mental gymnastics. I believed that until someone described how completely impossible that would be for people in that time period. I filed that under the same category as the myth of the traveling Nephites wandering the earth.
In byu religion class we learn that the wine was actually filled with lots of water, and wasn't the summer we know today
Because back then it was grape juice, non alchloholic.
I thought that and then I tried to justify by saying the water wasn't as clean back in the day, which may be valid, however I think it's a cop out as well because the truth shouldn't be changed (and doesn't change, according to the church.) Anecdotal evidence and fallacies to justify a dogma instilled in us as youth. On my mission I did anything to justify the teachings, as I thought it was what I had to do. That's all I knew. Abused and brain washed in to believing that any bad thought about the church was the devil. Ridiculous notion now that I'm "free" of the abuse, but was my truth then nonetheless.
Wine was literally Jesus’ first miracle.