Leviticus 10:8-11

 "8 And the LORD spake unto Aaron, saying, 9 Do not drink wine nor strong drink, thou, nor thy sons with thee, when ye go into the tabernacle of the congregation, lest ye die: it shall be a statute for ever throughout your generations: 10 And that ye may put difference between holy and unholy, and between unclean and clean; 11 And that ye may teach the children of Israel all the statutes which the LORD hath spoken unto them by the hand of Moses." — Leviticus 10:8-11 KJV.

THE PRIESTS FORBIDDEN WINE AND STRONG DRINK, 8-11.

9. Do not drink wine — This wine is in Hebrew יַ֣יִן (yayin), the most general term for this beverage, especially when it is intoxicating. “Yayin is a mocker.” Proverbs 20:1. In seventy-five out of a hundred and thirty-six passages it is spoken of with condemnation by reason of its disastrous effects. Unfermented, or new wine, called must, is in the Hebrew expressed by תִּירוֹשׁ (tirosh). This is never prohibited or condemned. It occurs thirty-eight times, with no indication of any intoxicating quality. The solitary apparent exception in Hosea 9:11 is explained as the gluttonous use of sweet, nutritious wine as an article of food. The meaning of the passage is, that the three great appetites — the sexual, the bibulous, and the gluttonous — “take away the heart” or understanding. There are several other terms sparingly used, some of which always involve a bad sense, as שׂבַע sobe, signifying soak and soaker, while others are doubtful. Nor strong drink — The Hebrew שֵׁכָר (shecar) is a generic term applied to all fermented liquors except wine. It includes, 1.) Beer, which was largely consumed in Egypt under the name of zythus. It was made of barley and certain herbs, such as lupin and skirrett, as a substitute for hops. 2.) Cider, or apple-wine. 3.) Honey-wine, of which there were two sorts; the first consisting of a mixture of wine, honey, and pepper, the other a decoction of the juice of the grape, termed debash (honey) by the Jews, and dibs by the modern Syrians. 4.) Date-wine, which was the fermentation of dates mashed and mixed with water. 5.) The fermented juices of various other fruits and vegetables, as figs, millet, pomegranates, and carob fruit. According to the latest researches in philology, the English word cider is a modification of shecar, through the Grecized form sikera. See Webster’s Dictionary. When ye go into the tabernacle — The service of God requires the clearest head and the purest heart. It is an intelligent exercise, and not a blind, mechanical opus operatum, or going through with the motions. If the priest even medicinally used fermented wine or strong drink in the smallest quantity, it disqualified him for his office during that day. What a rebuke is this to the usage — still prevalent in some countries — of drinking wine in the vestry before going into the pulpit and reasoning of righteousness, temperance, and a judgment to come! The enactment of this law immediately after the slaying of Nadab and Abihu affords strong grounds for the theory that they were drunken when they committed the act of sacrilege. The Targum of Palestine plainly sustains this view. “Drink no wine nor any thing that maketh drunk, as thy sons did, who have died by the burning of fire.” See Numbers 3:4.

11. That ye may teach — The priest was the earliest religious teacher of the Levitical law, “for the priest’s lips should keep knowledge, and they should seek the law at his mouth.” Malachi 2:7. The two sides of the priestly vocation, teaching and offering, are embraced in Deuteronomy 33:10. The Pentateuch knows nothing of a scholastic inculcation of the divine laws; it knows no formal religious instruction at all except the reading of the law before the assembled people, at the feast of tabernacles, in the Sabbatic year. Deuteronomy 31:10-13. All religious teachers should be τελειοι, perfect, having their senses — internal and external — exercised to discern or discriminate both good and evil. Hebrews 5:14. Wine draws a film over the spiritual eye and confounds moral distinctions. If the priests have aught to do with wine in a lawful way, it is only that it may, in the holy place,” be poured unto the Lord for a drink offering.” Numbers 28:7. Wine symbolizes joy. The joy of all believers is not the joy of earth but of heaven — of the sanctuary. “The joy of the Lord is your strength.”

Tainted Money?

QUESTION: Is  it a sin to let or sell a residence to a brewer or a cigar manufacturer or to one of their employees?

ANSWER:  It would be a good opportunity to show your disapproval by letting or selling your house at a sacrifice to some other person. But for me to say it is a sin to do otherwise, I am not prepared; for some one might raise the question whether the grocer would not sin in taking "tainted money" from the landlord, who has let or sold his house to a brewer or cigar-maker; and then whether it would not be wrong for the physician or minister to receive such money from the grocer, etc. etc., like "the house that Jack built." Human interests are so interlaced that there is no end to a boycott when once begun.

— Steele's Answers p. 221.

What Meats Should Christians Eat?

QUESTION: What meats should be eaten by Christians?

ANSWER: The word meat includes both vegetable and animal foods. There are some vegetables, such as tobacco, unfit for either saint or sinner to eat,  and  the extract of others, such as opium from the poppy, and alcoholic distillations from fruits and cereals, should not go into the mouth of any Christian. He is sure to eat healthy food if he limits himself to the clean animals enumerated. in Lev. II. But since Jesus abrogated the ceremonial law (Mark 7:19, American Revised Version), the Christian does not sin if he eats swine's flesh, clams, oysters, lobsters, eels, etc. It is thought that the superior longevity of the Jews arises from their observance of the Levitical Law which perfectly guards his beefsteak and mutton chops.

— Steele's Answers p. 149.

Was the Campaign Against the Saloons a Spititual Warfare?

QUESTION: Is the fight now going on, under the laws of many of our States against licensed saloon, led by the Anti­-Saloon League, a spiritual or carnal warfare?

ANSWER: The end aimed, at, the moral well-being of the people, and indirectly the spiritual salvation of myriads of young men, would rank it as a spiritual conflict. But the weapons, sheriffs, courts, fines and prisons, have a carnal aspect. There is in this a mixture of the carnal and the spiritual. Since the law is not made for a righteous man, but for the wicked, it is not only the right but the duty of all good men to assist in its execution. It is the duty of Christian men to use spiritual weapons against social wrongs so far as they are applicable; but if these are ineffectual, then they should resort to weapons of a carnal, or secular, nature. A very good maxim is moral suasion for the tippler and legal suasion for the vendor.

— Steele's Answers p 142.

Drink a Little Wine?

QUESTION: Explain I Tim. 5:23: "Be no longer a drinker of water, but use a little wine for thy stomach's sake and thine often infirmities."

ANSWER: Here are three facts: a total abstainer from intoxicants, a weak stomach needing a tonic, and a medical prescription of wine in homeopathic doses. There seems to be no moral peril in this advice by an apostle of the Gospel of Christ to a man who was not a reformed drunkard. It puts wine into the medicine chest where it belongs, and not on the sideboard, where it steals away the brains.

— Steele's Answers pp. 101, 102.

The Dancing Choir

QUESTION: What is the duty of a Methodist Episcopal pastor towards a choir who dance, play cards, attend theaters, and some drink beer?

ANSWER: The book of Discipline places the choir under the control of the pastor, who may if he wishes have a committee of which he is chairman, or he may have the sole direction. Let him discreetly use his power to weed out improper persons.

— from Steele's Answers p. 51.