I don't like smoking or the smoke of someone else blown in my face. But I think this is an area we have largely been influenced by culture rather than the Bible. Back when "everyone" smoked I don't recall many folks making a biblical argument against it. But when it became politically incorrect to smoke we all got on that bandwagon. In the 1960s preachers that smoked were held in high esteem. Today a minister might run off with his church secretary and be able to stay in the ministry, but could not in many places be a pastor if he smokes.
Now, I don't want to go back to the former days of smoke. But we also need some introspection on how we were driven to the position we hold.
That has been my position, too-- that smoking was quite acceptable until the 1960's-early 70's when measures began to be taken to forbid it in public places (
enclosed public places at that time). And
then the Bible started to be used to push this anti-smoking movement further. There were, of course, venues in which smoking had never been acceptable, at least in most cases-- in church, in a courtroom, and in schools janitors had to smoke outside or in the broom closet. I do remember in 1969, at 10 years old and a new Christian, I went to to an RA (Royal Ambassadors) camp at a local lake, and they showed an anti-smoking film with depictions of rotten lungs and a man who defended smoking, saying he was in good health at age 45, but when he caught his teenage son smoking he jumped on him about it. The son expectedly reminded his dad of his support of smoking-- for himself-- and the dad replied, "Yes-- but I didn't start when I was fourteen!" I was naive about business, being a working class kid, so I asked this older guy I came with why, if cigarettes are so bad, do they make them. This future CPA said "They do it to make money," which I did not think could be so bad So all in all, what little impression that film made turned out to be almost nothing, except that I avoided cigarettes, which so many of my peers smoked, and went for a pipe when I was 16.
It seemed to be then that I started hearing the Bible being invoked in the issue. At school there was an attempt to begin a smoking room for students because the restroom could become so smoke-filled between classes. A member of my church wrote a letter to the editor of the local paper against this proposition, and quoting the Bible about the body being the temple. I had become an avid reader of the Bible by then, and my 'research' showed that "your" in
your body is plural, so it means the assembly of believers, not an individual's body-- so I had my argument if one was needed. Then a year or so later that same woman who wrote the letter came with another to visit my mother, and they sat in the living room, where my pipe and tobacco were on the coffee table. My mom mentioned that, saying she would have hidden them if she had known they were coming. But I was glad she came and saw them there-- I guess we are all at least a little rebellious as teens. This lady later took a job in a drug store, and as I understand she refused to sell tobacco products to customers, and the store always got someone else to do that when she was asked. Now, stores typically don't so the same thing for those who do not wish to sell birth control products, or other things.
But yes, the church followed, rather than led, in the anti-smoking movement. Really, a similar conclusion can be said about other public issues, such as race relations. Only when change has begun and more is inevitable were there lessons and sermons on the subjects. Were churches trying to put in their bids for the spoils? Maybe. Many churches, of course, are still doing this with 'gender identification' and such stuff.
