Did the Ancient Israelites Drink Beer?

BAR 36:05 ^ | Sep/Oct 2010 | Michael M. Homan

[PzLdr]

Maneschevitz.

[November 2010]

See the posts further down. NIV was the only translation that uses “beer.” There’s some strong’s definitions of the hebrew terms used as well. Read all comments before getting snarky, silly.

[Rembrandt]

“*GROAN* “

Hey, a “groaner” every day is good for us all.

[Little Bill]

NKJ has strong drink first at 31:6 and then wine, must have been that strong ale mentioned by The Bard. Can't make beer with out Hops.

[BIGLOOK]

When taking a class on ancient civilizations, mostly Greek and Roman but it digressed quite a bit and often, I'd read that the enslaved Hebrews in Egypt were fed sausages made from grain and mushrooms (or some sort of fungi) and drank beer. Seems that was the ultra cheap fare for slaves.

Think about our wonderful cuisine on the plane, Green Lantern. Makes perfect sense.

[null and void]

It was magnificent!

[count-your-change]

I never saw any Scriptures about cultivating beeryards with beer vines or putting new beer into old beer skins.
He misquotes the Scriptures to support his theory and probably thinks Noah became a brew meister.

[UCANSEE2]

IIRC the straw had a filter effect so you didn't get all the bugs, vegetable matter and small rocks in your mouth while sipping your brew.

Dang those Egyptians are smart.

Actually, they were 'smarter' than we are.

They knew how to build the Great Pyramid, we do not.

So much for the theory that as civilization grows it gets more intelligent.

Actually I believe the Egyptians, and many middle eastern countries, had many varieties of fermented beverages, from wine, to beer, to what we call moonshine.

How long has JAPAN had sake? Thousands of years?

[JoeProBono]

[Grimmy]

“...the distillation of “al-kohol” was discovered by the medieval Arabs.”

Did the arabs discover it? or, did they conquer some peoples who had discovered it, learned it from them and then claimed it as an invention? much like current imams are trying to claim the invention of the telephone these days by islam.

Any new thing translated into arabic becomes the property of islam. It has always been so with the mohamadians.

So, the practice of distilling could very well have been in use somewhere “over there” for much much much much longer than “arab invention” says it could be. It all just may well depend on who got conquered by the roving hordes of jihadiscum and what got translated when.

[stefanbatory]

perhaps the Germans learned it from the Jews who lived among them...I bet that would make a few heads explode...

[TheThirdRuffian]

Beer is in the Bible in a number of places.

Beer was also fermented with wild bacteria, not just yeast, as is done now.

This created a brew that was full of tetracycline, a very effective antibiotic.

[TheThirdRuffian]

“Can’t make beer with out Hops”

Yes you can. Hops are just a flavoring, made popular in Turkey, then Germany less than 1000 years ago.

[Rembrandt]

“..were fed sausages made from grain and mushrooms (or some sort of fungi) and drank beer.”

You must have had a different CO and flight crew than me; I never got any of that.

[SunkenCiv]

;’)

[SunkenCiv]

:’) Thanks!

[November 2010]

Beer is in the Bible in a number of places.
____________________________________________________________

Anywhere other than the NIV translation? That’s all I saw.

[Renfield]

I often drink my wheat beer through a straw. Keeps me from spilling it on my shirt. :<)

[TheThirdRuffian]

It's in psalms and a number of places.

"Beer is a brawler and wine a mocker" comes to mind in psalms regarding how people drunk on those items act without even looking. Still rings true today.

More to the point, Israel was descibed as:

For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land with streams and springs and fountains issuing from plain and hill; a land of wheat and barley , of vines, figs and pomegranates, a land of olive trees and honey…”"



Barley is hard for humans to eat. You can do it. And the peasants did eat it with some serious milling. But it was not great stuff; harder to mill than wheat, not great tasting. Historically, it was most used for brewing, which was pretty easy. (We now have the luxury of using it as animal feed; in the Bronze Age a field would not have been so wastefully used.).

[November 2010]

Makes sense. Still a theory, but better than Bible quotes where most translations are not “beer.” Understand that “beer” is only used in the NIV, a very modern translation and it is alone. Makes me suspect it since it isn’t in the other translations.

Also, here are some barley recipes. I’ve had very good barley soup:

http://www.barleyfoods.org/recipes.html