Amish , Anabaptist , Mennonite History .
These Rainy , (but not snowy) December days make for reading times . So much information out there , not just on-line , but in old fashioned book form , too.
We are slowly working our way through Leroy Beachy’s ”Unser liet”‘ , his compilation of Anabaptist history he has called ”The story of the Amish.”
We would note here that if Jacob Ammon’s historic efforts took place Around 1700 A.D. (Give or take a dozen years either way ), That would mean that Amish history started rather late in the Anabaptist movements.
The last execution of an Anabaptist in Switzerland took place in 1614, in Holland about a dozen years earlier . Long before anyone was known as “Amish “.
There is an old Wagler story, we have heard since our youth , about a group of Waglers that arrived in Ontario, Canada , in the early 1800′s . Someone pointed them the general direction that the ”Amish” lived at .
The newcomers were confused , as they had never heard that description of themselves , until in America , to refer to themselves as Amish .
The ”Ausbund” the well known Anabaptist compiled Hymnal used to today by most Amish , and the ”Martyrs mirror” , the tome of the persecuted ,had been around for generations before Jacob Ammon, founder of all things known today as ‘Amish”, did his work .
We would wonder if one in Twenty Amishmen today would know that, that no Amishmen were ever burned at the stake of fire , for his beliefs ?