The Hallelujah Health Tip (SM) Issue #404
August, 2005
WHY NOT ALL RAW?
by Rev. George H. Malkmus
(Rev. Malkmus teaches the raw food diet from the biblical perspective
and has helped tens of thousands of people to achieve better health.)
The chair I sit in is sometimes a very difficult and controversial place to be! There is an old saying that, “You can please some of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time!” It kind of reminds me of a story I once heard that took place during the Civil War: Not wanting to choose sides, one fellow put on a blue top and gray pants. The only problem was that BOTH SIDES SHOT AT HIM!
Last week, when in this column I discouraged the consuming of an ALL RAW diet, there were some folks not very happy with me. But let me say right up front that I am not here to try and please anyone (other than my Lord)! But rather, my burning desire is to help people get well and stay well, and experience the ultimate Health God designed for each of us. My purpose is not to teach some dogma, but to share truths! What I share in this column is the result of almost 30 years of personal research and personal experience, as well as input from tens of thousands of others who have made the diet change that we teach here at Hallelujah Acres, and shared their experience with me.
Now when it comes to the subject of “WHY NOT ALL RAW?” let me give a little background. There is absolutely no question in my mind, that at creation, some six thousand years ago, God gave mankind a diet that was 100% RAW! (See Genesis 1:29.) God had just created the human physical body, and obviously the diet God gave to mankind in Genesis 1:29, was the very diet God had designed His human creation to be nourished with. And it was on this ALL RAW, 100% plant based diet that mankind, after the fall, lived for the next 1700 years of Biblical history (up until the flood) to an average age of 912 years (age of patriarchs at death) without a single recorded instance of sickness.
Then came the flood. Following the flood, man started to consume the flesh of animals (Genesis 9:3) and to cook his food. With the introduction of flesh and cooked food into the diet, sickness entered the human race. For the past 4000 plus years, man has been consuming animal flesh (though never before in history in the quantities or loaded with the fat and other contaminants of today), and man has been cooking most of his food.
Today, the health of mankind is in a deplorable state! Despite the trillions of dollars poured into so-called healthcare each year, just here in the United States, the health of the American people continues to decline at an alarming rate. Here at Hallelujah Acres, we have found a solution! A diet that will almost always enable the body to restore health to those who are sick, while keeping those who are not sick, from getting sick in most instances. With that as a little background, let me share a few things that will hopefully shed some light on this week’s subject:
WHY NOT ALL RAW!
Thirty years ago, after being told that I had colon cancer, and not wanting to go the medical route my mother had gone before me for her colon cancer (because of the devastating experience she had going the medical route), I went seeking an alternative. The Lord led me to an Evangelist in Texas by the name of Lestor Roloff, who encouraged me to not go the medical route, but rather to adopt the Genesis 1:29, ALL RAW, vegan diet, of the Bible, and to drink a lot of ALL RAW carrot juice.
I followed Bro. Roloff’s instructions 100%, and almost immediately started to get well. But if you remember in last week’s Health Tip #403, I shared that while this ALL RAW diet brought wellness to my body, it also brought about too rapid a detoxification and too rapid and too great a loss of weight. Shortly after this personal experience, the Lord opened the door for me to go to the Shangri-La Health Resort in Bonita Springs, Florida, in the late 1970’s, where I was employed as a lecturer and head gardener.
The Shangri-La was a Natural Hygiene fasting retreat where people came with serious physical problems to detoxify through the use of distilled water fasts. While there, I saw people go on water fasts of anywhere from 3 days to 40 days. Most of those who went on these water fasts experienced such rapid detoxification and weight loss they had to go to bed. I saw a few die while on an extended water fast. Then after they had broken their fast, usually on some raw fruit, they were encouraged to consume ALL RAW foods, which usually included a high percentage of fruit. On this ALL RAW diet, which contained a lot of fruit, I saw people who had been on these water fasts recover strength and weight too slowly. In fact, some never regained the strength they had before the fast.
ENTER DR. ANN WIGMORE
A few years later, I learned of Dr. Ann Wigmore, and the Hippocrates Health Institute in Boston, Massachusetts. I personally spent time with Dr. Wigmore and learned a lot! In fact, it was the first time I had ever seen a kitchen without a stove. Dr. Ann taught ALL RAW eating along with the consumption of wheat grass juice, rejuvalac (made from fermented grains), lots of sprouts, and some fermented food. Once again I saw people getting well, but once again I saw people going through strong detoxification and rapid weight loss.
RESEARCH
Between the years of 1976, when I adopted the Genesis 1:29 diet, and 1992 when Rhonda and I began HALLELUJAH ACRES, I was constantly seeking ever more information. I studied most modalities in both the traditional and alternative health fields, as well as spending time with Dr. Carey Reams in Blue Ridge, Georgia. I was constantly looking for what produced the best results in the shortest time at the least expense, without the negative baggage I had seen many people experience on an ALL RAW vegan diet.
ENTER HALLELUJAH ACRES
In 1992, Rhonda and I started HALLELUJAH ACRES. What we taught was the result of some 15 years of personal research and personal experience. Thus we used a basically RAW diet with lots of vegetable juice, but allowing 15% of the diet to be cooked. We learned that most people, if they could have a small amount of cooked food, found The Hallelujah Diet doable! We also found that because The Hallelujah Diet allowed 15% cooked, most people did not go through severe detoxification, nor did they experience too rapid or too great a weight loss. But the most amazing thing of all was that people were getting even BETTER RESULTS on the 85% RAW, to 15% cooked ratio, than I had seen folks obtain previously on ALL RAW.
Here at Hallelujah Acres, we have found that most people find it extremely difficult to go ALL RAW, and that when they attempt to do so, have a tendency to constantly have a desire to cheat. This we have found brings guilt! While others who are attempting to do all raw, often bring judgment and criticism upon those who cheat. It is almost like a cult that people become a part of. And one of the things I find especially sad is that many of those who publicly promote an ALL RAW diet, in private, CHEAT! The Hallelujah Diet takes away the guilt, because it does not consider consuming some high quality cooked plant food cheating. It is a part of the diet!
WHY NOT ALL RAW?
Let me attempt to bring this to a conclusion by sharing a few reasons for not eating ALL RAW. Some of what follows I shared in last week’s Health Tip #403:
1. Many people find it very difficult to obtain enough calories, while on an ALL RAW diet, to meet the metabolic needs of their bodies. If we do not take in enough calories, too much weight can be lost, and energy may be lacking.
2. When enough calories are not consumed to meet metabolic needs, protein needs are difficult to meet. The 15% cooked starches found in The Hallelujah Diet, makes it easy to meet both the caloric and protein needs, without having to consume huge quantities of RAW food. This cooked portion also helps increase energy, keeps people from losing too much weight, helps keep people from feeling the cold in the wintertime, and helps to stop the desire to cheat.
3. Quite often, shortly after adopting The Hallelujah Diet, a person may experience low energy while the body is cleansing. In fact, a person may go through cycles of cleansing for a number of weeks or even months. However, for many folks, low energy is simply related to not getting enough calories to meet metabolic needs as well as energy needs.
4. The following helps explain how the 15% cooked portion of The Hallelujah Diet helps meet caloric needs: A glass of RAW vegetable juice contains approximately 100 calories, while a serving of RAW BarleyMax® contains approximately 6 calories. One cup of chopped RAW Romaine lettuce provides 8 calories, while cup of RAW broccoli provides only 12 calories. Now watch this: cup of COOKED broccoli contains 26 calories, while cup of COOKED brown rice contains 108 calories and cup of cooked navy beans contains 129 calories. These examples show the value of consuming 15% of our daily diet in cooked form.
5. There is a trade off with cooked foods. Certain phytochemicals (such as lycopene, and carotenoids), are activated by the cooking process, while cooking destroys a percentage of other nutrients such as vitamin C and minerals, along with all enzymes. Some proteins and starches are more readily available in cooked foods. These figures show the advantages of making 15% of our daily food intake COOKED food. Thus on The Hallelujah Diet, an 85% RAW to 15% cooked ratio, we have the best of both worlds!
6. Because we do not chew our RAW foods adequately, we lose approximately of the available calories contained within them. This makes it almost impossible to eat enough raw foods to meet caloric needs without a heavy emphasis on nuts, seeds, and avocados. These high fat foods provide too high a percentage of calories from fat, and can lead to decreased insulin sensitivity and potential blood sugar problems.
7. Dr. Fuhrman encourages us to eat a large quantity of RAW vegetables, but he does not encourage an ALL RAW diet. He believes that eating ALL RAW foods is a disadvantage: “To exclude all steamed vegetables and vegetable soups from your diet narrows the nutrient diversity of your diet and has a tendency to reduce the percentage of calories from vegetables, in favor of nuts and fruits, which are lower in nutrients per calorie. Unfortunately, sloppy science prevails in the RAW-FOOD movement.”
(NOTE: Dr. Fuhrman is a medical doctor who consumes and promotes a diet very similar to The Hallelujah Diet. He has used this diet to restore health to many of his patients. His book, EAT TO LIVE, is an excellent scientifically documented book and it is available from Hallelujah Acres. Call (800) 915-9355 for more information or to purchase.)
Trust the above helps our readers to better understand why we include 15% COOKED food in our basically RAW Hallelujah Diet! Also, I want the ALL RAW advocates out there to know that I STILL LOVE THEM and mean them no harm. And I want all to know that even though I realize that the original Genesis 1:29 diet was ALL RAW, we have found through 30 years of personal experience, the testimonies of tens of thousands, and 30 years of research, that adding some cooked foods to our diet in this day and age, has advantages. If I am to be honest, and true to my calling, I must be willing to change pre-conceived dogmas, for learned truths! MARANATHA!
Hallelujah Acres is a Christian Ministry that teaches
health from a Biblical perspective! Hallelujah Acres is
trying to help the Christian community (as well as anyone
else who will listen) realize that God’s ORIGINAL diet, as
given by God in the Bible, in Genesis 1:29, was God’s
perfect plan for the proper nourishment of his human
creation. Multitudes have made this diet change that we
teach here at Hallelujah Acres, and experienced
normalization of weight, as well as the elimination of
almost all their physical problems. For more information,
visit our website at <http://www.hacres.com>
or call (704) 481-1700
Comments by Rhio
The raw diet recommended by Dr. Malkmus with the inclusion of 15% cooked food is an excellent diet, and many people are making this work for them with good results.
For other people, however, adherence to 100% raw food is easier to maintain because:
1) Cooked foods are addictive. For some people eating even a little cooked food, leads to more and more cooked food consumption, until they are back where they started… on a cooked food diet.
2) Then they know exactly what they are going to choose and don’t have to bother figuring out what 15% cooked means in terms of weight (of the food) and/or portions.
People on the 100% raw diet can obtain more calories, if necessary, by eating sprouted legumes and some sprouted grains. Nuts, seeds, avocados, coconuts, flaxseed and flaxseed oil in moderation are also excellent sources of more calories, providing the much needed “essential fatty acids”.
It is to our advantage to always slow down our eating in order to chew our food well. This applies whether one is eating raw OR cooked food. It is a good habit that can be cultivated, and it brings maximum digestive and assimilative benefits.
Energy comes from having a clean body, it doesn’t generally depend on food. Experienced fasters know that you can experience what is referred to as “a fasting high”. Lots of energy is the hallmark of a fasting high.
There is some truth to the contention that if you don’t get enough calories you will not meet your metabolic or energy needs, but I think, in many cases, lack of energy has more to do with toxicity and/or nutrient deficiencies.