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Archiver > BRETHREN > 2008-07 > 1215007099


From: winter dellenbach <>
Subject: [BRE] Pietists & Anabaptists
Date: Wed, 2 Jul 2008 06:58:19 -0700
References: <002f01c8dba3$c6325a40$6601a8c0@thomas01><486B6BEF.7080308@rtkonline.com>
In-Reply-To: <486B6BEF.7080308@rtkonline.com>


Merle - thank you for your info. re: Pietistism, Anabaptism," Annual
Meeting Brethren" and the "Pietist/Far West Brethren". I saw the
subject line, DAR and did not read some of the earlier emails thru
lack of time. But now I read your interesting review of Church and war
history. My family was involved with Ephrata and also around the Far
West Brethren in Montgomery Co. OH, so I am interested in what you had
to say - that some move to KY or OH before Annual meetings started was
something I hadn't considered before.

I would like to understand the difference between Anabaptism and
Pietism. I have read explanations, but particularly with pietism, the
explanations have been abstract and non-specific and I never really
understood. Could you simply explain the specifc, broad points of
each? I would really appreciate it.
winter
On Jul 2, 2008, at 4:52 AM, Merle C Rummel wrote:

>
>>
>> First, I highly recommend you read the book “Brethren in the New
>> Nation”, by
>> Sappington. Although this book does not deal with the
>> Revolutionary War
>> period, it does go into explicit detail regarding how the Brethren
>> dealt
>> with the draft during the Civil War. The attitudes toward pacifism
>> shown in
>> Sappington’s book during the Civil War would also have been the
>> same in the
>> Revolutionary War. The non-enroller listings for Frederick County,
>> MD, and
>> the non-associator listings for Lancaster County, support this view.
>>
>>
>
> Let me complicate the picture -
>
> I took the Conscientious Objector stand during the Korean War, but my
> son went into the Marines - so I have some sympathy with both sides -
>
> In this research I've been doing on the Early Brethren in Kentucky -
> the
> "Frontier Brethren" - one of the observations I am making was that
> these
> Brethren held strongly to the Pietist origin of our church - and there
> were differences. Dr Dale Brown, who taught the Pietism Course at
> Bethany Seminary, made the point strong that we Brethren today do not
> know what Pietism was. What he taught was the history of the
> beginnings
> - and he admitted that there were no records, except for Ephrata (a
> Radical Pietism), to show what it meant in the life of the individual
> and the church.
>
> The Brethren Church of today comes out of the Brethren of eastern
> Pennsylvania and Maryland (and slightly in Virginia, the Brethren had
> only been in the Valley a couple years before the war started) who
> survived the persecution of the Revolutionary period. Our stand was
> based both on the Bible -the commandment - "Thou shalt not kill." (The
> Hebrew word is "ratasch" - which means to kill a person -as opposed to
> "sachat" -which means to kill an animal. - so to explain it as "no
> murder" is incorrect!) and through our promise ("A Dunker's word is as
> good as his bond!") of loyalty to the King. We appreciated the
> opportunity the King gave, to permit us to live in this peaceful land,
> after the devastations suffered in the Palatinate during the wars of
> Europe. The Sons of Liberty, proponents of the Revolution, but not a
> majority of the population, terrorized those who stood in opposition
> to
> them. The Brethren, and Mennonites and Amish (fellow Anabaptists),
> were
> persecuted - some severely. The church "withdrew" into community with
> these others also suffering for their stand. Shall I say, we hid out
> together.
>
> The early Brethren were nearly opposite. The Germantown Church (mother
> church) was reported to pray and sing so loud, that it hurt your ears,
> clear down the street (Durnbaugh). Many a Brethren home became a
> center
> of evangelism to their neighbors. Pietism was concerned with a revival
> of the individual, to bring them to a closer relationship to Jesus.
> Creeds and practices hardly mattered. The original pietism spread
> through all the churches of Germany. There were only two denominations
> to directly result out of the movement, and the Brethren are one - and
> even his mentor, Hochmann von Hochenau, was upset about what Alexander
> Mack had done.
>
> As such, Dr Floyd Mallot, professor of Church History at Bethany
> Seminary, used to ask - "What happened to the Brethren during the
> Revolution? They Changed!" The change was from Pietism to Anabaptism -
> from an open freedom to a type of legalism. The church Elders met in
> an
> Annual Meeting, where they determined the direction of the Church, and
> they enforced their decisions on the churches.
>
> This was not Pietism, this was Anabaptism - and the Brethren who had
> migrated west (Brothers Valley, and Washington Co PA) and south (the
> Carolinas), and some few who were in Kaintuck - were Pietist - they
> had
> left before Annual Meeting developed and before the emphasis on
> Anabaptism. As one migrant coming to Ohio on the new National Road (US
> 40) -about 1826 asked: "What do we do about these 'Strange Brethren'?"
> There was considerable difference between the Brethren, who were
> already
> here, and these Annual Meeting Brethren who came later -and Annual
> Meeting kicked all these early Brethren OUT (unless they changed -and
> accepted the Annual Meeting decisions - see the records on the "Far
> Western Brethren" and Elder George Wolfe Jr - George Wolfe accepted
> the
> Annual Meeting way, many others did not!)
>
> The Frontier Brethren do not seem to have had the strong stand for
> Pacifism that was true of the Annual Meeting Brethren. They did defend
> themselves against the British and Indian invasions. Some of them
> killed, others reloaded the guns for the fighters or tended injured or
> fought fires from the fire arrows. It was as Daniel Boone (Quaker
> origin) said (speaking of being a waggoner for General Braddock, at
> the
> defeat at Pittsburg) -he killed the first of only three Indians that
> he
> killed in his life. Many of the early Brethren in Kentucky were youth
> who had fought in the Revolution (Capt Henry Rhoads -of Brothers
> Valley
> - in Muhlenberg Co KY 1784). Some had even been expelled from their
> family back home, because of the war, but they were still Brethren -
> and
> carried the Brethren faith with them (but Pietism -and not the
> Anabaptism).
>
> Annual Meeting "expelled" (Frontier Brethren term) these early
> Brethren
> about 1826. Elder Adam Hostetler and Elder Peter Hon were placed on
> the
> Ban (the Brethren Encyclopedia calls them "the Hostetler Brethren",
> they
> called themselves "the Brethren Association"). From what Historian
> Abraham Cassel says, in numbers it may have been almost half the
> denomination. The Brethren, in that time, practiced what they called:
> "Unanimity" - we sought the guidance of the Holy Spirit in our
> decisions, so there could be no decision until the whole body voted
> unanimous. The Annual Meeting Brethren saw these Frontier Brethren as
> not accepting the decisions of the Holy Spirit (but the Frontier
> Brethren had not been present when the decisions were made, and seem
> to
> have not even known about the question or the decision!) So they had
> to
> change and accept the Annual Meeting decision - or leave.
>
> The Brethren of the Civil War period were All - Annual Meeting
> Brethren,
> the Brethren of the Revolution were not.
>
> Be sure - there were other differences between the Pietist faith and
> Anabaptism - we don't really know them all (someone needs to translate
> the commentary of the Pietist Berleberg Bible -I'm sure it would
> tell us
> things we don't know about Pietist beliefs - but it is HUGE - 8
> volumes,
> over 1000 pages each - 18th Century German)
>
> Merle C Rummel
>
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