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Theology. History. Psychology.
Hello, everyone. Welcome back to the podcast. And today, we'll be doing episode two titled, you are what you eat. And so today, we're gonna talk about the history of the health message in the Seventh day Adventist church. So let's go ahead and begin with the first health claim that was made by Ellen White.
Orlando:This dates back to the Autumn of 1848, and she tells us a story where her accompanying angel instructed her that coffee, tea, and tobacco were injurious, even harmful. A few years later, 1854, this accompanying angel returned to Ellen White and told her that there was a lack of bodily cleanliness among Sabbath keepers, and control of appetite was sorely needed among them. And in fact she goes on in more detail regarding this uncleanliness. She says, I then saw a lack of cleanliness among Sabbath keepers. I saw that God was purifying unto himself a peculiar people.
Orlando:He will have a clean and holy people in whom he can delight. I saw that the camp must be cleansed, for God would pass by and see the uncleanness of Israel and would not go forth with their armies to battle. He would turn from them in displeasure, and our enemies would triumph over us and we'd be left weak, in shame and disgrace. I saw that God would not acknowledge an untidy, unclean person as a Christian. His frown was upon such.
Orlando:Our souls, bodies, and spirits are to be presented blameless by Jesus to his Father, and unless we are clean in person and pure, we cannot be presented blameless to God.
Nick:Man, that first sentence of that second quote, I saw that God would not acknowledge an untidy, unclean person as a Christian. It's crazy, dude, because I feel like that one phrase, I feel like the spirit of the law of that phrase leads to so much religious trauma in the church.
Orlando:Heavy implications to the passage that we just read. So these were isolated statements. You know, these weren't visions per se. You know, Ellen White said that, you know, an angel came to her. But her first major vision regarding health took place on 06/05/1863.
Orlando:The context of this vision was that her husband, James White, had been experiencing burnout from his work. While they were assembled for family worship at Erin Hilliard's house, she was taken into vision for about forty five minutes. This vision contained counsel on how to alleviate James White's health, as well as general health council for the church. Later on that year in the summer, Ellen White wrote a more complete account of the instruction given to her in the vision, and that can be found in spiritual gifts volume four. So I just wanted to give a brief summary regarding the evolution of, you know, these ideas of health, going from something that her accompanying angel told her to being given a full fledged vision, forty five minutes long, recounting how not just to help James and his health, but general health counsel for the entire denomination.
Orlando:So I wanna I wanna pivot. I wanna go to the year 1908. And it's in the year 1908 where we we discovered a really interesting story that involves Ellen White and the general conference president at that time, AG Daniels. So let's go ahead and dive into that story. A true reformation needs to take place among the believers in Washington in the matter of healthful living.
Orlando:If the believers there will give themselves unreservedly to God, he will accept them. If they will adopt, in the matter of eating and drinking, the principles of temperance that the light of health reform has brought to us, they will be richly blessed. Those who have received instruction regarding the evils of the use of flesh meats, tea and coffee, and rich and unhealthful food preparations, and who are determined to make a covenant with God by sacrifice, will not continue to indulge their appetites for foods which they know to be unhealthful. God demands that the appetites be cleansed and self denial be practiced in regard to those things which are not good. This is a work that will have to be done before his people can stand before him, a perfected people.
Orlando:The Lord has given clear light regarding the nature of the food that is to compose our diet. He has instructed us concerning the effect of unhealthful food upon the disposition and character. Shall we respond to the counsels and cautions given? Who among our brethren will sign a pledge to dispense with flesh meats, tea, and coffee, and all injurious foods, and become health reformers in the fullest sense of the term? She was requesting that this pledge be circulated among the pastors of the general conference.
Nick:An interesting theme is starting to come alive here, we can talk about it more a little bit later on. But the interesting theme that I was looking at was the previous quote that Orlando read, talking about health, talking about being clean, right? How she had said that God would not acknowledge an untidy and unclean person as a Christian. And now here in the instance of the meat pledge, what it became known as, she was saying, this is a work that will have to be done before his people can stand before God, a perfected people. So one of these underpinnings was there's this theological and more specifically this salvific underpinning in her councils of diet and food.
Nick:Right? It wasn't just like, hey, let's eat what God tells us we should eat because this is how we were created or it will be healthier if we do so, but it's God will literally not consider you a Christian unless you do this. Right? Or this is a work that has to be done if you wanna stand before God. So it's a little bit more, there's a little bit heavier of an implication there versus just health for health's sake, right?
Orlando:No, you're absolutely right. It's more than just general advice. Hey, guys. You know, this, is really the optimal way we ought to be eating and conducting our lives. It's if you take your Christian walk seriously, if you take your salvation seriously, then you need to do these things.
Orlando:You need to, like she said, dispense, to do away with all unhealthy foods. So AG Daniels wrote a letter back, to Ellen White, and he essentially requested that they meet together in person so that they could talk about the matter. AG Daniels was rather perplexed because this was a large request that Ellen White had made of him in circulating this meat pledge. And so they met together. They discussed, and the conclusion of that discussion was that the meat pledge would not be circulated.
Orlando:So the the meat pledge was essentially scrapped. It would not be circulated among the pastors or or the members, and instead what was to be done was that physicians would visit, you know, individual churches and would talk about the benefits of health reform, to talk about the benefits of a vegetarian lifestyle, to talk about the benefits of essentially what we as Adventists know as the eight laws of health. And so that is essentially the resolution of that story. So what are the eight laws of health? So the the idea of the eight laws of health are essentially a distillation of the ideas found within Ellen White's writings regarding health.
Orlando:The first law is pure air, followed by sunlight, temperance, rest, exercise, proper diet, water, and trust in divine power. So these are the the eight laws of health that are that were essentially posited by the the writings of Ellen White. And from the sound of it, I mean, it's it's really good advice. Like, it's really good guiding advice if you want to, to be healthy. I mean, there's nothing wrong with pure air, sunlight, temperance, rest, exercise.
Orlando:I mean, believe in all that stuff.
Nick:Yeah, was thinking because, you know, I'm senile like that. I was thinking about the eight laws of health and how there's two potential applications of them, right? Because I think on one hand, you're right, those are really good pieces of advice, right? Sunlight, fresh air, being outside and not being cooped up indoors the entire day. Those are good principles in general.
Nick:But then I figured that there was these two out of the eight that were interesting. Like, one of them was trust in divine power, and the other one was temperance. Because it really depends on how you interpret those. Right? Like, temperance, you could interpret as doing things in moderation, right, not being excessive when it comes to what you eat and things like that.
Nick:But I know that a lot of the things that Ellen White wrote were influenced by the temperance movement. And some of those things could have been a little bit more extreme. And we'll talk a little bit more about that soon about, you know, some extreme absolute statements that she made versus more general counsels on health. And then the trust in divine power, I think the face value of that sounds great. But did she mean trust in divine power via my writings?
Nick:Right? So, like, don't go against what I'm writing about this health message stuff. So that's why I'm just like, you know, I think it's good in general, but depending on how this is applied, it could be dangerous. Right? Especially if people today in the church misconstrue the meaning of it to just try to establish these mechanisms of control in their membership.
Orlando:Time travel back to the 1830s, right? And if you were trying to avoid getting sick with, like, cholera, for example, if you went to the doctor and you asked for their advice, the average doctor would tell you, okay. Well, if you wanna avoid cholera, what you need to do is you need to increase your meat intake. You need to drink more wine, and you need to avoid vegetables. That is a surefire way of avoiding, cholera or other diseases.
Orlando:Right? I mean, this was the time where people were still, you know, putting leeches on themselves to get rid of the bad blood. Right? So there was a lot of medical misinformation circulating at that time. It almost kinda sounds like today, where, you know, if you get on social media or on TikTok, boy, you will find a lot of medical misinformation.
Nick:I'm really glad you mentioned the whole leeches thing because one huge aspect to growing up in the Adventist church that was a big part of Ellen White lore is almost her unparalleled wisdom when it came to things about the health message. Right? It was like how it was always recounted to me in my youth and how Ellen White came up with these things is that she was this visionary. She was ahead of her time. And it's like, imagine the world was like the dark ages, and there was no law and no science.
Nick:And the cure to everything was, you know, drinking half a bottle of bleach. My bad. That's 2022. The cure to everything was going and getting leeches on you. Right?
Nick:And they would suck your blood and then you would be cleansed. Right? The disease would come out of you in your blood and things like that. So they would always paint this picture as Ellen White was the one true source of intelligence in the medical and health sector of her time, while everyone else is like running around with like clubs and stones, you know, they're like they're all cavemen and she knows the truth. So I just wanted to say that so that, Orlando, you can talk a little bit more about that.
Nick:But that's just the context that don't know about you, but that's the context that I grew up in was, like, she was a visionary. No one else was coming up with this medical wisdom and golden nuggets that Ellen White was coming up with at that time.
Orlando:No, I think a lot of Adventists are under that impression, where Ellen White was like a 100 years ahead of everyone else, and she was the one that, God gave her all these ideas, and she just shared it with with the world, and as if these ideas hadn't been circulating prior to her ministry. So I guess Like
Nick:bro, I've heard that exact figure before, that whole like, she was a century ahead of her time, you know?
Orlando:Oh, it's a very common claim, and so I think that is a good segue to what we wanna talk about next, was Ellen White really ahead of her time? So in order to, see if that's true, we have to look at individuals who were who were writing prior to her prior to her ministry and see if they talked about the same things. And so we can start with, the founder of the Methodist Church, John Wesley. And so health reform was an important part of the Methodist religion. John Wesley associated physical well-being to spiritual health.
Orlando:Wesley believed that health and healing were integral parts of the gospel message. And he actually even authored a number of books on health reform. And so here are some of the health reforms that he practiced and advocated for in the seventeen hundreds. Moderation in food and drink, warned against intemperance, indolence, overeating, excessive passions, frowned upon medicines such as opium, advocated for two hours of, walking per day. Plain foods are the best.
Orlando:Avoid highly seasoned foods, and discourage the use of sugar as well as abstaining from tea, coffee, and other stimulants as well as coffee or, tobacco. Then fast forward, now now we're in the eighteen hundreds. So we have an individual by the the name of Marie, Lewis Shoe, and she had written a book titled water cure for ladies, a popular work on the health, diet, and regimen of females and children, and the prevention of care, the prevention of care of diseases. That's a long book title. And in that book, she teaches the following: that alcohol is a deadly poison, drug medicines are most pernicious, get rid of salt, spices such as mustard, pepper, and vinegar are pernicious, tea is one of the most destructive poisons, tobacco very destructive poison.
Orlando:A vegetarian diet will promote good health. Cheese is hard for the body to digest. Two meals a day are better for sedentary persons. And, of course, we also have to mention Joseph Smith. In 1833, he had a number of ideas that he shared in his health reform, such as tobacco being forbidden, hot drinks, according to him, which were coffee and tea, are not designed for the body.
Orlando:For him, meat was allowed, but it should be eaten sparingly, and the use of wine and strong alcoholic drinks were, forbidden. And then, of course, we have Sylvester Graham. Sylvester Graham was known as the father of the clean living movement. In 1849, he promoted the following reforms in in his book. To avoid all simulating and unnatural foods, butter should be used sparingly.
Orlando:Condiments and spices such as pepper, mustard, and cinnamon were banned as being highly exciting and exhausting. Tea and coffee were were poisonous, and all medicine is in itself an evil.
Nick:And that's interesting what he was saying about condiments. So in Ministry of Healing chapter 26, talking about condiments, it's interesting. The title of that chapter is stimulants and narcotics. And in that chapter, talks about, like, condiments like salt, pepper, mustard. Right?
Nick:And it says in this fast age, this fast age of nineteen o five, the less exciting the food, the better. Condiments are injurious in their nature. Mustard, pepper, spices, pickles, and other things of a like character irritate the stomach and make the blood feverish and impure. I decided it was interesting that you mentioned that, you know, Sylvester Graham, another contemporary writing about mustard and pepper and and condiments being something that we should stay away from.
Orlando:And the reason why many of these health reformers advocated that we stay away from those things was that they would essentially arouse the lower passions. Right? So they would essentially make you more prone to sinning, and that's why some of the health reformers were against all of these, condiments. And, you know, there is a larger story to be told here in regard to why so many individuals in the eighteen hundreds were against these things. Many many of these individuals, they perceived in their in their society a crisis of morality and self control, and they believed that these foods were the reason.
Orlando:But when when you look into the systemic issues that were going on in the eighteen thirties was toward the end of the first industrial revolution, and this is where the nature of of of life and work fundamentally changed. You had a lot of people moving from the countryside into the cities so that they could perform wage labor. Wage labor was was becoming the only viable source of income for pretty much most individuals in America. And this work, you know, you'd be working anywhere between twelve to eighteen hour shifts, and that was extremely exhausting. And toward the end of the 1800, we had there you know what?
Orlando:There's a a book that actually talks about this. It's titled, A Work Without Salvation. It's a book written back in the nineteen seventies where they where this guy talked about how Americans were suffering from a mental illness known as neurasthenia. Now neurasthenia was essentially a catchall term to describe anxiety, depression, and lack of motivation. And the author cites all the stuff that the reformers were saying, crisis of morality, self control, but it was due to these horrible working conditions, as well as horrible living conditions, which led to people becoming more impulsive.
Orlando:Right? Their window of tolerance for stress just shrank, which led to people acting out. Right? Which, you know, as Christians, we consider to be sin. But a lot of the health reformers, because they didn't perceive systemic issues, they could only blame individual behaviors for being the reason for this supposed crisis of morality and self control.
Nick:I'm really glad you mentioned that because I think that it's easy for us to separate quotes from the fact that they happened within a very real historical context. I think that one of the challenges for us today, not just us like you and me, but Christianity in general, is separating a source from its context. Right? Taking something completely out of context and saying like, this particular text has universal application. So in the example that you laid out about the health performers and Ellen White, how they were harping on condiments and mustard and pepper and you know, coffee and flesh foods and things like that.
Nick:And Ellen made quite some absolute statements about things regarding health and how they could impact one's salvation. So then in 2023, Christians and Seventh day Adventists specifically, and correct me if I'm wrong, but my perception is that we'll take this, completely remove it from the very real historical context that it was written in and say, okay, this has universal application. So today in 2023, if we partake in coffee or tea, if we are not living a vegetarian lifestyle, then there is going to be very real theological and salvific implications with that. But what do you think about that?
Orlando:No. I think you're absolutely right. Because, again, it's one thing if you decide to be a vegetarian because it's better for your health. You know, it's one thing to decide to be a vegetarian because you look at the the meat packing industry, and you see how brutal it is to animals. Right?
Orlando:Like, it those are perfectly valid reasons. Like, you know, if those are your convictions, go for it. I think that's great. I just think it becomes problematic when we tell people that if you want to be accepted by God, right, if you want to be presented to God at the end of time, you know, as a collective, as a peculiar people, and you have to be vegetarian in order to do that. I think that's where we really run into some problems, and that's kind of where religious trauma comes in because you begin to lose that autonomy that each of us are given.
Orlando:You know Paul tells us is for freedom that Christ has set us free, and it is the spirit that guides us via via our conscience, you know, to indicate to us, you know, what is what is good and and what is bad. And by forcing a vegetarianism or telling individuals that meat, coffee, tea, or or any other things will potentially jeopardize your salvation, we are in infringing upon the freedom that Christ has given us.
Nick:Hey. We're not saying throw out the baby with the bathwater. Right? We're not saying get rid of the eight principles of health. You know, stay inside all day.
Nick:Don't get any fresh air. Don't exercise. Right? Don't be moderate in your food consumption and things like that. We're not saying these are not good councils that you should not follow today.
Nick:But what we are saying is we think that there's a danger when we start to head into the spiritual realm of these things have salvific implications. Right? And that we should be applying this today by really inflicting some very real religious trauma on people because not only are we saying that this affects our salvation, our eternal salvation. Right? But it says this affects God's perception of us.
Nick:So like how God himself sees us, how he relates to us is impacted by whether or not we're vegetarian, By whether or not we abstain from coffee and tea. So I think that's when it really gets dangerous when we start to say like this is going to impact me in this spiritual way, it's going to affect my relationship with God.
Orlando:So I think it might be helpful to look at a few different statements from Ellen White regarding health reform. She has absolute statements regarding the necessity of health reform, but she also has some variable statements regarding health reform. So I think it might be helpful to to explore those. So I wanna share two of the absolute statements first. Vegetables, fruits, and grains should compose our diet.
Orlando:Not an ounce of flesh meat should enter our stomachs. The eating of flesh is unnatural. We are to return to God's original purpose in the creation of man. Here's another quote. God demands that the appetite be cleansed, and that self denial be practiced in regard to those things which are not good.
Orlando:This is a work that will have to be done before his people can stand before him, a perfected people. So these two statements are absolute in the sense that flesh meat cannot be eaten. Things that are are perceived as unhealthy or injurious are to be totally abstained from. However, Ellen White also has some variable statements in regard to health reform. Here's one.
Orlando:Where plenty of good milk and fruit can be obtained, there is rarely any excuse for eating animal food. It is not necessary to take the life of any of God's creatures to supply our ordinary needs. In certain cases of illness or exhaustion, it may be thought best to use some meat, but great care should be taken to secure the flesh of healthy animals. It has come to be a very serious question whether it is safe to use flesh food at all in this age of the world. It would be better never to eat meat than to use the flesh of animals that are not healthy.
Orlando:When I could not obtain the food I needed, I have sometimes eaten a little meat, but I am becoming more and more afraid of it. Here's another variable statement: a meat diet is not the most wholesome of diets, and yet I would not take the position that meat should be discarded by everyone. Those who have feeble digestive organs can often use meat when they cannot eat vegetables, fruit, or porridge. So we have
Nick:How do you I was just gonna say, how do you relate to or interpret this, right? Because it's a pretty stark contrast between these absolute salvific statements and then these variable, well, if this, then that statements. Right?
Orlando:It can be a little difficult to reconcile. And what makes it difficult to reconcile is the absolute nature of some of the things that she has said, such as, you know, if if you wanna be presented to god or to be presented acceptable to him, this is what you have to do. Right? And then she, you know, also has those very quotes. So it it is tough to reconcile.
Orlando:But at the same time, she does show a degree of nuance, which I think is helpful because there there's a story that comes to mind for me where an individual came to Ellen White, and he told her a story about how a a church member, this church member lived in Norway, had read Ellen White's writings regarding health reform, and he chose to abstain from from meat and just to eat vegetables. Now during during the winter season, in Norway, meat, or vegetables were in very, short supply, and this individual became malnourished and emaciated. And when this story was told to Ellen White, she said, why don't the people have more common sense? Like, she literally said that. And, you know, I'm inclined to agree.
Orlando:Like like, that's, that's crazy. You know, how would this guy like, he's in Norway, in winter, vegetables are just going to be in short supply. The flip side
Nick:of that, yeah, they're unlike the flip side of that is, sure, it's easy to say, it's very convenient to say, why don't people have more common sense in facing that story, right? When she's hearing that somebody's like very unhealthy and the supplies are scarce, right? So I think it's convenient to say, well, mean, why aren't people smarter? Why why don't they have more common sense? But what's the context of the context of that story?
Nick:There's this dude that literally read her writings, her counsels on diet and food, and saw that she said there is a moral evil in eating flesh foods. We should abstain from these things. An unclean person cannot stand before God. These people cannot be considered Christians. So it's like like you said.
Nick:Right? There's how do you reconcile the fact that it's so absolute you cannot even stand before God as his chosen people? Yet, let's use our common sense when it comes to things like this.
Orlando:Yeah. For me, this story illustrates that we ought to do that. But despite that, these absolute statements almost make it seem as if there's no room for common sense. It's as if, okay. You've told me that this is a moral issue.
Orlando:And, logically speaking, if it's a moral issue and I don't comply, now my salvation is in jeopardy. So and I think this is just illustrative of the fact that Ellen White tended to be rather hyperbolic in her writings. I think she'd get really passionate about what she wrote, and in that passion, she tended to go to extremes. And I and I think later in her life, she got better about she got better about that sort of thing, where she didn't lean to such extremes. I I think we have to acknowledge a a growth in her life.
Orlando:What what do you think about that?
Nick:I think that a good takeaway from trying to reconcile the absolute versus the variable statement is that let's use our common sense. And I think that when it comes to church leadership, when it comes to just individuals in the church as well, they need to I'm not saying everybody does it. Right? But I'm saying those who do employ these tactics. Twenty twenty three, this day and age, is not when we should have a universal application to these absolute statements on health in relation to salvation.
Nick:You know what I mean? I think that we can take these things, we can reason, We can use common sense and we can apply some of these good principles to our lives today and they can result in us being healthier without us inflicting religious trauma on our church membership. You know, saying that they're less than by not being vegetarian, saying that their standing with God is impacted, that their salvation is in jeopardy. What do you think our responsibility is today in 2023, when it comes to how we should relate with these things?
Orlando:I will take Ellen White's advice and say that we should use our common sense. Common sense that guides us to say, well, you know, you know, in her writings there are some helpful things, and there are also some unhelpful things. And as I read, I will see, okay, I'm gonna hold on to this. Eight laws of health, definitely gonna hold on to that. It's good stuff.
Orlando:It indicates to me that God is concerned about my health. You know, God designed our bodies. Right? He knows what is best for us. And I think as we grow as individuals, we will learn to want to care for ourselves more.
Orlando:Right? Like Jesus said, if, you know, love your neighbor as yourself. Right? There's a a degree of self love when it comes to taking care of yourself. And as long as you don't tie your salvation to it, then I I think you're good.
Orlando:You know, it's like how salvation gets presented. You don't obey in order to be saved, but you're like, you know, you obey as a result of being saved. Obedience is not in the sense of, you know, like, know, trying to do good works, but obedience in the sense of, yeah, I I I want to live in a way that is healthy, you know, not just like for my body, but like relational health.
Nick:Yeah. Think this is a good place to end this episode, but I'm really excited about the next episode for multiple reasons. But number one, the next thing that we're gonna talk about is gender roles, and we're gonna cover some good stuff like the church's obsession with hierarchy, agency, objectification of women. But I think we've got a good episode lined up. But another good thing about the next episode is we are going to be in the same place at the same time talking to you.
Nick:So for the first time in this series, Orlando's gonna come out to Tennessee where I'm at from Texas. So we're excited to be able to present that and and have it in a little bit of a different format, both of us in the same place. Looking forward to to sharing that with you all at the next episode.