Does Life Exist in Outer Space?

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Why Do They Keep On Smoking?

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How Do They Think It in Spanish?

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Do Hospital Patients Have Rights?

SEPTEMBER 8, 1964

THE REASON FOR THIS MAGAZINE

Newt sources that are able to keep you awake to the vital issues of our times must be unfettered by censorship and selfish interests. “Awake!” has no fetters. It recognizes facts, faces facts, is free to publish facts. It is not bound by political ties/ it is unhampered by traditional creeds. This magazine keeps itself free, that it may speak freely to you. But it does not abuse its freedom. It maintains integrity to truth.

The viewpoint of “Awake!" is not narrow, but is international. "Awake!” has its own correspondents in scores of nations. Its articles are read in many lands, in many languages, by millions of persons.

In every issue "Awake!" presents vital topics on which you should be informed. It features penetrating articles on social conditions and offers sound counsel for meeting the problems of everyday life. Current news from every continent passes in quick review. Attention is focused on activities in the fields of government and commerce about which you should know. Straightforward discussions of religious issues alert you to matters of vital concern. Customs and people in many lands, the marvels of creation, practical sciences and points of human interest are all embraced in its coverage. “Awake!" provides wholesome, instructive reading for every member of the family.

“Awake!" pledges itself to righteous principles, to exposing hidden foes and subtle dangers, to championing freedom for all, to comforting mourners and strengthening those disheartened by the failures of a delinquent world, reflecting sure hope for the establishment of God's righteous new order in this generation.

Get acquainted with "Awake!” Keep awake by reading “Awake!"

PUBLISHED SIMULTANEOUSLY IN TH! UNITED STATES BY THE WATCHTOWER BIBLE AND TRACT SOCIETY OF NEW YORK, INC. 117 Adams Street                        Brooklyn, N.Y. 11201, U.S.A.

and in England by WATCH TOWER BIBLE AND TRACT SOCIETY Watch Tower House, The Ridgeway London N.W. 7, England N. H. Knorr, President                       Geant Suiter, Secretary

The Bible transfatlM regularly used Is "Awake!” Ie the New World Translation of tBe Holy Strip tires, M61 edition. Whu ether translations are used, tkfe Is clearly marked,

CONTENTS

Family Boss or Loving Husband?

Does Life Exist in Outer Space?

Why Do They Keep On Smoking?

How Do They Think It in Spanish?

The Role of the Rippling River

Do Hospital Patients Have Rights?

Vast Undersea Canyon

*Your Word Is Truth”

Why the New World Translation

Reads "All Other”

Watching the World

DO YOU walk several feet ahead of your wife to show your position as head of the house? Or do you speak disparagingly of your wife to others out of fear that kind words would imply that you are “henpecked”? Believe it or not, this is the practice in some communities. You may agree that the man should be head of the house, but still you probably say, “That’s taking headship a little too far.”

Nevertheless, in a society where the family is the basic unit it is proper that a man should take his responsibility as family head seriously. Some family heads, though, have difficulty in adjusting themselves to the home environment because of the highly competitive atmosphere in which they must work all day, where the big-man-kick-little-man attitude often alienates the overseer from his fellow workers. The boss wants to get as much out of his men as he can, while the men want to get as much out of the boss as they can. His presence will stimulate activity, but will not always be welcome. Perhaps you would like to improve conditions under which you work but are not in position to

do so. However, you can do something about conditions in the home where you are the head. Your homecoming can be something that the whole family looks forward to, or it can be a time when your wife says, “Look out, kids, your father’s coming!”

Something that makes any of us feel good is when the boss comes along, notices the good work we are doing and commends us. Nothing is more discouraging than always to have one’s mistakes noticed and bad work returned, while good work seemingly goes unnoticed, taken for granted. When we stop to think about it, we know that we are getting paid for doing the job right, but we still appreciate a little pat on the back. Now, if a husband feels that way, would it not be reasonable to conclude that a wife does too?

She will soon sense it if her housekeeping and cooking are being taken for granted. She works hard to have the house clean and the meal ready on time. Perhaps she has spent a lot of time looking through magazines to find a new recipe. She has changed her dress and tidied her hair, and now here comes her husband. Coat thrown there, shoes kicked off here, he gobbles down the meal without noticing anything different, then sinks back in the armchair buried in a newspaper. What a disappointment! If only he had said something that showed a little appreciation. It would have required very little effort, and it would have meant so much. Empathy, putting oneself in the place of the other person, makes all the difference. It can turn a bosslike head into a loving husband.

An inspired writer of the past made clear that this is a basic factor to keep in mind in exercising husbandly headship. He wrote: “A husband is head of his wife,” and he added, “Husbands ought to be loving their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself [because they are one flesh since marriage], for no man ever hated his own flesh; but he feeds and cherishes it.” (Eph. 5:23, 28, 29) Or, as Jesus Christ put it, we ‘should do to others as we would like them to do to us.' (Matt. 7:12) Such a simple rule, but so difficult for some to apply. It is as the West German magazine Kristal! commented: “In place of the understanding fatherly type, we now have the rushed robot that arrives home from work worn out and unapproachable.” All right, so you have been pushed around all day, but why make your home as unpleasant as the place where you work? Why not make it a place where there is an atmosphere of love and mutual refreshment?

In a commendable effort in this direction, many fathers have come to appreciate the need for some religious activity in the home, and set aside time each week for a family Bible discussion. Care must be exercised, though, to see that this does not become simply a duty performed, like a weekly meeting at the workshop where the boss delivers a short speech that no one would dare to miss but in which no one is interested. The family can always be commended for getting together on time and for the good comments that they make. The discussion must be kept lively and practical. The children, for instance, go to school and mix with a wide variety of other children. What problems do they face? How can the information studied be of help

to them? What is needed is not just an academic approach but one that takes in each member of the family and his individual needs. Such a Bible discussion can be very upbuilding, and one to which all will look forward.

This points up an important fact about a happy home environment. It comes about, not regardless of what the family head does, but because of what he does. How much effort do you expend in this behalf? Have you become just a mechanical breadwinner, or do you have a genuine love for your wife and children? You may be very generous, showering your wife with gifts and yet notice that there is not the same response as there used to be. Perhaps she feels that your gift-giving has become perfunctory. If this is the case, use a little more initiative, giving a gift when it is not expected. It is not that the gift is an expensive one, but it comes as a surprise and says, “Thank you, Darling, for all the effort and cooperation in making our home such a happy place.” By taking your responsibility seriously, always having empathy, commending wherever possible, and being alert to ways of showing appreciation, you can avoid the reputation of being a family boss, and show that you really are a loving husband.

DOES intelligent life exist in outer space? Sciencefiction writers have long been writing fantastic stories about “people” on other planets. However, much more reliable scientists have now begun to talk seriously about the possibility that life will be found elsewhere in the universe.

Fordham University chemist Bartholomew Nagy recently led a team that thought it had found microscopic fossil life forms in a meteorite that fell in France a hundred years ago. Spectacular newspaper reports termed this positive proof of extraterrestrial life. However, they did not give equal space to the fact that other scientists pointedly disagreed.

Scientists have conferred with a U.S. Congressional committee on the possibility that life could be found on other planets. The principal conclusion at the time was that even if material life does exist elsewhere, no one was willing to spend the fantastic sums of money that would be necessary to get in touch with it.

Other Kinds of Life

V. Axel Firsoff, writing in the British scientific publication Discovery, said astronomers have considered “the problem of life beyond the Earth . . . strictly from the narrow viewpoint of terrestrial organisms ... it is beginning to be widely felt that this onesided approach has become outdated.” Scientists no longer think all life must be our kind of oxygen-breathing, waterdrinking life. Firsoff proposes “only one selected alternative scheme of ‘pseudo-organic chemistry' in which liquid ammonia replaces water.” He says many other possibilities exist, but suggests that ammonia in the atmosphere of the giant planets and perhaps on some of their satellites could support this kind of life. “Jovian animals,” he says, “could breathe nitrogen and drink liquid ammonia. Whether they do remains to be seen.”

Dr. Ralph E. Lapp, special editor of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, thinks the places where life may exist are too far away for man ever to reach. The still theoretical ion rocket may someday be used to attain the fantastic velocity of a hundred miles a second. But even at that speed our closest stellar neighbor in space, Alpha Centauri, is eight thousand years away! Since it is not imaginable that man could travel such distances, Lapp proposes we listen for them. He thinks he knows what radio frequencies an intelligent society would use to communicate from remote space—frequencies close to the 21-centimeter hydrogen note. In 1960 the U.S. National Radio Astronomy Observatory near Greenbank, West Virginia, tried listening to two of the nearest stars, but without initial success. Lapp thinks an intelligent society could send an understandable message to

Earth. “The basic reason for my optimism,’’ he wrote in Harper’s magazine, “is that if we do establish contact with an exosociety [a society outside the solar system] it is probable that their technology is more advanced than ours. We may find that we are dealing with vastly brighter beings.’’

Interstellar Warnings

Sebastian von Hoerner, of the Astrono-misches Rechen-Institut in Heidelberg, Germany, thinks that more “advanced” planets may have been through cycles of self-destruction and would have something to say to Earth’s young civilization now approaching a great crisis. Writing in Science, a technical magazine published by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, he said: “The civilizations we find will very probably be much older than we are, and they will be more advanced. Our chance of learning from them might be considered the most important incentive for our search.” Time magazine, commenting on Von Hoerner’s views, suggested that perhaps there is “an old, wise civilization that has survived many crises and is trying to warn the callow earth against the mistakes of its own youth.”

Professor Shapley says: “The high probability of the existence of senses, and of sense organs, now unknown to man is proposed. Their existence is indeed so reasonable as to seem axiomatic. . . . Many realities may lie beyond the comprehension of human terrestrials, simply because our outfitting of sense organs is limited.”

Dr. Lapp adds: “Think of the knowledge we could gain if planet X is far advanced and is already familiar with the discoveries, inventions, and evolutionary steps which are still in our future. Think of the impact which such knowledge could have upon our lives, upon our philosophy and our religion. These matters are now being discussed quite seriously by reputable scientists.”

Life DOES Exist in Space/

The amazing fact is that life does exist in space—life that has senses and capacities man has never imagined! Further, contact with it has been made! The simple fact is that the scientists are looking too low. They are looking for an “evolved” kind of life, based on the type of chemical processes still-young man has thus far discovered.

However, they have made a great step forward. They have begun to realize that not all life has to be the kind we know, and not all phenomena need to be the kind we understand. This is of interest to the Bible believer who has long recognized the existence of a kind of life many scientists refused to admit. The evidence is clear that this life exists, though many men, like children at the edge of the sea, do not imagine the marvels that exist beyond the reach of their limited knowledge.

The life that unquestionably does exist in space does not require powerful radio signals to communicate with men. Nor does it depend on man’s ability to build radio telescopes to receive its messages. No 21.6-year time lag is necessary for a roundtrip message, as would be the case for radio communication traveling at the speed of light between earth and relatively nearby Tau Ceti. No 2,000-year wait is necessary for the answer to a question from a more distant source.

Ask one of Jehovah’s witnesses if life exists elsewhere in the universe. He will answer: “Certainty it does!" He knows that it exists on a scale far higher than life forms requiring the same chemical elements found on earth, or having only our limited number of senses.

Further, he knows that this intelligent life, much older and wiser than man, has something very important to teach us; that it has a vital warning for Earth’s young civilization in the face of its present great crisis, and that it has warned of the destruction of the world of unbelieving mankind, and has shown the way of escape. The impact this warning should have “upon our lives, upon our philosophy and our religion” is overwhelming.

Persons who consider this revelation beneath their intelligence are themselves the ones who are looking too low. In confining their investigations to the visible universe, they look far beneath the magnificence of what actually does exist, and dangerously ignore its warning.

Jfore Information than They Expect

Splendid creatures from what men call “outer space” were used by God to explain his requirements to faithful men three and a half millenniums ago—long before the epoch of modern radio or twentieth-century science! Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ, truthfully wrote under inspiration that the Law given to Moses was “transmitted through angels.” The Law they transmitted from God included severe warnings of what would happen if the people who accepted it failed to remain faithful to their God—these were warnings from space that proved to be amazingly true!—Gal. 3:19.

The word “angels” means “messengers.” These invisible messengers in space, far wiser and more powerful than any material life man knows, have transmitted outstanding predictions and warnings of the future. The fulfillment of the things they were used to foretell is the greatest proof of their existence, and of the fact that the men who wrote their predictions and warnings really were in touch with them. Let us consider two different examples, one that has already been accomplished in detail, and another that presents a serious warning for our day.

Two thousand five hundred years ago, in a message much easier to understand than the coded communications radio astronomers hope to hear from space, an angel told Daniel the Hebrew that Persia, then ruling as a world power, would be overthrown and replaced by Greece. This actually did occur! The messenger from space said: “I have come to cause you to discern what will befall your people in the final part of the days.” He gave “a vision yet for the days to come,” which foretold the major events of world history from Daniel’s time down to our day!

He described, in advance, kings who would rule Persia. He foretold the Greek Empire’s taking Persia’s place as a world power. He announced the division of Alexander the Great’s Greek Empire into four parts at his death. He predicted the replacing of Greece by Rome. The angel further described the modern world struggle between democratic and totalitarian governments. He told of the world’s impending “time of distress such as has not been made to occur since there came to be a nation.” He announced that the archangel Michael would stand up to protect God’s people at the “time of the end” of this troubled and wicked world, where we now find ourselves.¹

Certainly the angel who gave this message gave far more information than scientists hope to gain from creatures on another planet. Daniel was not writing on his own authority. How would he have known, two hundred years in advance, what Greece would do? How could he have predicted its split into four parts after Alexander’s death? How could he have foretold what would happen hundreds of years later in Rome, or some 2,500 years later in our century? No man could have predicted this. Rather, this was a vastly superior “wisdom from above.”—Jas. 3:17.

A Far Greater Wisdom

This ‘wisdom from space’ warns of the destruction of our present “civilization" in a far more specific way than any “old, wise civilization’’ in space could do. This destruction is discussed in detail in the Bible book of Revelation, which opens with these words: “A revelation by Jesus Christ, which God gave him, to show his slaves the things that must shortly take place. And he sent forth his angel and presented it in signs through him to his slave John.” That revelation contains angelic warnings of the destruction that now faces an unbelieving human society. Heavenly messages warn of man’s failure to establish righteous conditions, and foretell divine intervention. The political vine of disobedient mankind is gathered and hurled “into the great wine press of the anger of God.” However, the angel let John know that a righteous government is to come “down out of heaven from God,” and that by means of it God “will wipe out every tear from their eyes, and death will be no more, neither will mourning nor outcry nor pain be any more.”—Rev. 1:1; 14:19; 21: 1-4.

This is not fiction! Rather, it is a divine message, transmitted through a mighty spirit creature from outer space. It represents a wisdom far greater than man’s. That wisdom warns humankind against continuing its present course, and foretells the blessings that will come to those who heed the divine warning, flee from the world’s course, and receive life under the righteous new conditions the Creator soon will establish on earth.

The divine message from space said; “These words are faithful and true; yes, Jehovah the God of the inspired expressions of the prophets sent his angel forth to show his slaves the things that must shortly take place. And, look! I am coming quickly. Happy is anyone observing the words of the prophecy of this scroll.” —Rev. 22:6, 7.

Far Superior Creatures

Thus, the scientists are looking too low. A much higher form of life than many of them are willing to imagine does exist. It has contacted man, not through man’s radio, but through powers of communication far superior to the accomplishments of modern science. It is not limited to “potentially life-supporting planets,” and is not an evolutionary civilization that has progressed beyond earth’s. Rather, it was created vastly superior to human life by the Creator, who made the awesomely magnificent material universe. The proof it exists is the prophecy-filled Bible. This “wisdom from above" has not come about by trial and error, but it has warned men of what is about to happen, and it would be foolish not to listen.

What kind of life the Creator has produced elsewhere is not known to man. But one fact is sure: He /mis produced creatures far superior to man. He created them before he created man, and he has used them to communicate with men. Through them he announced, long in advance, marvels he will perform. And he has used them to give a small glimpse of the magnificent conditions that are in the immediate future for those of mankind who will heed his warnings.

Will you listen to this mature advice from space? Will you study the Book that the Creator of all things inspired? Will you learn from the Bible what is about to happen on earth, and what you can do to survive the impending destruction? The intelligent course is not to turn a deaf ear to this message, but to listen, and to accept the spiritual warning, which is rejected by many people who are looking for inferior, physical life in space.

«/CIGARETTES PERIL HEALTH, Vi U.S. REPORT CONCLUDES.”

Such was the headline in the January 12, 1964, issue of the New York Times, which went on to tell about the 150,000-word report by a panel of ten impartial authorities in several health fields, based on an evaluation of almost 12,000 studies of smoking's effect on health. Cigarette sales declined about 25 percent.

A few weeks later, on March 15, the same newspaper reported: “CIGARETTE SALES ARE REBOUNDING. Decline Following Surgeon General’s Health Report Is Now Less Severe.” Then in June the surgeon general said that cigarette sales in April 1964 had soared to 44 billion cigarettes shipped from factories. This was an increase of two billion cigarettes above the same month a year ago! Any decline in the nation’s smoking, he explained, was probably due to some young persons’ not taking up the habit after the government report. Thus the majority of smokers in the United States, estimated at about 70,000,000, never really quit.

Why? Yes, why, especially in view of what the government report revealed? It disclosed that “cigarette smoking contributes substantially to mortality from certain specific diseases and to the over-all death rate.” The greatest risk in smoking, it forcefully stated, was lung cancer; but other diseases were linked to smoking, such as various forms of heart disease, gastric ulcers, bronchitis and cirrhosis of the liver. Studies indicate, the report said, that those who smoke one to two packs a day have an overall death rate 90 percent higher than for nonsmokers. As for lung

cancer, cigarette smokers have a death rate that is almost 1,000 percent higher than for nonsmokers.

A similar report was released in Britain in 1962, when the Royal College of Physicians indicted cigarette smoking as a cause of lung cancer. Cigarette sales slumped for about a year. Then, despite an official campaign urging people to cut down or cut out cigarette smoking, Britons began smoking more than ever. Cigarette sales were estimated to be at least 5 percent higher than they were when the government report said that eight out of every ten deaths from lung cancer were caused by cigarette smoking.

Though measures have been taken in a number of countries, such as in Denmark, West Germany and the Soviet Union, to discourage cigarette smoking, it has generally increased. Why is this? Is it that the facts about the danger of smoking are not known? No, in most cases the smokers have heard about the peril. In many instances it is an unwillingness to face the facts, combined with encouragement people get from cigarette advertising to keep on smoking.

Effect of Advertising

In many countries television and radio advertise cigarettes daily. In the United States a great number of popular shows, including highly popular medical shows, are sponsored, at least in part, by cigarette companies. One could hardly expect a TV physician to tell his patient to stop smoking! Some smoking ads on TV seem to be aimed at young people; even if they are not, there seems to be little on TV in the United States to send a 15-year-old away with the feeling that smoking is not for him. While the television viewers are spurred by advertising to smoke a certain brand of cigarettes, there is little on TV and radio to warn the public of the health hazards. Such efforts have been described as “practically nil.” This is understandable, since cigarette advertising on TV in this one country alone cost more than $110,000,000 in a recent year.

Newspapers and magazines, moreover, have not done a great deal, especially in the United States, to emphasize the peril of cigarette smoking. Again this is understandable, since almost every issue of a magazine or newspaper has large cigarette advertisements. Though reports on smoking studies have appeared in newspapers, the general story has been fragmented. ‘ ‘Few newspapers,” stated the Consumer Reports, “undertook to present the full evidence on tobacco.”

This tendency to play down the perils of smoking is because many publications depend on cigarette advertising. Using various advertising mediums, the tobacco companies in the United States spend about $200,000,000 a year telling people to SMOKE! SMOKE! SMOKE! Who is going to spend such money telling people not to smoke? Many governments are in a difficult position because taxes on cigarettes and tobacco bring in a large amount of the budget resources.

Some governments, such as that of the Netherlands, have earmarked money to warn against smoking and some have placed limits on advertising. In Italy, where all cigarette advertising has been banned, cigarette smoking has been significantly inhibited.

But in many countries the advertising continues and the effect is evident. In a discussion held by the National Conference on Smoking and Youth, teen-agers noted that the antismoking propaganda is not as vast in magnitude nor as powerful in impact as the pro-smoking ads. They claimed that antismoking propaganda is usually unattractive and is no match for the alluring advertisements paid for by the cigarette companies. The teen-agers were also critical of the schools for “apathy” on the smoking question. Indeed, in another panel of youths the expression was made that teen-agers were “brainwashed” into smoking by “parents, television, people at school . . . everybody.”

Bad Examples Everywhere

This points up the fact that many people keep on smoking because others do. Those “others” are, all too often, parents themselves. No matter how much parents warn children about the perils of smoking, young persons who have taken up the habit are not likely to quit as long as their parents keep on smoking.

Moreover, there is the pressure to conform to the bad examples of other young persons. If others their age smoke, young persons feel they must do so. Instead of conforming to what is right, they conform to the crowd.

Then there is the bad example of doctors themselves. Some doctors, of course, have now quit smoking, but many still reach for a cigarette with great frequency. In fact, some years ago an advertisement in the United States declared: “More doctors smoke Camels than any other cigarette.” So bad is the example of doctors that the president of the Canadian Medical Association called on doctors to stop smoking or to refrain from it in front of patients in order to help stem the “epidemic” of lung cancer. How can a doctor with cigarette in hand or a pack in his shirt pocket convince his patient that he should stop smoking?

Powerful in effect also is the bad example of many of Christendom’s clergy, for it is an obvious fact that many clergymen are heavy smokers. What does this say to adults and especially young people? And those clergymen who do not smoke usually hesitate to speak out against smoking. At church affairs and clerical conventions the air is often heavy with cigarette smoke.

It is small wonder that people do not stop smoking and that they are apparently starting to smoke at an earlier age than ever, despite health reports. At least in Birmingham, England, a survey made last year revealed that the average age when a boy has his first cigarette is nine years, seven months. Nearly 85 percent of all boys were said to have smoked by their fourteenth birthday. And officials on the Toronto, Canada, Board of Health were recently shocked and disheartened when a survey among 8,000 school-age children disclosed that children smoke their first cigarette at the age of six or eight years. “If the parents smoke,” an official asked, “how are we to stop the children from smoking?”

“Weak Moral Fabric”

But the bad examples of so many persons do not explain it all. Many persons know that the hazards of smoking are great, yet they keep on smoking. In fact, one survey for the American Cancer Society found that 86 percent of the smokers queried wished that they could give up the habit. Is it that giving up the habit is impossible? No, the medical consensus is that if a person really wants to quit smoking, he can. Even the inveterate heavy smoker can break the habit. What, then, is the trouble? A professor of medicine, when asked why so many doctors did not quit smoking, answered: “Weak moral fabric.”

This points to the trouble with many smokers who prefer not to smoke. They lack sufficient willpower and moral determination to stop smoking. A person who wants to discontinue may try some of the antismoking pills or products, but, without a firm moral decision, he will likely keep on smoking. Those who have stopped usually are those who have made this firm decision. They do not try to taper off, but they make a complete break from the habit. One heavy smoker who had the moral fabric to make that decision said it was a fight for the first three days: “I had terrible headaches and felt ill enough to go to bed. I was addicted and I battled against an invisible enemy that I was determined wouldn’t win. Then the fourth morning I woke up hungry, my headache was gone and food had never tasted so good.”

But many persons never make such a firm decision to win the battle; they never get around to making the big decision—to stop completely. A lung cancer specialist at the Toronto General Hospital, who has seen too many smokers die in agony to be able to joke about the habit, forthrightly says smokers are “intellectually destitute and morally derelict.” Asked what might wake up a person to give up the habit, he answered: “The information that smoking can kill him.”

Indifference to Consequences

Even though the evidence is overwhelming that smoking can kill a person and that it is linked to many diseases, still there are multitudinous smokers who will not stop. Why?

Young persons who keep on smoking seem indifferent to the danger because it seems too far off. One teen-ager just beginning to smoke said: “Nobody young worries much about some disease they might get 40 or 50 years from now.” Death from lung cancer seems remote to those who have not seen a person die from it. A twenty-year-old girl told a reporter: “Look, I don’t know anybody that’s ever died from smoking.” Many are undoubtedly indifferent to the consequences until they come face to face with grim reality, much as the story goes about the simple man who was sentenced by a judge in April to be hanged in July. He took the news carelessly and was turning to go back to his cell when a thought suddenly occurred to him. Turning back to the judge, he asked, “You don’t mean this coming July, do you, Judge?”

Many are so indifferent to the consequences that even when the danger is immediate, they still puff away heedlessly. In his book Smoking and Health, Dr. Alton Ochsner tells about a patient with Buerger’s disease who was warned of the danger of amputation if he did not stop smoking. But the doctor had to amputate. “Nor is mine a rare experience,” he writes. “A well-known physician has remarked: ‘I marvel how intelligent individuals calmly go about killing themselves.’ He, too, had . . . patients who, despite repeated warnings to stop smoking, preferred to lose their legs rather than give up the cigarette habit. . . . Why, indeed, are smokers so intent on suicide? . . . How anyone could read these statistics and yet continue to smoke will also always be utterly bewildering to me."

One explanation why they keep on smoking must lie in the general attitude of great numbers of persons toward moral values and life itself. This is illustrated by the words of a doctor explaining why he continued to smoke, as reported in The Saturday Review of January 25, 1964:

“I didn’t need the government’s report to convince me that smoking can cause cancer or bronchitis or various forms of heart disease. I see the evidence almost every day in. the hospital wards or among my own patients. ... I suppose I’m like many of my own patients. I've advised them to give up smoking but they’d rather not. It doesn’t make that much difference to them if some years are lopped off their life. I’m very realistic when I tell them about the probabilities, especially when I point out that their chances of dying from cancer are about ten times greater than if they didn't smoke. But they really don’t care. That's about the size of it. They really don’t care.”

Asked if he felt the same way, the doctor replied: “Just about.”

But what kind of person are you? Are you enticed to smoke or to keep on smoking by the alluring and seductive advertisements? Are you letting yourself be brainwashed into smoking by the poor examples of schoolmates, friends, fellow employees, doctors or clergymen ? Do you have enough moral fiber to make a firm decision to stop and then abide by it?

Do you care enough for your family to take care of your health? More than the smoker’s life is involved; what about the grief and anguish of the wife whose husband dies in agony at age fifty of lung cancer? What if there are children? Will they be smoking, too, as a result of a bad parental example and headed for the same tragic end? How much better for fathers and mothers to set a good example for their children and eliminate the whole frightful chain that leads to one tragedy after another!

If any smoker really cares, not only for his life, but for his loved ones, he can indeed stop.

THE days of discovery _L are not gone. Times when hardy men set out for the unknown and unexplored in search of the new and exciting may seem to have faded except for the few who probe the remaining frontiers of space, jungle, ice and ocean. Yet the thrill of discovery offers itself to anyone who wishes to explore one of the Creator’s most fascinating productions—man himself in all his variety.

From babyhood curiosity about one another stirs in us until, later in life, induced prejudices blind people to the charms, ingenuity and abilities of others of our species but of a different race. Yet discovery awaits us if we keep alive the curiosity and keen observation of children, as when a European child and an African child, meeting for the first time, touch each other’s skin and look at their fingers to see if the respective black and white rub off.

Little reveals more of the thinking of one’s neighbor than his language. Certainly this is true of the Latin peoples of the Americas. From Spain came an intelligent, emotional and warm heritage to mix with the practical, hardy and stoic Indian to produce a people who, as in Central America, have a unique distinctiveness and charm. Look past mere grammar and vocabulary into the idioms and sayings of the Latin-American people. Ask yourself, “How do they think it in Spanish?” and an adventure in language is at the threshold.

Spanish reveals a heritage of courtesy and empathy. Perhaps no word in the English language matches in courtesy the Spanish title “Don.” A young man who

has become very fond of an older man and wishes to show both his respect and affection at the same time finds that calling him only by his first name would be too familiar, and using "Senor³³ or ‘'Mr.” with the last name would be too formal. So he uses the title "Don³³ with the older man’s first name, as "Don Pedro³³ and the older man responds warmly, pleased with both the respect and the affection shown him by the younger man.

The language itself provides for sparing from insult an acquaintance who may be of an unpopular group. Merely adding a diminutive or affectionate ending to the word makes an otherwise slighting term become quite acceptable. During World War II when being a German was frowned upon in much of the world, one could identify a German friend without implying an insult by calling him a “little German” or alemancito. Nowadays when North Americans are not altogether popular in many parts of Latin America children may not know any other way to describe them than by the snide term "gringo³³ Yet a "grin-guito³³ is quite all right; so approaching the home of Honduran friends, the 6-foot, 200-pound American may be amused to hear one of the children call out, “Daddy, here comes the ‘little gringo? ”

If you wish to keep your business to yourself, it is not necessary to tell your Honduran inquirer to mind his own business. Just tell him you are going to “make an errand.” You have not offended him, and he politely refrains from questioning you further as to your mission.

On the other hand, Spanish can be very emphatic in a negative way. What Englishspeaking schoolchild has not been corrected for using double negatives? However, in Spanish the double negative is not only correct but essential, and what could be more satisfying than an emphatic triple negative: “I do not want no sugar in my tea never!"

Different Viewpoint

Besides expressiveness, Spanish often reveals a different way of looking at everyday activities, sometimes with irrefutable logic behind it. In English, when someone calls you, you reply, “I’m coming.” But the Spanish-speaking person asks, “How can I be coming when I am not yet there? You can come to me, but in order to get where you are I must go to you, not come.” So he logically responds to your summons, “There I am going" ("Alld voy"). Similar reasoning gives him a generous outlook. We often say we must “take steps” to accomplish some project. But steps do not come to you nor do they just wait to be picked up and carried away. You must expend energy, reasons our Spanish friend, and so he “gives steps.” In many such expressions, Spanish “gives” where English “takes."

The Spanish language does allow one to “take” some things, however. Decisions, for instance. The Latin feels that when decisions are presented, they are already created and you merely choose among possibilities already in existence. So instead of “making a decision” he “takes the decision.” When presenting such choices English-speaking persons often present the alternative after saying, “on the other hand.” Literal translation of this into Spanish is quite amusing, as one looks first at one hand and then at the other. So he says, quite reasonably, “in change.” In examining the possible choices, one naturally chooses, in English, the one that is “worth while.” Of course, time, or a “while,” is worth something. Our Central-American neighbor, though, colorfully chooses that which is “worth the pain.”

Similar Viewpoints

That the human race is one family with a common ancestry and common experience is reflected in common expressions that are almost the same in different languages, some almost unchanged, others with slight but revealing differences. In English, for example, you can reject an obviously unreasonable offer by saying, “I wasn’t born yesterday,” whereas in Spanish the intended victim retorts, “I’m not in diapers” (“No estoy en panales"). If the deceptive rascal happens to be a thief as well, he will have “sticky fingers” in English and be “long of nails” in Spanish. You can also warn your friends of such a villain without a word by simply making a gesture like a cat extending its claws, and they will immediately look well to their purses.

When the North American is "just a step from” home, his Honduran neighbor will be “at two steps from” home. And what the former “takes to heart” the latter “takes to breast.” However, the slight differences in some ideas show a different way of life, a different setting for a similar experience. For instance, one who sleeps soundly in English may be so inert and motionless as to “sleep like a log.” But have you ever seen a child asleep, completely relaxed, with his legs sprawled at incredibly awkward angles? If so, you will appreciate the Spanish equivalent, “to sleep at loose leg.”

When a little one grows up into a young lady and attends dances, she will be a “wallflower” at an English-speaking party if no one asks her to dance, for she may as well be one of the decorations on the wall. However, at a Spanish fiesta chances are she will remain seated all evening if no one invites her to dance, and this is referred to as “to iron the seat.” Some well-meaning young man may undertake to teach the lonesome young lady to dance without stepping on her partner’s toes, but he may have taken on a job that is too big for him. So an English-speaking companion may suggest that he has “bitten off more than he can chew.” Can you imagine the struggles of one trying to wear a shirt made of eleven yards of cloth? If so, you can easily picture why his Spanishspeaking friend may suggest that he has “gotten himself into an eleven-yard shirt.”

To “bum the midnight oil,” of course, means one is working unusually long hours into the night to accomplish some task. However, if you use a candle instead of an oil lamp you may well “bum the eyelashes,” as the Latin American might say. If you suddenly find that the task will require more effort than you are willing to expend, you may say, “That is a horse of a different color.” Horse trading may not be so common in certain parts of the Spanish-speaking world, but flour of varying quality is a common part of life, so it means the same thing in Spanish to say, That is “flour from another sack.”

When your partner becomes angry and explosively loses his temper at you for having changed your mind, your description of him will be determined by your background. The English-speaking world has its Irish and the Spanish its Indian. So if he is English he “got his Irish up,” or if Spanish, “the Indian climbed up in him.”

Extension of Viewpoint

Gems of wisdom have been condensed into proverbial sayings in nearly every language, and Spanish is especially rich in them. Entire conversations can be carried on in Spanish with proverbial sayings. These brief expressions often settle a conversation or sound out viewpoints on delicate subjects. Sweethearts may demonstrate remarkable ingenuity at this game. Where there are similar proverbs in the two languages, Spanish frequently extends the thought.

If, for example, your neighbor wants to trade you some corn that he has only just planted for some beans you have already harvested, your English reply may well be, “A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush,” or, in Spanish, “Of more value is a bird in hand than a hundred flying.” If you were not wise and you lost heavily in the foolish bargain, in English you may be said to have been “fleeced.” The Latin mind, with its keen insight into human nature, recognizes that the victim may not have had the most blameless of motives himself, perhaps even being a bit greedy. So it is said, “He went in after wool and came out fleeced.” Such kind of persons are not uncommonly found in one another’s company, for “birds of a feather flock together.” But where great flocks of birds are not so common, Spanish observers may be heard to say, “They are foxes from the same pineapple patch.”

Persons who have become noted for certain characteristics may find it difficult to change; in fact, others may view this change as impossible. From the Middle East, where there were leopards, came the expression, ‘Can a . . . leopard change its spots?’ (Jer. 13:23) In Spanish-speaking tropical countries the people may be more familiar with monkeys and use this comparison: “Although she dresses herself in silk, monkey she remains.” Familiarity with monkeys coming out in troops in the evening has also given means of expression to the advice that if you want to stay out of trouble, do not go where you know trouble is likely to occur. So the Honduran parent wisely advises his youngsters, “He who does not want to see monkeys, let him not walk at night.”

Daily Life

The daily life of the people is often reflected in their sayings. In English the idea that everyone eventually suffers a defeat is expressed in various ways. However, in Latin America it is the pig that rarely dies a natural death, and it has been a custom in many places in Honduras to slaughter pigs on Saturday. So the Honduran farmer says, “To every pig there comes his Saturday.’’ The same farmer may not have had much education in mathematics, and he would be quite puzzled to be told that he was “going off on a tangent.” Yet, if in conversation you get off the subject and dwell too long on an unimportant angle, he will express the same thought in terms with which he has had experience: You are “dismounting by the tail” or “climbing down through the branches.” If you have ever tried to get off a donkey over the tail or climb down a tree without touching the trunk you will understand.

Practical Wisdom

Many Spanish sayings show practical, down-to-earth observations, and many are in harmony with Bible principles. The importance of rearing children correctly is graphically illustrated in this expression: “Raise crows and afterward they will pluck out your eyes.” The truth of this observation is borne out by the increasing number of juvenile delinquents who, resenting the failure of their parents to administer proper parental discipline, turn on them with hatred and even violence. Similarly, another effective Spanish comparison, substantiated by Proverbs 22:6, is: “Tree that grows twisted, never its trunk straightens up.”

The English “look before you leap” is given a very practical application in the Spanish proverb,“Antes que te cases, mira lo que haces,” or, “Before you marry, look what you are doing.” And delving into human nature, the Spanish sage observed, “The young one arranges himself in order to please; the old one in order not to displease.”

Finally, two very down-to-earth gems point up the Scriptural thought that bad associations spoil useful habits. (1 Cor. 15: 33) If you associate with bad people, some of their badness will “rub off” on you. So in a masterful understatement the Spanish says: “He who walks in honey, something sticks to him.” Similarly showing the impossibility of staying completely free of the customs of those you choose for your company, for good or for bad, is the following blunt comment: “Animals of the same flock share the same fleas.”

This is but a glimpse into the colorful personality of our Spanish-speaking neighbors, merely a taste of the enjoyment that can be yours through knowing your neighbors better. Make the effort. Look at your fellowman through eyes unclouded by prejudice. Examine his way of thinking. You will discover traits that make you admire him and qualities that can enrich your own life.

WORSHIPED as gods, extolled in song, feared and loved, the mighty rivers of the world have, through the centuries, played a singularly important role in the life of man. It is not surprising to learn that man’s very first home was located on the ; ; : banks of a river and ' that his descendants later settled farther down in the rich Mesopotamian valley between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers.

With the passage of time, the river’s importance to man has not lessened. There is almost no limit to the services and benefits they provide. Without doubt, the first of these is an abundant supply of that essential commodity—water.

The average citizen in many industrialized countries gives little more than a passing thought to the significance of that cool, sparkling stream of water that flows from a tumed-on tap. Where does it come from? What would we do if it suddenly stopped? Surely, nothing affects our lives as completely as water: drinking, bathing, cooking, sanitation—all depend on it. Actually, life on earth would be impossible without it, for men, animals and plants must have it to survive!

River water comes from melting snows and rainfall, which, in turn, largely come from moisture lifted from the oceans and other bodies of water by evaporation and carried inland to be deposited over the land masses. Thousands of streams then channel the water down to the rivers.

Water from rivers is often piped hundreds of miles to bring it to cities and towns that have no natural supply close at hand or whose supply is inadequate. Semidry southern California, in spite of a mushrooming population, enjoys water made possible in part by a 233-mile-long pipeline from the Colorado River. This system pierces six mountain ranges with 142 tunnels and is one of the longest of its kind in the world. In Venezuela we have another good example. The people in the state of Nueva Esparta, better known as the Island of Margarita, now have an ample water supply for the first time in centuries, thanks to a recently completed pipeline that runs fifteen miles under the Caribbean Sea and thirty-six miles overland to bring them fresh water from the Carinicuao River.

If little thought is given to where our water supply comes from and how it gets to us, much less is given to where it goes after it disappears down the drain. All this used water must be disposed of somehow. Again rivers come to man’s aid. They offer a simple and economical means of disposal and, if properly regulated, the results are entirely satisfactory. Rivers have a built-in system of self-purification that makes this possible. Bacteria in the stream consume waste products, using great quantities of oxygen in the process. Algae replace the oxygen. These two elements must be kept in proper balance. This control is provided in the form of protozoa, which feed voraciously on bacteria. They, in turn, are kept in balance by serving as food for aquatic insects, snails and other lower invertebrates. Small fish eat the insects and snails, and bigger fish eat the small fish. Man can upset the whole cycle by dumping more waste into the river than can be disposed of by the bacteria or by dumping waste that is toxic to life in the river. Sad to say, this is becoming a big problem in many parts of the world.

Agriculture and Industry

An outstanding example of the varied services performed by rivers in man’s behalf is found in the Nile. As a provider of Egypt's water supply and sewage system, and source of its food supply, the Nile is the faithful servant of over 27 million people. Little wonder that tourist guidebooks tell us that “the Nile is Egypt, and Egypt is the Nile.” Egypt’s chief industry, agriculture, depends entirely on irrigation from the Nile River. At the present time only about six million acres are under cultivation, but the Aswan High Dam, now under construction and expected to be completed by 1970, will provide water for the irrigation of two million more acres.

In Afghanistan, the Arghandab and Helmand Rivers are playing similar roles. The dammed-up waters of these rivers are being used in a huge irrigation project near Kandahar that is converting large sections of the Registan desert into farmland and changing the lives of former nomad families who now own lands and homes for the first time.

The role that rivers play in industry is indeed great. The papermaking industry furnishes a fine example. In Alberta, Canada, the Athabasca River carries thousands of cords of pine and spruce downstream yearly to paper mills. Their conversion into high-quality paper requires more water daily than is used by the capital city of Edmonton with a population of about 280,000 persons!

An abundance of cheap electricity is a vital factor in the growth and development of industry. Again rivers step in to serve man’s needs. Harnessed by dams, their waters are used to turn huge turbines that generate billions of kilowatts of electricity daily, and their potential has hardly been tapped. There are tens of thousands of rivers around the globe that can be utilized for the production of electricity.

Just as industries are greatly indebted to rivers for their supply of cheap electricity, so too are they aided by the inexpensive transportation they provide. Most of the large industrial centers of the world are located where there is easy access to river highways. These help keep factories supplied with the needed raw materials and carry away the finished products. One of the busiest rivers in the world, the Rhine, links the famous Ruhr industrial area with Belgian and Dutch ports and is a principal outlet of Europe’s system of inland waterways. The “beautiful blue Danube,” thought of by many only in terms of music and romance, plays a more important role as one of the main commercial arteries of Europe. Rising in the Black Forest of Germany, its some 1,750 miles of rolling waters serve as a means of water transportation for eight nations before finally emptying into the Black Sea.

We must not think, though, that river transportation is of benefit only to agriculture and industry. In many parts of the world, rivers serve as the sole means of travel and communication to otherwise inaccessible regions. Much of the Amazon basin would be virtually impenetrable were it not for the Amazon River and its more than 200 tributaries. Ocean steamers can go as far as Iquitoe, Peru, 2,300 miles upstream. In New Guinea, rivers keep isolated native villagers in touch with the outside world. Countries like Burma and Thailand with few good roads depend heav-Jy on rivers. Water routes in Thailand handle about 80 percent of all internal traffic.

Floods and Flood Control

Although rivers have proved to be man’s good friend and valuable servant, they can turn into powerful and feared enemies at floodtime, causing much destruction of property and lives. One of the most devastating floods man has ever experienced occurred in 1927 when the Mississippi and all its chief tributaries went on a rampage at the same time, flooding an area of thousands of square miles and leaving about 700,000 people homeless. In some places the Mississippi broadened to eighty miles, carrying away houses and burying farms under eighteen feet of muddy water. People and animals were trapped and drowned.

Undaunted by what may be considered an overwhelming task, man has pitted his brains against the tremendous forces unleashed at floodtime and has succeeded in taming many rivers. Trees have been planted on bare mountain slopes to retard the flow of water. Tidal rivers have been dredged to increase their depth and facilitate the passage of floodwater. Natural, and in some cases artificial, obstructions are removed, enabling the floodwaters to pass more rapidly and lowering their height. Flood-prediction services on many rivers are able to foretell the arrival and height of floods with remarkable accuracy and telegraph timely warnings ahead.

One of the most effective measures has been the building of dams across upper valleys of rivers. These not only help reduce the height of floods but at the same time provide for the storage of water. An excellent example is the Tennessee River. Once treacherous ana destructive, it can now be turned off “Just like a faucet” oue to thirty-one major dams operated by the Tennessee Valley Authority. In April of 1963 it was "turned off,” saving an estimated $100,000,000 in flood damages in Chattanooga alone.

To protect vulnerable lands along the river, embankments or levees have also been built. Rather than being situated on the riverbank as one might imagine, they may be as far back as five miles or more from the water, giving “Mr. River” ample room to thrust out his elbows. The resulting flood plain serves as a relief valve and the water loses much of its force before reaching the embankments. Today there are more than 3,500 miles of levees along the lower Mississippi and its tributaries. Spillways and floodways have been built at special places in the levees that permit the water to escape, flooding lands where they will do the least damage.

Provides Pleasure

Although rivers do at times present problems, these are overshadowed by far by the services they provide us. However, the role of the river is not limited to providing us with practical benefits. Think of the immense enjoyment and pleasure it affords us, its sparkling waters becoming a playground where we can swim, fish, go boating, water-skiing, or just laze around in the sun on its shores. In its wanderings, it brings this playground within the reach of numberless people.

Could anything be more tempting on a hot summer’s day than a dip in a cod, tree-shaded river? Or if you prefer to fish, what lovelier spot could you find than a beautiful, unspoiled mountain stream? As for boating, rivers attract pleasure craft of all types, including sailboats where the currents are not swift. For a pleasant Sunday excursion, if you happen to be in New York, there’s nothing like a boat ride down the Hudson.

Is it sightseeing you enjoy? Again "Mr. River” has just what you want, offering you some of the most magnificent scenery to be found anywhere. One of the most beautiful rivers in the world is the Rhine. Framed by castles, storybook villages and sun-kissed vineyards, the Rhine affords a delightful view. Canada's St. Lawrence is also a source of pleasure to countless visitors. Its amazingly clear waters are normally free from sediment, since it runs over rock formations for much of its length. Lined by towering cliffs and dotted with over 1,500 islands, its loveliness moved Charles Dickens to say; “The beauty of this noble stream at any point can hardly be imagined.”

When a river’s wanderings lead it to the edge of a cliff, the results can be truly breathtaking. Victoria Falls, in Africa, where the Zambezi River cascades down 354 feet, is one of the most spectacular sights in the world, as are the famed Niagara Falls of North America. Venezuela can boast of the highest falls yet discovered, lovely Angel Falls, an underground river that flings itself from the face of a cliff and falls 3,300 feet into the jungle below. A thrilling sight indeed!

Worship of Rivers

As we consider all these benefits that come to us from rivers, one instinctively feels the desire to offer praise and thanksgiving to the Creator of rivers, Jehovah, ‘the Gjver of every good and perfect gift.’

However, many ancient peoples, not knowing the true God, directed their praise to the river instead. The Egyptians, whose life depended so greatly on the Nile River, looked upon it* as a god. The existence of this great body of water whose flow never ceased was to them a great mystery and its annual rising and falling was considered a divine miracle and blessing. Their worship is well shown by the classical Hymn to the Nile: “Health to you, who comes to this land to give life to Egypt . . . when you kindly listen to the prayers of men . . . creator of all good things, lord of seeds . . . the graineries are overflowing, the warehouses are full and the possessions of the poor are multiplied.”

Although the Nile has long since ceased to be worshiped by these people as a god, river worship still continues. India and neighboring countries abound with “holy rivers” and “river gods” that hold an important place in the lives of the people. The most famous of the “holy rivers” is the Ganges, believed to flow from the hair of Siva, one of the Hindu trinity. It is the fervent belief of every good Hindu that bathing in the waters of the Ganges will impart spiritual strength and virtue. Even a single drop of the “holy” water on the tongue or eyelids of a dying man is thought to cleanse him of sin.

Enlightened men and women, however, who have come to know the true God, will worship neither rivers nor river gods. Neither will they take away the honor due the Creator of all things and ascribe the marvels of the river to a mythical “mother nature.” They give thanks to Jehovah, the Creator, for the role that rivers play in the life of man.

WHEN doctors in Miami, Florida, recently told Mrs. Regina Sovner she should

have her gangrenous leg amputated, she refused. Hospital officials then brought suit for permission to operate. Judge H. P. Dekle issued a court order authorizing the operation. The patient was forced to have her leg amputated despite her strenuous objections.—New York Daily News, July 20, 1964.

When a 14-year-old girl contracted cancer of the hip, an operation was recommended by Cleveland, Ohio, doctors. Her mother objected. Hospital authorities then obtained a court order from Judge W. G. Whitlatch and performed the operation anyway.—Toronto Globe and Mail, Nov. 12, 1963.

When a 25-year-old woman, one of Jehovah’s witnesses, was told she needed a blood transfusion, she refused to accept it. Thereupon doctors at a Washington, D.C., hospital obtained a court order from Judge J. S. Wright and forced her to take the treatment against her will.—Washington Post, Feb. 5, 1964.

Vital Issue Raised

These cases, and many more like them, raise an issue so vital that it affects every person.

The issue is this: Do adults, in full control of their mental faculties, have the right to accept or refuse any type of medical treatment doctors recommend?

This issue also raises these related questions: Are patients obligated to submit to a doctor’s orders, pay the bill and ask no questions? Can they leave a hospital when they believe it to be in their best interests to do so, provided, of course, that they are willing to sign a release? Or do hospital patients automatically lose their freedom, that treatments they do not want can be forced upon them by court order?

Lurking in the background is another ominous issue: Is the nation putting itself in the category of a slave state by rejecting the right of personal decision in these matters? Is the basic freedom of individual conscience, guaranteed by the law, to be preserved? Or are legal rights of individuals to be pushed into the background and their thinking and deciding taken over for them by officials?

If you—no, not someone else, but you— were confronted with a decision as to whether to lose a leg, would you want someone else to impose his choice upon you? What if a doctor said that both legs should be amputated? Would you want to be deprived of freedom to decide? Or if a surgeon were to urge you to undergo an operation that might cripple or paralyze you the rest of your life, or disfigure you, would you want it forced upon you regardless of how you felt about it?

So, then, does a person living in a free land have the right to decide what kind of medical treatment he will accept? Does he have the right to decide what will be done to his body?

Medical Science

Many of those in the medical profession are sincerely interested in helping the sick, in alleviating suffering, and in saving life. Beyond a doubt, they have done much good for humanity.

At the same time, honest doctors will freely admit that medicine is not an exact science. There are few, if any, absolutes, due to the complexities of the human body and mind. There is disagreement among those of the medical profession on forms of treatment. How best to treat diabetes, whether to add fluorides to drinking water, use of hypnosis by psychiatrists, and radical surgery as routine practice in cancer cases, are but a few of the many areas where currently there are strong differences of opinion in medical circles. Yes, honest doctors acknowledge that what they offer is their best opinion and not the perfect answer.

Also, because of human imperfection, there is always the possibility of error in diagnosis due to lack of knowledge, poor training, lack of experience, carelessness, or for some other reason, as the proliferation of malpractice suits bears testimony.

Consider carefully the words of Dr. A. A. Klass, of Winnipeg, Canada. Writing in the Canadian Bar Journal (1960, 3, 222-224) on “Why Do People Sue Their Doctors?” he stated: “First and foremost is the very nature of medical practice itself. In a field of rapid discovery, the accepted treatment of today was risky yesterday; and will be obsolete tomorrow. During the period of yesterday, the treatment was new and hazardous, perhaps experimental in the eyes of the court, and few doctors would come to its defense. During the period of tomorrow it is obsolete, antiquated, proven to be wrong, condemned in the witness box and accepted as negligent by the court. It is only during the brief period of today that the treatment is right and proper and this period is made ever shorter by the rate of discovery,”

Dr. J. H. Dible, Professor of Pathology, writes in the Postgraduate Journal, Volume 29, page 59: “Medical progress is a study of trial and error, of false paths, of whole generations under the sway of wrong ideas leading to wrong treatment and God knows what in the way of casualties.” Adds Dr. H. A. Davidson, in The Canadian Doctor, Volume XXV, No. 1, pages 37 and 38: “Honest doctors may disagree violently about diagnosis and treatment; and there will be no absolute objectivity in this field. It is healthier for us to recognize this, than to pretend that we are operating in a cold intellectual vacuum.” He warns: “Some doctors suffer from racial or religious prejudice and allow this to influence their judgment. . . . If we allow professional freedom, then there comes with it the freedom to have all kinds of whims and peculiar ideas coloured by our own personality, rather than drawn out of scientific facts.”

That medicine still involves considerable trial and error, distinguished surgeon Dr. B. Atlee admits. He states in Maclean’s magazine of September 23, 1961: “If all the normal ovaries removed or tinkered with since surgeons started to open the abdomen were laid end to end they would extend almost as far into space as Yuri Gagarin traveled.”

This inexactness of medical science is further noted too when organs are transplanted from one body to another. Newsweek of February 10,1964, says: “Of more than 200 transplants between persons other than identical twins, a bare half-dozen recipients have survived more than a year.” The Toronto Daily Star of March 10, 1964, adds: “Hospital surgeons said yesterday all six operations in which kidneys of baboons were transplanted to humans have been failures.”

When the body is invaded by a foreign substance, “certain cells immediately begin the manufacture of antibodies,” a report on a speech given by Dr. Medawar says. “These antibodies are weapons shaped to meet and destroy the specific germ.” (Toronto Telegram, Jan. 29, 1964) This explains why many who are given blood transfusions develop a violent reaction and even die. As Dr. A. S. V. Burgen stated in the Montreal Gazette of January 26, 1959: “One interpretation of the research results is that every individual shows an allergic type of response to every other individual’s plasma but his own. This phenomenon is similar to that known to exist for skin grafts. Skin may be grafted successfully from one portion of the body to another portion in the same patient. But a skin graft from another person, except an identical twin, will not ‘take.’ ”

In connection with blood transfusion, there are other dangers besides the incompatibility of blood. Note what the Journal of the American Medical Association of September 28, 1963, says: “It has been reliably shown that an essential therapeutic measure, blood transfusion, causes death in approximately one of every 150 transfusions in persons over forty years of age as a result of serum hepatitis. Since this is the age group to which most blood transfusions are given, and since many hundreds are given daily, such a high fatality becomes a major problem.” The article went on to show that of those over forty years of age developing hepatitis from blood transfusions the mortality rate was 23 percent. A recent prominent case in regard to contracting hepatitis was that of United States Ambassador to Japan Edwin O. Reischauer, who received a blood transfusion in a Japanese hospital. Later, the Honolulu Star-Bulletin of June 16, 1964, reported: “He was dealt a second blow when doctors at U.S. Army Tripier General Hospital discovered he had hepatitis— traceable beyond reasonable doubt to ‘bad’ Japanese blood. . . . Investigation disclosed that 97 per cent of blood in Japanese blood banks is sold by habitual donors—mostly slum dwellers who make a living by selling their blood.”

Yet serum hepatitis is but one of the various complications that can arise from blood transfusions. The Canadian Bar Journal of October 1960 tells of another case in which “the patient received a blood transfusion from which she contracted syphilis. The same doctor treated her for syphilis and she died from the treatment.”

Warning of this danger, United States Senator from Missouri Edward V. Long wrote an article entitled “The Blood Bank Scandal,” He said: “Did you know that in many American cities a skid row derelict, sapped by malnutrition and sodden with alcohol, can sell a pint of his blood for $5 or $6, enough for several more bottles of cheap wine? Do you realize that his blood, given to you or a loved one during an emergency transfusion, may not save but cost a life or cause serious illness? . . . the American people need to be shocked into an awareness of a health scandal that is rapidly assuming perilous proportions.” —Parade, June 14, 1964.

When the president of one blood bank was sentenced to jail for nine months and fined $10,000, he was found guilty “of the sale of 4-plus syphilis blood to Staten Island I.N.Y.] hospitals.”—Newark Evening Mews, June 12, 1964.

Such things have led Dr. Walter Alvarez, one of America’s leading physicians, to say: “It is really hard to understand why, when the risks are so great, thousands of us doctors keep ordering transfusions for patients who are not in shock and not in any great danger.”

Personal Responsibility

All these facts forcefully demonstrate that, while medical science helps greatly to alleviate man's ills, it still cannot be regarded as infallible. It shows the need for the individual to retain his God-given right of personal freedom to accept or reject medical treatment as he sees fit. It also shows the folly of making medical opinions the law of the land, which is what is done when courts back up doctors’ recommendations in the face of objections by patients.

True, a patient may die if he does not accept the recommended treatment. But it is just as true that many who do accept recommended treatments die anyway, some even as a result of the treatment suggested. The point here is that there is no guarantee of success. That is why the final decision to accept or reject a specific treatment must be retained by the individual. As a Bible principle says: “Each one will carry his own load.” (Gal. 6:5) Thus, if the patient’s decision is wrong, he, and he alone, must accept the consequences. That is his responsibility as a free moral agent. But once his right to decide is taken away from him, he is no longer free, but is a slave of a state, court, hospital or doctor.

Especially must personal choice be respected when an individual’s decision is based on religious grounds, as in the case of blood transfusion. If a person chooses to respect the Bible’s command to “abstain . . . from blood” and to “keep yourselves free from .. . blood,” then it should be his right to do so. (Acts 15:20, 29) Look at it this way too. Would you drink a cup of human blood freshly drawn from another person’s body? Normal persons are revolted at the thought. Then why insist on pouring it into the veins of one who refuses to take it into his body in any way? And why insist when he bases his decision on the God-given command to abstain from blood? Some may claim that a transfusion is not really drinking blood, so it would be different. But such argument is not valid for conscientious persons, because the Bible says to “abstain” from blood, regardless of how it is taken into the body. If a doctor advised you to abstain from drinking alcohol, would you inject the alcohol into your bloodstream instead? It he told you to abstain from drinking coffee, would you inject it into your body? If you were warned to abstain from smoking, would you take the nicotine and inject that into your veins? Of course, these actions would be senseless. So, too, a Christian has the right, when he reads God's law warning him to abstain from blood, to do just that —abstain. Injecting the blood directly into his bloodstream is hardly ‘abstaining’ from blood.

This does not interfere with anyone else’s right to take whatever medical treatment he desires. A Christian does not try to force others to adopt his views. Such a Christian is no threat at all to anyone else or to society in general. Quite the opposite is true. It is those doctors and judges who conspire against the freedom of an individual, who forbid him to choose his medical treatment, that are a menace to society, for they deny a person his God-given and legal right of freedom of choice.

Assault and Battery

There is something else to consider. In the case of Bonner vs. Moran (1942) the Court of Appeals, District of Columbia, ruled: “We think there can be no doubt that a surgical operation is a technical battery, regardless of its results, and is excusable only when there is express or implied consent by the patient; or stated somewhat differently, the surgeon is liable in damages if the operation is unauthorized.”

Yes, to force an operation upon a patient against his will is assault and battery, a criminal offense!

Pertinent here are the comments appearing in the British periodical Medicine, Science and the Law, January 1964: “In the event of a transfusion or other therapeutic measure of that type without consent, the aggrieved party would have the right to sue in the civil courts. Transfusion without consent is technically a ‘battery,’ a tort or civil wrong, and a trespass to the person. The first basic essential then of blood transfusion from the legal aspect is that it can only properly be carried out with real [explicit] consent.”

The June 1964 issue of The American Journal of Cardiology states: “To administer to an individual or the junior members of his family a form of treatment which he has refused would constitute a violation of the patient’s rights and could imply bodily assault.”

These views are backed up by many judges who do consider it wrong to force people to take treatment they do not want. In a case where a patient refused a recommended treatment, authorities in Meadowbrook Hospital, Long Island, New York, sought a court order from Supreme Court Judge Bernard S. Meyer to authorize the treatment. What was the result? Medical }V&rld News of March 27, 1964, relates: “Judge Meyer remained unconvinced. The individual who is the subject of a medical decision, he declared, has the final say on that decision, ‘and must necessarily, in a system which gives the greatest possible protection to the individual in the furtherance of his own desires.' ” Pointing out that the patient was an adult in full possession of his faculties, Judge Meyer refused to issue the court order.

An editorial in the Los Angeles Times of July 2, 1964, reasoned likewise. The headline declared, “Court Order to Take Medicine Is a Frightening Legal Precedent.” The writer stated: " T trust you are as horrified as I am,’ a professor of sociology, among the keenest men I know, writes me, ‘at this clear departure from the traditional and larger understanding of habeas corpus.’ The individual does indeed own his own body. . . . Suppose the doctor tells you that you have a 60-40 chance of being cured if you will submit to such-and-such an operation? Up until now it has been established practice that the choice is clearly yours. Is it now yours, but subject to the acquiescence of the courts?—which might reason that, the odds being in favor of the operation, you have a duty to submit to it? Does the state have the right to snatch up an alcoholic who is neglecting his liver and stow him away in an asylum? I warrant there are not many doctors who agree that Lyndon Johnson’s regimen is one that leads to longevity—might they some day ... instruct him as to when he may go to sleep at night, when he may wake up; how many whiskies he may drink, how many he must pass up? . . . any law that preempts the individual’s own right to decide about the use of medication aimed at preserving his own body health, is an unnecessary, and therefore a bad, law.... Someday a judicial zealot will inform a lady that she has to have her appendix out or she will die, and we will all be up in arms over it, and maybe ... we will conclude . . . that very often the law is ‘a idiot, a ass,’—and do something about it.”

Denied Rights

The logic of this editorial cannot be denied. Where does the invasion of personal freedom end? Is a person to have himself dismembered piece by piece in spite of his objections? Does he not have the right to say No! to a medical treatment just because it happens to be the vogue today? Are patients to be denied their Constitutionally guaranteed right of personal decision?

One case of denial of personal rights took place in Anaheim, California. There, on May 16, 1964, Mrs. Rotarius suffered blood loss after having given birth to a child. The hospital administrator called several judges until he got one who gave him immediate action, Judge Herbert S. Herlands. He gave the order over the telephone. There was no notice, no hearing, no witnesses were called, no written court order. It was a wholly illegal action “legalizing” assault and battery upon a hospital patient. It should also be of interest to note that several judges were contacted. Evidently the others refused to go along with the illegal procedure.

Since when is a judge authorized to hold cases over the telephone? Since when is he authorized to make orders without all the evidence in front of him? The forms of legal procedure are a protection of fairness. Was this judge being fair? Was he even acting as a judge? If a judge puts his judicial gown on and goes out to participate in a lynching, is he still within the powers of his judicial office? Is a judicial assault done in defiance of the law and without any elementary pretense of the forms of law a judicial act?

A very recent and distressing case involved Mrs. Willimina Anderson of New Jersey. Over seven months pregnant, she had a condition which possibly could have resulted in serious blood loss. The attorneys for the hospital where she was staying petitioned Judge Leon Leonard of the' New Jersey Superior Court on June 12 to authorize blood transfusion. But he said he could find no power in the court “that an adult person could be given medical treatment when he or she refused to accept the same.” The hospital’s attorneys then appealed to the New Jersey Supreme Court, which, on June 17, ruled that, since an unborn child was involved, a blood transfusion could be ordered. The Court provided for a guardian even though she had a competent husband. On June 25 her guardian (not her husband) ordered one pint of blood as she was delivered of her child by Caesarean section.

The Questionable One Pint

Why was the one pint given when medical opinion is agreed that, “if a patient is judged to require only a single pint of blood, chances are that she does not require any transfusion at all.” (Blood Transfusion in Clinical Medicine, 2nd Edition, Mollison, page 99, 1956) “Single pint transfusions should not be given adults.” (Lancet, 1960, 2, 421-424) “Whole blood is the most complex biologic product used routinely in clinical therapy today,” and this fact, “together with the risk of serum hepatitis,” indicates “that the need, for blood should be in excess of one pint to justify its use.”—The Surgical Clinics of North America, October 1958, page 1221.

In addition, note the pertinent item in the Asbury Park Evening Press, June 19, 1964: “Mrs. Anderson is nearing the end of the eighth month of her pregnancy. ... Dr. Raymond Jacobus, acting director of the obstetrical department at Fitkin Hospital, said the critical period for expectant mothers in cases such as hers is past when they enter the last month of pregnancy . . . Dr. Jacobus said it is possible for a Caesarean to be performed without a blood transfusion.”

Bearing out Dr. Jacobus’ judgment are the experiences of a number of mothers who were in the same condition and who had Caesarean sections without blood transfusions and whose children, as well as themselves, are doing fine several years later. In one instance the blood hemoglobin was down to six grams and the hematocrit down to 19. Dextran was successfully used.

Why, then, was a single pint of blood given in Mrs. Anderson’s case? Was it really in the best interest? of the patient, or were those attending her arrogantly flaunting their power in view of the publicity given the case and also in view of the fact that, if no transfusion were given, their exaggerated statements would have looked infantile? Was the single-pint transfusion a medical measure or was it a publicity measure for ego purposes? Really, whose interests were served?

When this case came before the courts there was no emergency, but just the possibility that one might later arise! So because something might arise are people’s Constitutional liberties to be jettisoned?

What to Do

If you are in a position of authority, such as a judge, you must examine your conscience to see that you are giving others what God gives them, what the law gives them—the right of choice.

If you are a doctor, you must do likewise. Do you refuse to treat a patient because he does not accept your primary recommendation in an emergency situation? If you do, are you really interested in the practice of medicine for the benefit you bring the patient who desperately needs your help, or are you only interested in your reputation, your professional pride? It would be inconsistent for you to say that you are so interested in a patient that you want to give him a blood transfusion in an emergency, but then refuse to treat him at all just because he refuses blood, especially when there is not time to get another doctor. If you are sincerely interested in your patient's welfare in an emergency, you will, while perhaps expressing disappointment at not being able to use blood, agree to do everything else in your power to help that person whose life may be expiring. That would be a real interest in humanity, acknowledging freedom of choice in the process.

Yes, doctors are to be highly commended for the good work they do to relieve human suffering. But they must also appreciate that they are not omniscient and that others must retain the right of choice. That will make for the best of doctorpatient relationships.

To patients it is recommended that they choose a doctor that will honor their views, where that is at all possible. Talk to him before an emergency arises, to be sure he understands your position.

Fortunately there are many doctors who will honor the convictions of the patient, who will respect his freedom of choice, who will respect the God-given and legal rights of the patient. They will cooperate and do everything in their power to help. To such conscientious doctors we owe a debt of gratitude. These are the ones that patients will wisely seek out in advance for medical attention.

THE value of new Bible translations is generally conceded by Bible lovers. As noted previously in these columns* there are four arguments in favor of new Bible translations: (1) discovery of older manuscripts; (2) better understanding of the original languages in which the Bible was written; (3) changes in the languages into which the Bible has been translated; (4) increased understanding of God’s will and purposes.

The fourth reason may not be appreciated by all Bible lovers, but a little reflection will make clear its validity. Time and again a certain word in Greek or Hebrew or a certain phrase or clause can be translated grammatically correct in more than one way. When this is the case it may well depend upon the translator’s understanding of God’s will and purposes as to whether he selects the right way to render the particular word, phrase or clause.

A case in point is the way Colossians 1: 15-20 reads in the New World Translation. Trinitarians complain because the word “other” repeatedly appears even though this word is not found in the Greek text itself. The passage in question reads:

“He is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation; because by means of him all other things were created in the heavens and upon the earth, the things visible and the things invisible, no matter whether they are thrones or lord-

• S&e May 8, I960, pp, 27, 28, ships or governments or authorities. All other things have been created through him and for him. Also, he is before all other things and by means of him all other things were made to exist, and he is the head of the body, the congregation. He xs the beginning, the first-born from the dead, that he might become the one who is first in all things; because God saw good for all fullness to dwell in him, and through him to reconcile again to himself all other things by making peace through the blood he shed on the torture stake, no matter whether they are the things upon the earth or the things in the heavens.”

Each time the word “other” occurs in the above verses it has brackets around it in the New World Translation, indicating that it has been added to complete the sense. Trinitarians argue that religious bias caused the New World Bible Translation Committee to add the word “other.” They say it should not be there because Jesus was not created, and, therefore, all things were created through him, and not merely all “other” things. What about this argument? Is it valid? No, it is not.

In the first place note that in verse twenty, the last one quoted above, God is said to reconcile all things to himself through the Son. Now certainly he did not require to reconcile the Son Jesus to himself, because the reconciliation was through this one, and so at least in this instance it is obvious that Paul meant reconciliation of all other things to God.

If Jesus created literally all things and not merely all other things, then how are we to understand the statement in verse 15 that says Jesus is “the first-born of all creation”? Clearly Paul includes Jesus in creation, the very first one created. For Jesus to be the firstborn he had to be created and therefore a part of creation; yes, also “the first-born among many brothers.”—Rom. 8:29.

That Jesus had a beginning and was born is consistent with his referring to Jehovah God as “my Father and . . . my God.” (John 20:17) In fact, in the Gospel of John alone Jesus is shown as referring to God as his Father more than a hundred times. Since God is indeed Jesus’ Father and Jesus is God’s firstborn, it follows that Jesus is a creation, and, therefore, when Paul says that all things were created through Jesus he must have meant all other things.

Note an illustration or two that bear this out. At Philippians 2:9, 10, according to the Catholic Confraternity translation, Paul writes: “Therefore God also has exalted him and has bestowed upon him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend.” Obviously God did not give Jesus a name above every name, for that would include his own name, which simply would not make sense. No, God gave Jesus “the name that is above every other name,” even as the Nev.: World Translation puts it.

Again, in his great prophecy Jesus said, according to the American Standard Version, “Behold the fig tree, and all the trees.” Certainly, “all the trees” includes the fig tree, and, so, it no more makes sense to say in modern English, ‘the fig tree and all the trees’ than to say ‘all the trees and the fig tree.’ The New World Translation also eliminates this apparent inconsistency by rendering Jesus’ words, “Note the fig tree and all the other trees.” —Luke 21:29.

Adding the adjective “other” to make a passage clear is not at all peculiar to the New World Translation. At Luke 13:4, for example, we have Jesus’ words regarding certain ones that were killed in an accident. These words, according to the King James Version, read: “Or those eighteen, upon whom the tower in Siloam fell, and slew them, think ye that they were sinners above all men that dwelt in Jerusalem?” Certainly they could not have been sinners above all men in Jerusalem, for they themselves were men in Jerusalem, and so we find that many other translations, such as the Catholic Confraternity, An American Translation, The New English Bible, Msgr. Knox, Phillips' and Revised Standard Version, all read “other(s).” Even the King James translators felt the need to add “other” at 1 Corinthians 11:21 to make the sense clear. Apparently back in the first century the use of “other” was not thought to be necessary, at least not in koine Greek, in which the Christian Greek Scriptures were written, but it is today. From the foregoing we can see that Bible translators may add the word “other” to the text for the sake of making a passage clear, consistent or to get across the right meaning.

Far from the New World Bible Translation Committee’s taking liberties with the text at Colossians 1:15-20, it is certain trinitarian translators that have been guilty of this. Thus Phillips' reads: “He existed before all creation began,” thereby hiding the fact that Jesus was created. However, the Greek text allows for no such rendering. It reads, prototokos pdses ktlseos, literally, “firstborn of all creation.” That Jesus is here spoken of as the “firstborn of all creation” is supported by many other translations, such as American Standard, Revised Standard Version, Douay and Catholic Confraternity. The New English Bible covers over this truth in the text but tacitly admits it in a footnote.

Clearly, an understanding of God’s purposes is essential to properly translating the Bible. Endeavoring to translate it without such an understanding not only makes it likely that a translator will make mistakes in judgment but also exposes him to the temptation to “slant” a text so as to support unscriptural teachings.

Chile Combats Illiteracy

Chile is waging a war against illiteracy. In the course of 1963, 105,000 persons were taught to read and write. In the month of June four radio stations cooperated with the program. Statistics show that, while in 1952 the number of illiterate persons was about 19 percent of the total population, last year this figure was down to about 16 percent.

Soviet’s New President

<$> On July 15 sixty-eight-year-old Anastas I. Mikoyan became president of the Soviet Union. He replaced Leonid I. Brezhnev, who had stepped aside to devote himself full time to the duties as Premier Nikita Khrushchev’s deputy in the Secretariat of the Communist party. Some analysts speculate that Brezhnev will someday succeed Khrushchev, who is over seventy years old, as premier of the Soviet Union,

Quake Lifts Island

<$> Montague Island, in Prince William Sound off the Alaska coast, about 100 miles south of the epicenter of the Alaskan earthquake of March 27, was raised more than thirty feet by the quake. The United States Geological Survey reported on July 22 that the island shot up to expose a strip of sea floor up to 1,350 feet in width. The southern end of the island was pushed up some thirty-three feet, while the rest of the island rose more than ten feet.

Learning a New Alphabet

<§> About 3,500 American schoolchildren are now using the new 44-letter alphabet that has been used in English schools the last two years. More than 20,000 American schoolchildren are scheduled to begin using the alphabet when school opens. The new alphabet was devised by Sir James Pitman, a member of Parliament and grandson of Sir Isaac Pitman, who invented the shorthand system bearing his name. Children using the new alphabet were said to gain an average of one year over children taught with the conventional 26-let ter alphabet. After ten weeks of instruction, it was found, the pupils could read and deal effectively with a vocabulary of 320 words, whereas children taught by conventional methods could read only sixty-six words on a purely sight basis.

The Republican Nominee

# United States Senator Barry Morris Goldwater was overwhelmingly chosen by the Republican National Convention in San Francisco as its presidential nominee for 1964. Goldwater received 883 of the 1,308 delegate votes. Goldwater’s choice as a running mate was Representative William E. Miller, a Roman Catholic from the state of New York. In 1952 Goldwater defined his political philosophy as follows: "I am not a me-too Republican. I am a Republican opposed to the superstate, and to gigantic, bureaucratic, centralized authority." His philosophy appears not to have changed. Come the November elections, he hopes to be the peoples’ choice for the president of the United States.

Hunger Stalks India

<$> India is faced with a critical food shortage that has reached starvation proportions in some areas. There were reports of hoarding, black marketeering and long food lines. Seeds meant for planting were being eaten. Food shops in Agra have been broken into. Half of the flour mills in Punjab State have been closed down for lack of grain to grind.

Caught Smuggling

<$> A published United Press International report stated that on July 21 the Soviet Union announced that its water polo team had been disbanded for smuggling foreign clothing into the country. The Soviet press accused the team of “moral degradation.” It assailed ten of the eleven players as well as the coaches.

Rash of Race Riots

® The United States broke out in a rash of riots in July. Thousands were involved in disorders in six states during the Fourth of July weekend. In New York City riots followed the shooting of a 15-year-old Negro boy on July 16. In the Harlem section of New York City and in the Bedford-Stuyvesant area of Brooklyn violence broke out with all its ugliness. There were shootings, fighting, looting, burning of automobiles, a breakdown of law and order. Over 500 stores were raided in the riot areas. President Johnson ordered the Federal Bureau of Investigation into the Inflamed sections to determine if Federal laws had been violated. President Johnson said: “It must be made clear, once and for all, that violence and lawlessness cannot, must not and will not be tolerated.”

In Singapore, race riots brought the death toll to 21. Hospitals reported hundreds more injured. Some 10,000 policemen and troops sought to quell the rioting, which virtually paralyzed the port city. The riots are between the Chinese and Malays. Many Malayans apparently fear that the Chinese may seize the government and possibly align Malaysia with Communist China. The Chinese make up 42 percent of Malaysia’s 10 million people; the Malayans, 40 percent The rest are an assortment of racial groups.

Snowstorm in South Africa & The worst snowstorm In more than sixty years struck the Maclear district of East Griqualand, South Africa, during the latter part of June. A group of men battled against time to save the lives of some 20,000 sheep. They used helicopters to bring stock feed to the sheep that were trapped by the storm. A helicopter airlift was also used to bring fuel, food and clothing to the farmers and shepherds marooned In the freezing cold. Farmers say that at least 10,000 sheep and hundreds of cattle have died as a result of the snow.

Smelting 3,000 Tears Ago

<§> North of the Gulf of Aqaba in the Timna area archaeologists discovered what they call one of the oldest metal smelting furnaces ever found anywhere. Three complete furnaces and the ruins of many damaged ones dating back some 3,000 years were excavated. The furnaces were pits about twenty inches deep and twenty-four inches In diameter. Dr. Beno Rothenberg of Tel Aviv, who headed the expedition, said that the smelting process used back there, possibly in Solomon's or in Reho-boam’s time, was more sophisticated than had been imagined.

Iraq Nationalizes Businesses

+ On July 14 all private and foreign banks, insurance companies and thirty industrial and commercial concerns were nationalized by the Iraqi government. Foreign .oil companies, which provide Iraq with more than 80 percent of her national income, were not affected.

Medical News

Do you feel that you have been sufficiently informed about your health and the health of your fellowman? The World Health Organization (WHO) informs us that there are 50,000 medical journals that publish 1,200,000 original articles every year.

Do you take the origin and background of your religion for granted? Are you confident that its teachings and practices are fully supported by the Bible? Would you be surprised to learn that a vast system of false worship has grown up with its roots in a city that flourished thousands of years ago? Where does your religion fit into this picture? You should know the facts! Be sure! Read:

“Babylon the Great Has Fallen!” God’s Kingdom Rules!

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Jesus lived a life of positive action. Therefore, a Christian, or an imitator or follower of Jesus Christ, cannot be passive in his attitude. He must reach out for the works of Christ and be led by God’s spirit as Jesus was. And if he is filled with God’s spirit he will produce the fruits of God’s spirit: “love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faith, mildness, self-control.”—Gal. 5:22, 23.

You too can display these ‘fruits of God’s spirit’ more abundantly. How it can be done was the theme of the series of “Fruitage of the Spirit” Assemblies of Jehovah’s Witnesses conducted throughout the world in recent months. The principal talks of the assemblies, highlighting this vital theme of Christian living, are currently being published in The Watchtower. Subscribe now and share in the rich benefits to be had from a study of God’s Word.

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¹

See the Bible book of Daniel, chapters 10-12, and chapters 10-13 of the book '‘Your Wil? Dona on Earth,” published by the Watch Tower Society,