Did the Ancient Israelites Drink Beer?

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Ancient Israelites, with the possible exception of a few teetotaling Nazirites and their moms, proudly drank beer—and lots of it. Men, women and even children of all social classes drank it. Its consumption in ancient Israel was encouraged, sanctioned and intimately linked with their religion. Even Yahweh, according to the Hebrew Bible, consumed at least half a hin of beer (approximately 2 liters, or a six-pack) per day through the cultic ritual of libation, and he drank even more on the Sabbath (Numbers 28:7–10). People who were sad were advised to drink beer to temporarily erase their troubles (Proverbs […]

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Footnotes

See Lawrence E. Stager, “The Fury of Babylon: Ashkelon and the Archaeology of Destruction,” BAR 22:01.

See Michael M. Homan and Mark Gstohl, “Jesus the Teetotaler? How Dr. Welch Put the Lord on the Wagon,” Bible Review 18:02.

Endnotes

Solomon H. Katz and Mary M. Voigt, “Bread and Beer: The Early Use of Cereals in the Human Diet,” Expedition 28:2 (1986), pp. 23–24.

Katz and Voigt, “Bread and Beer.”

Old Babylonian version, 2.3.6–25 (my translation).

D. Samuel, “Bread Making and Social Interactions at the Amarna Workmen’s Village, Egypt,” World Archaeology 31 (1999), pp. 121–144.

Michael M. Homan, “Beer and Its Drinkers: An Ancient Near Eastern Love Story,” Near Eastern Archaeology 67 (2004), p. 85.

Lines 108–109.

H.B. Huffmon writes, “One Mari text detailing the cult of Ishtar mentions that a muhhû ‘is not […] to become ecstatic’ and hints at a connection of the muhhû with water-downed beer” in “Prophecy,” Anchor Bible Dictionary, vol. 5, p. 479.

Homan, “Beer and Its Drinkers,” pp. 85–86.

Michael M. Homan, “Beer, Barley, and שכר in the Hebrew Bible,” in Richard Elliott Friedman and William H.C. Propp, eds., Le David Maskil: A Birthday Tribute for David Noel Freedman (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2004), pp. 25–38.

10.

See Philip Mayerson, “Grain Prices in Late Antiquity and the Nature of the Evidence,” in Ziony Zevit, Seymour Gitin and Michael Sokoloff, eds., Solving Riddles and Untying Knots: Biblical, Epigraphic, and Semitic Studies in Honor of Jonas C. Greenfield (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1995), pp. 443–449.

11.

“Ale” is actually more accurate, as “beer” typically refers to a beverage made from malted grains flavored with hops and carbonated. Like ale, ancient beer had no carbonation, though ancient beer was not flavored with hops as beer and ale are. Due to the malt, ancient beer was sweet and flavored with a variety of fruits and spices.

12.

Richard E. Friedman, Commentary on the Torah (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 2001), p. 523.

13.

Magen Broshi, “Wine in Ancient Palestine,” Israel Museum Journal 3 (1984), p. 35.

14.

Robert G. Boling, Judges, Anchor Bible 6A (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1975), pp. 219–220.

15.

Johann Döller, “Der Wein in Bibel und Talmud,” Biblica 4 (1923), p. 299.

16.

Werner Dommershausen, “Nyy” Theologisches Worterbuch zum Alten Testament 3, pp. 614–620.

17.

Homan, “Beer, Barley, and שכר in the Hebrew Bible,” p. 26.

18.

Enuma Elish III.134–136. Note also the frequent depictions of gods with both grapes and cereals, see Charles Seltman, Wine in the Ancient World (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1957), pp. 27–31, 156.

19.

J.V. Kinnier Wilson, The Nimrud Wine Lists (London: British School of Archaeology in Iraq, 1972), p. 81.

20.

Note that Lawrence E. Stager believes here that shekar refers to date-wine. See below.

21.

Homan, “Beer, Barley, and שכר in the Hebrew Bible,” p. 30.

22.

Chicago Assyrian Dictionary Š/2, pp. 420–428; Wolfram von Soden, Akkadisches Handworterbuch, pp. 1232–1233.

23.

Homan, “Beer, Barley, and שכר in the Hebrew Bible,” p. 29.

24.

See, for example, Magen Broshi, “Date Beer and Date Wine in Antiquity,” Palestine Exploration Quarterly 139 (2007), pp. 55–59. See also Lawrence E. Stager, “The Impact of the Sea Peoples in Canaan [1185–1050 B.C.E.], in Thomas E. Levy, ed., Archaeology of Society in the Holy Land (New York: Facts on File, 1995), p. 345. See Carey Walsh, The Fruit of the Vine: Viticulture in Ancient Israel (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2000), For further information, see Homan, “Beer, Barley, and שכר in the Hebrew Bible,” pp. 28–30.

25.

Baruch A. Levine, Numbers 1–20, Anchor Bible 4A (New York: Doubleday, 1963), pp. 219–220; Robert P. Teachout, “The Use of Wine in the Old Testament” (Ph.D. diss., Dallas Theological Seminary, 1979), pp. 135, 225, 245–247; Menahem Haran, “Myksn (Libations),” Encyclopaedia Biblica (1968), vol. 5, pp. 883–886; Berton Roueché, “Alcohol, I—The Christian Diversion,” New Yorker (January 9, 1960), p. 42.

26.

Homan, “Beer, Barley, and שכר in the Hebrew Bible,” pp. 33–35.

27.

Patrick E. McGovern et al., “A Funerary Feast Fit for King Midas,” Nature 402 (1999) pp. 863–864; John Fleischman, “Midas’ Feast,” Discover vol. 21, no. 11, pp. 70–75; Stephanie Pain, “Grog of the Greeks,” New Scientist, vol. 164, no. 2214, pp. 54–57.

28.

Mary Ann Murray, “Viticulture and Wine Production,” in Paul T. Nicholson and Ian Shaw, eds., Ancient Egyptian Materials and Technology (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 2000), p. 592.

29.

See Marten Stol, “Beer in Neo-Babylonian Times,” in Friedman and Propp, Le David Maskil, pp. 155–183. See also Homan, “Beer, Barley, and שכר in the Hebrew Bible,” p. 31, especially note 31.

30.

Homan, “Beer, Barley, and שכר in the Hebrew Bible,” p. 32.

31.

Lawrence Stager, “The Firstfruits of Civilization,” in Palestine in the Bronze and Iron Ages (1985), p. 177.

32.

See Homan, “Beer and Its Drinkers,” pp. 84–86.

33.

William Foxwell Albright, Archaeology of Palestine (Harmondsworth, Middlesex: Penguin, 1949), p. 115.

34.

Jennie R. Ebeling and Michael M. Homan, “Brewing Beer as Women’s Technology in Ancient Israel,” in Beth Alpert Nakhai, ed., The World of Women in the Ancient and Classical Near East (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2008), pp. 45–62.

35.

Ebeling and Homan, “Brewing Beer as Women’s Technology in Ancient Israel.”

36.

B. Alster, “Sumerian Love Songs” Revue d’assyriologie et d’archéologie orientale 79 (1985), pp. 127–159.

37.

Ebeling and Homan, “Brewing Beer as Women’s Technology in Ancient Israel.”

38.

One Greek poet noted that Phrygians drinking beer through such a tube resembled the act of fellatio (Athenaeus, Deipnosophists, 10.447).

39.

Patrick E. McGovern, Ancient Wine: The Search for the Origins of Viniculture (Princeton: Princeton Univ. Press, 2003), pp. 279–298.

40.

Ebeling and Homan, “Brewing Beer as Women’s Technology in Ancient Israel.”

41.

McGovern, Ancient Wine, p. 265 ff.

42.

Michael M. Homan, “Beer Production by Throwing Bread into Water: A New Interpretation of QOH. XI 1–2, ” Vetus Testamentum 52, no. 2 (2002), pp. 275–278.