Bible Stories: What’s Wrong with Pouring New Wine into Old Wineskins?
Today we’re going
to tell you what wineskins are, and perhaps, the meaning of the words of Christ
will be more clear for you. Neither is
new wine put in old wineskins; for if it is, the skins burst and are torn in
pieces, and the wine is spilled and the skins are ruined. But new wine is put
into fresh wineskins, and so both are preserved. (Matthew 9:17).
What did ancient vessels look like?
Wineskins are
leather bags of some sort, which were used for carrying liquids. People in
ancient times could not use clay or stone vessels to carry water or wine with
them on the go: they could break and were generally too heavy. That is where
wineskins came in handy. The wineskins were bags made of animal skins (e.g.,
goat or camel skin). The skin was treated thoroughly and then sewn in such a
manner so as to leave only one hole (where the animal’s neck had been), which
served as the bottleneck. You might have guessed that wineskins came in various
sizes depending on the size of the animal. They could be so huge that they held
up to 18 bucketfuls of water.
New wineskins, like
other leather products, were soft and flexible. That is why new wine was to be
poured into new wineskins: fermentation continued within the soft vessel and
the gases stretched it a bit. Old wineskins became stiff and more
tearing-prone. That was why fermentation of new wine could cause them to burst.
In that case, both the wine was spilled and the skins were ruined.
Where else does the Holy Scripture mention wineskins?
We read an
interesting story in the Old Testament. Residents of Gibeon came to Joshua to
make a peace deal with the Israeli people. Trying to fool the Israelites, they
wear old clothes and take old wineskins with them, so that Joshua could believe
that they had made a very long journey. They had to do so because God had
forbidden the Israelites to make peace with their nearest neighbours (the
Canaanites, to which Gibeonites belonged). Israeli elders were fooled, and the
residents of Gibeon had their way thanks to this trick. When their trick was
discovered, they could not be punished with death because the elders swore to
keep them alive. Although Joshua didn’t exterminate the liars, he turned them
into slaves: Now therefore ye are cursed,
and there shall none of you be freed from being bondmen, and hewers of wood and
drawers of water for the house of my God. (cf. Joshua 9:23).
We learn more about
the characteristics of the wineskins from the Psalter of King David, For I have become like a wineskin in the
smoke, yet do I not forget Thy statutes. (Ps. 119:83). It points at the
fact that the leather vessels were blackened with smoke and became very dark.
The Psalmist basically uses this image to point out that he has become black
from grief.
The Meaning of the Parable of the Old Wineskins
It is especially
important to pay attention to the context of this parable. Some disciples of
John the Baptist asked Jesus why his disciples didn’t fast. He responded with
this parable, thus making it clear through simple images that one cannot lay a
serious burden on someone who isn’t ready for it yet. Saint Ignatius
Bryanchaninov explains it perfectly, “It is not only sin that is devastating
for us. Even good actions can be harmful when we do good at a wrong time or out
of measure. Thus, not only hunger but also eating too much food or consuming
food, which doesn’t correspond to your age and physical needs, can be bad for
your health… The Lord used this parable to emphasise that acts of virtue must
by all means correspond to the condition of the actor, or else they will damage
the actor and perish, that is, they will be to no avail and will turn out to be
harmful for the soul, in contrast to what they were intended for.”
By Ilja Alekseev
Illustrations by Irina Savritskaya
St. Elisabeth Convent
December 6, 2018
