Bless YHVH O My Soul!

Bless YHWH, O my soul: and all that is within me, bless His Holy Name.

Bless YHWH, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits:

Who forgives all your iniquities; who heals all your diseases;

Who redeems your life from destruction; who crowns you with loving kindness and tender mercies;

Who satisfies your mouth with good things; so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's.

YHWH executes righteousness and judgment for all that are oppressed.

He made known his ways unto Moshe, His acts unto the children of Israel.

YHWH is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy.

He will not always chide: neither will he keep his anger for ever.

He has not dealt with us after our sins; nor rewarded us according to our iniquities.

For as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is His mercy toward them that fear Him.

As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us.

Like as a father has compassion upon his children, so YHWH is compassionate to them that fear Him.

For he knows our frame; he remembers that we are dust.

As for man, his days are as grass: as a flower of the field, so he flourishes.

For the wind passes over it, and it is gone; and the place thereof shall know it no more.

But the mercy of the LORD is from everlasting to everlasting upon them that fear him,

and his righteousness unto children's children;

To such as keep his covenant, and to those that remember his commandments to do them.

YHWH has prepared His throne in the heavens; and His Kingdom rules over all.

Bless YHWH, you His angels, that excel in strength, that do his commandments,

hearkening unto the Voice of his Word.

Bless ye YHWH, all you his hosts; you ministers of His, that do His pleasure.

Bless YHWH, all His works in all places of His dominion: bless YHWH, O my soul.

A Psalm of David.

The Lyon Diet-Heart Study: Implications

There's something ironic about the Mediterranean diet used in the Lyon diet heart study, the one that dramatically reduced participants' risk of heart attack and all-cause mortality relative to the prudent diet control group: it wasn't actually a Mediterranean diet.

The concept of the Mediterranean diet as protective against heart disease may have originated in Dr. Ancel Keys' Seven Countries study, in which he compared the food habits and cardiovascular mortality statistics both between and within seven European countries. Countries surrounding the Mediterranean, and in particular the Greek island of Crete, had the lowest cardiovascular death rates. The Cretan diet is high in monounsaturated fat, relatively low in saturated fat, low in omega-6, and high in omega-3 fatty acids, including fat from seafood and the plant omega-3 alpha-linolenic acid. It also includes abundant green vegetables. This became the inspiration for the modern American concept of the "Mediterranean diet". The part about low omega-6 tends to be omitted.

Of course, if you look at modern heart attack mortality statistics by country, France is the lowest in Europe. France is a Mediterranean country, yet happens to have a very high intake of saturated fat per capita. So the cardiologist-approved version of the Mediterranean diet isn't exactly accurate.

The Lyon study departs even further from the traditional Mediterranean diet. Neither the Cretan nor the French diet are low in fat, yet participants were encouraged to reduce their fat intake. The Cretan diet includes some animal fat and eggs, while Lyon participants were encouraged to avoid these. And finally, the margarine. You could be guillotined for using margarine instead of butter in France, and I'm sure the Cretans aren't too fond of it either. Yet the margarine used in the Lyon study was rich in omega-3 alpha-linolenic acid, a critical factor.

Previous intervention trials such as MRFIT, the Women's Health Initiative (WHI) dietary modification trial, and others, exhaustively tested the hypothesis that reducing total fat intake reduces cardiovascular mortality. It doesn't. A dozen trials have also tested the idea that reducing saturated fat reduces cardiovascular mortality. It doesn't. Increasing fiber doesn't, according to the DART trial. Increasing fruit and vegetables modestly doesn't, according to WHI.

So what's left that's unique about the Lyon trial? It was the only trial to dramatically reduce omega-6 consumption, to below 4% of calories, while increasing omega-3 consumption from plant and seafood sources. In my opinion, that combination is the only plausible explanation for the large reduction in heart attacks and total mortality. That combination also happens to be a consistent feature of the real Mediterranean diet. In both Crete and France, omega-6 intake is relatively low, and omega-3 intake is relatively high. They also eat more real food than processed food in general, a factor that I don't underestimate.

Where do we go from here? Obviously I'm not going to recommend eating omega-3 enriched margarine. Mediterranean countries don't need industrial goop to avoid a heart attack, and neither do you. Anyone who's been to France knows they don't deprive themselves over there. They eat real food and they enjoy it.

The way to preserve the essential elements of the Mediterranean diet without becoming an ascetic is to eat fats that are low in omega-6, and find a modest source of omega-3. That means eating full-fat dairy if you tolerate it, fatty meat if you enjoy it, organs, seafood, olive oil in moderation, coconut oil, butter, lard, and tallow. Along with a diet that is dominated by real, homemade food rather than processed food. Some people may also wish to supplement with small doses of high-vitamin cod liver oil, fish oil or flax. I consider the latter to be inferior to animal sources of omega-3, but it can be useful for vegetarians.

Soups That Heal!

Chicken soup

Chicken soup is a favourite healing soup all over the world. It has often been called Jewish penicillin and scientists have spent time and money examining the actions of chicken soup on colds and flu. It�s no surprise that they�ve found evidence of the way chicken soup combats the symptoms of a cold. Dr Stephen Rennard, a US pulmonary specialist, tested various chicken soups, from a traditional, home made soup, to a number of commercial varieties, in the laboratory. He found that the soups had anti-inflammatory properties that helped sore throats and helped stop the movement of neutrophils (white blood cells that encourage the flow of mucus that accumulates in the lungs and nose). So grandmother was right all along!

No wonder chicken soup is a fabled remedy for colds: It contains druglike agents similar to those in modern cold medicines, says Irwin Ziment, M.D., pulmonary specialist and professor at the UCLA School of Medicine. For example, cysteine, an amino acid released from chicken in cooking, chemically resembles the drug acetylcysteine, prescribed for bronchitis and other respiratory problems. Pungent ingredients often added to chicken soup, such as garlic, cayenne pepper and curry spices, all are ancient treatments for respiratory diseases. They work the same way as expectorant drugs and cough medicines, thinning mucus and making breathing easier. The more garlic and hot spices added to chicken soup, Ziment says, the better the soup will be at clearing your lungs.

USA Weekend

Tomato soup

Our family favourite for colds was tomato soup. Of course it helps to come from a tomato growing region - or in your back yard or patio garden. Made with a base of chicken stock, add tomatoes, onions, garlic and basil or oregano, all home grown. The soup is rich, thick and savoury. It�s still one of my favourite soups today. And what a glorious soup it is too. A wonderful sight as it comes to the table with a sprinkling of fresh oregano over the top, looking like chips of emerald against the ruby colour of the tomatoes. Truly, it�s a feast for the eyes as well as the mouth.

The tomatoes in my soup are full of lycopene and vitamin C, both are antioxidants. Onions and garlic are very common ingredients in soup and are well known for their anti-bacterial and anti-viral effects. Onions contain quercetin, a formidable antioxidant with wide-ranging activity. Studies show that quercetin is anti-cancer, anti-fungal, anti-inflammatory, anti-viral and anti-bacterial. Garlic is very active against bacteria, so active that the blood of garlic eaters can kill bacteria. It helps lower blood pressure, prevent blood clots, reduce atherosclerotic buildup, is active against yeasts, prevents cancer, removes heavy metals such as lead and mercury from the body, has anti-oxidant properties and is a source of selenium. The primary ingredients in Oregano, thymol and carvacrol (which are also found in thyme), help loosen phlegm in the lungs and relieve spasms in the bronchial passages. Many commercial cough remedies, including cough drops and skin rubs such as Vicks VapoRub, contain thymol.
No wonder it did us good!

Torah and Healing!

No matter how sick you may be, YHWH can heal you. We need to listen and obey His instructions. After that, have faith in Him and He will take care of the rest! The same way YHWH freed the people of Israel from slavery in Egypt, He can free us from our sicknesses. This week's story proves, once again, the amazing healing power of YHWH if we seek His guide and obey His words. People are rejecting His message because more people than ever before are dying from deadly diseases, despite all the money and resources we have today for research of disease. They can look all they want for a cure, but until they follow YHWH's instructions, they will not find the cure they are looking for. This week's study is just a great example to prove that.

Many people ask, if YHWH is such a loving Elohim, why do we suffer? We are told in

Isaiah 24:5:

The Earth suffers for the sins of its people, for they have twisted YHWH's instructions, violated his law, and broken His everlasting covenant.

YHWH has given us many signs to prove He has more power than any other source to heal us of all our diseases. But people are deceived to believe that doctors can do a better job. Or even worse, that there are other gods out there that can match YHWH's healing power. These ideas are misleading and dangerous.

In the story this week, many of Pharaoh's sorcerers were able to duplicate Moses' miracles. This may seem that all powers are equal. It can be very deceiving to the human understanding that all higher powers have the same power. If YHWH is the ultimate power, how were the sorcerers of Pharaoh able to duplicate some of Moses' miracles? Some used trickery or illusion, but many times people call on satanic powers. Worshiping other elohim (gods) other than YHWH, gods of the underworld, was part of their religion. But if they really had the power YHWH does, they would have reversed the plagues, not added to them.

Just like Pharaoh rejecting YHWH's powers, so did the people of Israel who were in captivity. YHWH not only gave the signs for Pharaoh to reveal that he is almighty, but he also gave the signs to the Children of Israel so they also understood His power. We see in last week's study how they also rejected YHWH's message via Moses. Finally they came around and showed some faith, but once they got into the desert and out of Egypt, their hearts became just a stubborn as Pharaoh's heart. They were shown time after time YHWH's mighty power, but still refused the message as soon as something didn't go according to their liking or understanding.

There are many different gods in the world, but only one Creator and His name is YHWH. During the times of Moses, there were many different nations praying to these other gods of the world and it caused them great hardship. Even the people of Israel, who YHWH rescued out of Egypt, prayed to idols and because of it, only two of them entered the "promised land." These other gods may seem to bring temporary relief, but only YHWH saves, heals and delivers.

Remember last week's message, we saw how YWHH saves, heals and delivers. Even after the transgressions and iniquities. People are afflicted, but we will see in future studies how every time the people didn't keep their promise or covenant with YHWH they were afflicted, but when they repented, YHWH rescued them.

Fools because of their transgression, and because of their iniquities, are afflicted. Their being despises all manner of food; and they draw near to the gates of death. Then they cry to YHWH in their trouble; and He saves them out of their distresses. He sent His Word, and healed them, and delivered them from their destructions.

Psalms 107:17-20

YHWH gave Pharaoh and the children of Israel many opportunities to heed Moses' warnings. But finally YHWH seemed to say, "All right, have it your way," and Pharaoh's heart became permanently hardened, as did the children of Israel in the desert. After a lifetime of resisting YHWH, you may find it impossible to turn to him. Don't wait until just the right time before turning to YWHH. Do it now while you still have the chance. If you continually ignore YHWH's voice, eventually you will be unable to hear it at all.

People want to see and experience YHWH's healing miracles before believing in Him. YHWH sent the greatest miracle of all, His son Yeshua. Yeshua means, YAH's-salvation. Still many people don't get it. They are stuck in the pleasures of this world and would rather live with sickness than to come around and realize that there is no better way than putting our trust and faith in Yeshua. What are you going to do, continue to harden your hearts or come around and believe in Yeshua?

It is better to trust in YHWH than to put confidence in man.

-Psalms 118-8

The Lyon Diet-Heart Study

Now that we have the proper context, it's time to dig into the Lyon Diet-Heart trial, one of the most important and misunderstood diet trials of all time.

The trial enrolled 605 middle-aged French men and women who had previously suffered a heart attack. This is called a "secondary prevention" trial because it's designed to prevent a second heart attack. The advantage of secondary prevention trials is that they can be smaller, because men who have already had a heart attack are at a much higher risk of having another. This increases your statistical power. The disadvantage is that the participants aren't necessarily representative of the population at large.

Participants were divided into a control group and an intervention group. The control group "received no dietary advice from the investigators but nonetheless were advised to follow a prudent diet by their attending physicians". Ah, the prudent diet rears its ugly head once again. In a later paper, they describe the prudent diet they used in a bit more detail:

[The control subjects] were expected to follow the dietary advice given by their attending physicians, similar to that of step I of the prudent diet of the American Heart Association.

And what exactly is this prudent diet? It was created by the National Cholesterol Education Panel, that very conflicted organization I've written about before. Step I is now defunct, having given way to the next generation of NCEP guidelines in 2000. Here's a summary of the old Step I from the American Heart Association's website:

The Step I diet restricted total fat to no more than 30 percent of total calories, saturated fat to no more than 10 percent of total calories, and cholesterol to less than 300 mg/day. It was intended as the starting point for patients who had high cholesterol levels.

This is an important point: the Lyon Diet-Heart trial wasn't an ordinary trial comparing the average person's diet to a different diet. It was a bare-knuckle showdown between the prudent diet and a modified version of the Mediterranean diet! I believe that's part of the reason it was rejected by the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine, although there's another reason I'll get to later. The intervention group received different advice:

Patients in the experimental group were advised by the research cardiologist and dietician, during a one-hour-long session, to adopt a Mediterranean-type diet: more bread, more root vegetables and green vegetables, more fish, less meat (beef, lamb, and pork to be replaced with poultry), no day without fruit, and butter and cream to be replaced with margarine supplied by the study.

Because the patients would not accept olive oil- traditional to the Mediterranean diet- as the only fat [because French people use more butter than olive oil- SG], a rapeseed (canola) oil-based margarine (Astra-Calve, Paris, France) was supplied free for the whole family to experimental subjects. This margarine had a composition comparable to olive oil [mon oeil- SG] with 15% saturated fatty acids, 48% oleic acid but 5.4% 18:1 trans. However, it was slightly higher in linoleic [omega-6- SG] (16.4 vs 8.6%) and more so in alpha-linolenic acid [omega-3- SG] (4.8 vs 0.6%), a fatty acid markedly higher (3 fold) in the plasma of the Cretan cohort in the Seven Country study compared to that of Zutphen (Netherlands).

The oils recommended for salads and food preparation were rapeseed and olive oils exclusively. Moderate alcohol consumption in the form of wine was allowed at meals. At each subsequent visit of the experimental patients, a dietary survey and further counseling were done by the research dietician.

After five long years of these brutal diets, participants in the intervention ("Mediterranean") group were eating slightly less total fat, 29% less saturated fat, 32% less cholesterol, a bit more bread, legumes, fruit, vegetables and fish, compared to the control (prudent diet) group. They were also eating less meat and much less butter and cream, although cheese consumption was the same between groups. French people know better than to give up their cheese!

So far, these changes are not unique. They're similar to the interventions in the ineffective MRFIT and WHI trials in the last post. Here's where it gets interesting. The intervention group ate three times as much omega-3 alpha-linolenic acid as the control group, and 32% less omega-6 linoleic acid. The ratio was 20 : 1 linoleic acid : alpha-linoleic acid in the control group, and 4.4 : 1 in the intervention group. This was due to the combination of a low-fat diet and the canola oil goop they were provided free of charge.

But it gets even better. The intervention group reduced their omega-6 linoleic acid intake to 3.6% of calories, below the critical threshold of 4%. As I described in my recent post on eicosanoid signaling, reducing linoleic acid to below 4% of calories inhibits inflammation, while increasing it more after it has already exceeded 4% has very little effect if omega-3 is kept low*. This is a very important point: the intervention group didn't just increase omega-3. They decreased omega-6 to below 4% of calories. That's what sets the Lyon Diet-Heart trial apart from all the other failed diet trials.

After five years on their respective diets, 3.4% of the control (prudent diet) group and 1.3% of the intervention ("Mediterranean") group had died, a 70% reduction in deaths. Cardiovascular deaths were reduced by 76%. Stroke, angina, pulmonary embolism and heart failure were also much lower in the intervention group. A stunning victory for this Mediterranean-inspired diet, and a crushing defeat for the prudent diet!

There's a little gem buried in this study that I believe is the other reason it didn't get accepted to the New England Journal of Medicine: there was no difference in total cholesterol or LDL values between the control and experimental groups. The American scientific consensus was so cholesterol-centric that it couldn't accept the possibility that an intervention had reduced heart attack mortality without reducing LDL. The paper was accepted to the British journal The Lancet, another well-respected medical journal.

In the next post, I'll describe how we can benefit from the findings of the Lyon trial, and even surpass it, without having to resort to canola oil margarine.

*I admit 4% is somewhat arbitrary, but I think it's a good reference point based on the shape of the HUFA curve in this post.

The Lyon Diet-Heart Study: Background

To appreciate the full significance of the Lyon diet-heart study, we have to go back in time a bit. We're off to 1982, the year the U.S. National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute published the results of their massive study, the Multiple Risk Factor Intervention Trail (MRFIT).

By 1982, the idea of the "prudent diet" was well ingrained in American medicine, despite a lack of direct evidence to support it, and even a certain amount of evidence at odds with it (such as the ill-fated Anti-Coronary Club trial). The prudent diet was designed to reduce the risk of heart attack, and suggests reducing total fat, saturated fat and cholesterol intake, while increasing consumption of vegetables, whole grains, fruit and fiber. Some versions of the diet replace saturated fat with polyunsaturated vegetable oils.

MRFIT involved 12,866 men at high risk of heart attack, making it one of the largest controlled trials of all time. Half of the group were told to keep doing what they were doing, under medical supervision, and the other half were given intense diet and lifestyle counseling. The intervention group was counseled to quit smoking and reduce their consumption of saturated fat and cholesterol, and increase polyunsaturated vegetable oil consumption.

After 6 years, 46% of the intervention group had quit smoking, compared to 29% in the control group. The intervention group reduced their cholesterol intake by 40% and their saturated fat intake by more than one-fourth, and increased their consumption of polyunsaturated fat (omega-6) by one third relative to the control group (source).

The results? After seven years, total mortality was 41.2 per 1,000 in the intervention group and 40.4 in the control group, a difference that was not even close to statistically significant. There were also no significant differences in heart attack rate or heart attack death rate. The authors and their apologists tried to wiggle out of the obvious conclusion through an avalanche of slippery math and editorials.

The results were mirrored by a later intervention trial published in 2006, the Women's Health Initiative dietary modification trial. This one was even larger, involving 48,835 postmenopausal women! This was another test of the prudent diet, in which participants were intensively counseled to

reduce total fat intake to 20% of calories and increase intakes of vegetables/fruits to 5 servings/d and grains to at least 6 servings/d.

After 6 years, the intervention group was eating 22% less fat, 23% less saturated fat, 20% less cholesterol, 15% more carbohydrate, 22% more fruits and vegetables, and slightly more fiber and whole grains than the control group. LDL dropped a bit in the intervention group.

I think you know what's coming...

Over a mean of 8.1 years, a dietary intervention that reduced total fat intake and increased intakes of vegetables, fruits, and grains did not significantly reduce the risk of CHD, stroke, or CVD in postmenopausal women...

Oh and you forgot to mention, 4.9% of women died in the intervention group as opposed to 5.0% in the control group. A "minor detail" that I couldn't find in the paper so I had to look up elsewhere. The study also showed that the diet modifications didn't reduce the incidence of breast or colorectal cancer, two of the most common cancers. RIP, prudent diet. Although it still seems to be struggling along, despite the beating. Another set of editorials appeared claiming that the diet didn't work because it wasn't extreme enough. How far do we have to move the goalposts before we give up?

There was one interesting finding that came out of MRFIT, which foreshadowed the result of the Lyon trial. MRFIT participants eating the most omega-3 from fish were at a 40% lower risk of coronary heart disease and a 22% lower risk of dying of any cause. This was not part of the intervention, so it doesn't necessarily reflect cause and effect. For that, we'll have to look at the Lyon trial.

Create a healthy digestive system

Today�s fast paced lifestyles often don�t leave time for peaceful mealtimes or even well-balanced nutrition. When your digestive system isn�t working well, you don�t feel your best. Research shows that a healthy digestive system supports short-term well-being and long-term health. When you eat foods, they are not in a form that the body can use as nourishment. Food and drink must be changed into smaller molecules of nutrients before they can be absorbed into the blood and carried to cells throughout the body. Digestion is the process by which food and drink are broken down into their smallest parts so the body can use them to build and nourish cells and to provide energy.

Signs of Healthy Digestions

In fact, a healthy digestive system offers:

� Improved regularity

� Support for healthy bowel function

� Relief from occasional mild constipation, gas, diarrhea, and bloating

� Freedom from occasional heartburn and occasional acid indigestion

� Ease of upset stomach

� Improved sense of well-being

� Better overall health

Poor Digestion Factors

Possible causes of maldigestion are bad food choices, anxiety, stress, enzyme deficiency, and many others. Junk food, for instance, irritates the digestive organs and reduces digestive speed and efficiency. Research indicates that today most people have weak digestion, resulting in fatigue, lowered immunity, and increased physical discomfort.

Digestive Build Great Tasting 100% Alcohol-Free Liquid Herbal Product

To avoid health problems, we can help our digestive system by avoiding unhealthy foods, by consuming an adequate amount of dietary fiber, by supplementing with friendly probiotic bacteria that help protect our intestinal flora, and by taking digestive enzyme supplements. One such product that offers both, as well as beneficial herbal extracts is Digestive Build from Higher Healing Herbals. Digestive Build� by Higher Healing Herbals stimulates the digestive juices and help build digestive tract integrity, actions that benefit both the digestion of foods and effective, sustained immune responses. This formula has a mild blood-purifying cleansing action that is extremely gentle on the liver. Digestive Build� can be used for �spring cleaning� the digestive system, or as part of a weight loss program. It may also be used for sluggish or congested digestive system.

Contact Higher Healing Herbal Institute for your organic, certified Kosher liquid extract of "Digestive Build".

HigherHealingHerbals@Yahoo.com