WHEN SATAN QUOTES SCRIPTURE.

Taranaki Daily News, 23 September 1922, Page 9

WHEN SATAN QUOTES SCRIPTURE.

A DISCREDITABLE PRINT. The Liquor Party is growing reckless. Not content with posing as the heavensent champions of British Liberty, it assumes the role of Bible expositor, prophet of righteousness, and defender of pure religion! It is not a prettv sight. Truth to tel), it is indecent. Since when I has the drink traffic stood for the church and religion? It is an old and discredited device. ‘"Beer and the Bible” is a banner which has floated over many a Tory stronghold in England, but for the eake of common decency, we wish the flag had not been unfurled in New Zealand. We know Satan can quote scripture, but when he does, the lovers of truth should examine the text. When the wolf professes solicitude for the safety of the flock, the shepherd should guard well his muttons. An essay on “Loyalty to a Friend,” written by Judas Iscariot, is adding insult to injury. When “the Trade,” which, more than any other single cause, is responsible for the wreckage of hornet, the ruin of men, the corruption of the State, and the hindrance of the Kingdom of God, masquerades in the livery of heaven to do the devil’s work, protest is demanded. Let brewers and publicans use any legitimate argument they can find, for they need them all, but hands off the Bible, hands off religion, and, above all, hands off the Saviour of Men. We believe that many decent folk who do not profess to be prohibitionists or saints will resent the insult done to sacred things by the crude and blasphemous pamphlet delivered from door to door. BEERIO AND THE BIBLE. The publican’s Bible is small and tkin, and not well read at that. If we may judge from his pamphlet, his bible consists of a text in the Book of Judges, a bit from the Douai Bible, the Miracle of Cana of Galilee, a single sentence from Saint Paul to Timothy, and a reference to the Lord’s Supper. The rest is calmly ignored. Beerio seems not to know that for forty years in the wilderness the whole nation of Israel practised total abstinence, for the Providence that watched over them did not ordain that the vine should follow them, or even a brewer’s cart. Beerio seems not to know that the Nazarites and the Rechabites, pledged abstainers, w"re specially commended by God, and that Samson, Israel’s champion, was a Nazarite. Beerio may like to memorise what John Milton wrote of Samson: “Oh J madness to think of strongest wines, And strongest drinks our chief support to health, When God, with these forbidden, made choice to rear His mighty champion, strong beyond compare. Whose drink was only of the limpid brook.” No one denies that intoxicating drinks were known in Bible lands, and no one, save the’ Liquor Party, denies that their use is sternly condemned in precept and example —use, mind, not in immoderate quantities, but use even in moderate quantities. The wine praised in the Old Testament is “wine in the cluster,” that is juice of the grape, and we have no quarrel with that. Our quarrel is with doctored and fortified stuff in the bottle, stid more wine in the glass, and most of all wine in the man. When the Bible speaks of “wine that maketh glad the heart of man,” and a little further on compares wine to the poisonous bite of a serpent and an. adder, commonsense should teach us that it is not speaking of one and the same thing. THE MARRIAGE OF CANA. Beerio regards this as convincing. Did not our Lord turn water into wine, and diu He not use it in the Holy Supper? Beerio must read his thin little bible again, and he must first wipe his spectacles that he may see clearly. If he should by any chance have a copy of the ’"Waymouth” translation or Dr. Moffatt’s version, or “The Twentieth Century” New Testament, let him read. He will find that each of the six waterpots held from twenty to thirty gallons —say I'2o gallons in all. Let him turn to Pearson in his article on “Poisons,” I and he will discover that six ounces of i alcohol is a fatal dose. But ten per j cent, of alcohol in 120 gallons of wine ■ would give you 12 gallons of pure alcoJ hoi. Did the Saviour of Men supply a i rustic wedding party with twelve gali lons of pure alcohol? Did He “show | forth His glory” by turning harmless water into sufficient doses of poison to slay 320 persons? The thing is unthinkable save by Beerio. Besides, if the Liquor Party could prove that the wine our Lord made was mildly alcoholic it would affect the position. The position of Palestine and New Zealand are totally different. Farrar says: “Palestine was a country almost entirely free from intemperance.” Of all the crowds who came to Christ, we read of no dipsomaniacs, of no despairing Wives and mothers pleading on behalf of husbands and sons, the slaves of drink. If the Son of Man came to this Dominion, what tragic stories He would hear! What burning words of indignation He would utter against “the Trade”! THE QUESTION is not the academic one: Did Jesus Christ make or use “wine in the cluster”? The burning question is, would He be an apologist for and a supporter of the liquor Traffic as we know it? Can we imagine Him holding brewery ehares. Can we think of Him behind the bar of a New’ Zealand hotel? The very suggestion is almost blasphemous. We can no more suppose Him being a moderate drinker in New Zealand today than we can imagine Him a moderate slave holder in America sixty years ago. To suggest that the Redeemer used alcoholic liquor in the Lord’s Supper is a gratuitous insult. The word “wine” is not used in either of the Gospels. Three of the Evangelists describe the drink u»ed as “the fruit of the vine.” TIMOTHY’S STOM KCH. Beerio should give that text a long rest. Poor Timothy! How he has suffered at the hands of a self indulgent multitude, who claim him as an example, though he had nothing in common with them. The passage really tells against the moderate drinker, for it is evident that Timothy had been a total abstainer, and that Saint Paul regarded wine as a medicine rather than a be\era*e. Prohibition would not prohibit the use of wine or spirits under a doctor’s orders. In conclusion, does not the whole spirit of our Holy faith, the spirit which has its supreme manifestation in the strength of the Cross, call each one of us to cease to countenance by example or practise this deadly traffic and bring it to an end as soon as we can? (Published by arrangement with the Taranaki Prehibitioa Council.)