What if he had turned the water into mediocre wine, you know like bargain basement stuff.
I'm on some sort of Jesus vibe today and have been pondering Jesus' coming out miracle if you will. As documented in the Bible (John 2:1-11), Jesus' first miracle occurred at a wedding.…
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26 - Ken Durden
Catholic teaching is that this miracle shows both the unique intercessory role of Mary as his mother and first disciple, and also the change from water into wine prefigures the change from wine into Blood at the last supper. Now, if you don't believe in those doctrines, then His first miracle carries little significance.
27 - Brandy
He did this miracle because His mother asked him to. ;-)
Also, people drank wine with meals in those days, not to get drunk. There is nothing to indicate anyone was "inebriated." I'm unsure the point you are trying to make here though.
28 - bliffle
Beer and wine were often drunk in place of water because the 'good' yeasts of fermentation would dominate and repress, sometimes extinguish bad yeasts and bad bacterias. Better to cohabit with a friendly yeast than wait a couple thousand years for Pasteur to invent pasteurization.
Most of those beers and wines were low alcohol, maybe 3-6%. Beer was well-known among the ancient Sumerians.
So, turning water into wine was a health boon as well as a taste treat.
29 - JamesD
Hello All - I see this thread is very old but keeps getting added to so I wish to put forth my opinion that I did not see from anyone else.
This miracle is much deeper and shows the awesomeness of God as I believe it's a direct correlation to the creation of earth and how it "appears" to be very old but if you truly believe God's word, it can't be.
What is the best wine? A wine that has been aged properly for a long time!
Jesus turned water into a wine that had the characteristics of being a very fine old/aged wine. Can't be done in a split second by us mortals, what a miracle!
30 - chalant
Many Christians will argue that it wasn't alcoholic wine, that it was unfermented grape juice. I don't buy that, because once someone has had alcoholic wine, Grape Juice would not be the 'better' stuff after wards.
But that's their take on it...
31 - Brunelleschi
What a waste of time.
Miracles are myths.
Its just another dumb story told by a cult to gain followers.
32 - Laura
@ Brunelleschi
"just another dumb story told by a cult to gain followers". Why don't you read up a little on the history of Christianity (there is a history, you know- not only just a 'religion', much like that of the Ancient Greeks and the Mongols). Making comments like this simply shows how much you don't know or don't care to know, which is even worse in my opinion.
33 - STM
What's wrong with turning water into wine?
Wish I could do it :)
What would you prefer guys, water into orange juice?
34 - Dr Dreadful
Water into wine really was impressive, I have to say.
It's easy enough the other way round, but...
35 - Jordan Richardson
Its just another dumb story told by a cult to gain followers.
Kind of like American history in general, with its inflated notions of heroism and the "Founding Fathers" in all of their unsullied glory.
"Mythology" exists in all walks of life, not just religions or cults. And in the case of this particular miracle, it isn't so much the physical act that retains significance for followers of Christ but rather the symbolism that it entails. There are many different interpretations of the act of turning water into wine, many of which aren't the least bit literal.
I think discounting this as a "dumb story to gain followers" is a little simplistic, but hell, to each their own.
36 - STM
Jordan: "Kind of like American history in general, with its inflated notions of heroism and the "Founding Fathers" in all of their unsullied glory."
Ah, you are one of our long-suffering Canadian brethren, Jordan, right?
The poor loves south of your border still haven't worked out that they lost the War of 1812 and that it was a war of aggression waged by the US on British North America and an invasion that unsuccessfully challenged Canada's right to exist.
Not, as Americans will tell you, "the second War of Independence". Such things must be galling for Canadians, who actually the ones to win their independence.
To be fair though, the opposite is what Americans are taught at school, so where do the faults with these things really lie? Not, I think, with ordinary Americans.
Blame Hollywood ... it's a phenomenon that's only really developed in the six decades since WWII. Prior to that, it was just enthusiastic but misguided patriotism, and we're all guilty of a bit of chest beating and flag-waving now and then.
Nonetheless, you should never tire of reminding our American brethren that the real clue to it all is in the fact that Canada today is an independent, sovereign nation still proud of its British and French heritage, not half a dozen northern states of the US that are covered in snow for the best of three months a year :)
37 - Brunelleschi
#32 Laura-
I happen to be very much into biblical history and listen to lectures on it every day while I am on line, when I don't listen to philosophy.
What exactly do I not know?
The miracles you read about from biblical times were legends spread about traveling magic shows like Jesus'. Judea and other regions were crawling with them.
Read up on Apollonius of Tyana. See if the story sounds familiar.
Christians today might even be Apollonists if the wind blew in another direction.
38 - Jordan Richardson
Not, I think, with ordinary Americans.
Certainly not. I have no disdain for the ordinary American, as I married one (well, she's not ordinary but you get my point).
She was one of those able to "break free," in many ways, of the constant propaganda and elected to not buy the Company Line from the textbooks, etc. She often tells me of saying the Pledge of Allegiance every day before school and repeating various rituals that showcase the "glory of America." Americans worship presidents (I don't know many Canadians who have a favourite PM or who celebrate politicians all that much) and worship their own history, complete with rituals and ceremonies. It is very much like a religion.
Hollywood plays a part, too, as the "outside world" is often painted as a dark and dangerous place (shit, look at what happens to Liam Neeson's daughter in Taken when she goes to fucking Paris of all places!) and America is portrayed as being safe, pure, and all that.
No, I don't blame the ordinary American at all. Were I infected with incredible hours of work just to make ends meet, flawed informational sources ("news" networks, etc.), continuous propaganda, distrust of The Other, and rampant Americanism, I'd probably be just as messed up in terms of perspective.
39 - Jordan Richardson
Christians today might even be Apollonists if the wind blew in another direction.
Paul knew that. Probably why he passed gas so much...
;)
40 - Brunelleschi
#34 and #35-
Political myths are common in every society.
America was founded by altruistic republicans.
South Africa was discovered by Europeans first, and local Africans saw what they built and tried to move in and take advantage of it.
Jesus died for your sins, so you better respect that, or else. Americans have adopted this one and transferred it to its wars-The veterans died for your freedom, and you better respect that, or else..etc.
Christians demand that you make your pledge to Jesus. Americans demand that you make your pledge to the flag.. Same stuff.
It's all political.
41 - Jordan Richardson
Bingo.
42 - STM
We do find rampant American patriotism amusing down here in the South Pacific, where no one would hesitate to use the flag - which IS an icon - as a beach towel if they couldn't find anything else (I've seen it done and it just raised a few laughs). Actual Aussie flag beach towels are pretty popular too.
Most of us don't even know the second verse of the national anthem, and most of us have only learned the first dreary verse by hearing our sports teams sing it before international competitions.
However, we did learn about other places ... our modern and ancient history lessons at high school spanned not just the 200 years since white settlement, but the history of the world (including Canada :) going back way beyond even the Roman invasion of Britain.
Perhaps that's what American kids need ... and some geography lessons.
It'd all help.
The truth is, though, until now Americans haven't needed to know that much about anywhere else.
43 - Tim Taylor
I absolutely love the fact that this post, going on 3 years old, still gets people to react and converse. Thanks for the comments everyone!
44 - bliffle
IMO the original point was not whether the myth was true, but why the choice of water to wine?
Why not wood to bread? Why not water to cheese? Why not paper to plastic? Etc.
45 - Tim Taylor
Actually, the post basically wonders why it's the first "miracle" when the next one was raising a child from the dead.
I actually don't doubt it happened, I just think it's funny to be his coming out party if you will.
46 - Brunelleschi
I'm curious why any of you think any of those miracles really happened.
47 - STM
I'm curious as to why anyone would think they didn't, in the absence of anything proving otherwise.
The fact they might not have happened doesn't mean they didn't happen.
I'll keep an open mind, on this and everything else.
48 - Jordan Richardson
I'm curious why any of you think any of those miracles really happened.
I'm of the opinion that the water-to-wine narrative isn't meant as a literal narrative. First of all, it takes place in the most suspect of all Gospels, John. It isn't in any of the other Gospels at all. Also, John describes the act in Greek as semeion or "sign" and not dynamis, which is the term used by the other Gospels in describing "miracles." So there's something to John's purpose and John's description of this event that probably speaks to a broader and more interesting truth.
Some believe that John's account here is just a re-telling of Jesus' "new wine/old wineskins" saying in the other Gospels, so that's always a possibility too.
A non-literal interpretation suggests that they "wanted wine," but they only had "water." This can be viewed in a spiritual sense, as if to say that Jesus can turn one's spiritual water into spiritual wine through re-creation and rebirth. That would have largely been John's take on Christ and such a thread is infused in most of his accounts in his Gospel, whereas other Gospel writers have other concerns.
In any case, I think wondering whether the miracles of Jesus really happened simply misses the larger point of what the Biblical authors were attempting to say. In fact, I don't even know that it matters if Jesus Christ really existed. The core of Christianity as intended by Christ - that of tolerance, compassion, peace, and love - remains intact even if Jesus is no more a reality than Santa Claus. (And before anyone suggests it, I am not saying that Christianity or any other religion invented those principles, but rather that their contextualization and application at such a point in history was unique, much like Islam's precepts were unique at the birth of that religion).
49 - STM
Jordan: "The core of Christianity as intended by Christ - that of tolerance, compassion, peace, and love - remains intact even if Jesus is no more a reality than Santa Claus".
Bingo. And the message has been quite clear throughout the gospels that it was intended to be practised without any conditions attached, which is where some of our fundamentalist brethren fall down a bit.
Hard for a human being to do but that was the message ... perhaps so that we constantly strive to rise above base human nature in a quest to keep doing the next right thing.
50 - Brunelleschi
#47 STM-
You have got to be kidding! A legend from antiquity claims something that is not possible happened, with no proof at all, and your defense of this is-
"Prove that the impossible did not happen, other wise, it happened."
That is comical.
In the ancient world, claims of miracles were very common and widespread. They were simply a way to convince someone of what they wanted to say, nothing more. They worked. People kept saying things like that because others believed it.
I hate to bring up the meme again (assuming you suffered through the 450+ posts in the Iran thread), but think about it...Ideas that "work" spread and evolve.
Jesus is interesting to study as a philosopher-both in terms of what he really said and did, and what happened afterwards-what his followers passed on and why, and where it went.
But he was no more divine than Plato or Marx. He just happened to live in a time and place where claims of divinity, backed up by claims of miracles, were typical.
No philosopher changed history as much as Jesus. This is good and bad, considering how much pain and suffering resulted once the powerful learned to use the movement for its own selfish ends. It's still going on today.
I am interested in what he really said and did, in the context in which he lived.
He was a small time, almost unknown, Jewish preacher in a place that was controlled by an outside empire, managed by a subservient local governor. He opposed this. The Jewish leader's had to go along or be repressed, and he opposed them too. He said the temple will fall, etc..
What do you do when you are a bit of a revolutionary, and your foes are so powerful and established? You can't say you are going to just toss them out. People would laugh. So, you say something is going to happen to bring them all down.
Jesus was basically an apocalypticist. Historians with no faith motive argue that this is the case (not all of them).
The message here was that the powers (Rome and the Jewish powers that went along) will fall on their own, and all their money and power will not matter, because god was going to wipe them out and start again, really soon.
This was good to hear if you didn't know any better, but it didn't happen and never was going to.
He and his followers traveled the rural areas of Judea, spreading this message, rejecting wealth and possessions, and lived off the people they preached to. Hardly anyone knew of him or recorded this at the time. In fact, the historical record of his life is almost nonexistent, except for what was written much later.
He shows up in Jerusalem during passover, stirred things up with this message, and was crucified as a matter of routine-just one more troublemaker of many eliminated and presumably, forgotten.
We just don't know for sure if he really died on the cross. He was flogged before, and only lasted a few hours on the cross before he was declared dead and taken away.
If he recovered later, it was no miracle. If he did recover and greet his followers, it would not have been the first time this happened. It was rare, but people were declared dead that weren't and survived. No miracle.
However, the message that he came back from the dead lasted. This assisted his followers in keeping the message alive, because people believed miracles.
As the legend spread, people added what they wanted to add.
We start with a small time apocalypticist who predicted the end of oppression, who said that wealth and power were irrelevant, who was later said to be divine etc..and the next thing you know, he (or his dad) created the universe.
People didn't have snopes.com back then to check on it, but that's quite a story!
You have to give those gospel writers credit, but its just storytelling, nothing more.
51 - Jordan Richardson
I hate to bring up the meme again
No you don't. ;)
52 - Brunelleschi
haha.
I'm busted.
All BS aside, does it make sense?
Did you notice Dave ran away about halfway through my Socrates act in the Iran thread? Bar said I was "poisoning the well."
Can you say Socrates did too?
53 - STM
Brunwhatever: "You have got to be kidding! A legend from antiquity claims something that is not possible happened, with no proof at all, and your defense of this is - prove that the impossible did not happen, other wise, it happened. That is comical."
Actually, you're the one providing most of the comic relief around here lately.
And can I suggest you get you hand off your tonk while you still only need coke-bottle glasses.
That's not what I said at all: I said there's no evidence to prove it either way, and I'm keeping an open mind on that and a plethora of other things including the results of US presidential elections, free tinfoil hats for 9/11 "truthers", global warming/cooling (which is it?), non-existent South Pacific summer swell patterns, why some Americans seem to have a wire loose between their brains and their mouths (or in this case, their keyboard fingers), time travel, and last but not least, why the only poisonous snakes and spiders I've seen lately are in my shed.
Unlike your good self, that is. You seem to think anything you don't agree with must be wrong.
Perhaps you could talk to someone about it.
54 - Tim Taylor
I'm open to the possibility that this didn't happen and I believe that it did.
I believe it because I think that humans have this type of power (and much more) inside of us. It can be accessed if we're open to it.
I'm not at the level of consciousness to do it, but I believe that it's possible.
55 - Memelleschi
Relax.
Its just silly to even consider assuming the unprovable is even a possibility, or likely. Miracle stories need to been seen in context, just stories from a time when these tales were common.
There is nothing to "keep the mind open for" unless you plan on miracling yourself a time machine.
56 - Tim Taylor
I see your point. So I think you're saying anything that can't be proven is not possible?
57 - Memelleschi
No.
It just makes no sense to look back in time to when people made incredible stories up, and then wait for the possibility that maybe they didn't make it up after all.
A dragon told me that.
58 - STM
"Unless you plan on miracling yourself a time machine."
No miracle. A Qantas 747 flying across the Pacific from Sydney to LA and arriving in LA before you left Sydney.
Time travel.
59 - Jordan Richardson
There is nothing to "keep the mind open for" unless you plan on miracling yourself a time machine.
Damn straight. I keep my mind closed up nice and tight, like a vault with no reason to understand history or other cultures.
60 - Brian aka Guppusmaximus
So...First, Jordan basically sums up that the New Testament is just a story based on ideology and STM agrees by adding that this ideology should be practiced without conditions. But, even though they both somewhat consider this to be some sort of sham,not the word of an almighty maker, they still jump all over Brunelleschi for calling Jesus'"Liquor Store" miracle a fib.
*Ahh*... I love religious people. Through a freakin maze of interpretations where no one has any solid answers along with the "personal" savior complex, us non-believers are supposed to keep an open mind or we are thought to be unintelligent!
61 - Jordan Richardson
ey still jump all over Brunelleschi for calling Jesus'"Liquor Store" miracle a fib.
Interesting. I must have missed the part where I jumped all over anyone...
62 - Jordan Richardson
Btw, I'm not a religious person.
63 - Brunelleschi
Agree.
I study history every day, switched off the TV a long time ago.
I'm into the history of philosophy, the historical Jesus (real history, not myth-(see#47, stuff I got from a lecture course by Dr Bart Ehrman), and western civ...
The more you study this stuff, the more the myths seem silly, but very understandable in their context.
:)
A great site to order all kinds of courses
64 - Brunelleschi
Btw, Jordan is my favorite contemporary philosopher.. :)
65 - Jordan Richardson
Bart Ehrman
Don't mind his work, really. I do think most of his assertions are based on a rather rudimentary appraisal of "biblical inerrancy" and that he doesn't leave a lot of room for multiple non-literal/linear interpretations, but he generally does a good enough job at making things interesting.
But such is the joy/awful torture of textual criticism. I've studied it for well over a decade now and am currently more confused on the topic than I've ever been.
I'm more of a Marcus Borg/John Dominic Crossan guy myself.
66 - Jordan Richardson
A great site to order all kinds of courses
Fucking YES!
67 - Brunelleschi
You get stuff from there too?
Do you think this site would want to run a review of some of the courses on DVD? I have three so far.
If I understand your critique of Ehrman.. I think you are saying he just wants to use the most likely accurate info, based on the commonly used 3 criteria, and leave the rest aside?
Maybe so, but even that is being generous. Some people think Jesus didn't exist at all. How many philosophers do we study that we have ZERO writings from?
68 - Jordan Richardson
We could argue that he is "being generous," but he does claim textual criticism as his field after all so I would assume that would be his bone to pick and not ours. In fact, we could almost entirely hold Ehrman responsible for bringing the ages-old idea of textual criticism to the layperson.
What I mean to say is that Ehrman's problem is mainly the same as it is with many similar scholars: it is based on the evangelical premise of Biblical inerrancy and is often so steeped in his own background that objectivism is impossible. Ehrman's approach is often to suggest that the text was deliberately "corrupted," while this is not always supportable by objective evidence.
He goes out on a limb and takes the approach that things were "intentionally changed" in the Bible, while most major textual critics - agnostic, Christian, Jew, otherwise - don't find adequate proof to hold to that opinion.
Ehrman's interesting that way. He'll heap platitudes on someone for their carefulness in transcribing material, like Bengel, but then he'll flip the script (so to speak) and will start talking about how scriptures were changed intentionally to articulate some other doctrine. In the case of Bengel, for instance, he'll heap praise on him for his carefulness but then dismisses his objective findings based on his own (Ehrman's) opinions overriding the scholar's work.
In other words, Bart Ehrman does an awful lot of speculating in regards to the motivations of Biblical translators. He also has a desire to characterize everything in the Bible as wholly unknowable due to his interpretation on Biblical inerrancy (that the Bible has to be the literal Word of God and that it was written from God's mouth, blah blah blah). Ehrman often overstates the case on "errors" in scripture, telling readers and listeners that there are hundreds of thousands of problems with the text, inferring that it can't be trusted. That makes him a favourite amongst wholesale atheists and agnostics, but scholars tend to disagree with his number-dangling and essentially argue that a very small minority of the "errors" are actually worthwhile and viable for textual criticism of Ehrman's sort. Most are numerical differences, problems in translation or spelling, and the like. The "intentional errors" he likes to focus on are extraordinarily rare and, in the objective scholarship we currently have available, largely mysterious.
Even so, I appreciate what Ehrman does in laying out a case. He has brought textual criticism basics to the masses and encourages people to find their own ways to what's really going on. I guess I just wish he didn't overstate his case under the guise of an objective textual critic.
69 - susan
You're totally missing the symbolism of the Bible (ie. Moses turning water into blood; Jesus turning water into wine - wine representing his blood during commumion, etc.)
Here's how one article describes the Wedding Miracle:
Jesus was asked to provide wine for a wedding feast. Why would he say "My time has not yet come?"
He came into this world to provide the wine for the wedding feast, not at Cana, but for his marriage to his bride, the church. And not just to provide the wine, he came to be the wine, to offer his own blood as the wine for that feast.
No, his time certainly had not come at the wedding in Cana. But when his time did come, it began in the same way as this chapter, "On the third day a wedding took place." This time not at Cana, but at the empty tomb.
70 - Ruvy
As a wine drinker who lives in Israel, I have an opinion or two on all this. As for the "miracle" business, small miracles, like keeping the grog going, are not that uncommon even today. Some rabbis and sages do it even now. I knew of a rabbi who did something similar - keeping the 'árak going on an empty bottle in Iraq and had quite an number of witnesses to what he was doing. Of all things that are attributed to Jesus this surprises me the least.
The Book of Kings talks about a feller named Elishá, who was a wandering seer and prophet with a bald head and a bad temper - and most of the miracles you find attributed to Jesus are also found in the Book of Kings - attributed to Elishá.
But the important issue here is the wine - one writer referred to it correctly - yáyin. The native wine here a couple of millennia ago was pretty sweet, and not all that strong. In addition, it was the common drink to have. But it was a fermented drink that gladdened the heart.
As for Brunelleschi's characterization of Jesus, it was pretty much on the mark - a nationalist preacher in a land occupied and corrupted by foreigners who figured he didn't have a Chinaman's chance of kicking out the Roman savages. So he came up with Divine Intervention, a concept familiar to Jews of the day. But he evidently had a few things wrong - or his followers mistakenly gave him the wrong lines - because what he said would happen didn't happen - and still hasn't. But I leave that for Christians to bother with. It ain't really my business....
71 - Alyssa
when i was reading this passage a couple days ago, i thought deeper into the things that were said, because i've never really paid much attention to this, searching for the meaning behind this miracle.
anyways, what i came up with was this:
the 6 jars the water was contained in was like the jars used to hold ceremonial cleansing water. priests used this water to bathe with beore they were considered clean to enter into the tent of meeting and offer sacrifices before the Lord, so the water in these 6 jars, brought on cleanness for the priests. in judaism, the number 6 symbolizes man. the fact that it was contained inside the jars, symbolizes that the clean would someday become internalized, however, the "time had not yet come," said Jesus, foreshadowing the purpose of His existance, to internalize clean and allow us to come into His presence without sin. i was also thinking, why wine? and in the Bible, water symbolizes purity and wine symbolizes joy. so, Jesus brought purity inward, to the heart and soul of a man, and that purity overflows as joy, a joy that others can taste, and is "the best," saved for last in that all other joys tasted before that are nothing in comparison to the joy brought about by the internalization of the clean that was once only outward. the miracle was a symbol of His ministry and His life and the future of His people.
72 - tracie
I tend to think that this miracle was first b/c it had more to do with his disciples placing their trust in him. I have studied this miracle in depth and am most impressed that Jesus choose to fill 6 imperfect jars with the best that life has to offer. It is also important to know that at this time, he had only called 6 of the 12 disciples. I believe his motives were all about the things already discussed but also about what he can do to a life that chooses to trust in him. What's in your jar of life? Is it currently empty? Are you full to the brim of water only? Or are you infused with his spirit and living an abundant life that only he can give?
73 - Fred
Sorry to say Manzar but the Quarran isnt exactly biblical. Also at "concerned": how long has allowing people to get drunk been a sin? The fact that the guy states people normally bring out the good stuff first and then the worse stuff later suggests the "good stuff" is the more alcoholic, numbing the tastebuds so the worse stuff later on still tastes "good". Im not saying the wine Jesus made was alcoholic but between the lines suggests the better stuff normally was and that the guy who thought it was good probably believed it was alcoholic.