“No one tears a piece from a new garment”
No one tears a piece of cloth from a new garment and sews it on an old one. If he does, he will tear the new garment as well, and the patch from the new will not match the old… no one after drinking old wine wants new, for he says, 'The old is better.' (Luke 5:36–39 BSB)
What it sounds like today
Quaint imagery about incompatibility.
The cultural key
Two household facts: a patch of new, unwashed cloth shrinks with the first rain and rips the old garment it was meant to mend; wine was stored in whole goatskins, and fermentation stretches the skin: a fresh skin flexes; an old one, already stretched taut and brittle, bursts. Everyone had seen both failures. Luke sharpens the folly: his patcher cuts up a new garment to mend an old one, ruining both, where Matthew's merely used unshrunk cloth. And Luke alone appends the wry coda about old wine tasting better: a knowing nod at how comfortable the old order feels to those inside it, and why the new is resisted.
Recovered meaning
The kingdom Jesus brings is still fermenting: alive, expanding. Forcing it into existing forms (the fasting customs just questioned) destroys both. New wine demands new skins; 'both are preserved' shows the goal is preservation, not demolition.