so...for something to be tea, that would imply it comes from a specific plant/tea leaves? Therefore, spearmint tea isn’t tea and doesn’t break any rules.
The prohibition is on "hot drinks" but then I always heard that this phrase was defined as "coffee or tea," and so hot chocolate wasn't illicit, unless to some fanatics somewhere.
Furthermore I ALWAYS heard/learned that "tea" referred to tea from the tea plant, and not to herbal teas such as spearmint. Always, without fail. So drinking herbal tea is also not against the WoW, anymore than a "hot drink" of a mug of soup.
I gather that the "what about soft drinks" long-running debate has been finally settled in favor of "go ahead and drink it." So only coffee and true tea remain banned, as far as I know.
I'm going to extend my remarks. Pre-modern people in England had hot herbal drinks. They relied on them for much of whatever medical treatment they could muster for various ailments. They didn't call them "tea" because that word didn't even make it into the language until the 17th-18th centuries when tea was introduced from the Far East by way of traders from Holland, and became a craze the English have never abandoned.
The word "Te" was used in the coastal province of Fujian where the Dutch ships took the stuff aboard, and so the word te/tee/the/tea became commonplace in Holland, Germany, France, and Great Britain. It was originally only the new kind of drink from China. By a kind of back-formation, people later began to call the hot herbal concoctions spearmint tea, camomile tea, etc. But in origin "tea" only referred to black or green tea from the plant Camellia Sinensis, the tea bush.
It's only a kind of linguistic accident that we call spearmint tea "tea" at all.
Cha/chai and other variations trace to the Mandarin dialect, in which "cha" was the word for the same thing as "te" in Fujian.
Basically in mormondom, tea is included in the "hot drinks" aren't good for you part. They link that to caffeine, and then link that to cold/ iced tea.
Technically you are correct, spearmint tea is OK.....because it doesn't contain caffeine.
However, any mormon zealot can easily take up the position that tea is tea is tea and it's all forbidden.....especially if served hot.
The herbal teas were acceptable to drink hot. No caffeinated teas would be however.
I knew many true blue sisters in the Relief Society who kept their stashes of herbal teas at home. If someone had Lipton black tea bags, OMG, that violated WoW. Just not the herbal kind.
Now that I have permission to drink what teas I really enjoy, an interesting switcharoo occurred. I no longer desire herbal teas but rarely. Now I prefer black or green teas. They are more energizing, with the antioxidant benefits that goes with them.
Brilliantly illustrates why it is impossible for any religion to legislate it's way into salvation, and aptly demonstrates how the very concept it might do so is in itself ludicrous.
For there will always be one bright thinking curious human who innocently asks the centipede how it walks.
zenjamin Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Brilliantly illustrates why it is impossible for > any religion to legislate it's way into salvation, > and aptly demonstrates how the very concept it > might do so is in itself ludicrous.
The term "any religion" is not applicable here, because the logic of this sentence seems to be applicable to Christianity only. If you said "any Christian denomination" then your statement would undoubtedly be closer to what I think is probably accuracy, but (though Christianity is not my area of any particular expertise) I think it might not apply to "all" Christian denominations either (and what I am thinking of are issues such as gay marriage, women in clergy leadership roles, etc.).
Remove the term "salvation" (which does not exist in Judaism, nor in any other religion I am aware of, with the possible exception of Islam), and Jewish religion (not to mention the fundamentals of Jewish education and culture) is built upon a continuing history of legislative argument. As I am typing this, I can say with complete confidence that there are countless thousands of yeshiva students and Jewish theological students worldwide arguing the legal issues of Judaism vehemently at this very moment.
> For there will always be one bright thinking > curious human who innocently asks the centipede > how it walks.
Yes!!!
This is, in fact, the continuing focus of Jewish parents and Jewish communities as a whole as they raise their children through the generations...
...that ideally, EVERY Jew should, at all times, BE that "curious human who innocently asks the centipede how it walks"...
...and then figure out the answer (at least eventually) by carefully observing what happens in the aftermath of that question. (In other words: it isn't just the confusion of the centipede which is important to observe and figure out, but also the underlying "why" of the confusion, and "how" that mental disruption interfaces with the subsequent physiological actions of each centipede foot.)
The overall effect of this kind of interactive, intellectual curiosity and debate to a community--ANY community!!--is to nurture the growth and development of all members of the community, for the overall benefit of not only that community, but literally ("tikkun olam": "repairing the world") the world as a whole.
Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/20/2018 07:35PM by Tevai.
This is such a taboo topic for mormons. It cracks me up honestly. My DW can't stand it when I drink coffee, but is completely down to guzzle Dr. Pepper every night of the week. She's also completely content when I drink energy drinks (way higher in sugar and caffeine than coffee-I'm pretty sure). But OMG touch the coffee and I'm a hell child.
I've always wondered if the entire coffee/tea/alcohol thing was because they are addictive. If you're spending money because you really want caffeine or alcohol, that's less money available to give to the church. Soda wasn't around when they made the WoW. It certainly wasn't for health reasons.
I've written before on this forum that I think that once the Mormon Church decided that there was nothing wrong with consuming caffeine, the only meaning left in the prohibition against coffee and tea is that abstaining from those two beverages is nothing more than a test of blind obedience to the Church hierarchy. At least when caffeine was prohibited, a Mormon could come up with some sort of philosophy about beverages containing caffiene -- perhaps that we need to find our inspiration and energy in the influence of the Holy Spirit and not from the effects of a psychoactive chemical. But to be consistent, the Church should at the same time have dropped the prohibition against coffee and tea.