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Archiver > BRETHREN > 1999-06 > 0928937151


From: Merle Rummel <>
Subject: Brethren History
Date: Wed, 09 Jun 1999 10:05:51 -0400


Yes, go to www.cob-net.org - there's quite a bit there on Brethren Faith
and History.

I've some 300-400 pages of printed material stored there, mostly on the
early Brethren on the Ohio Valley Frontier and early settlement: migration
routes; ways they lived; the Kentucky families/churches (and problems
between them and the Eastern Annual Meeting); also a timeline (journal) of
Brethren History. It collects together considerable of my responses on the
List, and a couple speeches.
[My materials are at: <www.cob-net.org/docs/brethrenlife.htm>]

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The Brethren come from two movements in Germany. The primary one that
started us was called "Pietism". In the later 1600s the revival of the
Reformation had deteriated into "churchism", as bad as the churchism that
Luther and Calvin rebelled against 200 years before. Starting with Bible
Study groups, at the University of Halle, Philip Jacob Spener called for
closer living to the teachings of the Bible/New Testament; he called it
"Primitive Christianity". His primary goal was revival in the existing
churches -not new churches. The movement spread across Germany. It was
aided by the depressive damages of the 30 Years War -which almost totally
depopulated various regions/states. One of these was Witgenstein in the
Palatinate.

These Pietists (a very humiliating term -then) were much like our modern
Pentecostals/Charismatics. They learned to trust God for everything, and
rely completely on Him -since this "world" was a deadly place, and
ownership and property were soon lost. They were very Radical!! -loud and
aggressive!! Some went too far, and were fought against, and massacred
-most were punished and jailed, when they were discovered.

There were only two church groups formed out of the Pietist movement -one
in eastern Germany, at Herrnhut, among a colony of (persecuted) Hussites
-led by the local Count Zinzendorff. The other formed among a small Bible
Study group that met in Alexander Mack's water mill (where the noise of
those wooden wheels covered the loud singing and prayers --a statement from
Germantown about the Brethren "They pray so loud, that it hurts your ears,
clear down the street!").
Hochmann von Hachenau, the itinerant preacher who came to Schwartzenau
intermittantly, was very upset to hear that Mack and his small group had
publicly been baptized by immersion and formed a church.

When Count William of Witgenstein died, the freedom of worship that he had
permitted (to encourage migration to his devastated county) was removed.
The Pietists had to flee, or renounce their faith. (In those days, seldom
did a person travel more than 5-10 miles from their birthplace -in their
whole life! -to move away -was totally unheard of!) They moved to a known
sanctuary on the boarders of Holland, Freisland, among the
Anabaptists/Mennonites.

Anabaptism was a third faith coming out of the Reformation (Lutherans and
Calvinism/Reformed -were the most prominent ones). The Anabaptists were
also based on studying the Bible and living its directions. They were
named "Ana-baptists" because they refused infant baptism -the Bible said:
Believe and be Baptized! A person must be adult to truely believe and
chose baptism. They too had been persecuted (there were only 3 accepted
churches out of the Reformation: Lutheran, Reformed, and Catholic) and
driven from place to place, till they had found a very few places of
sanctuary. In the process, another Catholic Priest had converted and
became the leader of a prominent portion of the Anabaptists -his name was
Menno Simons, they were called the Mennonites. (a similar group in
Switzerland was led by one: Jacob Ammen -they were called the Amish!) One
big difference -was these people had become very much community centered,
over the 200 years of persecution.

The Brethren fled to the Mennonite center at Friesland/Marianborn/Creyfeld.
Alexander Mack had been traveling and preaching through areas near to
Schwartzenau, and these converts came to the new group of Brethren. The
Brethren found many beliefs in common with the Mennonite/Anabaptists -but
there were differences (these Pietist-Brethren were very evangelistic
-"tell your neighbor -about this wonderful thing you have discovered" --the
persecution the Mennonites had suffered had mostly silenced their witness).
The Brethren were dismayed, when their youth began to marry Mennonites
-and many converted to that belief. The friction caused the Brethren to
look for other places to locate.

The Creyfeld Mennonites had been invited by William Penn to find sanctuary
and freedom of worship in his colony in the New World. They founded a
place called Germantown, just outside the main "city"/town of the Colony
-Philadelphia. They offered it as a place these dissatisfied Brethren
might go. In 1719, Peter Becker led a first shipload of Brethren to
Germantown. We have no actual list of the families in that migration -some
names were known in Germany and Holland before that date, and are found in
Pennsylvania after that date. We assume that many of these were in this
group, but it is not absolute -since there came a small stream of families
moving to this New World. In 1729, Alexander Mack brought another large
group to Germantown, effectively closing the work of the Brethren in
Germany (although some did remain there).

In the new world, it took several years to get life started again. The
rumor of a visit to the colony by the great Pietist Preacher, Christian
Liebe, brought many of these scattered Brethren to the home of Peter Becker
in Germantown. The rumor was false, but the occasion started the Church of
these Brethren. The next year, 1724, Peter Becker, with all the men of the
Germantown church, went out to visit the scattered Brethren -the Great
Mission Journey. Churches were started in homes in the several communities
-Coventry (Pottstown); Oley (Pricetown); Conestoga (Lancaster Co). As the
Brethren began to move west into the fertile farmlands of Pennsylvania and
Maryland, other early congregations were formed: Amwell NJ; Pipe
Creek/Beaver Dam MD; the Antietam; Middletown Valley; Conococheague MD;
Cocalico PA; Morrisons Cove and the Juniata River areas PA; Brothers Valley
(Sommerset Co) PA; Washington County PA; up the Susquehanna River; down
through the Valley of Virginia to the Carolinas; then the Boones led
families to lands west of the Mountains -Kaintuck; others moved back into
the Valley of Virginia; and into eastern Tennessee.

The troubles of the French and Indian Wars hit the Brethren of the Frontier
hard -and put pressure on the faith, our stand against war -coming out of
the wars in Europe -do you protect yourself against the deadly raids of the
Indian, do you cooperate in the local Militia? The conflict with England
that culminated in the American Revolution brought severe persecution to
the Pacifist Brethren -with the same question about Militia, now emphasized
with gratefulness to a King who had permitted freedom of worship as we
desired, and the vengeful attacks by those we deemed radicals, when we did
not subscribe to their approach to obtain freedom. These Brethren
retreated into traditions inherited from the Mennonite/Anabaptists of
Europe, and became a Community of Fellowship, isolating itself as much as
possible from the persecution or the "world" about. To bring solidarity
and unity, the Elders began meeting together, to discuss mutual problems
and arrive at acceptable solutions -the Annual Meeting was begun.

There were a couple triggering events for this: Count Zinzendorf came to
the colony, to visit, and to attempt a unity of those of common belief.
The Brethren attended, then these Brethren leaders held a meeting to
discuss the attempt, the first "Annual Meeting". The Brethren rejected the
attempted association -which destroyed the movement. The Annual Meeting
became a stabilizing source for the developement of the Brethren Churches.
It must be noted here, that it tended to reject the radicallism of Pietism
and held more to the Anabaptist traditions. These are the Old Brethren.

Part of the reason was nearby Ephrata. One of the German Pietists, Conrad
Biessel, came to the Colony. He quickly associated with the Brethren. But
there was differences between the Brethren and their Pietist/Anabaptism,
and the pure Radical Pietism which he held. He moved on to the frontier
-Cocalico Creek, in Lancaster Co PA. Others who held the Pietist faith
gather with him, and he established the very outstanding frontier center,
Ephrata. Many of the Brethren were attracted by it, from their Pietist
heritage. Some moved to Ephrata for a time, then returned to their homes
(including Alexander Mack's own wife and son).

The migration west (1750s, 1770s, 1790s) in Pennsylvania and Maryland (to
Brothers Valley, Washington Co, the Conococheague); south down the Valley
of Virginia to the Carolinas; north up the Susquehanna, even to Upper
Canada; -was previous to the developing Annual Meeting and the trend toward
Anabaptism. Most of these "Frontier Brethren" were strong on their Pietism
faith and Evangelism. House meetings grew into large fellowships -from
these, the youth, and their elders, as they searched for more good
farmlands, moved on with the very early Frontier into Kaintuck, Ohio,
Indiana, Illinois, Missouri. (This is the area of my research -the eastern
Kentucky, earliest southern Ohio Brethren.) As Brethren of Annual Meeting
moved into these settlements, they discovered considerable differences
between what had developed back east -in the Annual Meeting Brethren of
Eastern Pennsylvania, Maryland, and the Valley of Virginia -and the
isolated Brethren of the Frontier -who didn't even know about Annual
Meeting -let alone its decisions, but were old Pietists. This developed
into a conflict which the Annual Meeting won, by ejecting those who were
not in its faith and belief. In the 1790s, the churches of the Carolinas
were lost, over the preaching of some on Universal Restitution (accepted by
the Pietist Brethren) and Universalism (one step more extreme) -many of
these moved on to western Kentucky, where the conflict came to a head again
-c1810. Teams of Annual Meeting Elders visited the churches of Kentucky,
and refused to accept the Frontier faith. As the National Road opened
across Ohio (1827), Annual Meeting informed the migrants that they were not
to associate with those already here, who held other beliefs (pietism, but
others -connections to the Disciples of Christ and early Methodism (both
pietistic) from their participation in the Great Revival of the Ohio Valley
-a result of the New Madrid Earthquake of 1812). These early churches of
Kentucky, Ohio and Indiana were lost during this time (1820-1840). Todays
Brethren churches are almost entirely the result of Annual Meeting family
migrations.

The National Road went on across Illinois, the Brethren migrated on west.
Contact of the Old Brethren with the Far Western Brethren -those from
Kentucky who had moved up into northern Illlinois and Missouri -resulted in
a compromise in 1859. But reaction to the compromise, along with changes
from the Industrial Revolution following the Civil War, brought further
conflict, and in 1881-1882 the Brethren split -3 ways: the Old German
Baptist Brethren (called "Old Order"); the German Baptist Brethren (now
"Church of the Brethren"); the First Brethren (called "Progressive
Brethren"). These three, with some further divisions, are the Brethren today.

Merle Rummel
Church Historian

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