Prophetess of Health
A talk given by Dr. Ronald L. Numbers
at the San Bernardino County Museum
on May 29, 1976
Thank you, Stan. It is a pleasure to be reunited with Stan
Aufdemberg, who, I might add, twice in my life has been my pastor. If any of you
detect any deficiencies in my spiritual experience, you might attribute them to his
influence. There are a number of things I wanted to say this afternoon, but I don't
want to speak too long so that you will have opportunity at the end to ask whatever
questions are on your mind. Specifically, I want to address myself to four
questions: the (1) being, what was I really trying to say in this study? What
do I see as the most important points? (2) What methodology have I used?
(3) What were my motives? And (4) what has been my relationship with
the Ellen G. White Estate?
First, I should say that I have not written a biography in any
sense of the term, but have written a limited historical study of Ellen White's
development as a health reformer. In my opinion, the most important conclusions
which I reached were (1) that Ellen White was indeed a child of her times, that is, that
neither in terms of the content of her writings on health reform or in terms of the
selection of the material that she included were her views unique. Secondly, I think
I have shown that her views developed over time. By this I mean that Ellen White in
1900 is not the same as Ellen White in 1865. These, of course, are very modest
conclusions which would come as no surprise to an intellectual historian, but I think they
are also very significant. Let me illustrate this. A close comparison of Ellen
White's teachings on health reveals not only that she was saying precisely the same things
that other health reformers were saying on the topics of diet, dress reform, sexual
activities, et cetera, but that in may instances her language was remarkably similar to
the language that these other contemporaries were using, and I think it is beyond dispute
that we have evidence here of literary dependence of one kind or another. In some
way, and I'm still not certain how, Mrs. White was familiar with the writings of those who
went before her and she incorporated many of their ideas and some of their phraseology
into her own writings. In terms of content she said nothing that was not common
knowledge in 19th-century America.
Few individuals, I think would contest this conclusion, but many
have insisted that at least Mrs. White selected only those ideas from the 19th century
which have stood the test of time, which are today accepted as being scientifically
valid. But I don't think the evidence bears this out. For example, shortly
after her 1863 vision she wrote on the harmful effects of self-abuse, or masturbation.
"Everywhere I looked," she said, "I saw imbecility, dwarfed forms,
crippled limbs, misshapen heads, and deformity of every description." God, in
her vision, had shown her that continued masturbation produced not only hereditary
insanity and deformities, but a host of other diseases including "affection of the
liver and lungs, neuralgia, rheumatism, affection of the spine, diseased kidneys, and
cancerous humors." "Not infrequently," she said, "continued
masturbation led its victims into an early grave."
Now, I have no interest at all in debating the scientific accuracy
of these statements, but I think it is fair to say that science has not yet corroborated
these statements. Perhaps I should at this time mention the explanation offered by
the Ellen G. White Estate for her views on the effects of masturbation. In a
document that the White Estate prepared for Harper & Row, the publishers of my volume,
they argued that we should reserve judgment in this matter, that science may yet come
about to confirm her. Let me quote two brief passages:
In the matter of masturbation, the gaining of data is
difficult to come by. Is there the possibility of scientists sometimes reversing
their pronouncements overnight as they have in so many fields? We think it is too
early to declare the Ellen White statements unreliable.
Some of us at the White Estate have met people who, when in
their youth, with all innocence, were masturbating -- not connecting at all St.
Vitus's dance in one case and very distressing symptoms in another. After reading
Ellen White's counsel, they broke with the habit to find lasting relief. Scientific
tables would be meaningless to such, but they know some things from experience.
In a similar category, I might mention Mrs. White's assertion that
the wearing of wigs over the back part of the head often leads to insanity and
recklessness of morals.
The second contribution, as I have already mentioned, is, I think,
to show the development of Mrs. White's views on health reform and diet. A number of
examples could be cited to illustrate this point. In 1849 Mrs. White warned against
the use of earthly physicians. She wrote:
If any among us are sick, let us not dishonor God by
applying to earthly physicians, but apply to the God of Israel. If we follow his
directions (James 5:14,15) the sick will be healed. God's promise cannot fail.
Have faith in God, and trust wholly in him.
We know on the basis of historical evidence that this was the
practice of the Sabbatarian Adventists during the early 1850s. But by 1860 Ellen
White was advocating the use of physicians in some cases and denying that she had ever
urged Adventists not to consult earthly physicians. And certainly we all are aware
that by the early 20th century she was actively engaged in promoting medical education,
and it was her counsel that led to the creation of the College of Medical Evangelists in
Loma Linda.
A second example of her development might come from the area of
dress reform. In the early 1860s Ellen White urged Adventist sisters not to adopt
the so-called reform dress modeled to a great extent on the famous Bloomer costume;
however, after she visited Dansville, New York, in 1864, where a modified version of this
dress was worn, she saw its utility and its helpfulness and subsequently urged Adventist
sisters to adopt the reform dress. Still later, in the mid-1870s, after she saw how
much contention was created in the church by the adoption of this dress, she urged the
church to have nothing more to do with it.
A third area in which she developed related to the etiology of
disease. In the early 1860s she was writing about the miasmatic origin of diseases
resulting from decomposing matter surrounding houses. She was also talking about the
possibility of producing cancerous humors. By the late 19th century and early 20th
century, after the coming of the germ theory of disease. Ms. White becomes a contagionist
and no longer speaks of humors, but of germs.
And, finally, her reasons for not eating meat changed rather
sharply over time. In the writings produced shortly after her 1863 vision on the
evils of eating meat, she said that the two primary reasons for adopting a vegetarian diet
were: (1) to protect you from diseases transmitted by eating meat; but more
important, in terms of emphasis, to prevent from arousing the "animal passions,"
which led to undue sexual activity. In Ministry of Healing written in 1905,
however, we find no mention of the sexual consequences of eating meat, but only that meat
eating produces disease and is cruel to animals.
I mentioned at the beginning that my study had certain
limitations. One of them is that it is not a biography. But, perhaps, I should
say more about what I do not intend to imply with my study. I am not saying, nor do
I personally think, as some have said, that Ellen G. White was a pious fraud. On the
other hand, I do not think that was unique, either in what she said or in having visions.
If you'll indulge a little hyperbole, visions in the early 19th century in America
were reaching a nearly epidemic proportion, and it is my personal feeling that without
James White's organizational and publishing skills Ellen White today would be known only
as another Shut Door advocate in New England who experienced visions.
In writing about Ellen White, I've tried to treat her no
differently than I would Joseph Smith, the founder of Mormonism; Mary Baker Eddy, who
founded Christian Science; or Charles Taze Russell, who in the 19th century created the
Jehovah's Witnesses. Thus, as I point out in the preface of my study, I have
refrained from using divine inspiration as a historical explanation. I also say that
I have parted company with those Adventist scholars who insist on certain presuppositions:
These are, I insist, conclusions, not presuppositions. And
the question of inspiration by its very nature is one which the historian is not equipped
to answer. As a historian I make absolutely no judgment about the inspiration of
Ellen G. White, since, in my opinion, there is no evidence beyond her own claims to
document such a conclusion. But I am not saying in any way that Ellen White was not
inspired. That is a decision which each individual must reach, I would think, on the
basis of faith.
Some questions have also been raised about the nature of the
sources that I've used, especially those documents written by former Seventh-day
Adventists who left the church. It is irresponsible, the argument goes, to use in a
study of Ellen White the opinions of those who openly rejected her teachings. But
here I detect an inconsistency. For years Seventh-day Adventists have applauded as
excellent historical studies those biographies of Joseph Smith and Mary Baker Eddy which
freely incorporate the views of individuals who eventually left Mormonism and Christian
Science. But it seems that when the same methodology is applied to Ellen White, it
becomes, to quote a friend of mine, "wildly irresponsible." Frankly, I'm
puzzled by this attitude. It seems to me that we get a perspective on Ellen White
from the people who left the church that we cannot possibly get from those who stayed in
the church, and it also strikes me that the tendency to distort is no greater on the part
of the apostates than it is on the part of the disciples.
Lately, a number of individuals have asked me why I wrote this
study. There were, as always, several causes which prompted me to act this
way. The immediate cause was the need for interesting classroom material while
teaching the history of medicine to the medical students at Loma Linda University.
Some of you who went through the initial experience of my teaching here will recall that
all my lectures on ancient and medieval medicine were not well received, and I thought
that in future years it might improve my standing as a teacher if I could incorporate some
more recent material that related directly to the experience of the students, and so I
decided that I would try to find out why a small group like the Seventh-day Adventists has
become so committed to medical education and to health reform. And it was to obtain
this material that I first began my research on Ellen G. White as a health reformer.
However, the ultimate cause prompting me to write what I did was,
I think, to discover the truth. It seems to me that if we are to base the most
important decisions of our lives on the counsel of Mrs.White, we have a right, in fact a
duty, to turn up all the information bearing on these various issues. Ellen G. White
is too important to us all to allow her or her immediate family any privacy, even, I would
say, those sensitive documents between her and her children. Ellen White, for
Seventh-day Adventists, is an authority on child guidance and the Adventist home, I think
it is crucial for us to know how, in fact, she operated as a mother and as a wife.
Parenthetically, I might add that I think the proper place to investigate these issues is
in a Seventh-day Adventist university, and it does distress me that we are unable to do
so, in fact, that it as impossible to hold this meeting on the campus of an Adventist
University.
The most recent issue of Ministry Magazine contains an
interview with Elder Bradley, who is Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Ellen G.
White Estate. The title is "Does the White Estate Suppress Secret
Documents?" In it Elder Bradley states:
We have nothing to hide or to be ashamed of. We do
not fear to let light shine into any aspect of the work of Ellen G. White.
And to this I could only say "Amen." (Voice from
the audience: "Amen.") Thank you. Nice to know you have one
person in the audience who agrees with you. However, I must confess that my own
experience with the White Estate fails to substantiate Bradley's statement. It is
not true, as Arthur White has recently asserted, that nothing was withheld from me, and I
think it might be advantageous, briefly, to review my relationship with the Estate.
I first contacted the officials of the White Estate, specifically Elder Arthur White, in
the summer of 1972, telling him that I would be coming East in a few weeks and was looking
for material to incorporate in my historical lectures at Loma Linda University. When
I went there I discussed with him, also, my plans for publication. He gave me some
very sage advice at this time. He said, "Do not make the mistake that others
before you have made of trying to go to an outside publishers,"which I had suggested
that I'd planned to do, "because," he said, "You will not make any money if
you do so."
I don't know how many of you have worked within the White Estate,
but perhaps I should say a word or two about the procedures. The Estate does not
allow browsing in their documents. You must request a specific manuscript or
letter. It is then brought to you if it is not restricted. You may read it,
but you are not allowed to take notes. If you see a passage you would like to use,
you make a notation, bring it to the attention of the officials of the Estate; they then
bring it before the Board of Trustees of the White Estate. If they agree, then it
goes before a Spirit of Prophecy Committee composed of officials of the church. If
they pass on it, the material is released and you have permission to use it. During
this initial contact with Elder White and his staff, they were most cordial.
They granted me special permission not only to see many of the
documents that I requested but, in effect, to browse through Ellen White's entire
correspondence for the 1860s, which was the period I was particularly interested in, since
her vision on health reform occurred in June of 1863. During my discussions with
Elder White at this time I told him I would be happy before publishing anything to send
him a copy and receive his comments. Later, I will return to a differing
interpretation of this statement. During this first visit I had only about a week to
spend, and it was impossible for me to go through the procedure that was necessary with
all the documents I wished to see; so I arranged with Elder White to have a number of
other documents, which I specifically requested, sent to Loma Linda University where they
would be used under the same restrictions that held in the White Estate. Most of the
documents which I requested were sent; however, five were withheld. If any of you
are interested:
W-6-1863,
W-4-1866,
W-13-1871,
W-21-1883,
B-53-1888.
The explanation given me for this was, and I quote: "In
four or five instances we have withheld letters because of the highly personal nature of
some of the contents of them." But as I recall none of these letters involved
anyone outside the White family. They were not revelations about secret sins in
other individuals' lives.
After going through these documents I submitted a lengthy release
request to Elder White and the officers of the White Estate. Shortly after
submitting this request, Elder White came to Loma Linda to discuss my request. He
spent an entire afternoon with me and asked a number of rather pointed questions.
Before releasing this material he wanted to make sure how it would be used. At one
point he pulled out of his briefcase a copy of Mrs. White's little volume Appeal to
Mothers, which was her first booklet on health in which she describes her revelations
on masturbation,and he asked me, "Brother Numbers, do you believe this?"
And I told him that I thought this would be one of the most difficult documents to
substantiate today.
He also explained why the White Estate would not be able to
release one of the documents I had requested. This document was a letter, as I
recall, written by Mrs. White to the President of the General Conference, Elder A. G.
Daniells, in the 1890s. In the 1890s after a lapse of several decades Mrs. White
once again enthusiastically embraced health reform and vegetarianism, and she suggested to
the President of the General Conference that Seventh-day Adventists now begin to circulate
an anti-meat pledge analogous to the temperance pledge that had gone over so well in the
church. Daniells, who had just returned from Europe, responded that this would be
impractical, that such a device would undoubtedly split the church in two, and that
certainly before circulating an anti-meat pledge we would want to embark on an
educational campaign. Mrs. White subsequently backed down from this and at the next
session of the General Conference endorsed Elder A. G. Daniells' view of things.
"Now," Arthur White said to me, "It would be very
difficult for us to release this document to you because there are still some vegetarians
in the church, primarily on the right wing, who would want to impose this upon the rest of
us, and we could not allow this; so I am afraid you will not be able to quote it."
In July I received word from Arthur White saying that the Trustees
and the Spirit of Prophecy Committee had approved most of my requests, but, and here again
I quote, "In a very few cases the requests involved personal family matters and were
of a character that we could see no good purpose that they would serve in releasing them
for general use. I must tell you frankly that it is difficult for us to understand
how these could be of real service in reviewing the history of our health message, and we
can see by some they could be misused. I know that with the attitudes which are
manifested by our own men in the history field that our action in this respect may seem
unjustified, but we also stand before the church as a whole and must give an account for
our stewardship in the handling of unpublished materials. Now, Ron, you may feel I
am a bit overwrought on this matter, but I've had some experiences down through the years
which have shown how careful we must be in the releasing of unpublished materials to guard
against distorted use."
Not released were: (1) a passage from a letter (L-6-1864)
describing Dr. James Caleb Jackson's physical and phrenological examination of Edson and
Willie White, the two sons of Ellen White. Phrenology, I might add for a few of you
who are not acquainted with the subject, was the science of the mind very popular in early
and mid-19th-century America which said that you could read the character of an individual
by the bumps on the head. For example, if any of you have a very large protrusion in
the back of your head, you may be assured that you are having trouble controlling your
"animal passions." It's very desirable, however, to have prominent bumps
up here where traits like reverence and benevolence are located.
A second document that was not released was a passage from
W-11-1873 mentioning John Harvey Kellogg's view of James White as a monomaniac on money
matters. And a third one was D-162-1908 regarding Ellen White's anti-meat
pledge. I guess I should correct myself. I had attributed that to the
1890s. It was the next decade.
Also deleted from release was a passage relating to James White's
mental health. And over a year later, the White Estate still refused to release an
account written by Ellen White on the 1870s in which she describes a vacation trip to the
Rocky Mountains in which she and the members of her family dined on wild duck, the
explanation being that since there was still some controversy among Adventists whether
duck was clean or unclean, we would not want this information to get out until the matter
was resolved.
I think it's important to note that not one of the documents not
released was related to any revelation of personal sin in an individual's life, the Ellen
G. White Estate's only publicly stated reason for withholding material. The concern
was solely in protecting a certain image of Mrs. White carefully constructed by the White
Estate over a period of many years.
In April, 1974, I resubmitted my request for release of that
paragraph of L-6-1864 relating to Dr. Jackson's examination of Edson and Willie White,
pointing out at this time that the officials of the White Estate had repeatedly stated
that the Trustees had no interest in restricting significant historical data but were
concerned only with protecting confidential correspondence dealing with personal
sins. It seems to me, I said, that my request is in harmony with the stated policy
of the White Estate. Later that month, Elder White notified me that my second
request for this document had also been denied by the Trustees. Quote:
"The fact that Elder and Mrs. White, in connection with their visit to the Jackson
institution, presented their children for a physical examination by a doctor which
included a phrenological examination, is, in our opinion, a family matter and does not
carry with it particular significance. It is a singular case, an isolated case, and
comes in for bare mention on the part of Ellen White." End quote.
That same spring I learned that the staff of the White Estate had
discovered and brought to the attention of Elder White Dr. Jackson's own handwritten
description of Willie White's physical and mental characteristics. When I
subsequently visited the Estate, I asked Elder White if he knew of any documents besides
L-6-1864 relating to Dr. Jackson's examination of the White boys. He assured me in
the presence of Elder Paul Gordon that he did not know that any such documents
existed. Later, during a second visit to the White Estate, I prevailed upon Elder
Ron Graybill to show me this document. I might add that subsequently in a phone
conversation with Elder White I asked him why he had formerly denied that any such
document existed, and he said, I quote, "I didn't know it existed at the
time." End quote. I might also add that the paragraph from the 1864
letter relating to the examination of Willie and Edson White was released only after I had
cited, but not quoted, that document in the second draft of my manuscript which was
submitted to the White Estate for criticism.
It was in September of 1974 I sent Elder White a copy of my
revised manuscript asking him for corrections and criticisms. At the same time I
sent a copy to the editors of Harper & Row, who had previously agreed to publish this
volume when it was completed. Elder White, upon learning that I had sent the
manuscript simultaneously to him and Harper's, became irate, claiming that I had broken my
earlier promise to submit anything I published before it was sent to the publisher.
I have on more than on occasion assured the people at the White Estate that I had said
only that I would submit the document to them before it was published, which to me is
significantly different from "before I sent it to the publisher." But he
seems to feel that his interpretation of my statement is more correct; so I'll let you
decide.
Upon receiving the copy Elder White refused to read it, but,
instead, locked it in the vault with the approval of the Trustees. At the same time
he wrote a letter to the editor-in-chief of Harper & Row stating his concern about
this manuscript. He later told the editors that he had written at this time because
I had refused to let him read the manuscript, which was locked in his vault. He
expressed in his initial contact with the editors of Harper's his disappointment at not
having an opportunity to examine my manuscript before it had been submitted for
publication. I assured him on the telephone that there was still ample time to
change any factual errors that he discovered and that it was specifically for this that I
was submitting the document to him.
Harper's granted Elder White and the White Estate until December
15 to go over my manuscript carefully and prepare a rebuttal to be submitted to me and to
Harper & Row. As a result of this agreement Elder Arthur White, Bob Olson,and
Ron Graybill began collaborating on a line by line reply to my manuscript. They were
assisted in this endeavor for a period by Dr.Mervyn Hardinge of Loma Linda University, who
served as their scientific consultant and authority on the history of medical
education. All told, the White Estate estimates that it spent approximately $5,000
in preparing his reply, the purpose of which was very clear -- to discredit my
manuscript in the eyes of the editors of Harper's so that they would not publish the
volume.
In November Elder White contacted Harper & Row again and said
that they did not have sufficient time to prepare an adequate criticism and requested a
six weeks' extension. This was granted. In January Elder White went to New
York to spend the day with the editor-in-chief of Harper & Row armed with a briefcase
full of documents, which he hoped would prove to the publishers that this was such an
irresponsible work of history that they should have nothing to do with it.
In February Elder White returned to New York for a second visit to
Harper's accompanied by Ron Graybill and Robert Olson, and this time they had with them
their completed criticism of my study, a 220-page document. When they got to the
editorial offices, Arthur White laced their material on the desk of the editor and said,
"We will give this to you under one condition, and that is if you will promise never
to show it to Ron Numbers." And the editor was, of course, baffled by this
request and said he could not accept it under such conditions because what good would it
do for him to have all this evidence if I could not benefit form it? And Arthur
White was insistent that I should not see it. When Harper's failed to accede to his
request, the officials of the White Estate retrieved their document, took it back to
Washington, and with the approval of the Trustees decided that they would have no further
intercourse with Harper's and myself.
The editor-in-chief of Harper's and I then wrote letters to the
officials of the White Estate. I pointed out that I thought we had been dealing with
each other in good faith. They had requested, we had not requested, the opportunity
for them to delay publication, and we thought it was rather unfair of them at this time,
unilaterally, to back out of their agreement, that it looked to some as if they were only
trying to delay publication to give them additional time to prepare a reply. Because
of these responses the Trustees relented and agreed to let me see their criticisms, which
I spent an entire week going over with Dr. Richard Schwarz of Andrews University and Elder
Graybill, who were sent out to Madison, Wisconsin, by the White estate to help me
interpret the significance of their criticisms and, I might add, to try and be sure that I
did not become unduly upset with the ad hominem arguments that were sprinkled
quite freely throughout the reply.
As a result of this very helpful and informative discussion with
Dr. Schwarz and Elder Graybill, I made numerous corrections in the draft of my
manuscript. I think it's fair to say -- at least I cannot remember --
a single instance in which both of those men agreed that I had made a mistake that I did
not change the material. There were occasions where Graybill argued for one point
and Schwarz and I disagreed that I went along with Schwarz, and similarly with Graybill.
Currently the White Estate is preparing a book-length reply, which
I under- stand will soon be available. But that's another story and I have already
taken more of your time than I'm sure you wanted me to take, and we should go to the
question period.
# #
JOHN KONING.
John Koning, and I'm from Corona. There are a few areas where, apparently, your
conclusions and statements go beyond your sources or your references given, and this
detracts from your book. For instance, you didn't give the source of the gossipy
little tidbit about Mrs. White considering some husband-swapping. That one stands
out as a sore thumb in my mind.
NUMBERS. May
I reply to that. I assume you all heard the question. There is a passage in my
study where I allude to criticisms that were leveled against Sister White for having
suggested that she and an Adventist sister swap husbands at a time when James White was
impoverished and Brother Seneca King, I believe, was fairly well-to-do. Now, the
reason I mention this is solely to illustrate that during her own lifetime many
controversies swirled about her, and the source for that was given. It was a
document published by the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists that I cited.
There is also in that document, you probably read, the allegation that Mrs. White had
illegitimate twins, I believe, one of whom was named Jesus. And I think it's
significant that the leaders of the Seventh-day Adventist Church took these charges of
wife-swapping and illegitimacy so seriously that they went out and gathered notarized
documents proving that Mrs. White had not done this, and the source is there for anybody
to check. I'm sorry you missed it.
JERALEE SMITH.
You mentioned that you were interested in discovering truth as you did this study, and I'd
just like to ask you if you felt that you did discover truth? And, if so, how?
What type of truth,and how would you phrase it?
NUMBERS.
Well, I did not discover all truth, just a modest amount of truth, and I was asking very
limited questions, namely, what relationship did Mrs. White's health reform ideas have to
her contemporaries and how had her views on health change during her lifetime? And I
feel that I am closer today to understanding the answer to those questions than I was,
say, three years ago when I began the study. But there are many facets of Ellen
White's life which I do not understand and which I would hope others would begin to
investigate so that we would have a larger body of truth from which to make judgment
regarding Mrs. White.
DICK KOOBS.
... If she borrowed or had literary dependency, as you have suggested here, do you suppose
that it had anything to do with the fact that James White did a lot of the reading as well
as the writing for her? That would be a first question because you have mentioned
here, of course, that he took her very poor grammar and tended to straighten it out, and
would he have been responsible for the similarities that you cite?
NUMBERS. I
would welcome very much the discovery of Mrs. White's own handwritten manuscripts from
this period, but to my knowledge they do not exist. So, it's difficult, it's
impossible, to tell what was the content of her own draft and how much was added or
changed by editors, whether they be James White or people at the publishing house.
We do know that in instances like this, fairly significant changes were made. An
Adventist historian not too long ago completed a fairly exhaustive study of Great
Controversy and was lucky enough to find Ellen White's own handwritten draft of chapters
of Great Controversy which he could then compare to the finished product, and you could
tell what material had been polished and what material had been added or subtracted by
others. This document has been studied by the White Estate, or a committee that was
appointed for the purpose, I think, for about two years now, and no report has been
forthcoming. [Donald R. McAdams. Ellen G. White and the Protestant
Historians. Typewritten copy. 105 pages. Very difficult to find
copies of. McAdams tried to call all copies back, and the White Estate never allowed
its release.] But this is the type of evidence I would have loved to have had with
her health writings and I did not have.
KOOBS. ... As
I read the first part, the very nice background that you give to the health reform issues
of the day, I thought this was most informative and enjoyed this.
NUMBERS.
Thank you.
KOOBS. [But
then] I had to back off and say, "Now, but how many people in the population of the
US really knew what was going on? ...
NUMBERS. It's
of course impossible to tell in retrospect how widely known the views on health reform
were. We have a few indicators, however, for the population at large. The Water-Cure
Journal, which was one of the major publications in the area, was an extremely
popular journal published by Fowler and Wells, very successful publishers in New York
City.
KOOBS. What
was the circulation?
NUMBERS. I'm
not sure.
KOOBS. If it
were a hundred thousand, which was the largest, I think, you mentioned in your book of any
of the things published, that wouldn't cover a very wide territory, would it? Even
in the 19th century?
NUMBERS. No,
but for periodicals that would be a major circulation. Also, when we look at the
circulation of Dr. L. B. Coles' book entitled Philosophy of Health, we know it
went through forty-something editions, by which we mean printings, and as the reviewer in
the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal said, "These people not only read
the book but apparent eat them, so many of them are turned out." Now, it's also
difficult to determine how widely known these views were among Seventh-day
Adventists. I think one important clue we have to this is either James' or Ellen
White's comment that after her June vision, as she traveled about the country preaching on
health reform, repeatedly individuals, Seventh-day Adventists, came to her and said,
"My, your views are so similar to the writings of Dr. Trall and Dr. Jackson.
Were you familiar with them?" Well, the significance of this is that in order
for Adventists to be asking that type of question, many of them would have had to be
familiar not only with health reform literature in general, but with the writings of Trall
and Jackson in particular.
.
DICK RUHLING.
Dick Ruhling, School of Health. Before asking my question, I would just like to make
an observation. I think it's interesting that Ellen White wrote that one of the very
last deceptions of Satan would be to make of non-effect her testimony, and I think those
that are here that would consider this evidence would like to consider the evidence on the
other side of the coin. I, just Thursday night, read Graybill's 27-page summary,
which I found quite enlightening and substantial. I'm glad to know that the White
Estate is coming out with a more lengthy one that I understand is very valid also.
In regard to my question - - -
NUMBERS. May
I just comment on your previous statement? I, too, have seen, have not read
carefully, the paper prepared by Ron Graybill and given here, and I was very disappointed
by it. I do not feel that it accurately represents Elder Graybill's own opinions.
He has subsequently apologized to me for portions of that and has assured me that
it will no longer appear under his name.
RUHLING.
Well, I think it will be interesting to read the facts, whether he believes them or not,
because even the prophet Balaam spoke the truth though he no longer believed the
truth. I would just like to say, my question would in regard to why do men like
Clive McKay, Professor of Nutrition and Head of the Department for a quarter of a century,
claim in his review of Ellen White that he had a thousand cases in his files, yet one of
the most amazing was Ellen White, who writing at the time that she did, didn't incorporate
the fads and fallacies of her day but knew uncannily which to select and which to reject?
And there are similar testimonies. We are just dealing - - -
NUMBERS. May
I just reply to that one? I think that you would not place much reliance upon my
statements as a nutritionist, and I would think, analogously, that you would place little
confidence in Clive McKay's statements as a historian of medicine. Obviously, the
man was misinformed about 19th century history of medicine. This was not his field.
He was speaking outside his field. Had he known about it, I'm sure he would
not have said what he did.
RUHLING. He
said that for a quarter of a century he taught a course for graduate students on the
history of nutrition. Now that would seem significant, in the first page of an
eight-page review.
NUMBERS. They
teach a course in the history of nutrition at the University of Wisconsin [where Numbers
now taught] but it would not be accepted as history. There's a difference.
RUHLING.
We're dealing also, then, with merely one small area. As a denomination we're known
not only for a medical thrust but for an educational and evangelical thrust. It
seems highly significant to me that in the area of education Stratemeyer of Columbia
University said that [Mrs. White] was fifty years ahead of her day in the concepts that
she wrote regarding education - - -
NUMBERS. Let
me comment on that. I think that if anybody would compare Mrs. White's counsel on
education with the educational writings of the Fowlers, the publishers of the Water-Cure
Journal, they would find the same striking parallels that I found between her
writings on health reform and the writings of her contemporaries.
.
ALAN CRANDALL.
I'm Alan Crandall. I'd like to go back for just a moment to this matter of literary
dependence. You stated that ... you feel that Ellen White went out of her way to
deny any dependence upon earthly sources. It is true that she said that she was just
as inspired in the writing out of her views as in receiving them, or something to that
effect, but at the same time I think it's only fair to balance this statement with what
she wrote in the preface of Great Controversy, where she unashamedly states that
she often has borrowed the words of other writers when she felt that they expressed the
views that she had been shown were true.
And, also, I'd like to point out that ... the document prepared by
the White Estate, in response to your book, has also pointed out that she had a column in
one of our journals, I forget the name of it, in which she quoted many of these health
reformers, giving them credit for their views, and many of these same passages eventually
wound up in her own books. Now, this hardly seems like she was trying to hide her
dependence ....
NUMBERS. I
hope I remember all of your questions correctly. First, I believe you said that in a
preface to Great Controversy she unashamedly acknowledged her literary
indebtedness. I would point out that this was not in the first edition of the Great
Controversy. This was in a subsequent edition, after her unacknowledged use of
historians I believe had created a great deal of consternation. And so I am not sure
whether the word "unashamedly" really applies in this instance. I don't
think it was voluntarily done.
Secondly, you point out that in a document prepared by the White
Estate they say that in her Health Reformer column she incorporated material from
other health reformers which later found its way into her health writings and that these
were attributed to the health reformers. I have not made a study of the ones where
attribution is made and attribution is not made. I do know, for example, though,
that it was in her Health Reformer column that she talks about the dire effect
resulting form wearing wigs over the lower part of the brain, which is based upon the work
of Dr. Jackson's writings, I believe, which appeared not long before in the Health
Reformer. She does not give attribution in this particular instance; so I'm not
sure how to respond to that. You say that she was not trying to hide her
indebtedness, because it was so obvious. The people form whom she was taking this
material, for example Coles and Horace Mann, were widely read, and if she was going to be
sneaky about it, she would have taken from much more obscure sources. You've raised
a very interesting question. I would point out that in the one study I have seen, by
a psychiatrist name Phyllis Greenacre, who has studied pathological imposters, she points
out that one of the remarkable characteristics of people who are imposters in history is
that they leave, unconsciously, clues that will lead to their detection. So, even if
you took that extreme point of view, which I'm not taking, it would not be surprising to
find that she is taking her material from widely known contemporaries.
Now, there is one other experience with which I'm familiar that I
think bears upon this. I'm not sure just what to make of it, but I'll share it with
you. I am working in the history of American science, and the first history of my
field appeared only recently in the early 1970s written by a historian named George
Daniels and published by Alfred Knopf. George Daniels is a brilliant young
historian, a full professor at Northwestern University. Shortly after the book came
off the presses, other historians noted that large passages from his history were taken
word for word from other historians and not obscure historians, but historians who were
friends of his who were surely to be referees, and in fact one was a referee and didn't
even spot his own writings, and reviewers.
Now this discovery created a great deal of controversy. Some
historians immediately charged him with plagiarism and said, "We would not tolerate
this among graduate students; we certainly cannot tolerate it from professors," and
attempted to drive him out of the profession. They eventually succeeded, and he is
now selling antiques.
However, there were a number of historians who said,
"Obviously George Daniels is not a fool, and George Daniels is not stupid enough to
sit down and cavalierly copy from people who he knows are going to read his
work." He himself explained his research methods by saying that he had a
photographic memory (whatever that means) -- he retains large passages of
material without effort, I think is what he meant -- and that he wrote entire
chapters of books or entire articles in a trancelike state and was not consciously aware
of what he'd produced until after the fact. Now, as I said, he lost the debate, he
lost his job. But I do think that his experience is strikingly parallel to the
experience of Ellen White....
ARNOLD WALLENKAMPF.
My name is Arnold Wallenkampf....
I want to refer to the question of the E. G. White statements that
definitely reflect the essence of contemporary statements. My first question is,
what was the literary custom in her day? Today we are quite careful in giving
credit, certainly, for quoted material, and even for ideas that we reflect even though
they are not direct statements. What was the custom in her day with reference to
this? I'm asking this question purposely, because where I have been teaching the
last few years, I saw good students time after time quote long passages verbatim with no
credit, and it never occurred to them that any acknowledgment should be made. And so
what was the custom in the day when Mrs. White wrote, with regard to this?
NUMBERS. I
might add that if parts of my presentation appeared a little ragged, it's because I spent
a large portion of the day before I came out here dealing with a student who had
plagiarized a paper, who was supposed to graduate this weekend, and I agree that it
continues to be a problem with us, however not condoned.
I have not seen any comprehensive studies of literary dependence
in the 19th century. I do know a few things, however. One is that plagiarism,
if you want to use that term -- that is, you know, the conscious borrowing of
material from others without giving credit -- was not morally condoned in the
19th century. Many quarrels were created during this period because individuals
persisted in doing this. Now, I also have evidence that the Seventh-day Adventists
did not condone this. There is an article which I cite in a footnote in my study
that appeared in the Review and Herald in the mid-19th century entitled, I
believe, "Plagiarism." And in this essay the editors of the Review and
Herald are taking to task a non-Adventist woman who appropriated some lines from a
poem or song written by Annie Smith, a Seventh-day Adventist poet. And they made it
very clear to any reader that that type of unacknowledged borrowing of literary property
was unethical and wrong ...
WALLENKAMPF.
Then, one more observation. Mrs. White stressed repeatedly that she was not
dependent upon contemporary views in her presentations, even though they did resemble some
of those views. Our good friend here referred to Great Controversy.
She says that what she wrote in Great controversy had been given her in repeated
visions, and she wrote or portrayed in that book what she had seen, and then later on when
she found historical sources, or others pointed historical sources to her that backed up
her views, then she admits that she used these. But she says, "I was not
dependent on this. I'm only using this because it happens to agree with a vision I
have seen." So even though she used this, there would not be dependence, as I
see it ...
NUMBERS. ...
I think the problem with your Great Controversy episode comes where she
incorporated historical errors. If she used this material because it corresponded
with what she had seen in vision, then why did she not correct what contemporary
historians, mid-20th-century historians, see as historical errors in the material?
This is something that is clearly evident in the study I alluded to which was submitted to
the White Estate a couple years ago.
.
LINDSAY GREEN.
Do you think the vaults will be open more to
lay people, now that this book is out and causes controversy?
I've written for material and still haven't received it. That's why
I wondered.
NUMBERS. I really don't
know. The Ellen White Estate has not asked for my suggestions on how they should
handle their materials. It would seem to me, however, that it would save a lot of
trouble if they would at one fell swoop release all the material that they don't want to
restrict and make it open to everybody. I think that this would avoid a number of
embarrassing questions that are asked. It would avoid the long time that it takes to
go through the various committees to get a release. And it just seems to make a lot
of sense to me. You could probably save a salary or two at the White Estate by doing
this, but I doubt if they are going to do that.
.
FRED WOUDENBERG.
... Can you give me a quotation where she says she didn't borrow from other people?
... Do you have a quotation where she says that? Otherwise, your claim that
she claimed independence of other sources would not be justified. I would be very
serious in this.
NUMBERS. The
answer to the last question is "yes." There are sources that I can give
you after this meeting where she does claim independence in her health reform writings.
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