Let him drink, and forget his poverty, and remember his misery no more.
The verse stands in the section called the words of Lemuel, which is believed to be of later date. The word for wine there is general, covering both sweet, cheering wine and intoxicating wine, and its occurrence here is no endorsement of intoxicating drink. The saying is conditional, stating what follows if drink is given, not commanding or approving the giving of intoxicating drink. It concerns one who is ready to perish, one dying in pain and anguish, and those who are deeply afflicted.
For such cases it allows wine to cheer the deeply afflicted and strong drink to relieve the suffering of the dying as an anesthetic, even as sedatives, narcotics, or powerful drugs may be used to ease pain. At the same time it shows that strong drink dulls awareness of poverty and misery and works as a moral anesthetic, letting the drinker forget his troubles by blinding him to his true condition and needs and putting him beyond the reach of help.
That forgetting comes from alcohol's depression of the brain and exhaustion of the nerve centers; its temporary numbing depresses memory, while continued use permanently injures memory by destroying brain cells. Alcohol may dull pain or ease the experience of dying, and narcotic drugs may make a poor man feel for a time wiser or stronger and unaware of his real condition, but this is not genuine relief because it does not restore the body's power to resist disease and death. Taken as authorizing drink for one near death, the words are also taken to authorize wine for people in distress to forget poverty and misery, which is the reasoning behind trying to drown sorrows in alcohol; by clouding the mind this keeps men from seeking the comfort of God and from discerning their faults and need of divine help.
The verse stands in the section called the words of Lemuel, which is believed to be of later date. The word for wine there is general, covering both sweet, cheering wine and intoxicating wine, and its occurrence here is no endorsement of intoxicating drink. The saying is conditional, stating what follows if drink is given, not commanding or approving the giving of intoxicating drink. It concerns one who is ready to perish, one dying in pain and anguish, and those who are deeply afflicted.
For such cases it allows wine to cheer the deeply afflicted and strong drink to relieve the suffering of the dying as an anesthetic, even as sedatives, narcotics, or powerful drugs may be used to ease pain. At the same time it shows that strong drink dulls awareness of poverty and misery and works as a moral anesthetic, letting the drinker forget his troubles by blinding him to his true condition and needs and putting him beyond the reach of help.
That forgetting comes from alcohol's depression of the brain and exhaustion of the nerve centers; its temporary numbing depresses memory, while continued use permanently injures memory by destroying brain cells. Alcohol may dull pain or ease the experience of dying, and narcotic drugs may make a poor man feel for a time wiser or stronger and unaware of his real condition, but this is not genuine relief because it does not restore the body's power to resist disease and death. Taken as authorizing drink for one near death, the words are also taken to authorize wine for people in distress to forget poverty and misery, which is the reasoning behind trying to drown sorrows in alcohol; by clouding the mind this keeps men from seeking the comfort of God and from discerning their faults and need of divine help.