(2.) IWf I'Kuf- sweet, or " new wine," which, as well as the former, seems, from the use made of it (Acts ii, 13), to signify wine of an intoxicating (luality. "These men are full of new wine," to which charge Peter replies, "These men are not drunken as ye suppose" (v, 15), al- though Dr. Lees's interpretation is fairly admissible that the language is that of mockery, as if we should say of a drunken man. He has taken too much water. The (jleukos was the fruit of the grape, so kept as to preserve its sweetness, " perhaps made of a remarkablj' sweet, small grape, which is understood by the Jewish exposi- tors to be meant hy sorek (~"lw, (ien. xlix, 11), or so- rekdh (nD"ib, Isa. v, 2), and still found in Syria and Arabia" (Alford, On Acts ii, 13). So Suidas, to cnro- aTa\ayf.ia Tt)Q (TTCi^vXrjc irpiv Trflr/jSi). It could not be new wine, in the proper sense of the term, inasmuch as about eight months must have elapsed between the vintage and the feast of Pentecost. It might have been a|)plicd, just as musium was bj' the Romans, to wine that had been preserved for about a year in an un- fermented state (Cato, Be Re Rustica, c. 120). But the explanations of the ancient lexicographers rather lead us to infer that its luscious qualities were due, not to its being recently made, but to its being produced from the very purest juice of the grape; for both in Uesychius and the E/i/moloyicitni Maffiuim the term yXevKoc is ex- plained to be the juice that flowed spontaneously from the grape before the treading commenced. The name itself, therefore, is not conclusive as to its being an mi- fermented liquor, while the context implies the reverse — for Peter would hardly have offered a serious defence to an accusation that was not seriously made; and yet if the .sweet wine in question were not intoxicating, the accusation could onlv have been ironical (see Walch, De Nutura rov yXivicovi: [Jen. 1755]).
As considerable stress is laid upon the quality of sweetness as distinguished from strength, we may ob- serve that the usual term for the inspissated juice of the grape, which was characterized more especially by sweet- ness, was debdsh (TT^'l), rendered in the A. V. "honej^" (Gen. xliii, 11 ; Ezek. .xxvii, 17). This was prepared by boiling it down either to a third of its original bulk, in which case it was termed sapa by the Latins and 'f4/r]fia or aipoior by the Greeks, or else to half its bulk, in w-hich case it was termed defruturn (Pliny, xiv, 11). Both the substance ami the name, under the form of dibs, are in common use in Syria at the present day.
We may further notice a less artificial mode of pro- ducing a sweet licjuor from ihe grape, namely, by press- ing the juice directlv into the cu[), as described in Gen. xl, 11.
Lastly, there appears to have been a beverage, also of a sweet character, produced by macerating grapes, and hence termed the '"liquor" (ni'J^) of grapes (Numb, vi, 3). These later preparations are allowed in the Koran (xvi, 69) as substitutes for wine.
(3.) Vivv7]^a, or yfV/jjua, Trje dfnriXov, fruit of the vine=wine (Luke xxii, 18).
(4.) OZrof uKparog, pure wine (Rev. xiv, 10) — oh'ov uKparov tivai XfyoyufV, (;j ;i/^ p^uKTai to vSiop, ?/ ■KavTciwamv oX'iyov fi^HKTai (Galen in Wettstein, cited by Alford). Here the phrase is used figuratively. See below.
(5.) "OSor, sour wine, or vinegar (Jlatt. xxvii, 48 ; Mark xv, 36, etc.).
(6.) 'S.iKfpn (A. V. " strong drink ;" Ileb. "iSTT), "any strong drink made of grapes" (Robinson, Alford, etc.).
II. Historical iXotices of the Use of Wim in the Bible. — The first instance we have of wine in the Old Test, is in the case of Noah, who "planted a vinevard, and did drink of the wine (ydyin), and was drunken" (Gen. ix, 20,21). The culture of the vine no doubt existed be- fore, but the patriarch now resumes the occupation which had been interrupted by the P'lood. " Nowhere
does the vine grow spontaneously in such abundance and excellence as in the region of Ararat, in Armenia, and the Eastern Pontus; but, no doubt, the culture of the vine was of remote anti(iuity, invented by one nation and spread to other countries; for thus only can the re- markable circumstance be accounted for that wine bears the same name in almost all P^astern and Western na- tions" (Kalisch, On Gen. ix, 20, 21). " It may be added that the Egyptians attributed the manufacture of wine to Osiris, the Phoenicians and Greeks to Bacchus, the Romans to Saturn" (ibid.). See Vine.
The second notice of wine is in the history of Lot, whose daughters "made their father drink wine" (i/dyiii), so that he became stupidly intoxicated ((>en. xix, 32, etc.). It next occurs in Isaac's blessing pro- nounced on Jacob: "The Lord give thee . . . plenty of corn and wine" (ydyin) (Gen. xxvii, 28). The next notice of the juice of the grape (although, be it ob- served, the product is not called wine) is in connection with Egypt (Gen. xl, 11), when the chief butler says, " I took the grapes and pressed them into Pharaoh's cup." Are we to take these words according fo their strict literality? Did the kings of Egypt, at the time, drink the unfermented juice of the grape only ? How- ever that may be, and although an affirmative answer seems demanded, yet we know that the vine was culti- vated in Egypt from very ancient times, representations of the process of the manufacture of wines being found on tombs belonging to the 4th dynasty; that wine was used almost universally by the rich ; that it was freely drunk at the banquets of both men and women, and even excessively, as the monuments abundantly testify; that it was drunk even by the priests, and offered in the temples to their gods. All this is now well ascertained, notwithstanding the contradictory statements of He- rodotus on some points (see Rawlinson, Herod, ii, 103, 126; Wilkinson, .4 ??c. Egypt, i, 144. etc.). It has been inferred from a passage in Plutarch {J>e Isid. (i) that no wine was drunk in Egypt before the reign of Psam- metichus, and this passage has been quoted in illustra- tion of Gen. xl, 11. The meaning of the author seems rather to be that the kings subsequently to Psammeti- chus did not restrict themselves to the quantity of wine prescribe<:l to them by reason of their sacerdotal office (Diod. i. 70).