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    3. Therapeutic Use in Medical Emergencies

    A third category of situation in which Ellen White might depart from a vegetarian pattern of eating was in cases of medical emergency, in which meat might temporarily serve therapeutic purposes. In 1874, in a letter to her son, W. C. White, Mrs. White made mention of an interesting (and singular) exception to the vegetarian regimen then in vogue in the White household:EWV 15.2

    Your father and I have dropped milk, cream, butter, sugar and meat entirely since we came to California.... Your father bought meat once for May [Walling, a grandniece of Ellen’s] while she was sick, but not one penny have we expended on meat since. 9Letter 12, 1874 (Feb. 15).

    Ellen White was not a fanatic on the meat-eating question. In a Youth’s Instructor article published in 1894, she declared:EWV 15.3

    A meat diet is not the most wholesome of diets, and yet I would [not] take the position that meat should be discarded by every one. Those who have feeble digestive organs can often use meat when they cannot eat vegetables, fruit, or porridge. 10The Youth’s Instructor, May 31, 1894; cited in Counsels on Diet and Foods, 394, 395, #700. (Hereunder cited as YI.)

    Due to a typographical error the second not in the first sentence of the foregoing excerpt was omitted. This omission was rectified, when Elder O. A. Tait wrote to ask Mrs. White to clarify what she meant. She then went on to amplify her position on the meat question, saying:EWV 16.1

    I have never felt that it was my duty to say that no one should taste of meat under any circumstances. To say this when the people have been educated to live on flesh to so great an extent [in Australia, in 1894] would be carrying matters to extremes. I have never felt that it was my duty to make sweeping assertions. What I have said I have said under a sense of duty, but I have been guarded in my statements, because I did not want to give occasion for any one to be a conscience for another. 11Letter 76, 1895 (June 6).

    In dealing with certain illnesses, and in particular terminal cases, Mrs. White took a sensible position. She said:EWV 16.2

    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 become 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. 12Christian Temperance and Bible Hygiene, 117, 118 (1890); cited in Counsels on Diet and Foods, 394, #699.

    To physicians at Adventist sanitariums in 1896 Ellen White cautioned,EWV 16.3

    You are to make no prescriptions that flesh meats shall never be used, but you are to educate the mind, and let the light shine in. Let the individual conscience be awakened in regard to self-preservation and self-purity from every perverted appetite....

    The change should not be urged to be made abruptly, especially for those who are taxed with continuous labor. Let the conscience be educated, the will energized, and the change can be made much more readily and willingly. 13Letter 54, 1896 (July 10); cited in Counsels on Diet and Foods, 291, 292, #434EWV 16.4

    Mrs. White then pointed out that “consumptives who are going steadily down to the grave” and “persons with tumors running their life away” should not be burdened about the meat question; and physicians should “be careful to make no stringent resolution in regard to this matter.” 14IbidEWV 17.1

    Responding to an inquiry from a physician about whether chicken broth might be appropriate for one suffering from acute nausea and unable to keep anything on the stomach, Mrs. White wrote: “There are persons dying of consumption [tuberculosis] who, if they ask for chicken broth, should have it. But I would be very careful.” 15Letter 231, 1905 (July 11); cited in Counsels on Diet and Foods, 292, #435.EWV 17.2

    4. In addition to the three foregoing categories of exceptions to a vegetarian diet, there is a fourth to be considered. Were there instances when the family grew a bit careless, or when Ellen White was struggling against a craving for meat (she admitted to loving the taste of meat), when she actually slipped, and lost—if only temporarily—the battle?EWV 17.3

    The White Estate is not aware of any definitive, documented evidence of such a short-coming. Should such evidence be forthcoming, it would simply show the humanness of prophets. So far as this researcher is aware, the nearest thing to such a slip is an oblique reference to “conscience” in a letter Ellen White wrote February 19, 1884, to “Harriet [Smith],” wife of Review editor, Uriah Smith. Said she:EWV 17.4

    “I am happy to report I am in excellent health. I have proscribed [i.e., banned] all meat, all butter. None appears on my table. My head is clearer, my strength firmer, and my conscience more free, for I know I am following the light which God has given us.” 16Letter 11a, 1884 (Feb. 19).

    Does this mean that Ellen White had been falling into temptation to satisfy a craving for flesh foods, but had now gained the victory, and that as a result her conscience was now more free from guilt feelings? Perhaps, but it seems impossible from the letter itself to arrive at a conclusive determination.EWV 17.5

    The Scriptures were written, not only by those properly categorized as “holy men of God [who] spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost” (2 Peter 1:21), but also by men who occasionally lapsed into sin.EWV 18.1

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