The Elephant Head

Then God said, "I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. Genesis 1:29, NIV

You know how fascinated I am with certain plants. I order seeds that I may never plant, but that I hope someone will. Just a night ago, on a whim, I ordered seeds of Amaranthus gangeticus, also known as Elephant Head for its very large seed head. I was thinking of a large seed harvest per plant.

After the order I thought that maybe it was just a novelty item. So I looked it up and saw the abbreviated word "Linn." after the name. This was a reference to Carl Linnaeus, the Swedish botanist who had catalogued it. Since Carl lived in the seventeen hundreds, I knew that this was no modern hybrid or "invented" variety.

A little further search turned up screens of scientific articles on the medical value of this plant. One was from the Journal of Medicinal Food and was titled, "Radioprotective Role of Amaranthus gangeticus Linn.: A Biochemical Study on Mouse Brain." All this from ordering a little pack of seeds!

Radioprotective? I began to search for more health benefits and found that there is much information from the Caribbean, from India, and China too. A number of references are made to the above-mentioned mouse brain study. Why mice? It turns out that mice are very good indicators for certain diseases that this plant can treat.

Don't look for an article on Elephant Head in JAMA, the Journal of the American Medical Association. Most of the pages of this magazine are composed of advertizing for so-called "Big Pharma". They have a right to be so inclined. But would it not be wonderful if scientific and traditional medical articles would also get wider attention in reference to this medicine that God created?