Johnny Lovewisdom

Johnny Lovewisdom (July 23, 1919 – October 12, 2000), born John Wierlo, and known as Hermit Saint Of The Andes, was an American-Finnish author who wrote about diet, health, natural living, religion and spirituality.

Contents

Biography

Early diet ideas

Johnny Lovewisdom originally promoted a strict fruit diet but later changed it to the "Vitarian" diet with vegetables, raw yogurt, clabber, kefir and avocado. Experimenting with many diets throughout his life, including a diet of papaya leaf salads with clabber, which he claimed healed an avascular tumor,[1] he also promoted "Modern Live Juice Therapy", breatharianism (the idea that humans do not need food or water and can live on "spiritual energy" alone.[2]), aquarianism (water fasting), heliovorism (solarism), and a number of other unusual "lifestyle" diets. He suffered from paralysis, poor eyesight and neurological problems, which he claimed to be a result of working as a farm laborer in the pesticide contaminated orchards of California.[3]

Emigration

In 1938, he made plans to emigrate to South America to avoid being conscripted as a soldier in World War 2.[4] In 1944 a U.S. newspaper article reported how in 1940 a group of young Americans including Lovewisdom and the Windish family of Marian, James, Dick and Fred set out to found a nature colony in the equatorial forest.[5] The article, which was to be titled Father Of The New Age, depicted Lovewisdom as the biological father of the new age and race, even though he wanted nothing to do with the scheme. The reporter later changed the title to Danger In Paradise. When Walter Siegmeister met Lovewisdom in Ecuador in 1941, they spoke of plans for creating a paradisian utopia and a super-race in the Ecuadorean jungle, but Lovewisdom later stated that he only wanted to begin what he called a Propitiatory Shelter For The Apocalyptic Camp of the Saints [4][6]

Later life

In the 1960s, Lovewisdom lived as a hermit in the mountain crater lake, Quilotoa, in Ecuador,[7][8] which he felt would shield residents from nuclear fallout.[9] This was further documented in Lovewisdom's book Ecstatic Recreation Thru Paradisiacal Living where he invited 'paradisians', to build a 'camp of saints' in Quilotoa. Lovewisdom believed that the thin air at high altitudes would allow him to develop clairvoyance and "drink alcohol like water without getting drunk."

An article about Vilcabamba - an 'island of immunity' from cardiovascular disease, in Reader's Digest ignited Dr. Lovewisdom's interest, besides its abundant fruit varieties, so he moved there from Otavalo in the north of Ecuador. Dr. David Davies of University College London, and Dr. Alexander Leaf of Harvard University, both gerontologists, visited Lovewisdom due to his many articles on the longevity of the Vilcabamban people. Lovewisdom became a consultant for them, on the centenarians.

Reincarnation

Lovewisdom believed himself to be the reincarnation of Ananda (the primary disciple of Buddha), Milarepa and John the Baptist.[10] As the official successor to Kuthumi Lal Singh,[11] Tashi Lama and Maha Chohan, he founded the International University of Natural Living at Vilcabamba, Ecuador in 1962 with its credo "build paradise and eat the fruits thereof" and correspondence school which issued the degree 'Doctor of Vitalogical Science' or D.Vit.Sci., and Ph.D in 'Vitalogical Science and Agronomy'. He founded the "Pristine Order of Paradisian Perfection", a religious order, which was registered with the Ecuadorean government, and later founded the International University of the Vitalogical Sciences.[12]

Final years

The early 20th century nature cure movement inspired authors such as George R. Clements, Walter Siegmeister, Theos Bernard and Johnny Lovewisdom. Siegmeister told of his search for the safest place on Earth from radioactive fallout in order to build a paradise,[13] an idea later developed by Lovewisdom in Handbook on Radioactive Nuclear Fallout. Lovewisdom's many beliefs were documented in Viktoras Kulvinskas' Survival Into The 21st Century in the 1970s, which sold over a million copies.

In 1998, near the end of his life, inspired by Spanish fruitarians who visited him, he returned to promoting a strict juicy fruitarian diet, which he called the "Vitarian Fruit-Salad Diet", described in The Ascensional Science of Spiritualizing Fruitarian Dietetics (1999). His low fat stance was also corroborated by Dr. Corwin Samuel West of the International Academy of Lymphology,[14] Dr. Douglas N. Graham who warned against high raw fat diets[15], Otto Carque [16] and Arnold Ehret.[17] Lovewisdom died in Quito, aged 81. His life-story is chronicled in the autobiography Maitreya: The New Age World Teacher.

Legacy

Lovewisdom produced many books in English and Spanish on breatharianism, fasting, fruitarianism, natural hygiene, naturopathy, orthopathy, parthenogenesis, vitalism, yoga traditions, aquarian eugenics and ascensional science. Further topics included: anthropology, clairvoyance, body chemistry, comparative anatomy, geophysical changes, lemurian genesis, neuro-cerebropathology, organiculture, plant botany, tropical colonization and esoteric dietetics in religion, history and metaphysics. From the 1990s, Lovewisdom's books were published by Paradisian Publications, San Francisco.

Notable writings

Criticisms

Dr Teofilo de la Torre of Panama, critiqued Lovewisdom declaring nuts and seeds were optimal foods, though earlier advised against them, in the same book.[19] Health writer Gabriel Cousens attributed Lovewisdom's health problems to B12 deficiency,[20] although Lovewisdom attributed these to pesticides exposure and hospitals.[21][22]

Works

English

Spanish

Other Writings

Articles on Lovewisdom

External links

References

  1. ^ "After several years of dressing salads, often having nothing but papaya leaves for greens, an avascular tumor I had size of an egg was expelled without returning on my neck, using clabber thus.", A Look In A Nook Of A Vitarian's No-Cook Book, Johnny and Ruth Marie Lovewisdom, International University Press, Loja, Ecuador, 1963
  2. ^ Skeptics Canada: Skeptical Topics: Breatharianism
  3. ^ John Brandi in Reflections In The Lizard's Eye: Notes From The High Desert, Western Edge Press, 2000, 1889921084, 9781889921082, 190 pages
  4. ^ a b Introduction to Handbook on Radioactive Nuclear Fallout, Dr. J. Lovewisdom
  5. ^ J. M. Sheppard, The American Weekly, 31 December 1944 edition.
  6. ^ http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/cienciareal/invisible_eagle/invisible_eagle07.htm "The new Utopia, however, was not to be: Wierlo later claimed that he had no intention of creating a super-race"
  7. ^ http://www.mundoandino.com/Ecuador/Vilcabamba-Ecuador Mundo Andino Article
  8. ^ "This strange lake in this forsaken solitude of the Andes, shut off from all else by steep crater walls, provided only by a tongue of fertile land, and lost in a miracle of suggestive and exotic panorama, was sought and chosen by this strange personage to be converted into his sanctuary.", A Message Of Peace By One Who Lives In A Volcano, Mundial, Uruguay, June 7th, 1949, Miguel A. Puentes, Quito, Ecuador
  9. ^ Viktoras Kulvinskas, Survival Into the 21st Century, Ihopea Inc, 1970s
  10. ^ http://www.human-academy.com/english/articles/panchen_lama_part_2.asp The return of the world teacher - Johnny Lovewisdom – The Hermit “Saint” of the Andes
  11. ^ http://www.human-academy.com/english/articles/panchen_lama_part_2.asp The return of the World Teacher - Johnny Lovewisdom – The Hermit “Saint” of the Andes
  12. ^ http://www.human-academy.com/english/articles/panchen_lama_part_1.asp The return of the World Teacher - Johnny Lovewisdom – The Hermit “Saint” of the Andes - part 1
  13. ^ http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/cienciareal/invisible_eagle/invisible_eagle07.htm Invisible Eagle, "There he met a friend, John Wierlo, who had moved from America the previous year, and together they conceived the idea of creating a new Utopia and a 'super-race' somewhere in the jungles in the east of the country."
  14. ^ Corwin Samuel West, The Golden Seven Plus One, Utah: Samuel Publishing
  15. ^ http://www.lifeandlove.tv/article.cfm/aid/1014
  16. ^ Rational Diet: An Advanced Treatise on the Food Question, Otto Carque, Health Research Books, 1996
  17. ^ ""All fats are acid forming, even those of vegetable origin, and are not used by the body. You will continue to like, crave and use them only as long as you can still see mucus in the 'magic mirror'. What doctors call heat calories is caused by the fats in friction, obstruction in the circulation; they constipate the small blood vessels.", 'page 164, Mucusless Diet Healing System, Arnold Ehret, USA: ELPC Inc, 1923
  18. ^ The Ascensional Science of Spiritualizing Fruitarian Dietetics, Johnny Lovewisdom, Paradisian Publications, 1999 final chapter: Why Not Avocadoes, Olives & Seed Oils For Salads? page 40, and, epilogue: Fats & Oils Turn Up As The Key Factor For Middle Age, Elderly And Even Many Young Fruitarians Unable To Synthesize Fat From Fruit Sugar, page 41.
  19. ^ The Process Of Physical Purification Through The New And Easy Way To Fast, Teofilo de la Torre (1954)
  20. ^ Spiritual Nutrition, Gabriel Cousens, page 278.
  21. ^ Modern Live Juice Therapy, J. Lovewisdom, International University of the Natural Vitalogical Sciences, 1954
  22. ^ Nine Months In A Snake Pit, J. Lovewisdom, International University of the Natural Vitalogical Sciences