The
Bible and the Cannabis Plant
What
Does the Bible Teach about the Cannabis Plant?
Article ID: JAP385 By: H. Wayne House
The debate regarding the use of
marijuana has heated up considerably in recent years.
This has caused individual states to
decriminalize the use of marijuana.
There are many political, medical, and
scientific responses to this change in the acceptance of pot, but the evidence
is still strongly against such usage.
Separate from the medical question discussed
above, there is also now a change in how many Christians have come to the
defense of the use of marijuana, arguing that Scripture supports its use.
These Christians believe that the Bible
supports use of the drug or, at the least, marijuana is no more sinful than the
use of other drugs that Christians imbibe, such as tobacco, coffee, and
alcohol.
Though the medical and scientific evidence
regarding marijuana is important, my focus in this article relates to whether
the Bible truly supports its use by believers.
There are currently a plethora of websites,
often quoting each other to the point of plagiarism, that seek to support the
ethics of using marijuana.
They even tout biblical texts, or ancient
practice, to support their thesis. I will discuss these arguments.
The Biblical Text Used to Support the Use of
Cannabis.
Purportedly the Bible supports the
use of all the various seeds and herbs because they were created and blessed by
God and could not be wrong to use.
Consequently, the plant called hemp is proper
for Christians to use for food, medicine, and enjoyment (Genesis 1:12).
In Genesis 1:29–31, the Bible further
indicates that all herbs are given for food.
Much is made about the statement, found in the
KJV, which supposedly speaks of hemp being the plant spoken of in Ezekiel
34:29, called a “plant of renown,”
which would heal (Revelation
22:1–2).
First, I agree that God created everything, but this
argument does not address the problem that not all plants that are part of
creation are edible, or the fact that the original creation was impacted by
sin, so that some things created may no longer be in their original state.
One must use wisdom in discerning
the use of something made by God. It may be that its intended use is for
various products that do not involve ingestion.
Remember that hemlock and poison
mushrooms are part of creation but are deadly as food.
Second, there is no indication in the context of Ezekiel
34:29 or Revelation 22:1–2 that the hemp plant is in view, but in Ezekiel
34:29, marijuana supporters have based their thinking on a wrong translation of
the Hebrew.
The Hebrew maṭṭāʿ lešēm that the KJV translates as “plant of renown” should rather be translated in regards to the place of
planting and not to the plants themselves.
There Is Evidence of the Use of Drugs in the
Ancient Near East, Including Israel.
Although its mention by name is
uncertain, little question exists that the hemp plant was used in the Ancient
Near East, and likely in Israel, in a variety of ways, other than as a drug,
such as textiles, cords, incense, oils, and even seeds used for food.
The argument has been made that the reference
to herbs in Isaiah 18:4–5 concerns the cannabis plant, but it simply does not
use a designation that defines the term as hemp.
It is true that as early as 5000 BC what was
called a “joy plant,” possibly cannabis, was indulged in to induce sleep or a
trance.
Whether used in Israel, it is well known that
drugs from plants were tied both to medical applications and pagan activities,
including especially magic.
Galen, the ancient doctor, for example, speaks
at length of medical applications of intoxicating drugs (see also medical texts such as
Celsus, De medicina Prooemium 1.37).
Such a practice in the Israelite cults to
heighten communication with Yahweh is not found, even though the text of Exodus
30:22–29 is posited as an example of ceremonial use.
The argument is that the qaneh-bosem of
Exodus 30:22–29 is, in fact, a reference to cannabis, and that the common view
that it should be translated “sweet
calamus” is a mistranslation.
Such is not the case. The Hebrew qenêh-ḇōśem in Exodus 30:23 is the “sweet cane” of Scripture, probably the Andropogon calamus
aromatics, native to India.
Qaneh refers to a “water-plant”
or “stalk of grain”and bosem refers to “sweet” or a “sweet odor.”
Even if one could demonstrate that the
etymology of the word traced back to the Hebrew qenêh-ḇōśemwas cannabis, there is no evidence that the priests
ingested or smoked it.
The Bible Recognizes the Use and Abuse of
Drugs.
This is an argument by association
of alcoholic beverages in the New Testament—which is clearly discussed, both as
to the benefits of moderate use and as to the disastrous impact of excessive
use—with intoxicating plants.
Usually the fact that Jesus made wine at the
wedding at Cana (John
2:1–10) and passages
such as Proverbs 31:6–7 show the positive side, and Isaiah 5:10 gives the
negative.
Those who support the use of marijuana are
correct that the Bible presents alcohol in a positive light when used in
moderation and in a negative light when abused, as seen in the verses above and
others, but there is no mention at all of hemp plants being used as a drug in
the Bible.
The attempt is to try to bring a connection
with wine, and thus to say marijuana is OK. This is false.
Wine is a beverage used often with meals in
the Bible, and its effects are small and even healthy in moderation.
Even when wine is abused, it has little of the
residual impact of marijuana when used in even small proportions, so that
attempts to compare them fail.
It is plain that the argument by some that
wine was so watered down in the time of the New Testament that one could not
get drunk cannot be sustained because the New Testament itself forbids
drunkenness and at several points Christians, as well as Jesus, are accused of
being drunk (e.g., Acts
2:13; Luke 7:34).
On the other hand, the Bible does not provide
for moderate use of other intoxicating substances, so that sufficient parallels
cannot be drawn between the two substances to sustain a biblical case for the
Christian’s recreational or medical use of marijuana; the Scripture does not
mention either.
What We Can and Cannot Draw from the Bible on
Cannabis Use.
The following biblical
considerations appear relevant.
First, intoxication clearly is forbidden in Scripture (e.g., Ephesians 5:18), but though one can have a non-intoxicating
dose of wine, this is not so with cannabis, especially with the potent
varieties in today’s market.
Second, wine in the Bible is connected to dietary concerns
and is involved in, for example, the practice of table fellowship and weddings
in the Bible.
We may contrast this to cannabis,
which seems to have an exclusively intoxicating function.
Whereas wine will intoxicate only
with sustained use (and thus with restraint can have a strictly dietary use),
marijuana immediately intoxicates the user.
Third, part of the reason the Bible prohibits drunkenness,
it seems, is so that believers will not find themselves in a state in which
they are not able to discern the will of God.
Certainly, marijuana use jeopardizes
this in a way that the moderate use of wine does not.
Fourth, if the Bible intended for us to use marijuana in
moderation, as with wine, then why do we not find the same kinds of detailed
guidelines for drugs (including marijuana) that we do for wine and other
alcoholic beverages, since we know that many drugs were available and in use in
the first century?
In summary, the Bible has essentially nothing
to say about the use of cannabis or other drugs.
Even though many Christians now are attempting
to find justification for the use of marijuana, nothing they point to in the
Bible holds up under scrutiny.
Though the plant was known in the Ancient Near
East, it does not seem to be used in ancient Israel, as far as the biblical
record is concerned.
The attempt to find the hemp plant in Old
Testament passages cannot be substantiated from the Hebrew.
Also, to argue that all plants are acceptable
for our use because God created the universe is mistaken.
The curse changed our relation to the things
of the Earth, so that many uses of plants are harmful to us, such as hemlock
and poisonous mushrooms.
They have a purpose, but this does not mean
they are a food to eat or an herb to smoke.
Lastly, the attempt to compare the use of
marijuana with the moderate use of alcohol fails, since the Bible presents wine
as a table beverage, not harmful to the body unless abused.
.
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This article first
appeared in the Practical Hermeneutics column of the CHRISTIAN RESEARCHJOURNAL,
volume 38, number 05 (2015). The full text of this article in PDF format can be
obtained by clicking here. For further
information or to subscribe to the CHRISTIAN RESEARCHJOURNAL go to: http://www.equip.org/christian-research-journal/
H. Wayne House is a
distinguished research professor of theology, law, and culture at Faith
Evangelical College and Seminary in Tacoma, Washington, author of thirty-five
books, more than a hundred articles, and former president of the Evangelical
Theological Society.
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