What is the meaning of debauchery?

† Two words in this verse have bees subjected to no little violence. First, it is said that μεθύσκεσθε means drenched rather than "drunk;" secondly, that ἀσωτία means danger, not "excess." Now, it is certain that in the New Testament the regular word for drunkenness is μέθη, for drunkard μέθυσος, for making drunk μεθύσκω, and for getting drunk μεθύω, or, what is equivalent, the preceding word in Mid. as in our text. That μεθύει, in 1 Cor. 11:21, means "plentifully fed," is the mistaken notion of Mr. Ewing in his N. T. Lexicon. But πεινᾶ compels us to no such violence. Our own version faithfully represents the original, and makes good sense, in spite of the strictures of Archdeacon Jeffreys. The Septuagint translation of Ps. 36:8 is not parallel, because wine is not in question, and the expression is certainly figurative. The Vulgate also has the same — Inebriabunter ab ubertate domus tuae. Here, on the contrary, it is a question of literal eating and drinking. All admit that μ. may metaphorically mean "soaked," "steeped," as in oil or water. Hence it may also be transferred from the effect of wine to that of passion. But all this does not in the least weaken the proper meaning of the word. Accordingly, even in 1 Cor 11:21, we have the same idea given in the versions of Wiclif, (1380,) Tyndal, (1534.) Cranmer, (1539,) Geneva, (1557,) Rheims, (1582,) and the authorized. (1611.) It is the same sense in John 2:10, save in the Bible of Wiclif, who has "fulfilled." The ruler evidently did know the good wine from the had: he is merely describing the custom of substituting a worse wine when men could not discern the difference. That is, the context favours the common rendering. — Next, that ἀσωτία in the New Testament, means "excess," "prodigality," "dissoluteness," is manifest. It has just the same force in classic Greek. He who has read Aristotle's Eth. Nicom. may remember the sentence (ii. 7) — περὶ δὲ δόσιν χρημάτων καὶ λῆψιν, μεστὴς μὲν ἐλευθεριότης, ὑπερβολὴ δὲ καὶ ἔλλειψις, ἀσωτία καὶ ἀνελευθερία. Not danger but waste is the thought. So in Rhet. ii., where it is contrasted with φειδώ. This may justify our translators: though "riotousness" as given in the Rhemish, accords well with their own version of Titus 1:6, 1 Peter 4:4 and of a kindred word in Luke 15:13. Wiclif translated the last clause "wherein is lechery." But to say that he understood the evil to be a property of the wine, is as unwarrantable as to say that our translators meant "the excess" to be in the first drop. Just apply this notion to 1 Tim. 5:23, and we should have the Spirit of God advising Timothy to use a little "danger," or "excess," or even worse, for his stomach's sake. Their absurdity is not the worst thing about these pseudo-criticisms. It is evident, I think, that ἀσωτία refers to μεθ. οἴνῳ, not to one only, but both.

a) they were ungodly, impious and irreverent. This word (asebeiV) is a key word in Jude occurring several times. It suggests a lack of respect for God and deference for divine things. They were in some ways practical atheists, even if they professed a faith in God!

b) They turned the grace of God into lasciviousness (licentiousness). Their behaviour was outrageous; wholly shocking to public decency. Their shameless deeds were marked by wanton violence and unrestrained vice. This, in spite of their pretence to be using Christian liberty, only demonstrated that they were lewd fellows of the baser sort.

There are quite a few words in the Greek New Testament with the thought of luxury in them: streniao (Rev. 18:7, 9) tells of 'insolent luxury: ' luxuriated is the way the new Interlinear Greek Testament translates it. Truphao (James 5:5) tells of the effeminacy of luxury: 'lived daintily'. Spatalao (1 Tim. 5:6; James 5:5) tells of 'the wastefulness of luxury:' lived riotously. Aselgeia is 'the wantonness of luxury' (translated 'luxury' by Ronald Knox in Gal. 5:19: one of the works of the flesh). We find it four times in Peter's Epistles. The New Testament utterly condemns all this sort of thing. There we often read of 'prayer and fasting: ' what do we know of it today?

Hence the same apostle exhorts the saints that were in Ephesus to guard against exciting causes. "Be not drunk with wine whereby is dissoluteness, but be filled with the Spirit." Where He becomes the source and power of all within us, acts outward should be according to God's mind. Our singing even is meant to be so characterised that it may please Him Whom we praise, in no way carried away by sweet sound, but with the spirit and with the understanding also.

The use of wine is to be guarded — in it is excess, profligacy: the rather are we to be filled with the Spirit. This is a different thought from being sealed with the Spirit. The latter is God's work entirely, the Spirit being His gift to the believer, founded on redemption; but to be "filled" rests with ourselves in self-judgment and looking to Christ. How far do we hinder His operation within?

"And after not many days the younger son gathering all together went away into a country a long way off, and there dissipated his property, living in debauchery." There was eagerness to get away from his father. It was, as far as his will was concerned, a complete abandoning of his father to do his own pleasure. He wished to be so thoroughly at a distance as to act according to his own heart without restraint. There, in a far country, he wastes his substance with riotous living. It is the picture of a man left to himself, doing his own will in this world, with its ruinous consequences for the next as well as this. "But when he had spent all, there arose a violent famine throughout that country, and he began to be in want." Such, again, is the picture, not only of the active course of sin but of its bitter issues. Sin indulged in brings misery and want. There is a void that nothing can satisfy, and the selfish waste of all means only makes this to be more felt in the end.

200 The Lord here takes up the way in which the soul returns to God, and He chooses the case of one who had gone to excess of riot as the prodigal eating husks with the swine. Many have not done that, but He takes this case to shew that grace reaches him there, and that is God's delight - the joy of God, to bring him back and receive him. Remark this - the moment the soul has got hold of what God is, the grace of God has found entrance into the heart. It is not feeding on husks which is the worst thing; nor is there any real difference in people; some are upright and honest, others are sunk in debauchery; but as regards the heart, when you come to the root of the matter, there is not one bit of difference. Suppose I was brought up among thieves and drunkards, I would be a thief and a drunkard. It is a great mercy to be separate; that is connected with circumstances.

Impossible to conceive a sketch more graphically true. The younger son indicates very emphatically the sinner's path from his start in self-will and independency to open profligacy and the depths of degradation. Such were "some of you" even very far; such were most in a measure. We shall hear of another form of sin at least as evil before we have done. But this far country "knows what extreme famine is. No one gave him." But as the wasteful feel the pressure of dire want, so that even swine's fare becomes desirable, God turns all for good in His grace.

When the Lord Jesus was here on the earth He condensed the whole law into two commandments. "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. The second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself" (Matt. xxii). If the first and great commandment strikes at the root of idolatry, the second no less denounces the fruits of it. The sins forbidden in the second table of the law are the fruits of the flesh truly, but they flow direct from idolatry; and when the Lord Jesus said "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself," He summed up in a word the whole second table of the law. Idolatry forbids none, permits all, sanctions some; for the feasts observed in praise of their idols were the occasions for excess of riot, and debauchery was the incense offered to them. The morality of idolaters is on a par with their worship. Their moral sense was governed by superstition; this led them to vice that allowed no check.

We see the same in the following scripture: "Be not drunk with wine wherein is excess; but be filled with the Spirit; speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord" (Eph. 5:18-19). Without question we have here a warning against actual drunkenness; but I am sure you will agree with me that far more than that is suggested. Wine is that which exhilarates the natural man. It is a stimulant. It is also a type of joy. Here then we are warned against mere earthly joy, anything that merely exhilarates the natural man.