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The Amazing Ellen White
By Herbert E. Douglass, Th.D. © By Author, 2000
In September, 1997, while enjoying the spectacular Pacific coast along
Highway 101, Norma and I tuned in on Paul Harvey’s noon broadcast. Toward
the end of his broadcast we looked at each other and gasped—Paul was
talking about our favorite author.
In his own inimitable way he said: “I can name an American woman author
[whose] writings have been translated into 148 languages. More than Marx
or Tolstoy, more than Agatha Christie, more than William Shakespeare. Only
now is the world coming to appreciate her recommended prescription for
optimum spiritual and physical health. Ellen White. You don’t know her?
Get to know her!”
Since her death in 1915, enormous scientific research tumbles off the
computer validating her far-seeing health principles in many areas
including a wholistic view of the human person, psychosomatic medicine,
nutritional health, the value of exercise, and a long, careful look at the
use of drugs.
As early as 1848, Ellen White was making clear statements regarding the
harmful effects of tobacco, tea, and coffee. This at a time when tobacco
was recommended for healing tuberculosis! And when the impact of caffeine
was not a research topic.
In 1863, Ellen had a vision which outlined health principles that may seem
so “ho hum” today. But at the time when she wrote out these fresh
insights, Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, professor of anatomy at Harvard
University (later, Supreme Court Justice) wrote that “if the whole materia
medica, as now used, could be sunk to the bottom of the sea, it would be
all the better for mankind—and all the worse for the fishes.”
In the middle 19th Century, purging, puking, and drugging were still
conventional household notions of how to best treat the various diseases.
The typical American diet was loaded with fats and sweets that had much to
do with most of their diseases. The cause of disease was blamed on either
the will of God or imbalance of bodily fluids, or foul odors, or even
night air.
So, in 1863, when Ellen White pointed out certain dangers in conventional
medical practice and in prevailing notions of what caused disease, it came
as one big surprise to most everybody, even to those in her own family!
If you lived in 1863, not 2000, you can imagine how startling it was to
hear such concepts as: the danger of eating swine’s flesh (before the
discovery of trichinosis); that tobacco was a slow poison; that rich cake,
pies, and pudding are injurious; adequate time must be allowed between
meals; poisonous drugs kill more people than all other causes of death
combined; pure water should be used freely in maintaining health and
curing illnesses (in a day when baths were rarely recommended); nature
alone has curative powers; common medicines, such as strychnine, opium,
calomel, mercury, and quinine, are poisons; obeying the laws of health
will prevent many illnesses; God is too often blamed for deaths caused by
violation of nature’s laws; many invalids have no physical cause for their
illnesses, only their diseased imagination; cheerful, physical labor will
help to create a healthy, cheerful disposition; many die of disease caused
wholly by eating flesh food; outdoor exercise is very important to health
of mind and body; and willpower has much to do with resisting disease and
soothing nerves.
Not all these concepts were brand new. Many of them were pushed here and
there by lecturers and writers who floated them in oceans of other notions
that soon evaporated in the light of research. What was singular and
lasting about Ellen White’s writings on health was the remarkable
spiritual context in which she placed her health messages. Further, her
distinctive formulation of health principles that recognized principles
only then emerging here and there, also was able to reject all that which
would soon prove silly and worthless.
One of the first promoters of her principles was young Dr. John Harvey
Kellogg, who became world famous as the superintendent and chief surgeon
of the Battle Creek Sanitarium in Battle Creek, Michigan. The guest list
in this, the largest health institution in the world, included presidents
of the United States, industrial magnates, leading inventors, and other
world leaders.
In 1897, Dr. Kellogg said: “It is impossible for any man who has not made
a special study of medicine to appreciate the wonderful character of the
instruction that has been received in these writings. It is wonderful . .
. when you look back over the writings that were given us thirty years
ago, and then perhaps the next day pick up a scientific journey and find
some new discovery that the microscope has made, or that has been brought
to light in the chemical laboratory—I say, it is perfectly wonderful how
correctly they agree in fact. . . . There is not a single principle in
relation to the healthful development of our bodies and minds that is
advocated in these writings from Sister White, which I am not prepared to
demonstrate conclusively from scientific evidence.”
One of Ellen White’s graphic statements that has galvanized millions is:
“Pure air, sunlight, abstemiousness, rest, exercise, proper diet, the use
of water, trust in divine power—these are the true remedies.”
In her unambiguous teaching regarding the healthful diet, she summarized
in 1905 what she had been emphasizing for decades. She wrote: “grains,
fruits, nuts, and vegetables constitute the diet chosen for us by our
Creator.”
What should we think about all this?
The late Dr. Clive M. McCay, professor of nutrition at Cornell’s New York
State College of Agriculture and Life Sciences (where he taught for
thirty-seven years—1925-1962), was recognized worldwide as a pioneer and
authority in nutritional theory, research, and history.
After coming into contact with the health principles of Ellen White
through Helen Chen, a 20-year-old Seventh-day Adventist graduate student,
he wanted to know more about her church and its health teachings.
Eventually he received Counsels on Diet and Foods at his request. This
book, a compilation of Ellen White materials on a healthful diet and its
relation to physical, mental, and spiritual health, also dates and lists
the source of the various extracts. Since McCay believed that anything
written before 1900 was unscientific, he urgently asked Helen: “Where did
she [Ellen White] get her information?”
Later, Dr. McCay talked to F. D. Nichol, editor of the Review and Herald,
about his new interest in Adventist health principles as set forth by
Ellen White. Nichol, knowing that the Unitarian scientist probably would
not understand the Biblical doctrine of spiritual gifts, parried his
questions about Ellen White. He told McCay that her critics dismissed her
as a plagiarist, copying from her contemporaries.
“Nonsense!” McCay responded. “I simply cannot accept that explanation: it
creates a much bigger problem than it resolves! If she merely copied her
contemporaries, how did she know which ideas to borrow and which to
reject, out of the bewildering array of theories and health teachings
current in the 19th century? Most were quite irrational and have now been
repudiated! She would have had to be a most amazing person, with knowledge
beyond her times, in order to do this successfully.”
In July 1980, the U. S. Departments of Agriculture and Health, Education,
and Welfare issued jointly their “Dietary Guidelines for Americans”: (1)
Eat a variety of foods. (2) Maintain ideal weight. (3) Avoid too much fat,
saturated fat, and cholesterol. (4) Eat foods with adequate starch and
fiber. (5) Avoid too much sugar. (6) Avoid too much sodium. (7) If you
drink alcohol, do so in moderation. This report served as a ringing wakeup
call to health workers as it was to the general population. But if this
report had been issued in 1863, it would have been as startling as Ellen
White’s instructions were at that time!
In 1995 the same offices issued their updated “Dietary Guidelines,”
emphasizing that “vegetarian diets are consistent with the Dietary
Guidelines for Americans and can meet Recommended Dietary Allowances for
nutrients. This 1995 update placed greater emphasis on the plant foods
consistent with the Food Guide Pyramid. “The revised guideline also
acknowledges that grains are associated with ‘a substantially lowered risk
of many chronic diseases, including certain types of cancer,’ that
antioxidant nutrients have a ‘potentially beneficial role in reducing the
risk of cancer and certain other chronic diseases,’ and that folate
‘reduces the risk of a serious type of birth defect.’” Further, the
revised guideline emphasized that foods, not the salt shaker, are the
source of most dietary sodium, continuing to note “the link between sodium
and hypertension” and that sodium “is an essential nutrient substantially
overconsumed by the American public in general.”
The National Academy of Sciences and the National Research Council gave a
joint report in June 1982, entitled “Diet, Nutrition, and Cancer.”
Focusing on the connection between diet and cancer, this report was
essentially the same as the government report of 1980. Their research
indicated that by making changes in one’s diet, cancer risk can be greatly
reduced. Specifically they urged eating largely of fruits, whole grains,
and vegetables, and reducing consumption of fats, sugar, salt, and
alcohol.
In February 1983, the American Cancer Society’s journal, Cancer News,
published an article entitled, “At Last, An Anti-Cancer Diet.” The first
paragraph pointed to California Seventh-day Adventists as having a much
lower rate of colon/rectal cancer than other Americans. Later in the
article, studies were noted that indicated breast, colon, and prostate
cancer “is significantly lower among people who eat lots of vegetables.
This ‘startling finding,’ says Walter Troll, professor of environmental
medicine at New York University, suggests that vegetables contain
substances ‘capable of inhibiting cancer in man.’”
In July 1988 C. Everett Koop, M.D., Surgeon General of the U.S.A.,
released the first nutrition report by a U. S. Surgeon General. Based on
more than 2,500 scientific articles, his prescription for America was:
“Less fat, more vegetables and fruit.”
In the last few years, cover stories in such widely read magazines as
Time, Newsweek, U.S. News and World Report, have featured the latest
research that carefully validates the writings of Ellen White a century
ago. None of her astounding principles have had to be discarded. What she
said about prenatal influence, cancer being caused by a virus, and many
other areas relating to our health of mind and body are also as well known
as her teachings on nutrition.
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