Page images
PDF
EPUB

66

tament, the term "wine occurs 44 times -21 times unassociated, ten times with new," twice with "good," three times with "oil," five times with "press," once with "fat" or "vat," twice in the compound word "wine-bibber," and once in 66 excess of wine." The Greek term for wine, with a single exception, in all cases used in the inspired New Testament, is oinos; this term covering, as do all its cognate terms in other languages, every variety of wine. It occurs uncompounded 33 times; eight times associated with neos, "new," and twice with kalos, rendered "good;" once associated with lenos, "press;" also three times in compounds, in oinopotes ("wine-bibber "), and once in oinophlugia ("excess of wine"). In the English version the term rendered "new wine" (Acts 2: 13) is gleukos, or a drink grape-syrup; the term lenon, rendered wine-press," has the Greek oinon only in Rev. 19: 15; and the term rendered "wine-vat" (Mark 12: 1) is hypolenion.

66

The fact that oinos covers every variety of wine is demonstrated: First, from usage in classic Greek; second, from the Greek translation used by Christ and his apostles, in which tirosh, which had no intoxicating element, is generally rendered by oinos; third, from Latin terms used in allusion to unfermented wines described by Roman writers from Cato (B. C. 200) to Pliny (A. D. 100); fourth, from the usage of Mark, who, writing for Romans familiar with their own unfermented wines, calls the beverage offered to Christ when nailed to the cross oinos (15:23), while Matthew uses the term oxos, still called in French vin-gar, sour wine; though in vinegar, the last natural and divinely-ordered product of grape-juice, the alcohol developed in the temporary process of fermentation is converted into acetic acid.

The application of these attested facts and principles to the divine precepts concerning wine used as a beverage, as a medicine and as a symbol in religious rites, may be concisely stated. (1) The error of Noah (Gen. 9: 20-27) and its influence on his three sons is universally traced by Hebrew and early Christian writers in Palestine and the East to the specially significant statement of Moses, in harmony with all his history from Eden to Egypt "Noah began to be a husbandman;" inexperience, guarded by no such

express command like that given to Adam the first head of the human race, being the natural and excusable cause of the fall of the second head of the human race. (2) The second stage in this history of Moses, "learned in all the wisdom of Egypt," has led to statements from ancient Hebrew and Christian equally well attested, that in the age when unfermented wine, known to Moses in Egypt, had received the specific name tirosh used by Isaac (Gen. 27: 28, 37) it was also the yayin brought forth by Melchizedek to Abraham (Gen. 15: 18); the same writers seeing in this a precursor of the Passover and Lord's Supper provision. (3) The fall of Lot through the temptation of his erring daughters, recognized as parallel to that of Eve (Gen. 19: 34, 35), is as universally attested to have been the point of contrast between two kinds of wine, since the "vine" is not affected on the hills of Sodom by other causes than in the neighboring valley of Eshcol (Deut. 32: 32, 33, 38), one kind being used by pure men like Melchizedek, and an opposite kind by the debauched in Sodom. (4) The life of Joseph in Egypt brings out the fact, before his day inscribed on the tombwalls of Egypt, with whose scenes in real life Moses was familiar when he wrote of the fresh grape-cluster pressed into Pharaoh's cup (Gen. 40: 11, 13). (5) It is significant that when the second Passover was observed at Mt. Sinai (Num. 9: 5) it was in accord with the prospective direction that it was to be annually observed only when they came into the Land of Promise (Ex. 12: 24-27; Lev. 23: 9-14); that at the second observance the people had still stores brought out of Egypt (Ex. 12:36; Lev. 7: 1–80; 9: 3), after which no Passover was or could be observed till they had entered into the land of wheat and of the vine (Josh. 5: 10, 11). (6) It is yet more significant that immediately preceding the observance of this second Passover, the law for the Nazarites, who never drank intoxicating wine, as did not the Egyptian priests with whom they had been associated for generations, is given; that law exempting them from the extreme vow of tasting nothing made from the grape, though in the days of Samson, of Samuel, of Elijah, of Jeremiah, of Daniel and of devout Jews after Christ's coming, abstinence from intoxicating wine was required. (Num. 6:3, 4,

13; Judg. 13: 4, 7, 14; 1 Sam. 1: 11, 15; Jer. 35: 1, 19; Dan. 1:8; 10:3; Luke 1: 15; Acts 21: 24-26.) (7) It is yet more to be carefully and conscientiously noted, that it was directly after this law for the Nazarites, and when these gifts from reserved stores for the second Passover were exhausted, that the spies entered Canaan and brought from Eshcol the clustered grapes; on which palpable occasion the special law as to the quality of wine offerings, now indicated as possible when they should come into that land of the vine, was written; soon after which the general statute as to quantity was, in the same connection, added by Moses (Num. 13: 23, 24; 18: 12; 28: 14). That law as to the quality of wine-offering to be brought, for the priests' use as well as for the public festivals, requires that it be cheleb tirosh; the English, like other versions, making the word chele's an adjective, as does Fuerst in his Lexicon; cheleb in modern Arabic meaning "fresh" as applied to milk,

etc.

A clear light is thus, by this meaning of yayin, cast on the writings of David, Solomon and the prophets, who condemned always the use of intoxicating wine and commended the simple "cup of the country laborers, which was the fresh grape-juice now pressed into the "overrunning cup" in Southern France, Spain, and Italy, and also brought now fresh and unfermented from Mediterranean ports to New York. The reader has only to contrast the statements of the same writers to see this truth demonstrated, comparing Psalm 75: 8 with 23:5 and 104: 15; again Prov. 20: 1 and 23: 29, 31 with Cant. 5: 1 and 7: 9; again, Dan. 1: 5 with 10: 3; again, Neh. 2: 1 with 5: 18 and 13: 15; a contrast which the wayfaring man sees, and, if pure in heart, he heeds.

There is but one plain allusion in the Old Testament to wine used as a medicine (Prov. 31:6), and this is in perfect accord with the laws of the priests of Egypt and of India, with both of which Solomon had commerce; intoxicating wine being used only, as afterwards among the Greeks and Romans, to produce stupe faction and rest to the nerves in acute pain, as in strangury, and as an anæsthetic in surgical operations, when deadness to sensibility was necessary. In the New Testament it is inconceivable that

Jesus should, in example and precept, have been behind the law of Greeks and of Roman moralists in his use and teachings as to intoxicating wine; as it is inconceivable that he should have appointed for his Supper a wine that would have excluded from his church his chosen forerunner. The five incidents of Christ's life and teachings, which attest Christ's law as to wines, are among the clearest in the New Testament, being especially explained by Christian writers from the 2d to the 6th centuries. First, The wine which He made for the wedding (Jno. 2. 10) is by divine guidance ruling the writer John, as well as in the statement of the governor of the feast, which John heard, designated as kalon. The same word is distinctively applied by Christ to fruit (Matt. 7:16, 20); Jesus with manifest design using the term agathon, "permanently good," as applied to the tree, but the word kalon, "beautiful," for the fruit, which is good only when fresh and unaffected by decay. The inspired disciples of Jesus, therefore, manifestly recognized that as fruit-juice unexpressed, so fruit-juice expressed is good only when fresh. Second, The new wine" preserved in "new bottles (Matt. 9:17 and Mark 2:22), in which the term "new" is necessarily added to both wine and bottles for the contrast, is an attestation of the existence and use of oiled-skin bottles, as Origen states; which oiled skins preserved wine from ferment. Third, The charge that Jesus was a "wine-bibber" (Matt. 11: 19 and Luke 7:34) is united with three other charges, recognized as calumnies, namely, that he was "gluttonous," "avaricious" and

66

66

[ocr errors]

licentious;" calumnies revived by Marcion, the apostate, in the 2d century, and from that day in every age fully answered. Fourth, The provision for the communion of the Lord's Supper is never alluded to as "wine," but as the "cup," both of the Hebrew Passover and of Christian communion. It is significantly designated as the "fruit of the vine," figuratively and literally "new," to be drunk in Christ's coming kingdom; all of which statements are declared by early Christian writers as making it clear that the unfermented wine of the Passover is to be that of the communion (Matt. 26:27, 29; Mark 14:23, 25 and Luke 22:17, 18, 20); whose special significance,

as the early Christian writers note, is emphasized by Christ's allusion to himself as the "vine (John 15: 1), from which the pure" fruit of the vine," alike in the cup and its symbol, flows for man. Fifth, The refusal by Christ of a palliative at the commencement of his agony on the cross, and its reception only when he was expiring, to which is added the statement that this palliative called oinos, "wine," by Mark, was oxos, "vinegar," as stated by Matthew and John, who were eyewitnesses.

These cumulative and combined statements have in all ages led to the recognition of this double fact: (1) that the wine Christ drank in life was the pure fruit of the vine; and (2) that even the unintoxicating palliative was refused that his suffering might be perfect.

There are only two allusions to wine in the apostolic writings requiring notice. The first is Paul's allusion to the Corinthian feast made to precede the Lord's Supper (1 Cor. 11:21-26), in which the term wine is not used, while the Greek term methuo, in English rendered "drunken," is opposed to "hungry," referring to the food, not to the drink provided; and it means simply "gorged." The second noteworthy allusion is to medicinal wine (1 Tim. 5:23); which wine, as Greek medical writers from Hippocrates to Galen state, and as French medical writers now note, was made from fresh unfermented juice of the grape.

G. W. SAMSON.

Black, James, the first candidate of the Prohibition party for President of the United States. He was born in Lewisburg, Pa., Sept. 23, 1823. He lived upon a farm until 12 years of age, occasionally working as a canal-driver during the summer months. Removing with his parents to Lancaster, Pa., in 1836, he found employment in a sawmill and earned enough to engage a private teacher to give him instruction during the winter. Two years later he entered the Lancaster High School. In 1839, at the age of 16, he joined an engineer corps at work upon the Susquehanna and Tide-Water Canal, and his savings enabled him in 1841 to enter the Lewisburg Academy, which he attended for three years. In 1844 he began the study of the law, and in 1846 was admitted to practice at the bar in Lancaster, where he has

since resided. His success in his profession and in other pursuits has placed him in comfortable circumstances. When a lad of 16 years he was associated with drinking engineers. He was once intoxicated, but that experience was sufficient to make him a total abstainer for the remainder of his life, and a radical temperance worker. In 1840 he joined the Washingtonians, the first temperance organization in his neighborhood. In 1846 he helped to institute a division of the Sons of Temperance. Prominent in the "Maine law" Prohibitory movement of 1852 in Pennsylvania, Mr. Black was that year elected Chairman of the Lancaster County Prohibition Committee by a convention of men determined to carry the temperance question into politics and secure a State Prohibitory law like Maine's. A temperance legislative ticket having been nominated, Mr. Black, a few days later, made his first public Prohibition speech. It was largely due to Mr. Black's personal efforts that the Maine law movement became popular in Lancaster County and resulted, in 1855, in the election of two of the five temperance legislative candidates. Besides making speeches and writing for the cause, Mr. Black sometimes contributed as much as $500 yearly to it.

The Anti-Slavery agitation about this time, and the Civil War a little later, interrupted the temperance work and engaged the attention and interest of Mr. Black. He aided in organizing the Republican party in Pennsylvania, and was a delegate to the first National Conventon of that party in 1856. He was a Republican in politics until the formation at Chicago in September, 1869, of the National Prohibition party. He was chosen Permanent President of this body. At the new party's Columbus (0.) Convention, in February, 1872, Mr. Black was nominated as its candidate for President of the United States, and in the election that followed he received 5,608 votes. For the four years from 1876 to 1880 he was Chairman of the National Committee of the Prohibition party.

He

He has also been an active temperance worker outside strict party lines. was one of the founders of the National Temperance Society and Publication House. In a paper read in a National Convention held at Saratoga, in 1865, he

presented the plan of this society, and he afterwards prepared its charter, constitution, by-laws, rules of publication, etc., and was Chairman of the Committee appointed to secure a capital of $100,000 as a basis of operations. Having identified himself with the Good Templars in 1858, two years later Mr. Black was elected Grand Worthy Chief Templar of Pennsylvania, a position which he held for four successive years. In 1864 he prepared and presented to President Lincoln a memorial for the abolition of the whiskey rations in the United States army. Mr. Black's Cider Tract" caused the Good Templars to declare against the use of cider as a beverage. Prominent as a layman in the Methodist Episcopal Church, he was one of the 26 who in 1869 organized the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association, under whose auspices one of the most delightful seaside resorts of the country is conducted.

Mr. Black owns probably the largest collection of temperance literature contained in any private library in the world, about 1,200 volumes being included in it. Among the works published by him are a pamphlet entitled, "Is there a Necessity for a Prohibition Party?" (1875); "Brief History of Prohibition" (1880), and History of the Prohibition Party (1885).

[ocr errors]

Blue Ribbon Movements.-A distinguishing feature of many of the movements for the reformation of drinking men has been the bit of ribbon, generally blue or red, worn by the reformed men and others interested. The red ribbon was adopted by Dr. Henry A. Reynolds, Sept. 10, 1874, as the badge of the Bangor (Me.) Reform Club, which he organized at that time, and which, consisting of reformed drinking men, was the first club of its kind ever formed. Throughout the remarkable pledge-signing campaigns that followed in Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Mighigan, Illinois and other States, Dr. Reynolds made the red ribbon the sign of membership in the clubs he started, and they came to be known as Red Ribbon Reform Clubs. The white ribbon was adopted by Dr. Reynolds in connection with the red, the former to be worn by women and by young men under 18. The white ribbon is also worn by all ladies

of the Woman's Christian Teinperance Union. But the blue ribbon has been associated with temperance reform movements more extensively than any other badge. It was adopted by Francis Murphy, and has been donned by very many thousands in this country whom he has induced to sign the pledge.

was

The idea was borrowed in England. On Feb. 10, 1878, a conference of temperance workers was held in London and a total abstinence campaign was determined on. A central mission was to be established in London with town organizations in the provinces as the work spread. The blue ribbon was chosen, and the "Blue Ribbon Army" adopted as the name of the organization. Mr. William Noble, who took a prominent part in the inauguration of this work, had recently returned from a visit to the United States, where he had seen something of the methods employed in the Murphy and Reynolds movements. Pledge-cards were issued and scattered throughout the British Empire, and during the years since they have been translated into several languages, and have found their way into various countries of Europe, into Africa and the Sandwich Islands. More than 1,000,000 pledges have been officially issued, in addition to the pledges issued by independent workers co-operating with the movement. A change in the name from "Blue Ribbon Army" to "Blue Ribbon Gospel Temperance Movement" has been made, and several branch organizations, such as the "Help-Myself Society" among men, and the "Help-One-Another Society" among women, have grown out of the original movement.1

Brandy.-See SPIRITUOUS LIQUORS.

grains or fruits to fermented liquor. It Brewing. The process of changing early times. The process of brewing beer has been known and practised from very involves two chief operations:

four successive steps: (1) Steeping the 1. Producing the Malt.-This includes. grain in water for two or three days, to throwing swollen grain into a large heap swell and soften it. (2) Couching or where, in one or two days, it will sweat

1 The editor is indebted to Mr. William Noble for particulars of the Blue Ribbon work in Great Britain.

and begin to germinate. (3) Flooring, or spreading it to an even depth of 12 to 16 inches, to favor more rapid germination. It is sometimes stirred with shovels and spread over a wider surface, to prevent unequal heating and too rapid growth. This stage requires two or three weeks. (4) Kiln-drying, or spreading it from 4 to 10 inches thick on a stone or metallic floor, perforated and made so hot as to kill the grain-germ and check further growth. The starch has now been changed to sugar. The process is called malting," and the grain is called "malt."

66

2. Brewing the Malt.-Six distinct operations are involved: (1) Crushing the malt between two iron cylinders. (2) Mashing, or mixing the crushed material with warm water, to extract the saccharine matter. The mixture is now called "sweet wort." (3) Boiling the wort with hops, the object being to convert any residuary starch into sugar, and to extract from the hops certain elements which give the liquor a bitter flavor and tend to preserve it. (4) Cooling the wort, which must be done very rapidly to prevent acidity. (5) Fermenting the liquid, drawn off into vats of various kinds, and kept at a temperature of 60° to 70° F. To produce fermentation, from 1 to 1 per cent. of yeast is added. (6) Clearing and storing. Impurities are carried off through an orifice left at the top for that purpose. The resulting liquid is beer, ready now to be stored in oaken barrels.

Briggs. George N.-Born in Adams, Mass., April 13, 1796; died Sept. 12, 1861. He was of humble parentage, and in his youth served an apprenticeship to a hatmaker. As Governor of Massachusetts from 1844 to 1851, his whole influence was exercised to promote total abstinence, and no liquors were given to his guests. While in Congress he became President of the Congressional Temperance Society. British Columbia.-See CANADA.

[blocks in formation]

more could be accomplished to promote temperance and suppress the liquor traffic. The Association is entirely unsectarian, and welcomes all women who will accept its simple pledge and work for the common cause. An annual business meeting is held every May in London, and an autumnal meeting in some provincial town. Organizing agents are engaged in forming new branches and encouraging old ones. The official organ of the Association is the British Women's Temperance Journal (London), published monthly at one penny a copy. Among the other publications are the Non-Alcoholic Cookery Book, and a wall-card of "Simple Remedies," both intended to show that alcohol is equally unnecessary in food and medicine. The Association has sent numerous petitions to Parliament for the repeal of licenses and the concession of Sundayclosing, and has also urged clergymen to use unfermented wine for sacramental purposes. The local branches are engaged in all forms of beneficient endeavor, and the work done by them includes the cultivation of total abstinence sentiment and practice through gospel temperance missions, public meetings, medical lectures, drawing-room meetings, garden parties, meetings in young ladies' schools, Bands of Hope and other societies for the young, cottage and factory meetings, sewing classes, tract distribution, etc. The branches also make appeals to magistrates at the annual licensing sessions. Several homes for intemperate women have been established. The thirteenth annual re

The

port (for the year ending April 30, 1889) shows a total of 409 affiliated societies, with a membership of about 30,000, all officered and conducted by women. gross receipts for the year were 708 11s. 7d. Mrs. Margaret Bright (See LUCAS, MARGARET BRIGHT.)

Brooks, John Anderson, the fifth candidate of the Prohibition party for Vice-President of the United States, born in Germantown, Ky., June 3, 1836. His father was of Irish and Welsh descent, and combined the occupations of farmer, lawyer and preacher, but derived from them only a meagre support. Despite the disadvantages of his early years the boy was resolved to rise. When 12 years old he joined a debating society, and soon became a proficient speaker. At 16 he

« PreviousContinue »