The Ramik Report (Plagiarism/Copyright Issue)

Chapter 10—Ellen G. White’s Writings

The following are representative statements made by others relative to comparisons between the writings of Ellen G. White and her predecessors: RRPCI 10.2

“She copied a great deal more than six. In fact, we have confessed and I’ll read it to you that she used 88 different authors and 400 references in The Great Controversy alone. So, it’s not a small amount.” ¹

“She used The Great Teacher by John Harris, 1835, which they’ve admitted. She used The Life of Christ by William Hanna, 1863, which they’ve admitted. She used The Life of Christ by Farrar, which they have admitted, and others which they have admitted. My book will give a further list of those that she used. The Acts of the Apostles, she used The Life and Epistles of the Apostle Paul by Conybeare and Howson, The Life of Paul by Farrar, The Great Teacher by John Harris, Night Scenes of the Bible by Daniel March, and The Life of Paul by McDuff. And The Great Controversy I’ve read to you from Willie White, that in the new edition the reader will find more than 400 references to 88 authors and authorities, page 24, Willie White, General Conference, 1911. Patriarchs and Prophets, she used Paradise Lost by Milton Clarks Commentary, Night Scenes of the Bible by March, Edersheim’s Old Testament, and even The Aprocrypha which F. D. Nichol talks about in his book published in 1951. So far, I have found William Hanna, John Harris, Fleetwood, Farrar, Andrews, and others. I have gotten that, by the way, from a list that Bob Olson from the White Estate has published on ‘Mrs. White and Uninspired Sources.’ Underwood, Gordon, Hanna, Krummacher, Cole, Jackson, Trall, Stowe, Broadman, Miller, Taylor, Kirk, Horace Mann and Able Stevens and others.” ²

Donald R. McAdams notes Ellen G. White’s “use of historians for her passages on historical events,” and acknowledges “historians as the major source for her historical descriptions and details.” ³ RRPCI 10.3

From A Comparison Of Chapter Xxiii Of The Great Controversy, 1911 Ed. By Ellen G. White And Uriah Smith’s 2nd Ed. Of The Sanctuary And The Twenty-Three Hundred Days Of Daniel Viii, 14 by Delmer Alonzo Johnson, 1980, the following: RRPCI 11.1

“In general it cannot be said that Ellen White ‘copied’ from Smith. The correlation, at most, reveals a close paraphrase or summary of his entire book. Some sentences in the thirteen page GC (Great Controversy) chapter appear to be loose paraphrases of The Sanctuary; some tight paraphrases and some seem to be original. Not one sentence, other than the Biblical texts, is exactly identical to a sentence in The Sanctuary.” (page 18)

“Nevertheless, there are numerous instances of clear literary correlation which proves conclusively that Ellen White made use of some of the words, phrases, ideas and thought sequences in LC.” (The Life of Christ). ⁴

“As indicated earlier these are the clearest examples of possible literary dependency on Hanna we have found in the second half of The Desire of Ages. Their total number does not constitute a large part of the second half of the volume. Whatever borrowings occur are in the nature of words and phrases.

“There are many paragraphs, however, that are parallel in thought to Hanna, in which use is made of some identical words and phrases. More often, though, the resemblance between paragraphs between the two authors is one of ideas rather than literary structure. The occurrence of identical words and phrases in our two authors is not by itself sufficient evidence of the literary depending of the later on the earlier. One must note whether they are in common use, or whether they are unusual ones.” ⁵

“The material in Mrs. White’s book on Paul drawn from Conybeare and Howson was equivalent to less than 4 per cent of this English book, for it was a large book. And that drawn from Farrar was equivalent to less than 2 per cent of his book, for it also was a large work. As to The Great Controversy (1911 edition) only 4 per cent of the material is borrowed from other authors. But this 4 per cent is drawn from a number of works, with only a very small per cent being drawn from any particular work. The same would be essentially true of the 1888 edition and the 1884 edition.” ⁶