i think it's not plausible at all that Noah didn't know what he was doing.
he had to have taken the grapeseed with him.
winemaking isn't simple - he had to cultivate those grapes, harvest them, make a winepress, process them & tend to them from mash to straining several times and finally bottling. that's not all accomplished in a few days; that's at least a year's worth of investment.
also i don't know what your experience is with drinking wine but one doesn't just drink to passing out by accident, either. the effects are gradual and noticeable. Noah would have definitely known he was experiencing intoxicating effects long before he finished his wine and fell asleep. this is only wine; it's not shots of strong liquor you might be able to imbibe several of before you realize how strong they were.
concurrent with all this is that his whole family watched him carrying out his plan to make wine for at least a year. they knew what he was doing, and that he knew how to do it. they knew that after the horrendous catastrophe of the flood and Noah spending all this time making wine, he would drink it when he finally had a completed product. Ham knew this. Ham knew Noah would probably drink himself to sleep, enjoying the fruit of his labour.
the other thing i think is that if what Noah did was sinful it's awfully strange that Noah curses Canaan and God carries out that curse.
how often do we find someone wicked speaking curses that God agrees with and causes to come to pass, hmm?
fact is that the narrative doesn't portray Noah as being at fault at all, unless you approach it with the preconceived notion that drinking any alcohol in any amount is evil. if that's the case you project that onto the text. but the text itself doesn't have that present in it - it presents Noah as being attacked when he is not on his guard - asleep - and Ham as the one who did evil. and it curses Canaan.
why Canaan is cursed is something that really has to be understood to make sense of this. for that we have to remember what happened before the flood ((that's still the context)) and what was found in Canaan later when God had Joshua carry out judgement on the land, and we have to figure out what happened to Lot, and why, with his daughters - what the relationship to Sodom was. we have to have an idea of exactly what Ham did and why he did it.
it is a very complex story, that ultimately is portraying something of Christ to us. so #1 goal in understanding Noah & Ham is finding how it testifies of Christ. it is not a story about 'drinking is bad yo see what happened' -- it is a story about the Messiah, about love, salvation, life and death. about God and Satan and the redemption of our souls.
so, what i honestly think is that you're projecting a misguided teetotaling attitude on the story, and you are winding up with nothing more than a superficial gloss from it. i think if you set that aside and try to figure out how this account is speaking about Genesis 3:15 and about the cross and the victory of Christ over sin, then you will find it is a much deeper & richer section of scripture than you currently imagine. it is spiritual; it is not about mere carnal rules like 'touch not taste not handle not' or simple earthly things -- something very profound is happening there.
he had to have taken the grapeseed with him.
winemaking isn't simple - he had to cultivate those grapes, harvest them, make a winepress, process them & tend to them from mash to straining several times and finally bottling. that's not all accomplished in a few days; that's at least a year's worth of investment.
also i don't know what your experience is with drinking wine but one doesn't just drink to passing out by accident, either. the effects are gradual and noticeable. Noah would have definitely known he was experiencing intoxicating effects long before he finished his wine and fell asleep. this is only wine; it's not shots of strong liquor you might be able to imbibe several of before you realize how strong they were.
concurrent with all this is that his whole family watched him carrying out his plan to make wine for at least a year. they knew what he was doing, and that he knew how to do it. they knew that after the horrendous catastrophe of the flood and Noah spending all this time making wine, he would drink it when he finally had a completed product. Ham knew this. Ham knew Noah would probably drink himself to sleep, enjoying the fruit of his labour.
the other thing i think is that if what Noah did was sinful it's awfully strange that Noah curses Canaan and God carries out that curse.
how often do we find someone wicked speaking curses that God agrees with and causes to come to pass, hmm?
fact is that the narrative doesn't portray Noah as being at fault at all, unless you approach it with the preconceived notion that drinking any alcohol in any amount is evil. if that's the case you project that onto the text. but the text itself doesn't have that present in it - it presents Noah as being attacked when he is not on his guard - asleep - and Ham as the one who did evil. and it curses Canaan.
why Canaan is cursed is something that really has to be understood to make sense of this. for that we have to remember what happened before the flood ((that's still the context)) and what was found in Canaan later when God had Joshua carry out judgement on the land, and we have to figure out what happened to Lot, and why, with his daughters - what the relationship to Sodom was. we have to have an idea of exactly what Ham did and why he did it.
it is a very complex story, that ultimately is portraying something of Christ to us. so #1 goal in understanding Noah & Ham is finding how it testifies of Christ. it is not a story about 'drinking is bad yo see what happened' -- it is a story about the Messiah, about love, salvation, life and death. about God and Satan and the redemption of our souls.
so, what i honestly think is that you're projecting a misguided teetotaling attitude on the story, and you are winding up with nothing more than a superficial gloss from it. i think if you set that aside and try to figure out how this account is speaking about Genesis 3:15 and about the cross and the victory of Christ over sin, then you will find it is a much deeper & richer section of scripture than you currently imagine. it is spiritual; it is not about mere carnal rules like 'touch not taste not handle not' or simple earthly things -- something very profound is happening there.