Is Seventh Day Adventist vegetarian anything to do with ethical treatment of animals, or for health/law only?!
Answers: Please only answer if you have studied about SDA, you are SDA, or you were SDA. Thanks.
Seventh-day Adventists are very health-oriented and operate the largest Protestant Parochial Health Care system in the world.
However, less than 50% of Adventists are vegetarians.
Although I was raised a vegetarian, I am no longer one. I think, many are vegetarians for health reasons, but some include the treatment of the animals as a part of their decision-making process. Others, feel very strongly that is healthy for the environment. So, there are a number of factors that can contribute to the decision.
I think, also, that because Seventh-day Adventists are Creationists and believe in a literal seven day creation by God, just as outlined in Genesis 1 and 2, we view vegetarianism as being more like the original diet that God provided for human beings to eat.
Good question.
I have known many LDS They study health as part of their religion That is why in there are so many in the health services and hospitals .
I have not studied SDA and I am not SDA but I do know how to use Google!
SDA follow dietary restrictions that conform to Biblical guidelines.
SDA Church continues to recommend a vegetarian diet primarily for nutritious and spiritual reasons:
http://www.sdada.org/aboutsda.htm
http://adventist.org.au/about_adventists...
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The origins of SDA - studied it briefly - believed the body to be a temple and should be treated so. The leaders, I believe the most charismatic was a woman, felt that vegetarianism was the best way to keep the body clean, healthy, and in condition to be called a "temple."
The SDA population is the healthiest population in the world.
As I understand it, the SDA draw their dietary rules from the book of Genesis, chapter 2, where God created the plants of the field and the herbs of the field, and then gave Adam and Eve trees with things that were good to eat. This is more or less an "Eden diet", if you will.
(It was not until Adam and Eve were cast out from the Garden of Eden that God said that they could eat animals.)
I believe that I learned this concept from the wonderful SDA cookbook "Ten Talents", which was one of my first vegetarian/health books, the other being Jethro Kloss's Back to Eden, which is still in print.
Thank you for posting this instead of googling it.
Texaskel has a very good answer. I was going to point out the division on the meat issue. I do believe it is more of a belief that that was our original (vegetarian) diet and thus it must be more healthy for us. And it is done in preparation of Christs second coming in the belief that the lion will lie with the lamb and we will revert back to a "Eden Diet"
I am not a SDA nor am I a vegetarian but I have attended their seminars on this and other subjects. The Law is applied by some members pertaining to "clean and unclean" meats.
I think they follow the Biblical guidelines not to condemn over what a person deems as clean and unclean but is seems to stress a little among members.
Ethical treatment of animals is of course considered but we were told to eat meat, not to waste it or kill for waste. So the term ethical would have different meaning to different folks.