Amish Voices

A Collection of Amish Writings

Brad Igou

• Publisher: Herald Press
• Year: 2019
• eBook ISBN: 9781513805856
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Denominations

Strong families. Caring communities. The nearly nine in ten youth who join the church. How do the Amish do it?
In Amish Voices, Amish writers share news and advice from their communities and reflect on their daily lives, work, and faith. Brad Igou, publisher of Amish Country News, gives readers a behind-the-scenes tour of Amish life by compiling writing from Family Life, a popular monthly magazine that thousands of Amish people read. Learn about how the Amish began and what they value. Hear what they think about technology, happiness, community, obedience, success, and change. Listen in as they discuss shunning and rumspringa and forgiveness. Find out what sustains them in difficult seasons, and how they try to trust God in all things.
Why learn about the Amish from outsiders when you can learn from the Amish themselves? And why just learn about them when you can learn from them?
 

ONE

What Is Family Life?

FAMILY LIFE STARTED IN 1968 as a monthly magazine “dedicated to the promotion of Christian living among the Plain people, with special emphasis on the appreciation of our heritage.” At that time, the staff of writers-editors consisted of David Wagler, assisted by Joseph Stoll, David Luthy, Elmo Stoll, and Sarah Weaver. They estimated they would need 4,000 subscribers for a forty-page magazine, or 5,000 for fifty pages. The subscription price then was four dollars a year.

The April 1969 issue was mailed to 8,149 homes, and to 113 bookstores for resale, in 38 states, 4 Canadian provinces, and 9 foreign countries, including Germany, Australia, and Japan. The states of Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Indiana received the most.

By March 1982, Family Life was being sent to over 13,000 homes in 45 states, 8 Canadian provinces, and 13 foreign countries, including India as well as countries in Central and South America. In 1992, paid circulation was 19,000, and by 1998 more than 23,000. In 2010, Family Life was being mailed to more than 31,000 subscribers.

In January 1968, the editors at Pathway Publishing in Aylmer, Ontario, began the first issue of their new magazine with the following question:

What Is Family Life?

Family Life is the name of the magazine you are holding in your hands. But it is much more. The family is the heart of the community and the church. Even a nation is made up of families. If there is a strong family life, then the church, the community, and the nation will be likewise. If family life degenerates, then all will suffer.

Family life must be translated into terms of everyday living. What can we do to the community? Do we realize that our everyday work should be a God-given opportunity to serve him? Can we appreciate and make the most of the everyday blessings we receive? Do we stop to enjoy God’s creation all around us, and the works of his fingers?

This is the goal of Family Life—to be an instrument through which thoughts and ideas can be transmitted.

Do not feel that the Family Life writers or editors pretend to be experts in this field. Indeed, we often need the helps and inspirations offered in these pages as much as anyone. We hope that by sharing our cupful of oil, it will be increased even as that of the poor widow of Zarephath (see 1 Kings 17:10-16).

Across the Editor’s Desk

There is no way of accurately telling the sources of material contributed for Family Life. Regarding material arriving from outside the Pathway office, we estimate that it has come from the following writers: 60 percent from Old Order Amish, 30 percent from Old Order Mennonites, and 10 percent from selected or other sources. The Old Order Mennonites, with about 10 percent of the subscribers, are contributing about 30 percent of the material sent in. We appreciate this but can’t help wondering what would happen if our Amish readers would send in as much material per subscriber as do the Old Order Mennonites.

—Staff

***

We [the editors] are all Old Order Amish, and most of our contributors are either Amish or from related “horse and buggy” groups of Plain people.

—Staff

***

Practically everything that goes into Family Life is checked carefully by a minister. If it is a doctrinal article or one that is controversial, we like to have several ministers or bishops look it over. After it is published, it goes into nearly every community of Plain folks in the United States and Canada. Anyone who finds anything misleading has the privilege and the responsibility to inform us of it. We have this confidence in our readers that they will let us know if there is anything that will be a hindrance to anyone. Of course, there is often a difference of opinion on some matters due to the fact that no person has a full understanding of any subject.

First Corinthians 13:9 says that we know only in part, but that the time shall come when our knowledge is perfect, but not in this life.

—Staff

***

The stories in Family Life are either true stories or true-to-life stories. Sometimes a writer takes incidents from the lives of different people and puts them together in one story. The characters in true-to-life stories often make us say, “That’s just like someone I used to know.”

—Staff

***

We once received a story from a man. It sounded so true to life that we thought it probably was a true happening. How surprised we were when the man added at the end of the story, “As far as I know, none of this story is true.” We wondered for a moment how he could have written a story that was so real, so true to life, if he got it all from his imagination. But then we saw that he had added, “Please do not sign my name, or my relatives will think I wrote this story about them.” The story may not have been true in details, but was true in the ways that really mattered. In attitudes, problems, failures, and habits portrayed, it was true, too true.

I wonder how many of our readers realize how much time and effort goes into each of the historical articles that appear in Family Life. The historical editor is constantly working on many different projects at the same time and corresponding with hundreds of people. In this way, bits of information are being discovered and assembled on the various topics until there is enough for a whole article on one subject.

—Staff

***

A subscriber once wrote to say that there were too many “pat your own back” articles, letters from readers saying how much they like the magazine. The editors agreed and decided not to print letters saying nice things about the magazine, but only comments on particular articles.

Another time a reader wrote to say that because of all of his farmwork, he didn’t have time to read everything in Family Life. There simply was too much. The editors answered by saying, “If you are too busy to read it, then you’re too busy.”

Yet another woman explained that she feared she might be neglecting her Bible reading because of the publication. This prompted the editors to respond, “If reading our papers makes you neglect the Bible, we hope you will cancel your subscription.”

TWO

Amish Beginnings

THE STORY OF THE AMISH FAITH begins in Zurich, Switzerland, after Martin Luther’s historic Reformation. The emergence in 1525 of the Swiss Brethren, or Anabaptists, forebears of the Mennonites and the Amish, is a history as compelling and inspiring as can be found anywhere. Beliefs in adult baptism and separation of church and state were viewed as a threat both to Huldrych Zwingli’s Reformed Church and to the local government, with which it was allied. Thousands of these “radicals” were put to death in the following years.

Accounts of their individual stories are found in books like the Martyrs Mirror (in print from 1660) and the Ausbund (songs from 1535, in print from 1564), the hymnal used in Amish worship services. These are stories of pacifism and persecution, love and peace amid hatred and violence, a testimony to faith and survival at horrible costs. Upon arriving in America, the Amish faith grew and prospered, with each generation finding new and different challenges forced on them by the times.

Early Anabaptists

Felix Manz was born in 1498 in Zurich, Switzerland. He received a very good education, and when Huldrych Zwingli founded his Reformed Church, Felix joined him. But it was not long before Felix felt that Zwingli had not broken far enough away from the Catholic Church, especially concerning baptism. Because Zwingli continued to baptize babies, Felix and some others broke away and founded a church in which only adults were baptized. He was the first of the Swiss Brethren to give his life for the faith [in a Reformed area. Bolt Eberli was burned at the stake in a Catholic canton, May 29, 1525].

Felix was drowned on January 5, 1527, by order of the Zurich city authorities. He and Conrad Grebel are considered the founders of the Anabaptist movement in Switzerland, and our Amish churches today can count him a forefather in faith.

Georg Blaurock’s life could fill a book, as it was very eventful. It should suffice to say that he was a Catholic monk who joined the Anabaptists in the early years of the movement. He was baptized by Conrad Grebel and was a fellow worker with him and Felix Manz. Georg was a forceful and eloquent preacher, and very zealous. Many times he was cast into prison, punished, and banished, yet he remained true to the faith. He died a martyr’s death in 1529, being burned at the stake.

—D. Luthy

Children of Martyrs

We Plain people often refer to our ancestors, the Anabaptists. Willingly, they offered up their lives and accepted death. Hardly a sermon is preached in our churches today without some mention being made of our forebears and what they suffered.

Many of our homes have a copy of the Martyrs Mirror, well over a thousand pages, telling us about our ancestors in the faith, how they suffered, what they believed, and why they died. Yet we are so busy with our daily work that we seldom find time or interest to read this monumental book.

Take Michael Sattler, for instance. His story is only one of the hundreds in the Martyrs Mirror. His sentence has been recorded for us, preserved down through the years: “Judgment is passed that Michael Sattler shall be delivered to the executioner, who shall cut out his tongue, then throw him upon a wagon, and tear his body twice with red-hot tongs; and after he has been brought without the gate, he shall be pinched five times in the same manner.”

Notice that they took out his tongue at the outset. The martyrs were famous for letting their tongues be heard during their last moments. They would shout aloud to their fellow believers, or they would entreat their persecutors to think seriously about what they were doing.

So the first thing the judges decreed was that Michael Sattler be relieved of his tongue. Then, bring on the hot tongs.

With these preliminaries taken care of, Michael was sentenced to be burned alive. They tied him to a wooden stake, binding him hand and foot.

However, Michael’s testimony was not to be hindered by the loss of his tongue. He had told fellow believers beforehand that if he still remained faithful to God, he would lift two fingers aloft as a sign.

As the flames leapt around him, as the heat scorched his body and the pain seared him mercilessly, Michael must have struggled with almost superhuman strength to retain consciousness. At last the ropes that bound his wrists were severed. Mustering his faltering strength, he lifted his arm aloft, two fingers outstretched toward heaven. There can be no doubt: the final act of Michael Sattler inspired and breathed courage and renewed boldness into more onlookers than any mere words his tongue could have uttered.

We are children of martyrs! That phrase sets us apart from other people. There’s only one problem. If we do not have the spirit of the martyrs, but shrink from hardships, from self-denial, from sacrifice, from a life of discipline and restraint—then the martyrs were not our forebears at all, and we are not their children.

If we have the spirit of this world, loving ease and pleasure and luxury and leisure, we are the children of the prince of this world [John 12:31]. We are only deceiving ourselves if we then talk of the martyrs as being our ancestors. The simple truth is, unless we follow in their footsteps, we are not their children.

—E. Stoll

The Decisions We Make

In 1632, the Dutch Mennonites gathered at Dordrecht [Dordt, or Dort] in Holland and reached agreement on eighteen basic articles of doctrine, which we know as the Dordrecht Confession of Faith. These Mennonites, we believe, still held and practiced the doctrines of the earlier Anabaptists of the preceding century, when Menno Simons and Dirk Philips were living. These were Dutch Mennonites and not the gr...

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Preface
• 1 What Is Family
• 2 Amish Beginnings
• 3 Choices
• 4 Marriage and Family
• 5 The Young
• 6 Work
• 7 Church
• 8 Discipline
• 9 Clothing
• 10 The World
• 11 Aging, Illness, and Death
• 12 Controversies
• 13 People of Peace
• 14 Odds and Ends
• Postscript
• The Compiler