Читать книгу Edgar Cayce's Everyday Health - Carol Ann Baraff - Страница 17

It should come as no surprise to learn that current findings on the health benefits of wine amply confirm Edgar Cayce’s enthusiastic endorsement. Even the Concord grapes favored in the readings have been getting a lot of favorable press (pun!) lately. Those who delve into this material find that it’s literally loaded with therapeutic uses for various kinds of alcohol. This is a strong position when one considers that most readings took place during and shortly after Prohibition!

Drinkable varieties make a rather large topic with recommendations for red wine alone numbering at least eighty. Approval for other grape beverages can also be found, as is evident in scattered references to white wine, champagne, brandy, sherry, and cordial. Proprietary tonics containing wine as an ingredient, such as Wyeth’s Beef, Iron, and Wine, are endorsed in another sixty or so readings. Then there are the non-grape options, such as eggnog with spirits frumenti (apparently a grain-based distillation) or the occasional beer endorsed for its yeast content.

To separate therapeutic value from beverage associations, the readings encourage users of red wine, in particular, to treat it as a food with specific nutritional benefits:

Wines and brandies are rather good . . . Wine, red wine, as a food rather than as a drink, is rather preferable for the body.

261-28

Internal stimuli to the system of wine or champagne, or the like, will aid in centralizing the circulation, though this should not be too strong as to cause congestion in any portion.

264-25

Stimulant is always needed where there is the tendency for the depressions. This will be helpful to the body . . . Wine—red wine—is sufficient.

264-47

. . . Wine, if it is taken as a food, is good for the body—but never by itself nor just as a drink.

303-20

Although wine alone may be acceptable, most readings advise combining it with carbohydrates such as dark or whole grain bread or crackers:

Red Wine, and not too sweet. Nor too much of it nor too often but this is very good—especially when starches are taken.

257-226

. . . Small quantities each day of a red wine with black bread would be strengthening, and make for an alteration in the digestive forces here that will be the more helpful.

482-6

Taken in moderation, this combination is considered universally beneficial:

Wine is good for all, if taken alone or with black or brown bread. Not with meats so much as with just bread. This may be taken between meals, or as a meal; but not too much—and just once a day. Red Wine only.

462-6

It is important to observe these guidelines as only whole grains carry blood and health-building nutrients that are supplemental to those found in the wine. Wheat, rye, and pumpernickel (check labels for whole grain content) are all suitable sources:

. . . Also we find that a little (not much) Red Wine taken with brown or sour bread (that is, black bread), or with Ry-Krisp or the like, in the late afternoons will be well to add to the diet. About a jigger or half a jigger at a time, this also sipped.

528-6

Wine is a food if taken with brown or black bread, or whole wheat or rye bread.

365-4

Not when retiring; but about two ounces of red wine in the late afternoon—with black or brown bread—would be very, very well. It is strengthening, blood and body building. Let the bread, though, be sour bread; preferably what is ordinarily known as “Jew bread.”

340-31

Also, rather than any strong drink, there should be red wine taken with bread; for it is a food. Not beer, not ale. Occasionally white wine, or red wine; or the mixed—that are not heavy—are very good. But red wine taken regularly with bread—black bread—is good.

257-151

The readings make it clear that this combination is most beneficial when treated as a meal in itself, meaning without the addition of other foods (so sorry, cheese fans). The best time of day is late afternoon or in the early evening shortly before dinner:

. . . Wine taken as a food, not as a drink. An ounce and a half to two ounces of red wine in the afternoon, after the body has worn itself out; that is, two, three, four o’clock in the afternoon—or cock-tail time. Take it as a food, with brown bread. Not beer or ale, nor any of the hard drinks—but red wine!

578-5

. . . Sips of the food values are the more strengthening. The red wine should be rather as the meal once a day, with the black bread only; preferably in the afternoon when greater strength is needed and the reaction will be the better.

325-66

. . . red wine would be excellent if taken as a meal with black or sour bread, in the evenings or late afternoon.

437-7

When serving as a digestive stimulant, the wine is best taken in amounts of no more than an ounce or two at a time and then sipped very slowly:

. . . Take with sour bread or brown bread at those periods when there is needed the stimulation from the general activity of the system; that is, at three, four to five o’clock in the afternoon is the period when an ounce to an ounce and a half may be taken with the bread and be beneficial.

404-6

The lighter wines or champagne should be sipped, as to make for a settling of the stomach and to strengthen the body.

325-60

Though a dollop of wine may be a good constitutional for just about everyone, there are definitely cases in the readings of overloaded systems where all stimulants need to be temporarily avoided. In the meantime, grape juice may be an acceptable substitute. There are also precautions about avoiding hard liquor, sticking to the lighter wines, or those with the lowest alcohol content, and making sure the body does not become too dependent on alcohol.

In this day and age, when many people have allergic reactions to sulfites added to wine and other foods, some prudent label reading is also a very good idea. A host of excellent, even in-state, organic wines that contain no added sulfites can be found today.

With these caveats in mind, it’s an excellent time for a heartfelt toast—to the mighty fruit of the vine and its fermented essence.

¹James F. Balch, and Phyllis A. Balch, Prescription for Nutritional Healing (New York: Avery Publishing Group, 1997), 34.

²Ibid.

³Y. Toda, S. Takemura, T. Morimoto, and R. Ogawa, “Relationship between HLA-DRB1 genotypes and efficacy or oral type II collagen treatment using chicken cartilage soup in rheumatoid arthritis,” Nihon Rinsho Meneki Gakkai Kaishi (February, 1997): 44-51.

⁴Richard Schulze, Healing Liver and Gallbladder Disease Naturally (California: Natural Healing Publications, 2003), 42-43.

⁵R.W. Owen et al., “Olive-Oil Consumption and Health: The Possible Role of Antioxidants,” The Lancet Oncology (October 2000): 107-12.

⁶Gene A. Spiller et al., “Nuts and Plasma Lipids: An Almond-Based Diet Lowers LDLC while Preserving HDL-C,” Journal of the American College of Nutrition (June 1998): 285-90.

⁷P.M. Kris-Etherton et al., “Nuts and their Bioactive Constituents: Effects on Serum Lipids and Other Factors that Affect Disease Risk,” American Journal of Clinical Nutrition (September 1999): 504-11.

⁸Paul Davis and Christine Iwahashi, “Whole Almonds and Almond Fractions Reduce Aberrant Crypt Foci in a Rat Model of Colon Carcinogenesis,” Cancer Letter (April 2001): 27-33.

⁹F.B. Hu and M.J. Stampfer, “Nut Consumption and Risk of Coronary Heart Disease: A Review of Epidemiologic Evidence,” Current Atherosclerosis Reports (November 1999): 204-9.

¹⁰Chris Kilham, “Coffee and Chocolate, the New Health Foods,” HerbalGram 47 (Fall 1999): 21.

¹¹H. Leighton Steward et al., The New Sugar Busters! (New York: Ballantine Books, 2003), 31-32.

¹²Ibid., 8.

¹³James A. Joseph et al., “Reversals of Age-Related Declines in Neuronal Signal Transduction, Cognitive, and Motor Behavioral Deficits with Blueberry, Spinach, or Strawberry Supplementation,” The Journal of Neuroscience (September 15, 1999): 19 (18): 8114-121.

¹⁴Andrew Weil, Spontaneous Healing (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1995), 143-44.

¹⁵Ibid., 139-40.

¹⁶Andrew Weil, Spontaneous Healing (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1995), 142.

¹⁷Ibid., 141.

¹⁸Ibid.

¹⁹Rosario Cuomo et al., “Effects of Carbonated Water on Functional Dyspepsia and Constipation,” European Journal of Gastroenterology & Hepatology (September 2002): 991-99.