Understanding Ellen White

Statements that remain obscure or unconfirmed

The six statements in this section address issues that relate to geology, life sciences, and astronomy. An important biblical principle for this section is the purpose of divine revelation. Was the revelation intended to provide new breakthroughs in scientific understanding? Or was it to provide practical help in matters of faith, health, and divine guidance? UEGW 186.1

Interpreters of Ellen White’s writings have long distinguished between precepts or principles and the explanation or rationale given. Don McMahon, a physician, compared Ellen White’s statements on health with modern medical science and demonstrated that the accuracy of her counsel, relative to others of her time, regarding “what” people should do to improve their health was accurate to the point of statistical impossibility. This miraculous accuracy, however, did not always extend to the “why,” the scientific rational behind the counsel. She would therefore at times use the scientific understanding of her day as a point of reference, and because of this the accuracy of her explanations was comparable to those of her contemporaries—which she and her readers understood. ⁴¹ For example, guiding a person to better health by avoiding tobacco was the goal rather than miraculously advancing human scientific understanding. Over time, science advanced to the point where it now provides an understanding of this guidance. UEGW 186.2

Ellen White’s use of sometimes seemingly inaccurate contemporary ratio-nales for divine truth fits the biblical pattern for prophetic explanations for divine commands. These do not appear to be the focus of the divine revelation but rather a common point of understanding for her time. Biblical examples would include God’s command to burn or destroy items that might look like they had leprosy, such as a house, leather, wool, and so on, with spots (Lev. 13:51, 52; 14:44-57). God worked within their structure of understanding. UEGW 186.3

God designated many things as “unclean” in order, among other things, to protect His people from actual dangers to health including such things as clean and unclean meats, anything found dead, including water sources or ground that touches a carcass, and persons with contagious illness or involuntary bodily discharges (Lev. 5:2; 11; 13; 15). He even called for the washing of hands, body, clothing, and other objects contaminated by the discharge (Lev. 15). God did not provide a scientific basis for His commands but established guidelines within their understanding that resulted in sanitary practices that protected them from disease. God provided the “what” or the health-improving action without a scientifically defensible “why.” UEGW 186.4