Forbidden – and yet on everyone’s lips: wine in pre-modern Islamic culture

Wine, in particular, has been an important theme for centuries, not only in everyday life across many regions, but above all in literature, poetry and spirituality. The lecture begins by exploring how the Qur’an speaks of alcohol and how the well-known prohibition developed from this. It then presents various examples from pre-modern Islamic literature: from Persian poems on winemaking, through famous advisory texts for rulers, to mystical wine poetry.

This shows that, in Islamic culture, wine was far more than just a drink. It could be a luxury item, a social symbol, a literary motif and a religious metaphor all at once. But what does this say about our understanding of Islam? What conclusions can be drawn from the contradictions and ambiguities surrounding the treatment of wine?