2016-12 True Life Story: Musa Alami who made the Judean desert bloom
Musa Alami [1897-1984]
[DrNorman Vincent Peale writes about Desert Water and Musa Alami in his book "POWER OF THE PLUS FACTOR", in Chapter 5, "Plus Factor and Persistence": "Dream Creative Dreams. Set high and worthwhile goals. Take the first decisive step toward your goal. And then what? Then take another step, and another, and another, until the goal is reached. No matter, how long it takes, persist. No matter how discouraged you may get, persevere. No matter how much you want to quit, hang in there. Never give up; Never, never, never... give up!" NVP]
"I met
one of the world's great positive thinkers in the wilderness of Judea, where,
in the long ago, John the Baptist preached. His name is Musa Alami and hehas made the desert to blossom as the rose--a desert that in all the
history of the world had never blossomed before. He succeeded because he
believed that he could, and he kept at it until he did, which, of course, is
the way you succeed at anything.
Musa, an Arab man, was
educated at Cambridge, went back to Palestine where he became a well-to-do
man--well-to-do, that is, by Middle Eastern standards. Then, in political
turmoil, he lost everything, including his home.
He went beyond Jordan to the
edge of Jericho. Stretching away on either side was the great, bleak,
arid desert of the Jordan valley. In the distance to the left, shimmering
in the hot haze, loomed the mountains of Judea, and to the right the mountains
of Moab.
Judean Desert
With the exception of a few
oases, nothing had ever been cultivated in this hot and weary land, and
everyone said that nothing could be, for how could you bring the water to it? To dam the Jordan River for
irrigation was too expensive and, besides, there was no money to finance such a
project.
"What about underground
water?" asked Musa Alami. Long and loud they laughed. Whoever
heard of such a thing? There was no water under that hot, dry
desert. Ages ago it had been covered by Dead Sea water; now the sand was
full of salt, which added further to the aridity.
He had heard of the amazing
rehabilitation of the California desert through subsurface water. He
decided that he could find water here also. All the old-time Bedouin
sheiks said it couldn't be done; government officials agreed, and so, solemnly,
did the famous scientists from abroad. There was absolutely no water
there. That was that.
But Musa was
unimpressed. He thought there was. A few poverty-stricken refugees
from the nearby Jericho Refugee Camp helped him as he started to dig.
With well-drilling equipment? Not on your life. With pick and
shovel.
Everybody laughed as this dauntless man and his ragged friends dug
away day after day, week after week, month after month. Down they went,
slowly, deep into the sand into which no man since creation had plumbed for
water.
For six months they dug; then one day the sand became wet and
finally water, life-giving water, gushed forth. The Arabs who had
gathered round did not laugh or cheer; they wept. Water had been found in
the ancient desert!
A very old man, sheik of a
nearby village, heard the amazing news. He came to see for himself.
"Musa," he asked, "have you really found water? Let me see
it and feel it and taste it."
The old man put his hand in
the stream, splashed it over his face, put it on his tongue. "It is
sweet and cool," he said. "It is good water." Then,
placing his aged hands on the shoulder of Musa Alami, he said, "Thank
God. Now, Musa, you can die."* It was the simple tribute of a
desert man to a positive thinker who did what everyone said could not be
done.
Judean Desert Blooming
Now, several years later,
Musa Alami has fifteen wells supplying a ranch nearly three miles long and two
miles wide. He raises vegetables, bananas, figs, citrus fruit, and
boys. In his school he is growing citizens of the future, farmers and
technicians, experts in the trades. Imitating Musa, others have also dug
until forty thousand acres are under cultivation and the green is spreading
over the sands.
I asked this amazing man what kept him going, kept him believing
when everyone said it couldn't be done. "There was no
alternative. It had to be done," he said, then added, "God
helped me."
As the twilight turned the
mountains of Moab and the Judean hills to red and gold, I sat watching a huge
stream of water gush from the heart of the desert. And as it splashed
into a deep, wide pool, it seemed to say, "It can be done, it can be
done!"
So, don't let your
difficulties get you down and do not believe those croakers who say you cannot
do it. Remember Musa Alami,
positive thinker of the wilderness of Judea." *Another version: "Musa, now I can die. I've seen water come from the desert."
2016-11 True Life Story: Creative Dreamer - Dr. Dorothy Brown
[The other day, I was reading Dr. Norman Vincent Peale's book, POWER OF THE PLUS FACTOR. I read: "There is a power within you that can revolutionize your life. I call it the Plus Factor... The Plus Factor makes its appearance in a person's life in proportion as that person is in harmony with God and His universal laws... The world has always been full of dramatic examples of what can happen when one determined man or woman locks his or her mind around a dream and lets the Plus Factor begin to come through.
There followed, true stories of such dreamers, especially one orphan black child, Dorothy Brown who dreamt of becoming a doctor and serving humanity, and another, a Palestine youth, Musa Alami, who dreamt of bringing out underground water in the Judean desert and making it bloom. I shall share these inspiring true life stories in this post and in the next.]
Let us hear the story of Dr. D, in the gripping words of Dr Norman Vincent Peale. "A dream once came to a little black child living in an orphanage in Troy, New York. Her name was Dorothy Brown. When Dorothy was five years old, she was taken to a hospital for a tonsillectomy. Most youngsters would have been frightened or at least apprehensive but Dorothy was not. She was fascinated by the wondrous world of medicine in which she found herself. People helping others by relieving pain, setting broken bones, curing diseases. Then and there, Dorothy decided that someday she would be part of that world. She was only five years old, but she set a goal for herself. Eventually she would become a pioneering doctor! It was a dream that seemed absolutely hopeless. Born out of a wedlock, she had been placed in the orphanage because her mother could not afford to keep her. When she reached the age when other children enter high school, she would have to go to work. At the age of 14, Dorothy went to work as a maid, earning two dollars a day. There were many books in her employer's home, and Dorothy was allowed to read them. In two years, she saved $500 and decided to register for high school. When the registrar asked for her home address, she had to admit that she had no home and no address. But when a person has the aura of the Plus Factor about her, other people step forward to help. The Principal of the high school listened to Dorothy's story and found a couple who agreed to take her in as a boarder. When she graduated from the high school, she went back to being a maid, in order to earn money for college study. At the wages, then being paid, Dorothy figured it would take her eleven years to go for collegiate study. But her faith in her dream never faltered. Every night she prayed to God to help her turn it into reality. She worked extra hours. She took on extra jobs. One of her employers, hearing her talk of becoming a doctor, told her of a scholarship being offered by a Methodist College in North Carolina. She applied for that scholarship and won it. She took all the science and premedical courses that were offered. But when she finally graduated, there was no money left for the medical school. The onset of Word War II caused a shortage of manpower, and the army turned to women to work as inspectors in ordnance depots. Dorothy joined and in two years saved $2000. She entered Meharry Medical College in Nashville, Tennessee. When here funds ran out, friends came to her aid. And the day finally came when the friendless little waif from the orphanage in Troy, was a doctor at last. What does Dr Dorothy Brown herself think about all this? She believes that just as God gives each one of us our special talent, so He gives us dreams to make us aware of that talent."It does not matter, how far-fetched or unattainable the dream may seem. If we remain steadfast, if we have enough faith in God and in ourselves to go to work and stay at work trying to make the dream come true, then God puts into our lives the people who, out of their love for Him and for us, will do for us what we cannot do for ourselves."
Rhus toxicodendron or Rhus tox
is made from the plant poison ivy which grows as a shrub
or a woody vine. It is one of the most valuable medicines, especially for over-exertion, in Homeopathy. Rhus tox is almost the specific for STRAINS and SPRAINS. It was proved by Hahnemann and icluded in his Materia Medica Pura Part 2.
Rhus tox has great restlessness; cannot lie long in one position, changes often with temporary relief. Lameness and stiffness on beginning to move after rest; better by continued motion.
Dr Hahnemann contrasts the action of Rhus tox with that of Bryonia. "With almost identical symptoms, there is the striking amelioration by avoiding all movement of Bryonia , exactly the opposite of what Rhus-tox does." He calls them "the two antagonistic sister remedies" and tells of their inestimable value in the disastrous war pestilence of 1813. Dr Hahnemann treated it symptomatically with Rhus-tox alternated with Bryonia, as the symptoms changed and demanded the one or the other remedy. And he says that of the 183 cases he treated in Leipsic, not one died, "which created a great sensation among the Russians then ruling in Dresden, but was consigned to oblivion by the medical authoirities." He says, "If ever there was a triumph for the only true, the homeopathic treatment, this was one."
Dr Farrington describes the use of Rhus tox in fevers: "Rhus tox, when acute diseases take on a typhoid form -- dysentry -- scarlet fever -- diphtheria -- pneumonia... Rhus is indicated when the stools are of dark b lood, with tearing pains down the thighs.
Regarding the extraordinary action of Rhus tox on the skin, Dr Dunham says: "Rhus tox produces a most remarkable imitation of vesicula erysiplelas and is our most valued remedy here... But its grand role is in the treatment of the pustular form." Dr Nash reports a case: F65 was taken with severe chill, followed by aching pains all over, went into a stupor with low grade delirium muttering and continually tossing from side to side in bed. Baptisia 200 was given with no improvement. Then Sulphur 200; there developed the most intense erysipelas of the head and faceThe eruption was decidedly vesicular. Now the remedy was plain. Rhus tox mm was given. The patient made a rapid and complete recovery.
Dr Trousseau says that he had often used "Rhus tox for paralysis of the lower extremities succeeding on a concussion of the spinal marrow, or a desion of that organ, which did not destroy its tissue." SKINS, then, and TRAUMATIC PARALYSIS without destruction of the nervous tissue!
Rhus is a great remedy for over-exertion. "A player of wind instruments gets pulmonary hemorrhage. Rhus tox will be his remedy. If from violent exertion a patient is seized with paralysis, his troubles may yield to Rhus tox.
In Lumbago, Rhus tox is the remedy whether the patient is better from motion or not. Rhus tox has great pains in attempting to rise; stiff neck from sitting in a draught; interscapular pains, better from warmth and worse from cold. Rhus is especially indicated in rheumatic gout; and in rheumatic hard swelling of the big toe joint, often mistaken for bunion.
Rhus tox has "Colic, better by bending double and moving about [Coloc better bending, but not from motion]. In orbital cellulitis, Rhus tox is almost a specific." Dr Farrington speaks of Rhus tox as useful in various forms of PARALYSIS, especially in rheumatic patients from over-exertion or exposure to wet, as lying on damp ground. Rhus tox has a great record in the treatment of Lumbago, Sciatica, and Sprains.
Rhus Tox
Useful for:
Key Symptoms:
Restlessness, both physically & mentally
SPRAINS & STRAINS
SORE MUSCLES
From overexertion
RHEUMATIC
"Rusty gate" syndrome; less painful when limbered up
PAINS
Pain & stiffness in small of back, nape of neck
SCIATICA
Tearing pains down thighs
INFLUENZA
Aching in all bones
Can't lie still, restless
COLD SORE
After cold or influenza
Tongue dry & red tipped
HOARSENESS
From over straining voice
COUGH
Dry, teasing cough
Coughs from midnight until morning
Coughs on putting hands out of bed
Coughs during a chill
IVY POISONING
Intense itching & burning
HIVES
Red, swollen, itching
CHICKEN POX
Intense itching
Restless
Better from:
Continued motion, Warm applications, Cold,
Lying on something hard, Rubbing, Change of position, Warm
Dry weather, Walking, Stretching out limbs
Worse from:
Beginning motion, During sleep or rest, Dampness, While sitting,
After rain, Lying on back or right side
