he shall separate himself from wine and strong drink. He shall drink no vinegar of wine, or vinegar of fermented drink, neither shall he drink any juice of grapes, nor eat fresh grapes or dried.
A nazirite shall not eat fresh grapes
The cited verse
The Hebrew (Masoretic Text)
וַעֲנָבִים לַחִים וִיבֵשִׁים לֹא יֹאכֵל
In Maimonides’ words
How Maimonides defines this commandment in his Sefer HaMitzvot — his own words, shown as a primary source.
הזהיר הנזיר מאכול ענבים וכשאכל ענבים כזית לוקה. והוא אמרו וענבים לחים ויבשים לא יאכל. (נשא את ראש, הפלאה הלכות נזירות פ"א):
He prohibited the nazirite from eating grapes; and if he ate a kazayit of grapes, he is lashed. And that is His saying, "nor shall he eat grapes fresh or dried" (Numbers 6:3). (See Parashat Nasso; Mishneh Torah, Nazariteship 1.)
Hebrew: Sefer HaMitzvot, Warsaw 1883 (public domain). English: Sefaria Edition, trans. Rabbi Francis Nataf, 2021 (CC0). Via Sefaria; translator’s footnotes omitted.
Literary form: a prohibition
Applicability
How the catalog describes where and when this commandment applies. These are independent descriptions, not a verdict on which laws still count.
- Recorded as practiced today
Classical halakhic consequences
The consequences the classical halakhah attaches to this commandment, grouped by who imposes them. Where a category has none recorded, that absence is itself meaningful.
Imposed by a court
- Lashes (malkot)
At the hands of Heaven
No divinely-imposed consequence is recorded.
Ritual remedy
No ritual remedy is recorded.
How the streams of Judaism treat this commandment
The streams of Judaism read the same commandment differently — an ongoing plurality, not a ranking. Each position below is reported as the catalog records it; none is presented as the correct one.
- Orthodox Binding
- Conservative Binding
- Reform Not binding
- Reconstructionist Not binding
- Karaite As the catalog records it: not applicable
24 of 613 commandments have been examined in depth so far — this one is queued.
How later traditions received this commandment
How later traditions read or reworked this commandment, each attributed to its own voice. The catalog’s own classification of each reception is shown as it records it, never adopted as GEBible’s.
Rabbinic aggadah
- Numbers Rabbah 10:4 expanded it homiletically
- b. Nazir 4b expanded it homiletically
Philo of Alexandria
- De Specialibus Legibus 1.247-254 read it allegorically
Josephus
- Ant. 4.72 rationalized it
- War 2.313-314 The catalog describes this reception as: attested Attests Bernice's nazirite vow in Jerusalem, evidencing continuing practice
The New Testament
- Acts 18:18 affirmed it Paul's hair-cutting in connection with a vow is sometimes read as nazirite-related, though the identification is debated among scholars
- Acts 21:23-24 affirmed it Paul sponsors four men under a nazirite vow, presupposing the institution's continuing practice
- Luke 1:15 carried a parallel John the Baptist's abstinence from wine and strong drink echoes nazirite-style consecration
Beside the older legal codes of its world
The commandment set beside the ancient Near-Eastern legal collections scholars compare it to — a descriptive comparison, not a claim of dependence.
- ugaritic texts wine and vine products figure prominently in the Ugaritic divine-assembly feast imagery associated with El and Baal; this provides cultural background for the symbolic weight of vine products but does not constitute a parallel to the votive abstinence institution itself Relationship to the parallel: shared theme Baal Cycle KTU 1.3 ii 40-iii 10; KTU 1.4 iii 40-iv 45 Smith and Pitard, The Ugaritic Baal Cycle, vol. 1 (Brill, 1994)
Where this commandment meets modern human-rights frameworks
One modern normative lens, attributed to it — not GEBible’s assessment. Each row names the framework it measures against and the catalog’s own classification of the relation.
This framework catalogues tensions; it records agreement in only one of its entries. The near-total tension rate is the shape of the instrument, not a finding.
-
general principle
This framework classifies the relation as a direct contradiction.
Mishnah Nazir 6:1 prescribes lashes for consuming fresh grapes while under a nazirite vow; modern proportionality principles preclude corporal punishment for a dietary infraction that constitutes no harm to any third party, even when the restriction was self-imposed.
-
general principle
This framework classifies the relation as an incompatible method.
Post-Enlightenment penal codes do not recognize breach of a religious dietary vow as a criminal offense, and the enforcement method of flogging is rejected across virtually all contemporary legal systems.
-
rabbinic tradition
This framework classifies the relation as abrogated in practice.
Rabbinic tradition holds that capital and corporal jurisdiction lapsed with the dissolution of the Sanhedrin in the Second Temple era; the malkot sanction for nazirite violations is de jure but not de facto enforced.